Never in Your Favour: Precarity, Trust, and Consumption in Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games Trilogy

Neuroscience and Young Adult Fiction: A Recipe for Trouble?

Reviewed by: Contemporary Dystopian Fiction for Young Adults: Brave New Teenagers ed. by Balaka Basu, Katherine R. Broad, Carrie Hintz Susan Tan (bio) Balaka Basu, Katherine R. Broad, and Carrie Hintz, eds. Contemporary Dystopian Fiction for Young Adults: Brave New Teenagers. New York: Routledge, 2013. Contemporary Dystopian Fiction for Young Adults, edited by Balaka Basu, Katherine R. Broad, and Carrie Hintz, is a robust and comprehensive anthology. While the young adult (YA) dystopia is a relatively recent phenomenon, many of the texts covered in this anthology already have been subject to critical discussions centering on similar questions of self, politics, and gender. It is a testament, then, to the rigorous construction of the collection that each chapter offers incisive, fresh insight into this burgeoning field of academic study. In their introduction, the editors set out a comprehensive framework for the essays to follow: defining YA dystopian literature, examining the genre traditions it draws upon, and reviewing the genre’s central themes. Throughout, the editors draw attention to three main discussions that unite the anthology: the dynamic between didacticism and escapism, political radicalism and conservatism, and hope and despair. Acknowledging the many contradictions within the genre of YA dystopia itself, the editors make it clear that they do not seek to achieve consensus or to draw any overarching conclusions. Rather, the “aim” of the collection “is to enable a prismatic understanding of the genre as a political, cultural, and aesthetic phenomenon” (9), opening new forums for academic dialogue and pointing toward possible new readings within this recent spate of texts. The collection is divided into four thematic sections. The first, “Freedom and Constraint: Adolescent Liberty and Self-Determination,” examines the interplay between maturation and dystopia. This section includes some of the strongest essays in the collection; particularly noteworthy is Basu’s “What Faction Are You In? The Pleasure of Being Sorted in Veronica Roth’s Divergent.” Aligning Roth’s novel with the “anti-utopia,” Basu notes Divergent’s ultimate push toward social complacency, an idea that is reinforced in marketing campaigns for the Divergent film, which encourage fans to “sort” themselves into the factions so central to dystopia within Roth’s world. Another striking contribution, Carissa Turner Smith’s “Embodying the Postmetropolis in Catherine Fisher’s Incarceron and Sapphique,” employs Edward Soja’s notion of the postmetropolis in a reading of urban dystopias. Uniting discussions of coming-of-age, embodiment, and spatial theory, Smith suggests an elucidating link between “social anxieties” caused by the “unstable geographies” of the postmetropolis and the cultural anxieties that surround the adolescent body (62). The second section, “Society and Environment: Building a Better World,” focuses on ecological dystopias and post-apocalyptic narratives. Its essays examine the interplay between nature and technology in a wide range of YA dystopian fiction, and effectively question the ways adolescents are often [End Page 234] linked with destructive technologies and dystopian decline. Elaine Ostry’s “The Role of Young Adult Culture in Environmental Degradation” draws together the many strands of this section, exploring whether ambivalent endings might push young readers toward environmental activism. Acknowledging the tension between “somewhat forced and infantilizing” happy endings and the otherwise bleak narratives that precede them, Ostry posits that “despair and inconclusiveness may encourage adolescents to face inconvenient truths,” particularly in a world that is “becoming increasingly urban,” where adolescents no longer “have the luxury of thinking of nature as a utopian escape” (111). The essays grouped under “Radical or Conservative? Polemics of the Future,” explore the kinds of social critique proffered by recent YA dystopias. Broad’s “Utopia as Romance in Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games Trilogy” stands out as a thought-provoking reading of gender and feminism in Collins’s series. Positioning Katniss’s romantic interest, Peeta, as a figure of utopian change, Broad argues that the end of The Hunger Games taps into the more conservative impulses of the romance genre, undercutting protagonist Katniss Everdeen as feminist icon. Kristi McDuffie’s “Technology and Models of Literacy in Young Adult Dystopian Fiction” offers an innovative take on the dynamic between technology, social decline, and adolescence, pointing toward the impulse to associate traditional reading and writing with nostalgia and positive change. McDuffie ultimately argues...

