Sunday, April 8, 2012

The Hunger Games Series

Product Details Product DetailsOnce I finished The Hunger Games, I needed to read the series, and I was not disappointed. The second and third books complicated the fascism and resistance occurring in the first by indicating that individual moments of resistance are good but not enough; the disaster of fascism will not end until the structure is eliminated and replaced not by another kind of fascism but by a political system that respects human rights.

The second novel, Catching Fire, challenges Katniss and Peeta’s victory in the Hunger Games by revealing the ongoing manipulation victors experience at the hands of the Capitol. So, it isn’t enough for Katniss and Peeta to outwit the Gamemakers; they can’t just go home and live a comfortable life in Victor’s Village. They have captured the attention of Panem in an act of resistance against the games and must therefore be used to garner support for the government or be destroyed.

Catching Fire follows Katniss and Peeta on their victory tour as they attempt to meet the Capitol’s expectations for their fictional romance. Once home, Katniss tries to return to her hunting life but faces the imposition of more violent “Peacekeepers” on District 12. This repression combines with evidence of rebellion in the other districts, encouraging Katniss to think of fleeing and of fighting. As the tension escalates throughout Panem, President Snow announces that the Quarter Quell, a celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Hunger Games, will draw tributes only from prior victors, which throws Katniss and Peeta again into the arena.

When I realized the storyline mirrored that of the previous book, I was worried that Catching Fire would be a pale shadow of the first story, like Return of the Jedi was of the 1977 Star Wars, with the goal of both being the destruction of the Death Star, but the differences in context between the Hunger Games and the Quarter Quell made the storylines in the Hunger Game series different enough for the second to be interesting.

In this version of the games, there’s no question that Katniss and Peeta will work together, and they build alliances with other victors in self-preservation. The need for mutuality in the face of oppression is a given. In addition, the context of growing rebellion in the districts makes rebellion in the Quarter Quell more meaningful, as any act could become a symbol contributing to resistance. And the rebellion even penetrates the Quarter Quell when other victors secretly act to ensure Katniss, the symbol of rebellion, survives and can be rescued. These additional complexities expand upon the issues of social justice from the first novel by making collaboration in rebellion necessary. A government that so little values the lives of its citizens must be brought down.

The third volume in the series, Mockingjay, further complicates the issue of fascism and resistance by making the resistance potentially fascist in its own right. At the end of Catching Fire, we discover that District 13 has been destroyed only at the surface. The Capitol has allowed its citizens to dwell underground in a kind of nuclear détente, and since that agreement, District 13 has been preparing to challenge the Capitol in conventional warfare. To survive, District 13 citizens have had to live an exceptionally regimented life. This regimentation and the undoubted necessity of overthrowing the Capitol combine to make it possible for District 13 leadership to excuse violation of human rights, namely Katniss’s rights, in the name of the rebellion. The leadership plans to use Katniss as a rallying symbol of the rebellion, just as the Capitol had planned to use Katniss to encourage loyalty. As in the Hunger Games, Katniss takes things into her own hands, mounting an unapproved expedition to assassinate President Snow.

During and after this expedition, three events occur that determine Katniss’s ultimate decision to assassinate President Coin, the leader of District 13, instead of President Snow. First, District 13 stages the death of children imprisoned in front of President Snow’s mansion, in an effort to frame him for the children’s deaths. Second, Katniss encounters the captive President Snow who comments, “I’m afraid we have both been played for fools” (Mockingjay 357). Third, President Coin proposes holding another Hunger Games using children of the Capitol’s citizens as a means of reparation. These three events, grounded in Katniss’s experience of death for entertainment in the Hunger Games, lead her to see that any power structure risks fascism, even one ostensibly intending to do good. To consolidate her own power, President Coin has engaged in the same oppressive strategies as President Snow has used. To stand on the side of human rights, one must be always aware of the complexity of power dynamics and always alert to such abuses of power.

Works Cited

Collins, Suzanne. Catching Fire. New York: Scholastic, 2009. Print.

---. The Hunger Games. New York: Scholastic, 2008. Print.

---. Mockingjay. New York: Scholastic, 2010. Print.

