1984 and the hunger games essay

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Essay: Comparison between 1984 and Hunger Games

• Essay: Comparison between 1984 and…

In the novel 1984 by George Orwell, the dystopian country of Oceania is controlled by the Party. Many citizens of the nation have no freedom of thought, speech or knowledge. The Party brainwashes people into thinking the same way as it and kills those who so much as disagree with it.

In the film version of The Hunger Games, originally written by Suzanna Collins, the country of Panem is controlled by the Capitol. The inhabitants of the Capitol live luxuriously and safely while the people of the twelve other districts are in poverty and fear. Both fictitious stories have many similarities and differences.

In each world, the government unfairly controls its population and suppresses the peoples’ freedom. The Capitol kills anyone who is disobedient, and they also hold an event called the Hunger Games. “Once a year, boy and girl ‘tributes’ are chosen by lottery from each district and forced to compete in the Hunger Games, an event is televised throughout the land and manipulated for maximum ratings.

The last one left alive is the winner.” This event gives the Capitol power because its citizens are constantly reminded of the Capitol’s power. In 1984, the three classes were the Inner Party, the Outer Party, and the proles. The Inner Party brainwashes the other citizens by telling them lies and torturing them until they believe what the Party wants them to believe. Winston Smith, a member of the Outer Party, and Katniss Everdeen, a girl from the districts, are the protagonist in each story. The two each disagree with the way their respective governments rule and they fight for that in which they believe.

In the Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen becomes one of the contestants in Hunger Games. She allies herself with Peeta, a fellow player from her district. They end up being the last two standing and to rebel against the Capitol, and they decide they will kill themselves at the same time so that there is no single winner. The Capitol ends up letting them both win since the citizens of the Capitol would find it unacceptable if they were to both die.

At the same time, allowing two victors was interpreted as an act of rebelling against the government. This causes an uproar in the Capitol and shows the other districts that the government was weak. Katniss completed her mission by giving hope to the other districts and convincing them to fight back, therefore beginning a revolution.

Winston Smith decided to rebel against the Party by living part-time in an apartment with his girlfriend Julia in a location that the Party does not supervise. He also tries to find ways to convince the proles to rebel with him. The proles are weak-minded laborers who make up approximately 85% of Oceania’s population and as Winston wrote it, “If there is hope, it lies in the proles.” By saying this, he means that the only way the Party could ever be overpowered is by the proles turning against the Party itself.

Living unsupervised with a girl and attempting to be freed from the Party’s control were both for which the Party had no tolerance. When they caught him in the act of rebelling he was sent to be tortured and brainwashed until his old mentality was non-existent and he had truly become loyal to the Party. Winston and Katniss both fought for what they believed in, but only one succeeded in their goal because of the division of classes in their world.

Panem has a distinct division of classes. The high class is the Capitol which menacingly rules the country and its citizens have good jobs and healthy lives. The low class is comprised of the citizens of the districts who live in poor conditions and collect and manufacture primary materials that are used in the Capitol. The Capitol sits high above the districts, but its rulers fail to realize that the districts could one day rebel.

Although the people from each district are too weak mentally to wrap their minds around the fact that they could rebel, Katniss reveals to them their true value. In the Hunger Games, not having a middle class weakened the high class since they were fooled into thinking that there was no threat from the low class. Oceania is ruled by the Inner Party, which is a division of the Party.

A small percentage of the population are members of the Inner Party, and they live like royalty. They all think alike, and it is their job to control their country’s collective mind, but; “If an Inner Party member gets out of line they are dealt with the same as any other member of society, mainly through torture, imprisonment and/or being erased from history (becoming an “unperson”).”

There is also the Outer Party whose members do jobs that require intelligence, and the uneducated proles who produce goods for little pay. The proles are too feeble to rebel, but the Outer Party members are smart enough to think for themselves and could persuade the proles into an insurgency. The Inner Party knew the Outer Party could begin an uprising, so it used preventative counter rebellion tactics to maintain its position as the high class. These stories show that a middle class was crucial for the high class to remain in an authoritative position.

Winston and Katniss were both rebels. They did their best to rebel, but Winston was not as successful as Katniss since he was up against a more dominant form of government. There are three tiers of classes in Oceania, and the middle class was a known threat to the high class, so the high class incorporated precautions to prohibit the middle class from taking away its power.

The rulers of the Capitol did not think they had to worry about rebellion since the whole time they had been in power; the lower class was so far beneath them that they could not take over the high class. This blinded the Capitol to the fact that there was a chance that a citizen from a district could one day reveal to the lower class their true strength. As shown in these two unforgiving societies, the class structure is an important factor in the government maintaining or losing its control.

Bibliography • Eby, Douglas. “Suzanne Collins on The Hunger Games and Being a Writer.” Psych Central.com, 22 Mar. 2012, blogs.psychcentral.com/creative-mind/2012/03/suzanne-collins-on-the-hunger-games-and-being-a-writer/. • Orwell, George. 1984. Penguin, 2008. • “The Hunger Games.” Lions Gate Home Entertainment, 2012. • Bean Shadow. “The World of ‘1984’: Class System.” Writing As I Please, 11 Mar. 2013, writingasiplease.wordpress.com/2013/03/11/1984-class-system/.

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Critical and Analytical Writing

5 Dystopia and Violence in the Hunger Games Trilogy

Complit 131 brave new world, shannon roch.