Recent years have witnessed a spike in the sales of dystopian fiction, especially in the category of post-apocalyptic literature. Moreover, dystopian fiction is no longer directed to adults only, for many post-apocalyptic works fall now under the category of young adult (YA) literature. The massive production and consumption of such works, which present a pessimistic and catastrophic vision of the world, reflect the fear that has invaded the world since the 1960s due to the effects of the Cold War. One major post-apocalyptic work that was produced in the last few years is Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games trilogy (published in 2008, 2009 and 2010) which presents a sinister view of the future, hence warning against the consequences that are to be expected should authoritarianism remain unchecked. The linguistic choices made by an author contribute to the construction of the message he/she is trying to convey. Hence, this paper aims to analyze the linguistic indicators of point of view, proposed by Short (2013) and Black (2006), in Collins’ first book of the trilogy in an attempt to investigate how such indicators contribute to creating an atmosphere of gloominess and uneasiness. Such atmosphere serves as a warning against a catastrophic future to be expected should dictatorships and totalitarian regimes be allowed to last.

Reviewed by: Female Rebellion in Young Adult Dystopian Fiction ed. by Sara K. Day, Miranda A. Green-Barteet, and Amy L. Montz Kaylee Jangula Mootz (bio) Female Rebellion in Young Adult Dystopian Fiction. Edited by Sara K. Day, Miranda A. Green-Barteet, and Amy L. Montz. Farnham, UK: Ashgate, 2014. In the past ten years, the dystopian subsection of young adult fiction has exploded in popularity. With Amazon.com listing over four thousand titles in this category, and the enormous Hunger Games and Divergent series’ fan base, this collection couldn’t have come at a better time. Divided into three sections, the essays presented here analyze how female protagonists of this genre navigate gender, sexuality, relationships, and self-discovery while dealing with the oppressive regimes under which they live. The authors generally follow a similar pattern of outlining an analytical framework, giving a brief plot overview, and then delving into a deeper exploration of the text. While some are more heavily theoretical than others, all of the essays in the collection draw on contemporary scholarship in the field of young adult literature and offer excellent insight into what it means to be a rebellious teen girl in the dystopian future. Section 1 includes four essays, of which the first two focus on how rebellion complicates and shapes [End Page 208] subjectivity and gender in the selected novels; the second two examine the ways in which selected dystopian young adult works fail to seize the genre’s potential to break down existing stereotypes and gender norms. The first essay, Sonya Sawyer Fritz’s “Girl Power and Girl Activism in the Fiction of Suzanne Collins, Scott Westerfeld, and Moira Young,” examines the protagonists of three trilogies—Katniss in The Hunger Games, Tally in Uglies, and Saba in Dust Lands—as celebrations of the defiant teen girl. By layering discussions of Girl Power and comparing the protagonists to the Riot Grrrls of the early 1990s, Fritz explores how these protagonists depict the complications of being a politically active, empowered girl in the twenty-first century. She argues that these novels contribute to developing a new era of feminism and encourage readers to activism. Perhaps the most distinctive of the essays in the collection, the third essay in this section, Rachel Dean-Ruzicka’s “Of Scrivens and Sparks: Girl Geniuses in Young Adult Dystopian Fiction,” analyzes two steampunk dystopias, Fever Crumb and Girl Genius. Dean-Ruzicka begins her article by describing the “Draw a Scientist” test, which measures the perceptions of children about professionals in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields. Overwhelmingly, this test shows that children perceive scientists as male. Dean-Ruzicka uses this example to frame her argument that dystopian fiction has the potential to break down stereotypes about women in STEM fields and offer positive role models for female readers interested in STEM. However, she finds that both female protagonists examined here reinforce gendered stereotypes and fail to offer engaging role models for female readers. The second section focuses on the performance of gender via beauty, fashion, and gendered behaviors. The first of its four essays, Meghan Gilbert-Hickey’s “Gender Rolls: Bread and Resistance in the ‘Hunger Games’ Trilogy,” provides an in-depth analysis of the significance of bread throughout the trilogy. Gilbert-Hickey also argues that the characters in Collins’s trilogy do not simply reverse gender roles, but complicate and diversify them. Though she remarks on several characters, her primary focus is on Katniss, who, neither wholly masculine nor wholly feminine, represents and performs androgyny; she willingly performs both femininity and masculinity in order to survive and to take care of those she loves. Gilbert-Hickey argues that this blending of gender roles and the act of giving bread becomes a form of rebellion. Of all the essays in the collection, I find the fourth essay in this section to be the most interesting. “‘Perpetually waving to an unseen crowd’: Satire and Process in Beauty Queens,” by Bridgitte Barclay, focuses on disability, race, and non-normative sexuality in a way that the other essays do not. Though some essays remark on the troubling implications of hetero-normative romance in young adult dystopian fictions and the relative lack...

