> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.timdoleschall.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # on hunger - URL: https://www.timdoleschall.com/on-hunger/ - Published: 2026-08-17T07:09:47.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-17T07:09:47.000Z - Author: Tim Doleschall - Tags: Journal i finished **bel-ami**last week when the novel opens, maupassant’s protagonist, georges duroy, is broke, hungry and walking through paris wondering how he’ll afford dinner. duroy climbs his way through parisian society not through talent or hard work alone, but through charm, calculation and an appetite that separates him from many people. he’s ruthless, opportunistic and entirely self-serving. and yet, i found parts of him strangely compelling. he hates his current situation, but still maintains a certain pride. what separates him from the people around him isn’t simply his background. it’s that he knows exactly how much he wants, and is willing to go after it. the people around him were born into comfort. they’ve never had to want anything that badly. he has. and that hunger drives everything. what struck me most is how it begins. duroy runs into an old military acquaintance, charles forestier. one conversation turns into a dinner invitation, an introduction and a first opportunity. from there, he does the rest himself. but without that first door opening, nothing would’ve been possible for him. i’ve been thinking about that a lot. i left the military about a year ago and moved to hong kong at twenty. my tuition fees are being paid for with money i saved during my service. i arrived without a network waiting for me, in a city where many of the people i met came from backgrounds very different from mine. some came from old money. some from family businesses. some had a kind of ease that comes from never having had to think too hard about whether something was financially possible. i don’t say that with resentment. i say it because i recognised something in duroy’s position: being on the outside of a world you want to understand, and having to find your own way in. in the first months, i accepted almost every invitation. run clubs, dinners, events where i knew nobody. i showed up alone and made an effort to meet people. not cynically. i was genuinely curious about people and what had brought them here. but i also knew i was building relationships, and that the only way to do it was to keep showing up. over time, that changed. you realise that you can’t maintain closeness with everyone. you start to value the people you genuinely connect with over the ones who are simply good to know. i’ve met a handful of people here who i hope to keep close for a long time. showing up stopped being about meeting everyone and became about showing up for the people i cared about. duroy never makes that shift. he keeps collecting people like assets, moving on the moment they’ve served their purpose. that’s where i part ways with him, and probably where maupassant intended the reader to feel uncomfortable. but the hunger? that part i understand. there’s something clarifying about wanting a life that wasn’t handed to you. it makes you pay attention. it makes every open door feel significant, every conversation worth having. duroy treats every encounter as an opportunity. his intentions are often far from admirable, but the instinct to notice opportunity isn’t wrong. what matters is what you do with it. hunger without a conscience turns people into assets. knowing what you want and being willing to go after it isn’t ruthlessness. it’s hunger. and hunger, pointed in the right direction, is a useful thing to have.