The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins has become well-known for both its popularity among young adult readers, and its subsequent influence on the creation of dystopian young-adult franchises such as Divergent. Books in the young adult genre—particularly when they are, like this trilogy, paired with extreme popularity and with the sci-fi/fantasy genre—traditionally seem to be viewed by the general public as frivolous escapism, and thus are frequently overlooked by academics and literary critics as serious literature expressing concepts meaningful to the real world. However, the Hunger Games trilogy incorporates many grim elements common to dystopian literature, such as authoritarian governments and all that tends to accompany them—lack of freedom of speech, for example. The trilogy also includes themes of violence (including war, fear, and PTSD) as major themes in both the progression of the plot and the growth of the main characters. This paper will look at how the themes of dystopia and violence manifest themselves in the trilogy, and will argue that the trilogy actually explores socioeconomic, political, and psychological concepts much more mature than its critics would expect.

The Hunger Games trilogy is set in Panem, a future North America beset by environmental crises and rent by past war. Panem is governed by the wealthy, decadent Capitol in the Rocky Mountains, which survives on goods produced by the twelve working-class districts surrounding it. In punishment against the districts for a past rebellion, the Capitol forces each district to send one boy and one girl to participate in the Hunger Games, an annual event televised live throughout Panem, in which the children fight each other to the death. District children are selected for this purpose via a sort of grim lottery, called the reaping.

The dystopian elements of the series are obvious from the very first chapter of the first book in the trilogy, which opens with the heroine, Katniss, waking up on reaping day. As she goes about her daily activities and muses on the unfortunate reality of the reaping, the reader slowly gathers that Panem is a dystopian world. The most obvious dystopian element at this point, before the nature of the Hunger Games itself becomes fully revealed to the reader, is the lack of free speech. Katniss notes how she has “learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into an indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts. […] Even at home, where I am less pleasant, I avoid discussing tricky topics. Like the reaping, or food shortages, or the Hunger Games” (The Hunger Games 7). It is not made obvious precisely how Katniss fears that incriminating speech could get back to the Capitol, but as Don Latham and Jonathan M. Hollister note in “The Games People Play: Information and Media Literacies in the Hunger Games Trilogy,” “clearly the fear of surveillance is a powerful means of social control through Panem,” even though it “is not clear how extensively surveillance is actually used” (Latham 40). The fear of even the possibility of rebellious comments being recorded is enough to curb any such discussion.

What is clear is that this is not a world where free speech is valued or even possible, but instead a place where citizen dissent has serious ramifications. The threat comes not only from the government, but also from other citizens, who may use their familiarity and knowledge of others’ actions to exploit them, as evidenced by Katniss’s description of those who take bets on whose names will be drawn for the reaping. “Odds are given on their ages, whether they’re Seam or merchant, if they will break down and weep. Most refuse dealing with the racketeers but carefully, carefully. These same people tend to be informers, and who hasn’t broken the law?” (The Hunger Games 20). Needless to say, this makes District 12 a place of distrust not only toward the Capitol, but also toward one’s fellow citizens.

Another element making Katniss’s world dystopian becomes obvious in the first chapter: class differences. Katniss lives in the Seam, the poorest part of District 12, as does her closest friend Gale. The people of the Seam are less fortunate than other people of District 12, living in such extreme poverty that emaciated bodies and death from starvation are not at all uncommon. But aside from these disadvantages, the poverty of people in the Seam also forces them to put themselves at much higher risk of being reaped for the Hunger Games. Katniss describes how, at the age of twelve (the same age at which they become eligible for the Games), District 12 children may “opt to add [their] names more times [to the reaping bowl] in exchange for tesserae. Each tessera is worth a meager year’s supply of grain and oil for one person” (The Hunger Games 15). The necessity of providing for both oneself and one’s family every year means that, at the age of sixteen, Katniss’s name appears in the reaping ball twenty times, and eighteen-year-old Gale’s name appears a whopping forty-two times.

Clearly, both Katniss and Gale are at much higher risk of being selected for the Hunger Games than Madge, the mayor’s daughter, who seems to come from the merchant class and “has never been at risk of needing a tessera” (The Hunger Games 16). As evidenced by Gale’s anger toward Madge when she happens to meet him and Katniss on reaping day, these differences sow further discord and mistrust between the citizens of District 12, this time along class lines. Of course, Katniss quickly learns that their assumptions about the risk of being reaped are a bit misplaced—as evidenced by the reaping of both Prim, whose name was entered only once, and of Peeta, who is a baker’s son from the merchant class, and therefore has probably never needed tesserae. Much later, Katniss also learns that Madge’s aunt was herself a tribute, one who died while partnered with Seam-born victor Haymitch.

Class differences also lead to more generalized friction between the classes in District 12. In fact, as Joe Tompkins argues in his article “The Making of a Contradictory Franchise: Revolutionary Melodrama and Cynicism in The Hunger Games,” that these class differences dovetail nicely with the Capitol’s desire to keep the different classes (and the different districts) from feeling too unified, due to their differences, since “These circumstances [of poorer families taking more tesserae] underscore the class divide that propels the competition, and they disclose a world where ‘pitting every district against the others’ is a way of maintaining class structure” (Tompkins 74). As the people of the Seam look down on the merchant class for their supposedly soft lives, the merchants look down on the people of the Seam for no apparent reason than their poverty. In remembering the desperate days of starvation after her father died, Katniss describes how when she checked the Mellarks’ trash bin for food, Peeta’s mother started screaming at her, “telling me to move on and did I want her to call the Peacekeepers and how sick she was of having those brats from the Seam pawing through her trash. The words were ugly and I had no defense” (The Hunger Games 36).