This study explores the psychological coping mechanisms employed by Katniss Everdeen in <em>The Hunger Games</em> using Sigmund Freud’s defense mechanism theory. Through qualitative analysis of key scenes, the research identifies various defense mechanisms, including repression, denial, displacement, projection, regression, rationalization, sublimation, reaction formation, and intellectualization. These mechanisms serve as crucial survival strategies, enabling Katniss to navigate the extreme psychological and physical challenges imposed by the oppressive society of Panem. The findings reveal that Katniss unconsciously employs defense mechanisms to cope with trauma, anxiety, and fear. Repression allows her to suppress painful memories, while denial helps her manage the reality of the deadly Hunger Games. Displacement manifests in her redirected frustration, while projection highlights her insecurities. Regression appears in moments of emotional vulnerability, whereas rationalization helps justify her actions. Sublimation channels her distress into strategic survival, reaction formation masks her fears, and intellectualization allows her to detach emotionally and focus on survival tactics. By applying Freud’s psychoanalytic framework, this study emphasizes the role of psychological resilience in literature and movie, demonstrating how defense mechanisms function as both coping strategies and narrative tools. The research contributes to the intersection of literary and psychological studies by offering insight into how characters reflect real-world psychological responses to oppression and adversity. <em>The Hunger Games</em> not only portrays a dystopian struggle for survival but also serves as a commentary on human resilience, trauma, and resistance. This study underscores the significance of psychoanalysis in understanding character development and thematic depth in dystopian fiction. By analyzing Katniss’ psychological responses, the research provides a broader understanding of how defense mechanisms shape individual behavior under extreme circumstances, making <em>The Hunger Games</em> a compelling study of human psychology in literature and cinema.

