The Hunger Artists

Etymologically, the word hunger derives from the Old English hungor, akin to the Old High German hungar, and is related to the Lithuanian word kanka, “torture.” To be hungry means to have an urgent need for food or some other special form of nutrition, but by metaphorical elaboration, hunger has come to refer to any strong desire—“a hunger for success,” for instance, or, as is quite common, hunger for another, an expression of strong sexual desire. “For always roaming with a hungry heart/Much have I seen and known,” wrote Alfred, Lord Tennyson in his poem about the mythic hero Ulysses, although in his poem about the heroic figure, Tennyson invented survivors in addition to Ulysses after the end of the Odyssey as recorded by Homer. Hence hunger refers not only to an urgent need for “food,” as in nourishment, but also to appetite, an appetite that can never be satisfied or satiated. What Tennyson’s Ulysses craves is experience itself, and since experience is boundless, what Ulysses wants is the impossible—that which can never be satisfied. His desire to know is apparently boundless, without limits.

In the same way, sexual desire can never be sated; it is a thirst that can never be quenched. Desire can be understood as a quest, a search or hunt that never ends: “Mouth is alive with juices like wine/And I’m hungry like the wolf,” sings Duran Duran in “Hungry Like the Wolf.” Since hunger is recurring, insistent, and never-ending, the singer speaks of a desire that is “hungry like the wolf”—always and forever seeking more and more, insatiable—no wonder that the word hunger is related to the word torture.

Various Hors d’oeuvres:
Eric Clapton – “Hungry,” No Reason to Cry
Deep Purple – “Hungry Daze,” Perfect Strangers
Duran Duran – “Hungry Like the Wolf,” Rio
Merle Haggard – “Hungry Eyes,” Untamed Hawk: The Early Recordings of Merle Haggard
INXS – “Hungry,” Switch
Van Morrison – “Hungry For Your Love,” An Officer and a Gentleman (OST)
Paul Revere & The Raiders – “Hungry,” Greatest Hits
Bruce Springsteen, “Hungry Heart,” The River
Twisted Sister, “Stay Hungry,” Stay Hungry
White Lion – “Hungry,” Pride