We’ve made our way through Harry Potter’s magickings and Bella’s Twilight vampire kisses. And here we are at the cusp of yet another young adult novel being transformed into what its makers hope will be cinematic gold. The Hunger Games will hit the theaters March 23, and fans are holding their bated breath.
If this is the first you’ve heard of it, brace yourself: The fact is, this is one of those stories read by huge numbers of teens and adults. (And in many cases, read twice.) I myself picked up the first two books of the Suzanne Collins trilogy as part of a teen lit article I wrote a couple years back, when Katniss fever was first coming to a boil.
So, while even though most of you are probably already nodding your heads and wearing a knowledgeable grin, let me give those not in the know a quick breakdown of the tale.
The Hunger Games presents a world of struggling, half-starved city/districts dominated by the high-tech Capitol and its dictatorial government. To keep the citizenry in line, the Capitol stages an annual Reaping: Two kids are chosen in a lottery from each of the oppressed districts and sent off to participate in a televised death game. Twenty-four adolescents go in and only one bruised and battered contestant comes out, awarded with accolades and food bonuses for his or her home district. It’s brutal and barbaric, but it’s the way things work in this dystopian world. So when the story’s heroine, 16-year-old Katniss, selflessly steps up to take her younger sister’s place in the Reaping, she knows she’s likely signing her own death sentence.
Action. Adventure. Innocence lost. Good vs. evil. And even a dash of romance. It’s got it all. And that’s what makes this franchise so popular. It’s also the stuff, however, that has made the story a bit controversial. It is, after all, a tale predominantly focused on the bloody killing of youths. The New York Times went so far as to label it “war stories for kids.” And many parents have worried that, as the adventure’s popularity has grown, the audience has skewed from teens to tweens to, well, tykes.
Some schools, for instance, have even been putting the popular books on their reading lists for adolescent students. And that prompted a New Hampshire mom not long ago to petition her school district to pull the book from her daughter’s middle school reading list.
“Twenty-four children are pitted in a life-or-death struggle with each other. The reason? Entertainment. That’s sick,” Tracy LaSalle was reported to have said by her local Goffstown News. “You guys don’t want Columbine, but you’re putting forth material that will totally desensitize the children to murdering other children.”
LaSalle’s book-pulling attempt went nowhere, but she wasn’t the only one who tossed a few grenades. The Huffington Post reported that last year there were 348 efforts to have the Hunger Games books banned or removed from school curriculums, putting the titles on the American Library Association’s list of the Top 10 Most Challenged Books in 2010.
So the question then becomes, is that fair? Fans say no way. “She obviously didn’t read the book,” one blogger opined about LaSalle’s efforts on the myhungergames.com fan site. “The purpose of the book is to show how horrific those things are and to question the morals of the people in charge of committing such horrific acts.” A like-minded supporter added, “I think there’s a lot to be learned from The Hunger Games—it’s a cautionary tale about the power of empire, the cult of personality we live in, and the very thing this woman is concerned about—becoming desensitized to violence.” Of course, there are others who disagree, even if only by a degree or two. “It is young adult, meant for teen-agers and should NOT be in a middle-school class,” a concerned mom posted.
Personally, I think that last comment is indeed a key element to focus on. One of our editors told me a brief story of taking his young daughter to a 6th grade girl’s birthday party that featured a Hunger Games-themed cake that was iced with the thematic motif—sporting green jungle leaves with a red icing trail of bloody drizzle. Hmmm. Not exactly your typical pretty ponies and purple bows. But obviously the party planning mom knew what was on her daughter’s mind.
It’ll be the same thing on the minds of many a fan come March 23. (Our review will be published the night before.)
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