While Young Adult dystopian texts commonly manipulate expectations of time and space, it is largely in a linear sense—projecting futuristic scenarios, shifting the contemporary reader into a speculative space sometimes only slightly removed from contemporary social, political, or environmental concerns (Booker 3; McDonough and Wagner 157). These concerns are projected into the future, having followed their natural trajectory and come to a dystopian present. Authors write words and worlds of warning in a postapocalyptic landscape, drawing from and confirming established dystopian tropes, and affirming the activist power of teenage protagonists in cultivating change. This article examines the intersections between dystopian Young Adult literature and Indigenous Futurisms, and the possibilities for sharing or encoding Indigenous Knowledge through the disruption or revision of genre, where the act itself become a movement of activism and survival echoed in text. Lynette James acknowledges the “ruptures” (157) Indigenous authors have made in the genre through incorporating Indigenous Knowledge into story as an embedded element – not only of narrative, but of structure. Ambelin Kwaymullina, of the Palyku people of the Pilbara region of Western Australia, exemplifies this approach in her disruption or rupture of the dystopian genre in her embodiment of Indigenous Knowledge in the Young Adult (YA) text The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf. Kwaymullina centres Indigenous Knowledge throughout the trilogy, offering a powerful revision of key tropes of the dystopian YA genre, creating a perspective that privileges Indigenous Knowledge. This is most significantly identified through her depiction of time as a non-linear concept, at once realised narratively, conceptually, and structurally in the text. The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf, the first of a trilogy of novels in “The Tribe” series, presents a futuristic post-apocalyptic world, set 300 years after the Reckoning, a cataclysmic environmental disaster. The protagonist, Ashala Wolf, is one of a number of people with supernatural abilities that are outlawed by their government and labelled Illegals. As the novel begins, Ashala is being interrogated by the villainous Neville Rose, held in a detention centre as she plots to escape, free her fellow detainees, and return to the Tribe in the Firstwood. The plot draws from historical and contemporary parallels in Australia, yet part of the text’s subversive power is that these parallels and connections are never made explicit on the page. The reader is invited to become an active participant in coding meaning by applying their own understandings of the context and connections, creating an inter-subjective dialogue between reader and text, and Indigenous and non-Indigenous knowing. This article looks to the first novel in the trilogy as the key exemplifier of the disruption of genre and knowledge through the representation of time. It is in this novel that these concepts are established and realised most clearly, being predominantly from Ashala’s perspective as a direct descendant of Indigenous Australians, with the following two novels divided between Ashala, Georgie, and Ember as polyphonic narrative focalisers. Acting as an introduction to the series, The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf presents a foundation for readers to challenge their perceptions on both genre and knowledge. Kwaymullina entangles the two, imbuing knowledge throughout narrative and structure which in turn disrupts genre. In her revisioning of narrative through genre and structural focus of time as a non-linear concept, Kwaymullina puts into practice Conrad Scott’s argument that “the potential healing of moments or processes of crisis in Indigenous dystopias is never possible without a strategic engagement with narrative itself, and even the formal aspects of the text” (73).While the series fits the conventions of the dystopian genre, it has been more commonly identified as speculative fiction, or Indigenous futurism, as Kwaymullina herself defines her work. James notes the significance of acknowledging a text as Indigenous futurism, writing, “identifying a work as Indigenous futurism rather than simply as YA dystopia asks readers, critics, and scholars to adjust their orientation in ways that may radically alter both their perception and reception of it” (153). For the purposes of this article, I acknowledge the clear value and importance of identifying the text as Indigenous futurism, but also find value in the movements that define the shift from dystopian literature to Indigenous futurism, in its engagement with and recasting of dystopian conventions in the text. In embedding Indigenous Knowledge in her worldbuilding and narrative, Kwaymullina actively rewrites dystopian expectations and tropes. These notions would be expected or normalised when grounded in Indigenous futurism, but are regarded as a subversion and revision when read in dystopian fiction. The text engages directly with the specific tropes and expectations of dystopian genre—its significance in rewriting the spaces, narratives, and structures of the genre cannot be overstated. The employment of the dystopian genre as both framework and space of revision speaks to larger debates of the value of dystopian fiction in examining socio-cultural issues over other genres such as realism. Critics argue the speculative nature of dystopian fiction that remains linked to concerns of the present and past allows audiences to envision and experience their own transformative experience, effecting political change (Kennon; Mallan; Basu, Broad, and Hintz; Sypnowich). Balaka Basu, Katherine Broad, and Carrie Hintz argue that serious issues presented in fantastic futuristic scenarios “may provide young people with an entry point into real-world problems, encouraging them to think about social and political issues in new ways, or even for the first time” (4-5). Kerry Mallan notes the “ability of dystopian fiction to open up to readers a dystopian social elsewhere serves a double function: On the one hand, it offers readers an opportunity to reflect on their current existence to compare the similarities and differences between the real and the fictional; on the other, these stories implicitly exhort young people to take responsibility for their own lives and the future of society” (16). Drawing on these metanarrative structures with the interweaving of Indigenous knowledge increases the active responsibility for the reader. It invokes Nnedi Okorafor’s labelling of Indigenous Futurisms as “the most truthful way of telling the truth” (279), creating opportunities for the Indigenous and non-Indigenous reader to engage with narratives of a real apocalypse on invaded land. The dystopian setting and expectations form a buffer between reader and text (Basu, Broad, and Hintz 4), making the narrative more accessible to the reader without shying away from the embedded trauma, while drawing on dystopian fiction’s balance of despair and optimism (Basu, Broad, and Hintz 2).The stakes and value of dystopian fiction are heightened when engaging with Indigenous narratives and knowledge; as Claire Coleman (a Noongar woman from the south coast of Western Australia) notes, Indigenous Australians live in a post-apocalyptic state as “all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people alive today are the descendants of people who survived an apocalypse” (n.p.). James, quoting Uppinder Mehan, concurs, writing “these narrators are ‘survivors—or the descendants of survivors’ [162], not just of broken dystopian worlds or post-cataclysmic events but of the real historical legacies of slavery, conquest, and oppression” (157). Writing on Indigenous futurisms in dystopian and utopian fiction, Mary Morrison argues “people outside Western hegemonic power structures would likely be well-placed to transform the utopian imagination, to decolonize it” (11), acknowledging the significance in the intersection of genre and lived experience by author and character.Kwaymullina expands on this, noting that for Indigenous authors the tropes of speculative fiction are familiar lived experiences. She writes thatmany of the ideas that populate speculative-fiction books – notions of time travel, astral projection, speaking the languages of animals or trees – are part of Indigenous cultures. One of the aspects of my own novels that is regularly interpreted as being pure fantasy, that of an ancient creation spirit who sung the world into being, is for me simply part of my reality. (“Edges” 27)Kwaymullina affirms Coleman and James in her approach, writing “Indigenous people lived through the end of the world, but we did not end. We survived by holding on to our cultures, our kin, and our sense of what was right in a world gone terribly wrong” (“Edges” 29). The Tribe series demonstrates survivance, with Kwaymullina’s approach forming possibilities for intersubjective dialogues across genre. The concept is reinforced through Ashala’s repeated, joyful cries of hope throughout the text: “I live! We live! We survive!” (197, 200, 279, 391).Sara K. Day, Miranda A. Green-Barteet, and Amy L. Montz note dystopian literature considers possible futures from the outlook and failures of the present (8), arguing “the label ‘dystopia’ typically applies to works that simultaneously imagine futures and consider the present, essentially occupying a liminal space between these times” (Day, Green-Barteet, and Montz 9). This sense of liminality is heightened with the engagement of time from an Indigenous perspective; as Scott writes, “Indigenous dystopian fiction presents not only the crisis of the future but the ongoing crisis of the present time, and that which is still resonant from the past” (73). In “Respect, Relationships, Renewal: Aboriginal Perspectives on the Worlds of Tomorrow”, Kwaymullina notes that linear time can “become a tool of ideology, with colonial characterisa