It is worth noting that, although race or appearance itself seems to have little meaning in Panem, it is frequently noted how the merchant class and the people of the Seam look quite different, to the point where Katniss’s blond and blue-eyed mother (from the merchant class) and sister “look out of place” (The Hunger Games 9) in the Seam. By contrast, Katniss resembles her Seam-born father, and like Gale has straight black hair, olive skin, and gray eyes. The mention of olive skin in particular suggests that the people of the Seam may be people of color. The connection between appearance and social discrimination is worth noting—not only in District 12 but also in District 11 (Rue’s and Thresh’s homeplace), an agricultural district seemingly set somewhere in the south, where many of the citizens are black-skinned and work in orchards of some sort in slavery-like conditions. District 11’s description in Catching Fire makes it clear that the residents of this district are far more severely oppressed than those of District 12:

We slow slightly and I think we might be coming in for another stop, when a fence rises up before us. Towering at least thirty-five feet in the air and topped with wicked coils of barbed wire, it makes ours back in District 12 look childish. My eyes quickly inspect the base, which is lined with enormous metal plates. There would be no burrowing under those, no escaping to hunt. Then I see the watchtowers, placed evenly apart, manned with armed guards, so out of place among the fields of wildflowers around them. “That’s something different,” says Peeta. Rue did give me the impression that the rules in District 11 were more harshly enforced. But I never imagined something like this. (Catching Fire, 67–68)

It is important to acknowledge, of course, that the social hierarchies traditionally ascribed to race and color in the real world may not necessarily apply in Collins’s world. Nevertheless, this description of almost concentration-camp-like conditions in a district populated by black people, laboring daily in what is essentially a plantation for their rich Capitol overlords, are hard to ignore. Notable, too, is the surprise of Katniss, who has previously seemed to assume that the poverty and famine experienced by her own (generally lighter-skinned) district is the height of misfortune, and only now realizes that she has actually been privileged to escape the additional misfortune of social oppression experienced by District 11 residents. In other words, Katniss has been privileged all her life (due, if not to her race, then to the region she grew up in), to the point where she has been totally ignorant of her own privilege.

Aside from poverty, the lack of free speech, and class/ethnic differences, the ultimate challenge faced by the people of Panem’s districts is the Hunger Games itself. While there are certainly many citizens who never get reaped, the risk is always there for residents of every district, in every class, while going through their teenage years. The annual spectacle of the Hunger Games, however unpleasant, is very much a part of district culture: Even someone who does not get selected themselves is likely familiar with watching people die on live television, starting from a very young age. This is an important part of the preparation for potential future tributes, as stated by Latham and Hollister, who note that it “seems likely that Katniss has already gained a well-developed ‘sense’ of the Games from watching previous Games year after year, something that is required of every citizen in Panem” (Latham 36). Some of the people whom viewers see die may well be people they know from their own districts, or even their own family members—while in the Games, Katniss is often motivated by the thought that Prim is probably watching her efforts to survive. Of course, the Hunger Games also forces contestants to sacrifice their own morality and humanity in order to survive, since all children must attempt to kill other children (one of which may even hail from the same district) in order to survive. This ties into the larger subject of war, violence, and PTSD, which will be discussed later in this paper.

Aside from the personal challenges faced by tributes to the Hunger Games, the Games are dystopian in the sense that they also serve the larger purpose of discouraging revolt against the Capitol, which arguably counts as an authoritarian government due to its surveillance and its brutal treatment of the districts. The story told at every District 12 reaping recounts the Dark Days, in which the thirteen districts revolted against the Capitol “which brought peace and prosperity to its citizens” (The Hunger Games 21). The Capitol’s retaliation led to the supposed obliteration of District 13 and the beginning of the Hunger Games: “The Treaty of Treason gave us the new laws that guarantee peace and, as our yearly reminder that the Dark Days must never be repeated, it gave us the Hunger Games” (The Hunger Games 21). But Tompkins makes the case that the creation of the Hunger Games and the division it symbolizes between the Capitol and the districts can also be seen as an issue of class:

The ostensible purpose of the Games is ceremonial: to commemorate The Dark Days, an erstwhile rebellion wherein the poorer districts tried, and failed, to overthrow the Capitol, forcing the revolutionary vanguard underground in the seemingly abandoned District 13. But the Games’ true function is symbolic violence in the guise of entertainment, a ritualistic reminder of the sheer power of the Capitol and the futility of rebelling against it. In short, the Games exist to keep class conflict at bay, or, to paraphrase Guy Debord, to manifest a social relationship mediated by spectacle. (Tompkins 71)

In other words, the Hunger Games not only brings peace (in a sense) and provides entertainment, but also provides a framework for reinforcing class differences between the Capitol and the districts. What the reaping day’s history lesson does not mention, of course, is that the Capitol lifestyle is one of massive excess and comfort, and that most of the people of the districts do come from a drastically different socioeconomic class, being essentially impoverished slaves who spend their lives working to support their hedonistic Capitol masters. Hence, it seems highly likely that this framing of the Hunger Games as a just punishment against ungrateful districts is Capitol propaganda, and that the Hunger Games were instead created to discourage future revolts by demoralizing the Districts and making union between the Districts unlikely. Katniss seems cognizant of the fact that the first of those goals—demoralization—is inherent in the Hunger Games, noting that the “real message is clear. ‘Look how we take your children and sacrifice them and there’s nothing you can do. If you lift a finger, we will destroy every last one of you. Just as we did in District Thirteen’” (The Hunger Games 22).

