Hunger Artist by Franz Kafka - Essay Example

A Hunger Artist A hunger artist is written by Franz Kafka. The story is about an un d hunger artist who is immensely dissatisfied and unhappy both spiritually and physically. The story shows how there is no faith or belief in professional fasting artists in the modern time. Traditionally many spectators used to come and watch the performances of the hunger artist. People used to buy tickets and watch the performance with their families. There are many symbols and themes used in this story. The small detail chosen is the cage where the hunger artist performed which portrayed a larger theme. The story shows how the hunger artist was caged not just physically but also spiritually. One of the most annoying things for the hunger artist was that the spectators lost interest and faith in his performances and talent. Many of them thought that his fasting was dishonest and thus there were many people form the audience who kept an eye at him. Moreover, there were night watcher groups as well that monitored him to ensure that he is not taking any nourishment. They annoyed him all night by pointing their pocket torch lights at his face. the author writes “Nothing annoyed the artist more than such watchers; they made him miserable; they made his fast seem unendurable; sometimes he mastered his feebleness sufficiently to sing during their watch for as long as he could keep going, to show them how unjust their suspicions were” (Kafka 57). The cage is a symbol used by Kafka which represents the alienation of the hunger artist from the society. The cage is where the artist performs and it creates a division between the spectators and the artist to prevent him from those who don’t understand him. The hunger artist has his own world inside the cage where he understands himself and respects his talent whereas the world outside is unable to respect and understand the artist's perfection and honesty. The author writes “For he alone knew, what no other initiate knew, how easy it was to fast. It was the easiest thing in the world. He made no secret of this, yet people did not believe him’’ (Kafka 58). The spectators did not believe him and thought he cheated on his fasts as there was no one to keep an eye on him all the time. The artist believes that what stops the spectators form believing him is their position which is outside the cage. These spectators don’t even appreciate him and thus the cage is a symbol to represent security and protection for the artist from these people who are unable to understand him. The hunger artist feels cheated and helpless which is why he has isolated himself in the cage. It is the place where he and his honesty reside. It is the part of the world where he feels separate from others and believes in himself. But it is not long when the attitudes of people and spectators broke him down. the audience showed that they admired him so much but in reality they hated him and were cruel, “And he looked up into the eyes of the ladies who were apparently so friendly and in reality so cruel, and shook his head, which felt too heavy on its strength-less neck” (Kafka 58). The cage also represents the relationship that the hunger artist had with himself. The artist felt that he was trapped and caged within himself. His fasts were directly affecting his body which is why he was physically constrained. He was trapped in his body and even if he wished to escape from it, it was only through death. His fasts were merely a way through which he attempted to escape his skin. Fasting was associated with his divinity and death. In the end he gives up his life to escape his body unable to do anything else as his body had limitations. This was an achievement for him as this was his idea of perfection. The hunger artist believed in himself and his perfection, he set out leaving his manager and “So he took leave of the impresario, his partner in an unparalleled career, and hired himself to a large circus; in order to spare his own feelings he avoided reading the conditions of his contract” (Kafka 62). He went in a large circus where they kept him at the entrance in a cage. He was placed with many other animals. He believed that people would value him and enjoy his performance but he was wrong. The circus had many other animals and artists that would interest people more than the hunger artist. “When the public came thronging out in the intervals to see the animals, they could hardly avoid passing the hunger artist's cage and stopping there a moment, perhaps they might even have stayed longer had not those pressing behind them in the narrow gangway, who did not understand why they should be held up on their way towards the excitements of the menagerie, made it impossible for anyone to stand gazing quietly for any length of time” (Kafka 69). This is why the hunger artist starting shrinking in his own soul and became spiritually hurt. The hunger artist had his time and earned a bog name when Europe used to enjoy the hunger artist's performances. He was an entertainer and it was a time when entertainers like him ruled the hearts of the crowd. At this time of his life, he had turned old and earned a big name. Yet he didn’t leave fasting. He had made it an act of public approval. He wanted to know that people believed him and did not think he was a cheater. In the last days of his life he had given up and staying in his cage he kept on fasting and fasting. No one counted the days he fasted; not even the artist himself. Even though he knows himself that he has achieved his feats of fasting, his spiritual satisfaction is in knowing that the world believes that he has not cheated. His efforts and talents are known to him alone and he believes in himself, but his satisfaction and achievement is only in the crowd’s recognition of his efforts. This shows how he believes in artist's perfection and that a crowd is the one who makes an artist. The cage in the end also describes how he it has been