Reviewed by: Agency in The Hunger Games: Desire, Intent, and Action in the Novels by Kayla Ann Victoria Carrico (bio) Agency in The Hunger Games: Desire, Intent, and Action in the Novels. By Kayla Ann. McFarland, 2020. Few series have captured the world’s attention at the scale of Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games trilogy. With the publication of the first book in 2008, an international obsession was born. The popularity of The Hunger Games spread like wildfire as young adult readers around the world soaked up the tragic, inspiring, hopeful tale, laughing, crying, and struggling alongside protagonist Katniss Everdeen as she fought for her life against the Capitol. For over a decade, scholars have investigated this popular series in depth, attempting to determine what has made the books so popular and what value they bring to the genre of dystopian literature. In Agency in The Hunger Games: Desire, Intent, and Action in the Novels, author Kayla Ann adds her voice to this scholarly discussion, focusing specifically on how characters utilize agency within the series. What separates this work from other analyses, beyond the specific attention to agency, is its target audience. While much analysis surrounding The Hunger Games is academic in nature, Ann writes for the everyday reader. “The purpose of this book,” she explains in the introduction, “is to build on previous scholarship with the direct intent of focusing the discussion on the evolution of personal agency as displayed by various characters in a way that is both enlightening and understandable for fellow Hunger Games enthusiasts” (3). The resulting text engages both scholars and fans, extending Hunger Games scholarship to include a broader audience. In refreshingly accessible language, this book delves into the complex topic of agency, defined in this context as “the individual’s ability to perform intentional actions based on his or her own beliefs and desires,” by systematically analyzing when, how, and to what extent major and minor characters successfully (or unsuccessfully) exercise agency within the trilogy (7). Ann also investigates how morality, power, and sacrifice influence a character’s ability to act as an independent agent. Throughout this investigation, she grapples with questions such as: “Can an individual truly retain agency if their actions are controlled by another?”; “Is the act of killing moral if it is self-defense?”; “Must agency be vocalized?”; and “Is shared agency more powerful than individual agency?” (10, 11, 12). In answering these questions, Ann encourages readers to think more critically about the motives, influences, and consequences surrounding characters’ actions. While not explicitly divided into major sections, readers will find that the first three chapters are dedicated to the main protagonist, Katniss Ever-deen, while later chapters investigate secondary and tertiary characters including Peeta Mellark, Gale Hawthorne, Cinna, Haymitch Abernathy, [End Page 413] Primrose Everdeen, Finnick Odair, Mags, Johanna Mason, and Beetee Latier. Ann uses each of these characters to explore a different facet of agency, revealing the depth and complexity of the topic. The first three chapters investigate agency through its connection to the human body, morality, and trauma, respectively. Within these pages, Ann suggests that Katniss’s agency is intricately linked to control over her own physical body, her adherence to a moral code, and her ability to confront and overcome trauma. One particularly interesting question Ann explores in chapters 1 and 3 is whether or not suicide constitutes agency. She compares two instances in which Katniss considers suicide within the trilogy, ultimately suggesting that the connection between suicide and agency depends on the motivation, logical reasoning, and situational context surrounding the act. This frank discussion, and many others within the first three chapters, illustrate Katniss’s agency as a fluid construct, something she constantly and cyclically fights for, gains, loses, and reclaims. This illustration of agency being consistently attainable offers readers a sense of hope, showing that they, too, have the ability to continuously strive towards personal agency. Chapters 4 and 5 shift the focus away from Katniss, toward the two characters closest to her: Peeta Mellark and Gale Hawthorne. Within these chapters, Ann thoughtfully analyzes each character’s identity, painting Peeta as a Messianic character whose actions are rooted in self-sacrifice and Gale as...

