The Meaning Behind "The Hunger Games"

         

*I'm going to be completely honest I've only read the first several books of this series, and am getting some of my other information from other articles and the movies.

           Fiction books are often highly regarded for their made-up stories, but very rarely is the deeper meaning of these novels critically analyzed. The Hunger Games saga, specifically the first book in the series, is an example of the social statements a dystopian novel can portray.

           Suzanne Collins's writings have become a staple of primary to high school reading, and thus the story of Katniss Everdeen volunteering to fight in a 24-child government-enforced death fight has also become famous. The plotline describes the way Katniss must force an act to overcome the cruelties of the capitol, and gain the commercial support of rich businessmen to receive advantages in the games. She becomes a public figure in the capitol because of her pretend love for Peeta Mellark, and her quiet but confident nature later helps her backstab the capitol with the rebels in a violent war.

So what is the meaning of such a story?

           Because of the Hunger Games' fictitious nature it's hard to place an objective meaning on the novel. However, we can take from the plot that the members of the capitol are tyrannical and evil; they force the districts to provide them with their labor and products and in return make the citizens live in fear of being reaped for the games.

There are two possible explanations (I could think of) for why the book portrays the capitol in this way:

The series is anti-war. 

            The first book eludes to the capitol's reign over the districts, specifically it describes how the powerhouse city forces each district to give them a specific good, based on what that region is known for producing. This, as well as the games, are products of a war which the capitol won and profited from by inducing fear throughout the nation. Suzanne Collins could possibly be making a statement on the negative affects of war--the implication that war made the lives of the common person miserable.

            "The Hunger Games" saga also shows how war can change people. When Katniss leads the rebellion against the capitol she motivates thousands of people of the lower class districts to lay their lives down. Everyone looked up to her, and went into battle hoping that they could help the greater good by doing so.

             By the end of the battles, Coin, the political leader of the rebels, proposes to set up a hunger game between the capitol kids--this idea disgusts the majority of previous hunger game tributes and council people who risked their lives for freedom. By this point, even Katniss, who was the confident leader in battle, was completely altered mentally. She had witnessed deaths of loved ones at the hands of war and the games; Katniss realized the war had resulted in similar tyrannical nature from Coin and although it freed the exploited districts, it had already done its damage on the society the rebels would have to restructure.

The series is pro-revolution.

             I know this sounds contradictory to my previous reason, however revolution doesn't just entail the violence of the capitol and rebels' fights. The intellectual revolution of the people is also present throughout Suzanne Collins' writing; the people of Panem (aside from the capitol) witnessed how Katniss reacted in the games and had funerals for fallen tributes, and decided that they could use their majority numbers to defeat the gruesome capitol guards in their district. 

             It must be noted that despite there still being some bad apples, the revolution and war of the saga created a more ethical system by the climax--no longer were laborers in the districts getting exploited and put in poverty, and no longer were the games and abuse of the capitol relevant. 

            Regardless of Collins' intended message, the series clearly attempts to make a statement on tyrannical governments' effects and how they end. The reader's interpretation of this fictional work can prove to bring about insightful discussions on real-world issues; these sorts of novels motivate students to form opinions on various concepts.

-Dan