Hunger

Part I


It was during the time I wandered about and starved in Christiania:
Christiania, this singular city, from which no man departs without
carrying away the traces of his sojourn there.

* * * * *

I was lying awake in my attic and I heard a clock below strike six. It
was already broad daylight, and people had begun to go up and down the
stairs. By the door where the wall of the room was papered with old
numbers of the _Morgenbladet_, I could distinguish clearly a notice
from the Director of Lighthouses, and a little to the left of that an
inflated advertisement of Fabian Olsens' new-baked bread.

The instant I opened my eyes I began, from sheer force of habit, to
think if I had anything to rejoice over that day. I had been somewhat
hard-up lately, and one after the other of my belongings had been taken
to my "Uncle." I had grown nervous and irritable. A few times I had
kept my bed for the day with vertigo. Now and then, when luck had
favoured me, I had managed to get five shillings for a feuilleton from
some newspaper or other.