the symbol which represented his unhappiness. This is shown when his cage was placed near other animals and no one would stop by for more than a few minutes. All his life he fasted for the audience and relied upon them. He was famous for never breaking his fasting records but the public usually forced him to end the fasts after forty days. When he joined the circus, he thought of the same that he would fast for the audience and entertain them. But this time he had lost all the attraction and value in the eyes of the public. This time he fasted and fasted, he broke his own records but there was no one to ask him or notice him. He looses all hopes and spirits. He is trapped in his cage with his body and his beliefs, and there is no one to notice him. Many days passed by like this until a circus overseer notices his cage and the hunger artist. He thinks that the cage is empty as the hunger artist is buried in a corner very near to death. The circus overseer thinks that the artist is insane. This shows that none of them actually understands his problems and his feelings. The hunger artist is asked for any last words and he says that he wants to be forgiven and that all he ever wanted was to be admired by his people. The artist then asks him that does everyone admire him. On this the overseer replies and ensures that everyone admires him. The hunger artist replies “But you shouldn't admire it, because I have to fast, I can't help it” (Kafka 72). The overseer asks him why he can’t help it and the hunger artist speaks his last words in his ear, “because I couldn't find the food I liked. If I had found it, believe me, I should have made no fuss and stuffed myself like you or anyone else” (Kafka 72). In the story, the cage is hunger artist's only assylum and the boudry that differentaited his world from the others'. It is said in the story: "So then on the fortieth day the door of the cage—which was covered with flowers—was opened, an enthusiastic audience filled the amphitheatre, a military band played, two doctors entered the cage, in order to take the necessary measurements of the hunger artist, the results were announced to the auditorium through a megaphone, and finally two young ladies arrived, happy about the fact that they were the ones who had just been selected by lot, and sought to lead the hunger artist down a couple of steps out of the cage, where on a small table a carefully chosen hospital meal was laid out." (Kafka, 59). It shows how dual standards the society kept. the cage was outwardly decorated with flowers and inside a man was famished to death. This shows how the cage had isolated the poor hunger artist from everyone else, because everyone else was just enjoying the spectacle while it was him and his deteriorating condition inside the cage who was a source of entertainment for them. The cage also represents the hunger artist's animal like condition which was a source of joy for others. as said in the story: "..at an advanced stage of the fasting, that the hunger artist responded with an outburst of rage and began to shake the cage like an animal, frightening everyone." (Kafka, 61). It shows the reaction of the hunger artist when he faced extreme hunger and people hovered near his cage to catch a glimpse of him, this invoked his animal like behavior and he started shaking the cage with a fit of rage and it frightened everyone. so the cage was also a boundary of animal instincts and normal human behavior, outside the cage normal humans existed while inside the cage, humanity was changed into animal nature. The cage also alienates him from his fellow human beings and places him with wild beasts as it is evident in the text when his cage is put next to those of animals in the circus. "However, basically the hunger artist had also not forgotten his sense of the way things really were, and he took it as self-evident that people would not set him and his cage up as some star attraction in the middle of the arena, but would move him outside in some other readily accessible spot near the animal stalls." (Kafka, 59-60) This shows the pessimism of the hunger artist that he was no longer hopeful of being the centre of attraction in the circus, instead he was placed with other animals and there too, he was of secondary importance. The cage stole poor hunger artists' identity and he became just a forgotten "thing" just like the cage itself and remained there forgotten and alone until one day he was discovered. "Finally the cage caught the attention of a supervisor, and he asked the attendant why they had left this perfectly useful cage standing here unused with rotting straw inside. Nobody knew, until one man, with the help of the table with the number on it, remembered the hunger artist." (Kafka, 64). The irony here is that no one still cared about the hunger artist, in fact it was the cage that attracted attention and then among heaps of straw, the hunger artist was discovered, worthless as the straw itself. So it proves that things in the modern world are more important than people. The hunger artist is at the verge of death at that time and dies afterwards, then he is buried and his cage is give to a panther that is totally opposite to the hunger artist. The hunger artist’s cage is now the main attraction of the circus and people stand there in excitement for long. The cage in the story is used as a theme but it represents some very important themes. The cage is the place where the hunger artist has been living all his life and how he was caged in himself. The cage is what he believes separates him from all the other people. The cage represents how he is alienated from the rest of the world and how it is similar to his inner dissatisfactions. The cage represents his life which is trapped and alienated from everyone else because no one understands him, and that is the biggest cause of his unhappiness. Work Cited Kafka Franz. A Hunger Artist and Other Stories. NY: Oxford University Press. Print. Read More