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Beginning my response I would like to say first that I really enjoyed this book. I believe that from four stories that Kafka combined together "A Hunger Artist" is by far the most celebrated and studied. This story really feels at once dream-like and utterly real; no such hunger artist could exist as Kafka describes it, yet all the events and feelings in the story seem true to life. The ending of Franz Kafka's The Hunger Artist at first glance it seemed to me to be lacking something. The Artist just dies and is simply replaced by a panther, which strangely enough is more pleasing to the onlookers than the Artist ever was.
My belief is that the author wanted to show the conflict between the immaterial world of the Artist, and the material world of the changing society around him. And more over I think that Kafka's main hero symbolizes more than just the immaterial world, but a spiritual one as well. It is vividly seen in the final paragraph where it becomes more than just a struggle between the immaterial world and the material one, but a symbolic loss of religion to a material world. Through the Artists depiction as a spiritual figure, and the growing conflicts between the Artist and the Material world, I began to see why Kafka choose this ending, and how the figure of the panther concludes the storys previously developed themes. Kafka presents the Hunger Artist immediately as a spiritual figure. The art of fasting alone has a spiritual connotation to it.
The Artist is depicted while fasting in a meditative state, drawing deep into himself, paying no attention to anyone or anything staring into vacancy with half shut eyes (Hunger 197). I think that this meditative state is just the beginning of Kafka's representation of the Artist as a spiritual figure. Just as in a religious prayer, the Artist is the sole completely satisfied spectator of his fast. There is doubt cast upon him, but he cares not of the public, but in the act of his fasting alone. Besides the act of fasting, Kafka symbolically portrays the Artist as Jesus. My first glimpse of the Artist is of him sitting on nothing but straw on the ground, paralleling Jesus birth in the manger.
After the Artists fast, the impresario lifts his arms to the air, as if inviting Heaven to look down upon its creature here in the straw, this suffering martyr. (Hunger 199). I believe that Kafka's most dramatic parallel of the Artist as Jesus comes in his fasting. First of all, the Artist is allowed only to fast up to forty days. This parallels The Bible in Mathew 4: 1 - 2, Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungered. Kafka also describes the fast as the three butchers tempt the Artist, obviously intending to give the hunger artist the chance of a little refreshment. (Hunger 197) much the way the devil tempts Jesus to eat in the next line of Mathew 4, And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. (Mathew 4: 3).
It became very obvious to me that the Artist, just as Jesus had done, resisted the temptations of the material world. This conflict between the Artist / religion and the material world is just the first of many progressively larger conflicts Kafka introduces in the story. Here I see the Artist mentally tested by the material world, represented by food. I think that food in this story is symbolic of the material wants and desires of society. The conclusion of his test by the butchers is the Artists happiest moment when the morning came and an enormous breakfast was brought them (Hunger 197. ) His triumph over the material world and the butchers need for it exemplifies Mathew 4: 4 Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. The Artist feeds off the mouth of God while the butchers feed off bread alone.
Here we see religion overcome the Material world. The next conflict that became obvious to me is the following. The Artist joined the circus and is now overlooked continuously by those seeking the excitements of the menagerie (Hunger 201). The material world is now symbolized by the excitement of the animals, and this is where the panther will later come into play.
Now it became evident to me that the material world has completely surpassed the religious world. Exemplifying this is the scene where the father stops by the Artists cage and tries to tell his children of the meaning of fasting, but the new generation cares not of fasting, or religion, but for the new and better times [that] might be coming. (Hunger 201). The material world was cheating [the Artist] of his reward. (Hunger 202), meaning that the material world has surpassed the interest of religion. Overall Kafka addresses a principle of human behavior: the weirder, or more absurd something is the better the public will like it.
She offers a new insight into this principle by allowing the reader to view this principle through the eyes of the freak show. By doing this the author allowed me to feel not only the fascination of the crowd, but also the pain of the individual being taken advantage of. This story made me rethink my views on entertainment at another human being's expense. I truly believe that Franz Kafka's The Hunger Artist symbolically portrays society's interest in religion succumbing to the material world. The author represents the spiritual world through the Artist, paralleling him to Jesus and the church. She chooses the ending of the Artist dying and replaced by a young and lively panther to portray the image of a loss of society's interest in religion to a more appealing material world.
The Lord never did away with the principle of fasting, but it has been man who has attempted to make it obsolete. ; just as the society of the Artist did to him.
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