Contents: Introduction From 'new woman' to 'future girl': the roots and rise of the female protagonist in contemporary young adult dystopias. Part I Reflections and Reconsiderations of Rebellious Girlhood: Girl power and girl activism in the fiction of Suzanne Collins, Scott Westerfeld, and Moira Young, Sonya Sawyer Fritz 'I'm beginning to know who I am': the rebellious subjectivities of Katniss Everdeen and Tris Prior, Miranda A. Green-Barteet Of Scrivens and Sparks: girl geniuses in young adult dystopian fiction, Rachel Dean-Ruzicka Docile bodies, dangerous bodies: sexual awakening and social resistance in young adult dystopian novels, Sara K. Day. Part II Forms and Signs of Rebellion: Gender rolls: bread and resistance in the 'Hunger Games' trilogy, Meghan Gilbert-Hickey Rebels in dresses: distractions of competitive girlhood in young adult dystopian fiction, Amy L. Montz The three faces of Tally Youngblood: rebellious identity-changing in Scott Westerfeld's 'Uglies' series, Mary Jeanette Moran 'Perpetually waving to an unseen crowd': satire and process in Beauty Queens, Bridgitte Barclay. Part III Contexts and Communities of Rebellion: Rebellious natures: the role of nature in young adult dystopian female protagonists' awakenings and agency, Megan McDonough and Katherine A. Wagner Real or not real - Katniss Everdeen loves Peeta Melark: the lingering effects of discipline in the 'Hunger Games' trilogy, June Pulliam The incompatibility of female friendship and rebellion, Ann M.M. Childs. Index.

