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| Nature in The The Hunger Games https://cdn.amomama.com/73647510a83872fd7241b67ae97440f2779111542672848.jpeg |
In literature, nature typically represents and symbolizes a wide range of themes including freedom, life, and wilderness. In The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins, nature is present throughout all three novels and informs the reader on the relationships between Katniss, the other characters and districts, and technology.
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| The 13 Districts of Panem https://cdn.amomama.com/73647510a83872fd7241b67ae97440f2779111542672848.jpeg |
The 13 districts were originally established based on the environments and landmarks surrounding the area. District 12 mines coal because they were given the Appalachian area. District 4 controls fishing because they were given a large chunk of the coastline. The environment played a huge role in establishing the identities of the individual districts, a notion which relates to the theory of new materialism as described by Jane Bennett in her book Vibrant Matter.
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| Vibrant Matter by Jane Bennett. https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com /books/1328807459i/7547895._UY475_SS475_.jpg |
In The Hunger Games, nature plays a role that is equally as influential as that of Katniss or Peeta. For Katniss, nature represents safety and shelter because Katniss knows how to survive in the wild. When she is in district 12, she escapes to the nature outside the fence as a way to leave behind the atrocities of life inside the district itself. However, during the Games, while Katniss manages to survive in the wild, nature inevitably begins to have negative effects on her. She is burned by the forest fire, she is stung by tracker jackers, the freezing air threatens to kill her every night, and she struggles to find water and fears dying of thirst. The environment in The Hunger Games is particularly interesting because it also represents the relationship between nature and machine. While to Katniss it appears as if the wilderness she is in is having these negative effects on her, it is near impossible for her to know which effects are natural and which are machinations from the Game-makers.
While Katniss runs from the other tributes who are hunting her down to kill her, the elements of the dystopian environment in which she struggles to survive could very well kill her first. Her environment, the nature and wilderness she is placed in, has its own agency separate from Katniss and the other tributes, and even from the Game-makers. In the first two books, Katniss is in her element in nature and the wilderness. However, in Mockingjay, Katniss flees the wilderness and is either underground with District 13 or is in the Capitol, a city lacking in nature and comprised almost entirely of technology, buildings, and stone. This environment too has an effect on Katniss, because it causes her to have to develop new skills outside of the survival skills she developed in nature. This dichotomy, pictured below, impacts Katniss' state of mind when she is forced to not only try and adapt but thrive outside of her comfort zone in nature.
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| The Wilderness of District 12 https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/thehungergames/ images/f/f8/Gale_%26_Katniss_on_hill.png/revision /latest?cb=20120101002628 |
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| The City Circle in the Capitol https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/thehungergames /images/e/e1/Capirgbsdd.jpg /revision/latest?cb=20120317000759 |
In The Hunger Games series, nature holds a great deal of power over the characters because of its agency. Without nature, Katniss would have starved long before the series even began because nature provided her with food, in both animal form and plant form. Nature allowed her to developed the skills she needed to survive the Hunger Games themselves, which ultimately led to the beginning of the Rebellion led by President Coin with Katniss as its Mockingjay and face. It is often easy to forget about the significance of the environment in novels because the readers are so focused on the characters. However, Jane Bennett argues in Vibrant Matter that the environment, and every other non organic object, is equally as important as the people because ultimately, everything is the same. As a result, while Katniss is crucial in defeating the Capitol, so is the nature that surrounds her in the dystopian environment and world of The Hunger Games. The nature in The Hunger Games has the ability to revive, maintain life, or destroy life, as seen in the clip below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bM9ycudAL-k
References
Bennett, J. (2010). Vibrant matter: A political ecology of things. Duke University Press.
Collins, S. (2008). The hunger games. Scholastic Inc.
Collins, S. (2009). Catching fire. Scholastic Inc.
Collins, S. (2010). Mockingjay. Scholastic Inc.
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