"Hunger: Book One" by Knut Hamsun is a novel published in 1890. Set in late 19th-century Kristiania, it follows a starving young man whose grip on reality deteriorates as he wanders the city streets. The unnamed protagonist clings to respectability while his body and mind decay from hunger. Through a series of encounters, the novel explores the irrational workings of the human psyche, blending psychological depth with dark humor as the vagrant intellectually refuses conventional work yet slowly descends into delusionary desperation.