The Hunger Games, Spartacus, and Other Family Stories: Sentimental Revolution in Contemporary Young-Adult Fiction David Aitchison It is already commonplace among scholars that Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games trilogy (2008–10) tells a kind of Spartacus story: one influenced by historical accounts of the gladiator, who, in 73 BCE, led a slave revolt against the Roman Empire, and by modern interpretations of his life, primarily Kirk Douglas and Stanley Kubrick’s 1960 big-screen epic Spartacus.1 Interviews with Collins are typically cited to corroborate this connection. In one, from 2011, she made explicit her debt to Spartacus’s life narrative, pointing out how protagonist Katniss Everdeen “follows the same arc from slave to gladiator to rebel” (Dominus n.p.). In another, from 2009, she described having researched “not only the historical Spartacus and the popular media about him, but many of the historical gladiators from pre-Christian times,” which led her to schematize the “three things always present” in what she calls the “gladiator paradigm: (1) a ruthless government that (2) forces people to fight to the death, and (3) uses these fights to the death as a form of popular entertainment” (Blasingame 727). Not insignificantly, this paradigm has long been subject to rival interpretations, perhaps best exemplified in the play between two definitive Spartacus novels of modern times, Arthur Koestler’s indictment of communist idealism, The Gladiators (1939), and Howard Fast’s sympathetic lament for failed communist revolution, Spartacus (1951). Though arguably written for a different audience, the Hunger Games trilogy takes its place in this tradition of fictions contesting the political and ethical virtues of the gladiator. To say that Collins is suspicious of the pleasure afforded by the gladiator paradigm is to acknowledge that there is debate over the allegorical dimensions of the arena as a social space—that is, over the ethics of what individuals, in relation to one another, feel compelled to do in order to [End Page 254] survive. A very different kind of Spartacus story, for instance, has evolved recently in the movement between Ridley Scott’s blockbuster Gladiator (2000) and cable channel Starz’s Spartacus (2010–13), neither of which puts pressure on the differential between self-interest and self-sacrifice as the Hunger Games novels do. While the Starz series echoes a number of plot elements from Gladiator,2 Gladiator paid homage to Douglas’s Spartacus,3 a film in turn based on Fast’s novel. Notably, though tempering the revolutionary optimism of the original, Douglas’s adaptation still tells a leftist story in which the divisiveness of the arena is countered by an unwavering solidarity—brought home in the well-known “I am Spartacus” scene, where the captured rebels would sooner die defying the Romans than betray the cause. Keeping Spartacus (1951) and Spartacus (1960) in mind, we do well to remember that gladiator fictions are sometimes driven by a desire to care for, rather than punish, bodies politic. For some critics, admittedly, works like The Hunger Games are less about probing political reality and more about capturing the universal tumult of adolescence. Laura Miller, for example, finds Collins’s trilogy “intelligible” only when considered “as a fever-dream allegory of the adolescent social experience”: more precisely, “it’s not about persuading the reader to stop something terrible from happening—it’s about what’s happening, right this minute, in the stormy psyche of the adolescent reader” (n.p.). The shortcoming of this diagnosis is that it makes little room for any outward turn of the young reader’s imagination. Consider, for example, the moment when teenager Katniss volunteers on behalf of her younger sister to take part in the Hunger Games, a state-enforced fight to the death between twelve- to eighteen-year-old representatives from districts subjugated and exploited by the centralized power of the Capitol. By Miller’s account, Collins’s readers relate to what Katniss feels without grasping the painfully political nature of her feelings. By my account, we do these readers a disservice unless we acknowledge that they are poised more properly to work through the stormy stuff not of psyche, as such, but of political consciousness. Not all of the trilogy’s...