But it is not until Katniss is actually in the Games that she seems to get the first inkling of how the Hunger Games are actually used to divide the Districts. The fact that flow of information between districts is banned seems to be a given, considering Katniss’s thoughts when she discusses life in District 13 with Rue. “It’s interesting, hearing about her life,” Katniss notes. “We have so little communication with anyone outside our district. In fact, I wonder if the Gamemakers are blocking out our conversation, because even though the information seems harmless, they don’t want people in different districts to know about one another” (The Hunger Games 246). This is in itself notable as a dystopian element, as it is part of Panem’s “strict control of information and misinformation” (Latham 37) by which the Capitol “tightly controls information in an effort to discourage resistance as much as possible, particularly any kind of widespread resistance” (Latham 37).

But while partnering with Rue is not unusual—temporary partnerships form all the time in the arena—Katniss’s unusual refusal to see Rue as an enemy, and her insistence on mourning her death, make clear that the animosity the Games typically arouses in rival districts is essentially an anti-revolt measure. After all, if Katniss had done the more typical thing and killed Rue, the people of District 11 would probably have hated her, and by extension would have hated District 12, making union between the districts difficult. Instead, Katniss covers Rue in flowers and sings to her, wanting to “do something, right here, right now, to shame them, to make them accountable, to show the Capitol that whatever they do or force us to do there is a part of every tribute they can’t own” (The Hunger Games 286). In doing so, she unwittingly invites sympathy from the people of District 11, who send her a gift of bread, and also commits her first act of rebellion against the Capitol, although she does not really seem to realize this until she watches the replay of her Games and notes that the act of covering Rue in flowers has been censored, since “even that smacks of rebellion” (The Hunger Games 440). Much later, in Catching Fire, the sheer sight of victors from different districts holding hands in unity is enough to cause a media blackout.

Aside from pitting the districts against each other and thereby discouraging rebellion, the yearly Hunger Games also, of course, involve violence and death. As noted, this has a powerful impact not only on the people of various districts who watch their own people kill and be killed, but also on the victors. It must be remembered that the violence visited on the tributes is not only perpetrated by other tributes (who could themselves be seen as “a piece in [the Capitol’s] Games” (The Hunger Games 172), but also by the Capitol through other threats in the arena. In Katniss’s first Games there are several examples of environmental threats—fireballs, tracker jacker wasps, and a body of water that dries up—most of which are merely meant to drive the tributes closer together for the sake of drama. The Games are, after all, being broadcast on live television and serve not only as oppression of the districts, but also as the “circuses” that keep the people of the Capitol safely entertained. But the final environmental threat instigated by the Capitol in Katniss’s first games are the muttations, which seem specifically designed to serve not only as a physical threat but a psychological one. This could be seen as the Capitol’s way of terrorizing the three remaining tributes—at least one of whom will certainly become a victor and thereby will have “slipped the noose of poverty that strangles the rest of us” and become an “embodiment of hope where there is no hope” (both Catching Fire 212)—and reminding them that all tributes are still the Capitol’s dogs, collared and lacking their own agency.

Katniss’s first Games are only the first of the trilogy’s many instances of violence and killing. On her post-Games Victory Tour, Katniss witnesses the civil unrest in the districts which she has unwittingly instigated through her celebration of Rue and her romance with Peeta (which culminated in their particularly provocative suicide pact with the berries). The most poignant of these is in District 11, where displaying the three-fingered salute and Rue’s mockingjay call lead to the Peacekeepers putting a bullet through an old man’s head. Aside from being an obvious act of violence, this serves as more psychological warfare against the victors, particularly Katniss, whom President Snow sees as the one to blame for the unrest and who consequently has more guilt over the violence. Though Katniss has obviously been affected by her experiences in the Games since they ended, it is the Capitol’s retaliation that really seems to cause her to be wracked by symptoms of post-traumatic stress. It is on the Victory Tour that Katniss’s nightmares increase to the point that she wakes up screaming in spite of taking sleeping pills.

It is not until the revolution is well underway that Katniss fully realizes just how strong the Capitol’s hold has always been over the victors—while her actions make her particularly prone to arousing the Capitol’s ire, the Capitol has never been particularly kind to those who win the Games. Johanna, unlike Katniss, is untroubled by jabberjays mimicking the sounds of tortured loved ones because, as she says, “They can’t hurt me. I’m not like the rest of you. There’s no one left I love” (Catching Fire 418), which may suggest that any loved ones from her own district were murdered by the Capitol after Johanna became a victor. This may seem like a far-fetched inference to make until one considers the backgrounds of Finnick, who was blackmailed into prostitution out of a desire to protect his loved ones, and Haymitch, whose family was killed because he, like Katniss, made the Capitol feel threatened by the unconventional way he won his Games. In fact, the only relevant difference between Haymitch’s and Katniss’s actions in the Games were that Katniss’s actions not only defied the Capitol but actually incited revolt, whereas Haymitch’s did not.

