The Misunderstood Artist: The Hunger Artist

258 Words2 Pages
In the short story “The Hunger Artist”, the main character, The Hunger Artist, symbolizes a misunderstood artist whose fame has been stripped away as a result of capitalistic forces. On a symbolic level, his career of being a hunger artist is the manifestation of suffering and deprivation. There is no more powerful way of depicting the suffering of the artist than to compare it to the wilting away of the human body. This characterizes the reality many artists face when they are not appreciated for their work. During this time period there was a shift from contemporary to modern artwork. This shift could be recognized in “The Hunger Artist” since the Artist was formally appreciated as a form of art, however the public shifts their attention