Hunger by Knut Hamsun (06/09)

A talented, arrogant young man wanders around the Norwegian capital attempting to write philosophical articles for local periodicals, having absurd run-ins with people on the street, and gradually starving to death. One by one, the young man's ideals are stripped away by means of the hunger - his moralizing fades, his presumptions dwindle down to occasional outbursts. He is a more tolerable person by the end of the novel. The book resembles Crime and Punishment in many ways, but less convoluted and messy and with no didactic moralizing lurking under the prose. An elegant thing, but less stirring for all its being well-crafted.