After the decimation of District 12 and Katniss’s escape to District 13, the psychological warfare of the Capitol continues to serve as a weapon against the victors, particularly Katniss, and by extension against the rebellion. This could actually be said to have started at the beginning of Katniss’s second Games when Cinna was beaten up in front of her, but its frequency and severity takes a sharp uptick in Mockingjay. Conditioned by a life spent carefully attempting to avoid aggravating the Capitol in any way, Katniss feels guilt when she visits the remains of District 12, blasted after her escape from the arena, and sees bodies “reeking in various states of decomposition, carrion for scavengers, blanketed by flies. I killed you, I think as I pass a pile. And you. And you” (Mockingjay 6). The Capitol’s torturing of Peeta also serves as long-distance warfare against Katniss with which they attempt to cripple not only him but also her. The roses that Katniss associates with President Snow serve as psychological warfare on several occasions, including the discovery of the roses in District 12 and the hideous rose-scented muttations in the sewer that call Katniss by name. Of course, there are also many more general instances of PTSD to be found in the other tributes, such as Johanna’s fear of water and Annie’s mental illness.

Finally, it could be argued that the effects of war, mistrust, and PTSD start to turn the supposed heroes of the trilogy, and Katniss in particular, into anti-heroes who bring about realities just as dystopian as the ones they are fighting against. On a wider scale, the anti-hero concept can be seen in District 13, which uses Katniss as a tool just as heartlessly as the Capitol did, and where President Coin seems poised to become just as much of a dictator as President Snow—to the point where Katniss chooses to shoot her rather than Snow. On a more personal level, Katniss in her child-soldier role seems to have become equally heartless, having transformed into more of a killing machine than she ever was in her first games, killing an unarmed Capitol citizen and shortly thereafter mowing down countless people in the Capitol streets. “Peacekeeper, rebel, citizen, who knows?” she says. “Everything that moves is a target” (Mockingjay 398). This is very different from the Games—where Katniss knew who she was killing, did so for her own survival (and Rue’s or Peeta’s), and frequently felt empathy for her victims.

Toward the end of the trilogy, however, Katniss seems to have a growing awareness of the pointlessness and evil of the violence she is both experiencing and inflicting, and again starts to feel, if not exactly empathy, then at least a weary discomfort with war. The key to unlocking this emotion is realizing that her own actions, and Coin’s actions, are endangering the lives of children just as much as President Snow ever did. Before Coin even proposes her own Hunger Games, Katniss feels deeply uneasy about the death of the Capitol girl in the lemon-yellow coat (Mockingjay 397) and the District 13-instigated attack of the children serving as a human shield for the President’s mansion, which results in Prim’s death. The latter incident is a particularly poignant example of the sort of anti-heroism of war at this point in the story, since it seems likely Gale played a role in devising this trap.

In conclusion, the world of Panem contains a number of elements that make the Hunger Games trilogy a classic, chilling example of dystopia. Many of the themes are ones familiar to readers of dystopia—authoritarian governments and surveillance, for example—but the Hunger Games trilogy has a particularly modern resonance with its use of themes such as class/racial friction, the use of media to manipulate viewpoints and simultaneously entertain/control the masses, oppression of the lower socioeconomic tiers, and the ensuing rage and desire for a revolution of the social order. The presence of such elements is especially poignant when one considers that the trilogy is supposedly intended for children and, as such, is frequently seen as just a frivolous mainstream franchise. On the contrary, it could instead be argued that the mature nature of many of the themes touched upon in the trilogy mean it deserves to be taken more serious in literary circles as a work of dystopian literature.

Works Cited

Collins, Suzanne. Catching Fire. Scholastic, 2009.

Collins, Suzanne. The Hunger Games. Scholastic, 2008.

Collins, Suzanne. Mockingjay. Scholastic, 2010.

Latham, Don and Jonathan Hollister. “The Games People Play: Information and Media Literacies in the Hunger Games.” Children’s Literature in Education, vol. 45, issue 1, Mar. 2014. 33–146. Web. Retrieved 9 Nov. 2020.

Tompkins, Joe. “The Makings of a Contradictory Franchise: Revolutionary Melodrama and Cynicism in the Hunger Games.” Journal of Cinema & Media Studies, vol. 58, issue 1, Oct. 2018. 70–90. Web. Retrieved 9 Nov. 2020.

Writing the World 2020 by Shannon Roch is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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The Hunger Games

Suzanne collins, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

Division and Control

Panem is a dictatorship ruled by President Snow and predicated on authoritarian control. President Snow maintains his control by sowing division among Panem’s people—divvying up the country into twelve districts—and ensuring their dependence upon the government. Each of the districts specializes in producing particular goods—and only those goods—and therefore relies on centralized distribution in order to survive, and this dependence is further enforced through rules like the one against poaching, which prevents residents from augmenting…

Love, Loyalty, and Compassion

In the harsh environment of the Hunger Games, it is normal for tributes to form temporary “alliances” for strategic purposes, only to eventually kill their allies when the time comes. Yet though the Games turn tributes into brutal competitors who know only that they must kill or be killed, Katniss forms not alliances but relationships . First, she volunteers for the Games in place of her little sister, Prim . Because District 12 has a…

Societal Inequality

In The Hunger Games , social inequality occurs at all levels: throughout the nation of Panem, among the twelve districts, and among the inhabitants of any given district. It is this inequity that breeds strife and creates the main conflicts of the book. In Panem, for example, wealth is heavily concentrated in the hands of those living in the Capitol, and the result is that they can’t even comprehend the lives of the poor. The…

