Overwhelming Hunger in Murakami

 Something I’ve noticed several times in Murakami’s works is a kind of overwhelming hunger that drives the character to immediately seek food. This is no ordinary hunger. In “The Second Bakery Attack”,  Murakami uses phrases like “...the pangs struck with the force of the tornado in The Wizard of Oz” and “tremendous, overwhelming hunger pangs” to describe the extent of the feeling. In “Samsa in Love”, Samsa’s hunger is described as a kind of excruciating pain. In the most recent example I noticed, the protagonist of “Sleep” experiences “unbearable” hunger pains. In each example, the character is rendered unable to focus on little else than the all-consuming hunger they feel. This hunger often drives the characters to engage in activities beyond their comfort zone, such as robbing a McDonalds or beginning the laborious task of exploring an unfamiliar house with a foreign human body.

I found myself wondering what function this hunger serves in the story. Though I haven’t necessarily found a satisfactory answer to this question, I have noticed some similarities in each case. It appears that the characters are experiencing some kind of change when the hunger comes. Once the characters have finished satisfying their craving, they are on the other side of that change. 

For example, the hunger comes to Watashi in “Sleep” during the first day she reads through the night. By the time she eats, it is the morning of the new day, marking the beginning of a series of sleepless nights and whatever affliction she is experiencing. In “The Second Bakery Attack”, the protagonist effectively ends the curse that has been apparently plaguing him since his first robbery when he indulges in the stolen McDonalds burgers. In “Samsa in Love”, I saw Samsa’s aggressive feasting on the abandoned meal as solidifying his status as a human rather than an insect in some way. This concept isn’t a surprise considering some of our previous class discussions on how eating food often solidifies one’s presence in another world.

-Angela