The rest of my Hunger Games thoughts
Spoiler alert. Spoiler alert. Let me say it again: spoiler alert.
I finished the trilogy a couple of weeks ago. I got into the swing of the series, understood the way it was crafted, and enjoyed myself immensely. The new Robert Cormier, if you ask me. “Young adult” fiction that pulls no punches, deals with death, loss, physical and emotional torture, and violence. The whole gamut. But the real question is, did I feel like it went far enough with the concepts underpinning the world of Panem, and did it do justice to the political concepts which I hoped were being foreshadowed in the first book?
Yes, yes, a million times yes. Class struggles, the futility of war, moral grey areas (was anyone else surprised by Katniss voting in favour of one final Hunger Games?), brainwashing - the only topic author Suzanne Collins didn’t really engage with, which I hoped she would, was whether the ‘love’ that Katniss and Peeta shared wasn’t irrevocably flawed and doomed due to its origin in, y’know, bloodshed, torture and murder. But I’ll forgive her that, because she spent enough time creating a love triangle which (in my eyes) was a very useful narrative tool for unpacking Katniss’ emotional issues which were unavoidable when she grew up in the hell that was Panem. Collins seemed to go the fairytale ending at the very last second of “love can overcome all odds”, after clearly and powerfully communicating to the reader just how overwhelming and embittering those odds can be.
And you know what? I wanted a resolution to that love story, and I got it, and like I said last time, in honour of my own young adulthood (or what I call ‘girlhood’, after having studied these terms to death, but don’t get me started), I appreciate the author giving the readers a bit of romance. Did Cormier ever do that? I loved After The First Death, but come on, that kind of romance makes a reader want to claw their own eyes out rather than have to endure that suffering. (Impeccable writing and narrative delivery, horrific concept.) (Go read it, I’m not telling you what happened.)
Anyway, if someone asked me “yes but is The Hunger Games feminist?” I would say, yes, yes it is, because it challenges so many traditional, conventional and contemporary tropes of femininity and girlhood, because it effortlessly puts up a girl in the role of hunter, provider, murderer, fighter, revolutionary, and, yes, lover.
Go read them. Enjoy.