Appearances

The Hunger Games are set up as entertainment for the citizens of the Capitol and are essentially a very extreme reality television show. As with American reality TV, appearances matter a lot in the Hunger Games, and they don’t always depict reality. The tributes need to learn how to appeal to their viewers in the Capitol so that they can gather support from sponsors. In Katniss’s case, she pretends to be in love with Peeta …

By celebrating and watching the Hunger Games, the citizens of the Capitol suggest that the tributes, drawn from the districts of Panem, don’t deserve the same security and respect that the people of the Capitol do. They suggest that the tributes are beneath them. However, during the course of the Games, many of the competitors prove that they’re more capable of feeling genuine emotion—and acting on it—than the citizens of the Capitol who watch the…

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The Hunger Games, or 1984 in the entertainment era

2012, JAST - Journal of American Studies of Turkey

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The study deals with the aspects of political dystopia in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games. The objective of study is to describe the aspects of political dystopia occur in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games. The data were analyzed by identifying the statements found in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games. The findings show that there are five aspects of political dystopia occur in the novel. The five aspects are: a) Totalitarian Government, b) Political Repression, c) Dehumanization, d) Restrictions of Freedom, e) Oppression which Led to the Rebellion. From those aspects, it is concluded that political dystopia occur in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games. Keyword : prose, novel, science fiction, political dystopia

novia indri wijayanti

This research discussed the social class relations in the novel The Hunger Games written by Suzanne Collins. The purposes of this study explain how the ruling class control the entire population even they can control the society to obey the rules and how the population reacton toward the domination of the ruling class. This novel tells about how the Capitol people make District residents obey their orders and the various systems implemented in the city of Panem. This research used Marxism theory especially in the domination of power by the ruling class. The method used is descriptive qualitative. The author uses qualitative methods to explain the ways of Capitol controls the District residents and the reactions of the District residents over the domination in the city of Panem. The author takes several quotes from novels related to the Capitol system and the reactions of the District residents. The result of this study showed that the ruling class has a variety of ways to maintain t...

JURNAL ILMU BUDAYA

Fathu Rahman

The aim of this research is to describe the reflection of the global capitalism system in Suzanne Collins’s novel The Hunger Games. This research also explains on how the influences between The Hunger Games with the portrait of the global capitalism in the world. The research uses qualitative descriptive methods trough sociology of literature theory. It focuses on the relation of intrinsic elements in the literary works with the reality aspect from the society. The data constitute both primary and supporting data. The primary data was taken from the novel itself The Hunger Games, while supporting data are taken from books, theses, journal and articles from internet which related to the topic of the research. The result of research shows that The Hunger Games novel represented the global capitalism system in many ways. The differences between Capitol and all districts considered as the symbol of capitalism system where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. The government of Pa...

Sandra Fetouni

Suzanne Collins’ young adult novels The Hunger Games trilogy present a dystopian tale told through the eyes of the protagonist Katniss Everdeen. While the novels lift several topics that are common in dystopian fiction, this essay will focus on the controlling power of the governments introduced in the novels, one led by President Coriolanus Snow and the other led by President Alma Coin. I use Antonio Gramsci’s theory of hegemony and John Gaventa’s theory of power as frameworks to discuss and compare the Presidents’ ruling powers over their respective societies. Furthermore, I also use Gene Sharp’s theory of nonviolence as a foundation to examine a nonviolent approach to the rebellion presented in the novels. The aim of this essay is to illustrate that the trilogy makes readers question the governing powers at play. I argue that Collins is problematizing our understanding of what a good and bad governing power is by blurring the thin line between the dystopian and utopian societies ...

unpublished MA thesis

Ceren Alkan Üstün

The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, is a narrative embodying significantly dystopian elements such as an oppressive ruling regime, advanced technologies of surveillance, and constant threat on human life, which then transforms into a revolution narrative. This thesis presents an analysis of The Hunger Games in terms of notions of hope and revolution, in comparison to classical examples of dystopian literature such as Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four. First I look at the discussions on genre limits within utopian literature as well as criticisms brought to utopian thinking in general. Acknowledging hope as an ambivalent concept, I approach The Hunger Games beyond the framework of currently introduced sub-genres of critical utopia and critical dystopia. Using the means provided by the concepts of ―cruel optimism‖ and ―militant pessimism‖, I take hope as two different categories and emphasize hope‘s potential for operating in favor of the existing system as well as being a revolution trigger. Using critical discourse analysis, I examine The Hunger Games and the revolutionary interest it embodies in relation to the transition of individual hope to collective hope, through acts of solidarity. Finally, based on the critical approach that the trilogy presents for revolution, in terms of devotion to a leader and use of violence, I examine how power may take over utopian dreams.

