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In Franz Kafka's "A Hunger Artist," the author speaks about his method of writing; his affliction that mirrors that of a person who fasts. Throughout his prose, he tells the story of a man who-- while others in his time flaunt their skills in living and in cheating death-- has mastered the art of dying. In his own time, Kafka was never famous for his writing. In 1922, around the time he retired from a Czechoslovakia insurance company for which he was a lawyer, he wrote "A Hunger Artist." He had been diagnosed with tuberculosis a few years earlier, and died just two years after penning the story. Throughout his lifetime he felt compelled to write, yet he believed that his work was unworthy of any praise. To him, his need to write drove him and pained him at the same time, much like the Hunger Artist's work propelled and tortured the character simultaneously. This connection is vital in understanding why Kafka writes this story the way he does: the contrast between necessity......

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Approximate Word Count: 1073
Approximate Pages: 5 (250 words per double-spaced page)

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