History BigEater / Literature

-->"A Centaur has a man-stomach and a horse-stomach. And of course both want breakfast. So first of all he has porridge and pavenders and kidneys and bacon and omlette and cold ham and toast and marmalade and coffee and beer. And after that he tends to the horse part of himself by grazing for an hour or so and finishing up with a hot mash, some oats, and a bag of sugar. That's why it's such a serious thing to ask a Centaur to stay for the weeekend. A very serious thing indeed."

* Nathaniel "Ned" Robbins in ''JellyBelly'' starts out as this. His friends at summer diet camp are straight examples, especially Richard. And Richard's parents.

* [[WinnieThePooh Winnie-the-Pooh]]. At the beginning of the first book he cleans out Rabbit's pantry. In the second book he eats Tigger's lunch ''and'' Roo's. And he's incapable of carrying a pot of honey from A to B without devouring its contents along the way!

* Luke in ''EightDaysOfLuke'', [[spoiler:which makes sense considering that he's really Loki, who once almost won an eating contest with the anthropomorphic personification of fire. Also, by the time the book opens he's been imprisoned for quite a while.]]

* [[ActionGirl Katniss Everdeen]] of ''TheHungerGames'' eats like a starved wolverine when given the opportunity. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] in that she comes from the poorest district of an oppressive regime, where starvation is a constant threat, and thus food is often on her mind. Her leanness is explained by her inconsistent access to food, and how much energy she expends to provide for herself and her family.

* From the ''WildCards'' series of novels, we have Croyd "The Sleeper" Crenson, who can sleep for as little as a night or as much as several weeks/months. Upon waking, he is always a BigEater, to the point that there's a jingle about it (Sleeper waking, meals taking/Sleeper speeding, people bleeding). , and people recognize him by his eating habits.
** Croyd is the most obvious example, but it's mentioned once that the Great and Powerful Turtle has to eat fairly constantly, as using his telekinesis drains his physical energy, and it is implied that the other aces also have a faster metabolism to fuel their abilities.

* In {{Plautus}}'s plays, table-companions (a peculiar Roman institution, also called "parasites") are played as comically large eaters, making this OlderThanFeudalism. Ergasilus in ''Captivi'', given the run of Hegio's kitchen, causes an uproar not unlike those common in ''The Slayers''.

* From the ''WildCards'' series of novels, we have Croyd "The Sleeper" Crenson, who can sleep for as little as a night or as much as several weeks/months. Upon waking, he is always a BigEater, to the point that there's a jingle about it, and people recognize him by his eating habits.

* [[ActionSurvivor Fitz Kreiner]] from the ''Series/DoctorWho'' EighthDoctorAdventures. He also has ExtremeOmnivore tendencies, and questionable table manners. And, as per usual for this trope, he's incredibly skinny, although when he's not busy running for his life and can have three square meals a day, he doesn't take long to get a bit out of shape. FridgeBrilliance: it's probably because by the time he's 33, he's spent about 2/3 of his life either [[WorldWarII under rationing]] or traveling with the Doctor. Being on a see-food diet (you know, [[IncrediblyLamePun if he sees food, he eats it]]) is ordinarily a useful survival mechanism which he probably picked up when he was still a small child.

* In {{Harry Turtledove's}} ''Tale of Crispos'' the healer-priest sent to deal with the cholera outbreak explains that although monks are supposed to be frugal eaters, healers are an exception.
* In {{Mercedes Lackey's}} ''Valdemar'' universe, Heralds, Healers, and Mages who over-use their powers have to be force-fed sometimes.

* Corwin from the ChroniclesOfAmber, to the extent where his brother Random once snaps him out of an AchillesInHisTent sulk by showing up with a very large tray of food.

* ''Literature/TheRedemptionOfAlthalus'', by DavidEddings: Eliar. Although it's because he's a teenager and he grows out of it somewhat later on.

* [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungry_Tiger The Hungry Tiger]] in the ''Oz'' books is quite possibly the largest and most powerful tiger in the whole of Nonestica, and has an appetite to match. He is only full once -- after devouring a good portion of a royal banquet.

* Fermín from ''TheShadowOfTheWind'' blames his thin build to his incredible metabolism, which he displays throughout the book.

* Lieutenant Hélène Froissy, in Fred Vargas's thriller novels. She is seen eating a lot, and hides food wherever she can, including in the police station; the other policemen know this and use her food reserves as emergency supplies.

* Joel Duffle in Damon Runyan's short story ''A Piece of Pie'', a competitive eater who consumes a huge amount of food during the story, but "does not look as if he can eat his way out of a tea shoppe".

* ''{{Discworld}}''

* Most of the Brotherhood boys in J.R. Ward's ''BlackDaggerBrotherhood'' series. Of particular note are Rhage (who is regularly described or insinuated to be the biggest eater, even amongst the brothers) and [[spoiler:Zsadist, as of book 3, ''Lover Awakened.'']] The latter is an especially fortunate development since the extreme and very detrimental opposite was the case beforehand. [[spoiler: In layman's terms, Z more than half starved himself for over a century, hating and outright not trusting any and all food he couldn't see whole or make himself, since he "didn't know if it was tampered with" otherwise. But thanks to his bonding with the aristocrat vampire Bella, he's since done a 180 and even adopted eating alongside Rhage.]]

* [[ActionSurvivor Fitz Kreiner]] from the ''Series/DoctorWho'' EighthDoctorAdventures. He also has ExtremeOmnivore tendencies, and questionable table manners. And, as per usual for this trope, he's incredibly skinny, although when he's not busy running for his life and can have three square meals a day, he doesn't take long to get a bit out of shape. FridgeBrilliance: it's probably due to the fact that by the time he's 33, he's spent about two-thirds of his life either [[WorldWarII under rationing]] or traveling with the Doctor. Being on a see-food diet (you know, [[IncrediblyLamePun if he sees food, he eats it]]) is ordinarily a useful survival mechanism which he probably picked up when he was still a small child.

* ''Literature/HarryPotter'': Ron Weasley, of course. It's a RunningGag to have him cheerfully stuffing 'self out at the feast at the beginning of every year at Hogwarts, sometimes grossing Hermione and Harry out. In ''[[HarryPotter/HarryPotterAndTheDeathlyHallows Deathly Hallows]]'', it gets even worse.

** Keldas of Nac Mac Feegle clans in general, such as Fiona, as seen in the Tiffany Aching books. When she's sharing a meal with Tiffany, she takes only ''slightly'' less than what Tiffany has -- and while Tiffany is a fifteen-year-old human girl, Fiona is ''six inches tall.'' Justified as she is pregnant pretty much all of the time.

* Bruce Bogtrotter in ''{{Matilda}}'' swipes a slice of cake from [[DeanBitterman The Trunchbull's]] stash. By way of punishment, she makes him eat an entire cake. ([[CrowningMomentOfAwesome He manages]], although he's completely zonked in a food coma at the end.)

* Graystripe from the ''WarriorCats'' series is called this by other characters, though we don't actually see him eating large amounts.

* Mulch, in the ''ArtemisFowl'' series. Let's not get into ''what'' he eats, please.

* ''Literature/TheRedemptionOfAlthalus'', by DavidEddings: Eliar.

* Josh Pinto in the ''A to Z Mysteries'' books.

* Joel Duffle in Damon Runyan's short story ''A Piece of Pie'', who is a competitive eater who consumes a huge amount of food during the story, but "does not look as if he can eat his way out of a tea shoppe".