Bridget Nyambura

Andreea Rosca

This paper provides evidence of the fruitfulness of combining analytical categories from Cognitive Linguistics and Critical Discourse Analysis for the analysis of complex literary characterizations. It does so through a detailed study of the "tributes", i.e. the randomly selected children who have to fight to death in a nationally televised show, in The Hunger Games. The study proves the effectiveness of such categories to provide an analytically accurate picture of the dystopian world depicted in the novel, which is revealed to include a paradoxical element of hope. The type of dehumanization that characterizes the dystopian society of Panem is portrayed through an internally consistent set of ontological metaphors which project negative aspects of lower forms of existence onto people. This selection of metaphors promotes a biased perspective on the poor inhabitants of Panem, while legitimizing the social inequalities the wealthy Capitol works hard to immortalize. However, Katniss undergoes a metamorphosis through her discovery of her own identity, which hints at an emerging female empowerment. This transformation, together with her identification with the Mockingjay, a supernatural being that voices her beliefs and emotions, contributes to disrupting the status quo imposed by the almighty Gamemakers and to purveying a message of optimism.

John Schaefer

This paper explores the dystopian imaginaries of the recent popular novel trilogy "The Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins and its film adaptations. Having put the narrative into a genealogy of dystopian fiction concerned with the historical nation-state totalitarianisms, I ask what is specifically contemporary about "The Hunger Games". I explore this by focusing on the functioning of the reality show format in the narrative, which I link to G. Agamben's understanding of the spectacle, as part of his wider biopolitical theories. I apply an Agambenian biopolitical reading to the narrative, seeing it as a production of bare life through the camp of the reality show arena. I suggest that "The Hunger Games" offer a critique of contemporary liberal democracies by calling attention to their production of underclassed and expendable life, and crucially, an eruption of the nation-state right to kill, similarly as in Agamben's theories.

The Hunger Games

By suzanne collins.

'The Hunger Games' by Suzanne Collins captures the dangers of totalitarian regimes through the eyes of the protagonist, Katniss Everdeen.

About the Book

Article written by Neesha Thunga K

B.A. in English Literature, and M.A. in English Language and Literature.

It has a strong female protagonist who acts as the catalyst for several events in the book. The main characters are well-drawn out and the world-building is excellent. The tone of the novel reflects its gruesome contents , making The Hunger Games one of the best Young Adult novels released in recent times.

Terrors of a Totalitarian Regime

The minute we start reading The Hunger Games , it becomes clear that we are no longer dealing with the world as we know it today. We enter the post-apocalyptic nation of Panem where the autocratic President Snow has taken control, and there is no freedom anymore – merely the illusion of it remains.

This is revealed to us at the beginning when we are introduced to the history of Panem by the Mayor of District 12 during the reaping . A great amount of world-building occurs here, as we are provided information regarding the 13 districts , their rebellion, their punishment, and subsequently, the birth of the Hunger Games.

Throughout The Hunger Games , we are shown the callous nature of those at The Capitol who care for nothing other than their luxury and comfort – and of course, the suffering of those at the districts . Watching the tributes fight amongst themselves to the death every single year is what they live for, and what provides flavor and excitement in their superficial and heartless lives. 

President Snow appears benevolent but is actually ruthless. He will stop at nothing to maintain control. Everything he does is aimed at expressing dominance, to remind the people in the districts that the Capitol always wins. Most people in the districts have either accepted their fate or have resigned themselves to a life of misery. Those in the wealthier districts have deluded themselves into thinking that they are the Capitol’s favorite, which gives cause for tension throughout the novel. 

All of this showcases a totalitarian regime, but one of the major drawbacks of the novel is the fact that it does not go into detail. It is written in a matter-of-fact and superficial manner which does not quite capture the gravity of the content. Nevertheless, it achieves the kind of world-building that is required for the readers to understand the plot, and sets the foundation for the sequels well.

The Spark Lit by Katniss Everdeen

The entire story is narrated by the 16-year-old protagonist, Katniss Everdeen . As such, the novel is in the first-person point of view – something which allows us to experience the horrors of the Hunger Games first-hand.

We are privy only to those things that are related to Katniss, and as a teenager who has had to take on the role of primary provider early in life, there is not much on her mind other than keeping her family alive.

As such, the novel is more about Katniss and her thoughts, feelings, and actions per se than it is about the Hunger Games themselves. We understand the Games from her unique perspective – one that is disgusted by the Capitol and laced with sarcasm and irony. 

However, this is not how others in the novel treat the Hunger Games. For instance, the Career tributes have made it their life’s mission to excel at the hideous Games concocted by the Capitol, while those at the Capitol itself revel in the mass killings that take place.

On the contrary, Katniss’s fury at the injustice of the Games grows steadily (and subconsciously) until it ends with her “trick” with the berries. Although Katniss’s only hope behind consuming the berries was to be left alive with Peeta, the very fact that she thought of killing herself is a mark of her awareness, as well as her subtle forms of rebellion.

Katniss undergoes a remarkable change in the short period it takes to complete the Hunger Games, and she transforms from someone who cares only about her family to someone who is deeply affected by the injustice of the Capitol. There is even a point when she thinks of the death of a tribute as “murder.” She reflects on the word the minute it crosses her mind, ultimately concluding that it is a fitting word to use in the situation.

Katniss has a fire within her that is longing to burst forth. Coincidentally, she becomes the “Girl on Fire” with the help of Cinna ’s creations but the references to fire do not stop there. Katniss seems to spark a fire that spreads throughout the nation of Panem with everything she does. The spark she ignites provides an unpleasant jolt to the people of the Capitol, while it acts as a beacon of hope to those in the districts. Soon, Katniss becomes the person who everyone in Panem admires and looks up to, whether she wants them to or not.

