Hunger by Knut Hamsun is a strange, semi-delirious, gorgeous narrative of a young man who wanders the Norwegian urban milieu and spends most of his time starving and contemplating eccentric ways of obtaining food for a few coins.

The occasional income he gets from his writing is barely adequate to keep him alive, and between the bouts of hunger he hallucinates and imagines -- and sometimes engages in -- sensuality in all its forms. Food and sex and vivid creative daydreams, in combination with a peculiar personal pride, keep him on the fringes, apart from others. And yet, his need for...