Sult Grøde

« And I left her.

Ha! a match for this dishonest cake-vendor was not to be found. The whole time, whilst I walked to and fro in the marketplace and ate my cakes, I talked loudly about this creature and her shamelessness, repeated to myself what we both had said to one another, and it seemed to me that I had come out of this affair with flying colours, leaving her nowhere. I ate my cakes in face of everybody, and talked this over to myself.

The cakes disappeared one by one; they seemed to go no way; no matter how I ate I was still greedily hungry. Lord, to think they were of no help! I was so ravenous that I was even about to devour the last little cake that I had decided to spare, right from the beginning, to put it aside, in fact, for the little chap down in Vognmandsgade⁠—the little lad who played with the paper streamers. I thought of him continually⁠—couldn’t forget his face as he jumped and swore. He had turned round towards the window when the man spat down on him, and he had just looked up to see if I was laughing at him. God knows if I should meet him now, even if I went down that way.

I exerted myself greatly to try and reach Vognmandsgade, passed quickly by the spot where I had torn my drama into tatters, and where some scraps of paper still lay about; avoided the policeman whom I had amazed by my behaviour, and reached the steps upon which the laddie had been sitting.

He was not there. The street was almost deserted⁠—dusk was gathering in, and I could not see him anywhere. Perhaps he had gone in. I laid the cake down, stood it upright against the door, knocked hard, and hurried away directly. He is sure to find it, I said to myself; the first thing he will do when he comes out will be to find it. And my eyes grew moist with pleasure at the thought of the little chap finding the cake.

I reached the terminus again.

Now I no longer felt hungry, only the sweet stuff I had eaten began to cause me discomfort. The wildest thoughts, too, surged up anew in my head.

Supposing I were in all secretness to cut the hawser mooring of one of those ships? Supposing I were to suddenly yell out “Fire”? I walk farther down the wharf, find a packing-case and sit upon it, fold my hands, and am conscious that my head is growing more and more confused. I do not stir; I simply make no effort whatever to keep up any longer. I just sit there and stare at the Copégoro, the barque flying the Russian flag.

I catch a glimpse of a man at the rail; the red lantern slung at the port shines down upon his head, and I get up and talk over to him. I had no object in talking, as I did not expect to get a reply, either. I said:

“Do you sail tonight, Captain?”

“Yes; in a short time,” answered the man. He spoke Swedish.

“Hem, I suppose you wouldn’t happen to need a man?”

I was at this instant utterly indifferent as to whether I was met by a refusal or not; it was all the same to me what reply the man gave me, so I stood and waited for it.

“Well, no,” he replied; “unless it chanced to be a young fellow.”

“A young fellow!” I pulled myself together, took off my glasses furtively and thrust them into my pocket, stepped up the gangway, and strode on deck.

“I have no experience,” said I; “but I can do anything I am put to. Where are you bound for?”

“We are in ballast for Leeds, to fetch coal for Cadiz.”

“All right,” said I, forcing myself upon the man; “it’s all the same to me where I go; I am prepared to do my work.”

“Have you never sailed before?” he asked.

“No; but as I tell you, put me to a task, and I’ll do it. I am used to a little of all sorts.”

He bethought himself again.

I had already taken keenly into my head that I was to sail this voyage, and I began to dread being hounded on shore again.

“What do you think about it, Captain?” I asked at last. “I can really do anything that turns up. What am I saying? I would be a poor sort of chap if I couldn’t do a little more than just what I was put to. I can take two watches at a stretch, if it comes to that. It would only do me good, and I could hold out all the same.”

“All right, have a try at it. If it doesn’t work, well, we can part in England.”

“Of course,” I reply in my delight, and I repeated over again that we could part in England if it didn’t work.

And he set me to work.⁠ ⁠…

Out in the fjord I dragged myself up once, wet with fever and exhaustion, and gazed landwards, and bade farewell for the present to the town⁠—to Christiania, where the windows gleamed so brightly in all the homes.»

End of Hunger (Sult) [1890]

The long, long road over the moors and up into the forest — who trod it into being first of all? Man, a human being, the first that came here. There was no path before he came. Afterward, some beast or other, following the faint tracks over marsh and moorland, wearing them deeper; after these again some Lapp gained scent of the path, and took that way from field to field, looking to his reindeer. Thus was made the road through the great Almenning — the common tracts without an owner; no-man's-land.

The man comes, walking toward the north. He bears a sack, the first sack, carrying food and some few implements. A strong, coarse fellow, with a red iron beard, and little scars on face and hands; sites of old wounds — were they gained in toil or fight? Maybe the man has been in prison, and is looking for a place to hide; or a philosopher, maybe, in search of peace. This or that, he comes; the figure of a man in this great solitude. He trudges on; bird and beast are silent all about him; now and again he utters a word or two; speaking to himself. "Eyah — well, well...." — so he speaks to himself. Here and there, where the moors give place to a kindlier spot, an open space in the midst of the forest, he lays down the sack and goes exploring; after a while he returns, heaves the sack to his shoulder again, and trudges on. So through the day, noting time by the sun; night falls, and he throws himself down on the heather, resting on one arm.

A few hours' rest, and he is on the move again: "Eyah, well...." — moving northward again, noting time by the sun; a meal of barley cakes and goats' milk cheese, a drink of water from the stream, and on again. This day too he journeys, for there are many kindly spots in the woods to be explored. What is he seeking? A place, a patch of ground? An emigrant, maybe, from the homestead tracts; he keeps his eyes alert, looking out; now and again he climbs to the top of a hill, looking out. The sun goes down once more. [...] 

Beginning of Growth of the Soil (Markens Grøde) [1917]

Knut Hamsun