Supporting Characters

The plot of The Hunger Games is brilliantly set forth and moves at a breathtakingly quick speed. This is more than enough to sustain the reader’s interest till the end. However, the novel is a little lacking in terms of characters. No character other than Katniss is fully developed, other than through the thoughts and feelings that Katniss has about them.

You might think that her relationships are better explained but this is not the case either. We do not really know much about her relationships with her sister, Prim, who is the very reason for all of the events in the novel. We know that Katniss loves Prim and would sacrifice almost everything for her, including herself, but we do not fully understand why.

Similarly, the other characters in the novel are not provided space for their own development. This is the case for Peeta Mellark , Katniss’s co-tribute and love interest as well as President Snow, the main antagonist of the novel.

All of this could be attributed to the fact that The Hunger Games caters to a younger audience, i.e., young adults, but the novel is still missing some crucial character development.

The Final Pages of The Hunger Games

The concluding pages of the novel credit Suzanne Collins’ ability to hook the reader in. She introduces several twists in the novel, with the final one taking everyone by surprise. The reader is taken on a rollercoaster, where they are given hope (much like the characters themselves) that both Katniss and Peeta would survive, and subsequently given to despair as that hope is snatched away by the Gamemakers .

Ultimately, however, Katniss and Peeta end up surviving, and they come back home. The concluding pages also set the foundation for the sequel, which is based on the Capitol’s fury at Katniss’s rebellion. Lastly, we are left with the love triangle between Katniss, Peeta, and Gale, which takes shape in the next novel, Catching Fire .

Thus, the last pages of the novel act as a spark, much like Katniss herself, for the trilogy of The Hunger Games as a whole.

Did they kill Cinna?

Cinna remains alive by the end of The Hunger Games book 1. However, due to his transgressions in Book 2, where he creates a deceptive Mockingjay outfit for Katniss, he is tortured and killed.

Is Cinna in love with Katniss?

No, Cinna is not in love with Katniss. As her stylist, it is Cinna’s job to make Katniss look appealing to the public. He sees Katniss naked many times, but he looks at her body only professionally (to assess the outfits she needs to wear) and never romantically.

Who is Haymitch to Katniss?

Haymitch is Katniss’s mentor in the 74th and 75th Hunger Games . He is an alcoholic who drowns his sorrows in drink, but comes to care for Katniss very deeply. He tries his best to keep Katniss alive both times she’s in the arena .

Did Katniss ever love Gale?

Katniss does love Gale, but only as a friend. Though Gale confesses that he loves her, Katniss never viewed him as a romantic partner. She is closer to him than anyone else because of their hunting and poaching days, until she forms a bond with Peeta.

The Hunger Games Review: A True Young Adult Dystopian Fiction

• Writing Style
• Lasting Effect on the Reader

The Hunger Games review

The Hunger Games is a highly memorable young adult dystopian fiction. It is one of a kind and deals with several important themes that are relevant even in our world. The plot and pace of the novel are praiseworthy. It is commendable in terms of world-building and leaves an impression on the reader in an unsettling and uncanny manner. However, character development is weak and superficial.

• Incredible plot and setting
• Relevant despite being unsettling
• Good world-building
• Provides an immersive experience through the use of a first-person point of view
• Characters other than the protagonist are not well-developed
• Lazy writing at times
• Falls prey to the clichéd love triangle

About Neesha Thunga K

Neesha, born to a family of avid readers, has devoted several years to teaching English and writing for various organizations, making an impact on the literary community.

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Home — Essay Samples — Entertainment — The Hunger Games — Social Issue of Government Control in “The Hunger Games”

Social Issue of Government Control in "The Hunger Games"

• Categories: The Hunger Games

About this sample

Words: 1047 |

Published: Sep 1, 2020

Words: 1047 | Pages: 2 | 6 min read

Table of contents

Government control theme throughout the "hunger games" scenes, oppression and inequality, works cited.

• Collins, S. (2008). The Hunger Games. Scholastic.
• Ross, G. (Director). (2012). The Hunger Games [Film]. Lionsgate.
• Foster, T. (2013). Government Control and Subversion in The Hunger Games Trilogy. In S. H. Geczy (Ed.), The Politics of The Hunger Games (pp. 47-60). McFarland.
• Baker, J. (2016). Oppression and Rebellion in Dystopian Fiction: A Comparative Analysis of The Hunger Games and 1984. The Journal of Popular Culture, 49(5), 993-1008.
• Patel, N. (2018). Control and Resistance: Governmental Power and Rebellion in The Hunger Games Trilogy. In M. Battis (Ed.), The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters (pp. 163-166). Routledge.
• Levine, G. (2015). From the Page to the Screen: Adaptation and Resistance in The Hunger Games. In M. J. Clarke (Ed.), The Hunger Games Phenomenon: Essays on the Suzanne Collins Trilogy (pp. 85-99). McFarland.
• Mathieu, J. (2014). Dystopian Fiction and Political Ideology: An Analysis of Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games Trilogy. The Looking Glass: New Perspectives on Children's Literature, 17(1), 1-17.
• Stutzman, C. (2013). The Hunger Games: Rebellion and Resistance. In N. J. Sokoloff (Ed.), The Science Fiction Handbook (pp. 144-155). Wiley-Blackwell.
• Knapp, P. A. (2017). Control and Resistance in Dystopian Fiction: An Analysis of The Hunger Games. The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 90(6), 216-221.
• The Harry Potter Alliance. (n.d.). The Odds In Our Favor Campaign.

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