Archetypes In The Hunger Games

It is generally believed that dystopian literature frequently shows the future life of human being. One of the most appealing setting in contemporary dystopia is taking place in a post-apocalyptic background. In the beginning of The Hunger Games, the novel draws the setting of time and place which illustrate generally the condition of the post-apocalyptic world. Using the first point of view, the story of the novel is mostly seen from the perspective of the main protagonist character, Katniss, including the description of the world where she lives in. Here, the use of first person point of view enhances “the ideological impact by appealing to emotions as well as the intellect. “ (Henthorn. 109) Moreover, by telling the story in the present

The story has Katniss Everdeen as its main protagonist character who leads the districts to revenge for the freedom. The characterization of Katniss in the story shares some common archetypes to the characteristics of hero in popular literature. As Davis M. Bryan (www.tatsbox.com/hero), referred to the theory of Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung, explains that the hero in any popular literature included dystopian shares the some similar characteristics as following: a). unusual circumstance of birth; sometimes in danger or born into royalty, b). leaves family or land and lives with others, c). an event, sometimes, traumatic, leads to adventure or quest, d). hero has special weapon only he can wield, e). Hero always has supernatural help, f). The hero must prove himself many times while on adventure, g). The journey and the unhealed wound, h). Hero experiences atonement with the father, and i). When the hero dies, he is awarded spiritually. Some of the qualities are owned by

The conventional pattern of sci-fi or dystopia has male character as the hero. Here, the trilogy has Katniss, a female character as the heroine. In line with this, Hopkins explains that in the contemporary action, female character is more exposed and usually becomes the main hero. He continues that the female hero is not always a “good” girl –instead she can be selfish as well as selfless, competitive as well as cooperative, fierce as well as kind (Hopkins, 2002: 209) It means female character usually has both qualification of feminine and masculine. Historically the female action hero has roots in both traditional concept of femininity and in the portrayal of traditional male action heroism. However, Katniss demonstrates masculine traits rather than to her male counterpart,