Image Source:

Catching Fire and Mockingjay. Book Cover Images. Amazon.com. 8 April 2012. <http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Hunger+Games>

The Hunger Games

Product DetailsI gobbled Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games when I was supposed to be reading Life of Pi. This was interesting pairing, given both novels depict characters pushed to extremes and using other potentially deadly characters for survival. Collins’s work is written for a younger audience and is easy to digest quickly while Martel’s Life of Pi is denser, postmodern, and more aesthetically interesting.

The thematic difference between the two, I would argue, surfaces when examining the presentation of violence. The ending of Life of Pi, which retells the castaway story using humans instead of animals, suggests that it’s easier for humans to digest stories of violence when attached to animals than when attached to humans, which assumes humans find violence among humans distasteful. Hunger Games, on the other hand, suggests humans delight in watching other humans torture and kill one another, which assumes humans are comfortable objectifying one another, particularly in the service of entertainment and of maintaining power in the hands of a few. Sadly, I think the latter assumption is more true than the former, as public displays of violence for entertainment have demonstrated from games in the Roman Coliseum to CNN’s capitalization on embedded reporting during the Gulf War.

So, while the Hunger Games series is lighter literary fare than Life of Pi, it does address serious social justice issues. In the first book of the series, the main issue is fascist power structures encouraging the disenfranchised to battle one another instead of overthrowing the oppressive power structure itself. In the novel, Panem represents civilization arising in post-apocalypse America. Due to the thirteen districts rebelling against the Capitol, the Panem government keeps the districts economically dependent on the center and implemented the Hunger Games as a reminder of the price paid for treason. Each year, each of the twelve remaining districts sends two tributes, a boy and a girl, to the Capitol for the Hunger Games, which are televised live. The tributes battle each other until only one is left, and that one is declared the winner. The Hunger Games themselves illustrate the use of media to establish competition among the districts so that they cannot again collaborate to attempt a coup, maintaining power in the hands of a few in the Capitol.

In response to the “divide and conquer” political strategy that maintains the oppressive power structures, the novel also posits small ways in which individuals can collaborate to resist those structures. When the protagonist, Katniss, volunteers to replace her younger sister as District 12 tribute, her selflessness becomes an act of resistance. Same goes for the mutual support that grows between Katniss and Peeta, the boy tribute from District 12, and between Katniss and the youngest tribute, Rue. Where the games encourage tributes to kill one another, mutuality indicates a refusal to play.

The ultimate moment of resistance that saves both Katniss and Peeta occurs when Katniss and Peeta plan to eat poison berries together and thus rob the Capitol of a victor. In staging this moment, Peeta uses the media coverage that has been used against them. Peeta says, “Hold them out. I want everyone to see” (344). He wants to make sure the Gamemakers and those in the home audiences know they are intentionally eating poison berries so that either the Gamemakers intervene to stop them or so that citizens can hold the Gamemakers accountable for their deaths. Through this act of mutuality, Katniss and Peeta defeat the game, embarrassing the Gamemakers, and situating themselves in rebellious opposition to the Capitol.

It’s important to remember that individuals have power in fascist systems, even if it is only the power to refuse to cooperate. As Michel Foucault writes, “Where there is power, there is resistance” (95). The existence of resistance to domination should give us all hope that we can take action against injustice. The keys to this action are mutuality (we don’t have to work alone) and publicity (one of the few ways small resistances can put pressure on fascism).

When the movie came out, I was worried that Hollywood’s need to reap profit from entertainment would co-opt the social-justice message of the novel, but I was pleased that the film remained closely aligned with the novel. In particular, the Hunger Games were not depicted as brave or fun but as an obscene form of torture perpetrated by a spoiled, comfortable public on oppressed groups. The costuming was particularly effective in making the film consistent with the novel. Never did viewers feel comfortable in the seductive wealth of the Capitol; instead, we remained consistently on edge with the protagonist, horrified at the excess and waste, the foolish obsession with fashion and media, and the willingness of the Capitol audience to enjoy the bystander role in witnessing human-on-human destruction.


Works Cited

Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. New York: Scholastic, 2008. Print.

Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality: An Introduction. Vol. 1 New York: Vintage, 1978. Print.

Image Source:

The Hunger Games. Book Cover. N.d. Amazon.com. 8 April 2012. <http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Hunger+Games>