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

This study focuses on hunger, social breakdown, political oppression and Michael Foucault’s concepts of surveillance and discipline in the The Hunger Games Trilogy, which is about rebellion and survival under a totalitarian regime. This paper aims to illustrate how The Hunger Games trilogy (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Mockingjay) examines the reflections of oppressive authority both in today’s and the future world and tries to reveal the connection between the districts in Panem in the films and today’s countries, based on Foucault’s concepts. Suzan Collins' civilization is portrayed by hunger and a ruthless central authority that is guarded by the Capitol and governs 12 surrounding districts. Panem is separated into 12 districts, which are controlled by the Capitol, the capital. As penance for their earlier disobedience, the 12 districts send a boy and a girl, ages 12 to 18, to fight to the death in the Hunger Games each year. Because of the economic situation of the districts, the Capitol easily dominates and controls them, and despite the fact that there is enough food in the Capitol, it does not supply the districts. Poor economic conditions caused by the Capitol in districts cause famine, thus residents occasionally opt to search for food regardless of being observed, yet the problem of starving persists. Drawing from Foucault's ideas on surveillance, discipline, and the panopticon, this article will explain the living conditions of citizens in Panem, the surveillance of the Capitol, and the relations between the Capitol (United States of America and some exploitative countries) and the present (exploited nations).

In this selective overview of scholarship generated by The Hunger Games—the young adult dystopian fiction and film series which has won popular and critical acclaim—Zhange Ni showcases various investigations into the entanglement of religion and the arts in the new millennium. Ni introduces theories, methods, and the latest developments in the study of religion in relation to state politics, audio/visual art, material culture, reality TV, and transmedia projects, whilst also reading The Hunger Games as a story that explores the variety, complexity, and ambiguity of enchantment. In popular texts such as The Hunger Games, religion and art—both broadly construed, that is, beyond conventional boundaries—converge in creating an enchantment that makes life more bearable and effects change in the world.

In this selective overview of scholarship generated by The Hunger Games—the young adult dystopian fiction and film series which has won popular and critical acclaim—Zhange Ni showcases various investigations into the entanglement of religion and the arts in the new millennium. Ni introduces theories, methods, and the latest developments in the study of religion in relation to politics, audio/visual art, new media, material culture, and popular culture, whilst also reading The Hunger Games as a story that explores the variety, complexity, and ambiguity of enchantment. In popular texts such as this, religion and art—both broadly construed, that is, beyond conventional boundaries—converge in creating an enchantment that makes life more bearable and effects change in the world.

This study aims to dismantle how national identity becomes the arena of a constellation of Nationalism and de-nationalism in some dystopian fiction. The national identity described as a factor forming Nationalism is one of the fields of Nationalism and de-nationalism that always appears in American dystopian novels. A mutually beneficial two-way relationship between the state and the people is essential to build state nationalism. The fading of Nationalism as a result from government’s oppression was revealed by Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Westerfeld’s Uglies, Collins’s The Hunger Games, and Roth’s Divergent. The main problem of this article is to find out how the national identity becomes the arena of constellations between Nationalism and de-nationalism. The significance of this study is to reveal the Nationalism and de-nationalism through the constellations of national identity through American dystopian novels. Using Derrida’s deconstruction theory, the constellations appear in binary opposition as follows: country versus people; ruler versus society; regulation or oppression versus freedom; power versus weakness; independence versus dependence; intelligence versus stupidity; manipulative party versus receptive party; and global versus local. The main finding of this analysis in that the oppression and totalitarianism of the Government have eroded people’s identity, which turns the sense of Nationalism to de-Nationalism.

If Young Adult (YA) literature constitutes one of the social mechanisms that indoctrinate teenagers into working within capitalistic institutions, high school teachers would do well to ask what political and economic ideologies YA fiction invites teenage readers to adopt. This article examines one genre of YA literature—YA dystopian fiction—to understand how it participates in neoliberal discourse. The article begins by defining neoliberalism and describing some of its core assumptions. Responding to arguments that regard YA dystopia as reproducing neoliberalism and its attendant ideologies, the article next examines how the critical dystopia, a type of dystopia that emerged in the 1980s and which critiques oppressive systems by depicting characters who resist them, models strategies for resisting neoliberalism. To demonstrate the different stances that YA dystopias can take in regard to neoliberalism, the article then examines the different degrees of emphasis that three popular YA novels—Divergent (Roth, 2011), The Hunger Games (Collins, 2008), and Orleans (Smith, 2013)—place on individual exceptionalism, competition, and systemic oppression rooted in gender, race, and class. To conclude, the article discusses the implications for high school teachers of asking students to critique neoliberalism in YA literature, and in their lives more broadly.