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Animals of Panem

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We can use ecocriticism to understand the Hunger Games Series better. Each of these animals have something to say about the story. Some were meant to represent the Capital of Panem, and others represent the rebels. I think these animals can even have something to say about the classes that Katniss and her family lived in, and perhaps they can also say something about the psychological states that the characters were dealing with.

Katniss's ability to hunt and their goat's milk are important parts of the Everdeen family's usual income. This shows that Katniss’s family is quite poor because they prefer to have pets that have an alternative use and they can’t afford to buy meat. The fact that Prim’s cat, Buttercup, is also really scrawny and beat up, suggests that the family doesn’t have much to go around.

The mutts are good examples of the power, manipulation and wickedness of the Capital. The mutts show to have an effect on the tributes while in the hunger game arenas. The monkey, wolf, and lizard mutts were made to kill the tributes while reminding them of other things. Specifically, the wolves were meant to remind the tributes of their fellow, but fallen tributes and the lizards were meant to scare Katniss by hissing her name and smelling like President Snow’s roses. The jabberjays that were used in the arena were also used to torture the tributes to make them think their loved ones had been hurt. We can look at these things and see how the animals play into the psychoanalysis of the books.

Both mockingjays and their forefathers, the jabberjays, can be examples of the rebels. Specifically, the jabberjays represent District 13 because in the same way that the Capital sent the jabberjays into the wild to die off, they had bombed District 13 hoping they would disappear. In both plans, the Capital did not expect any sort of survival, but were surprised to find that jabberjays survived by mating with mockingbirds and District 13 survived by living underground. Mockingjays represent Katniss because they, and she, are leaders in rebellion. The bird is a sign of hope for the people in the districts, just as Katniss becomes a sign of hope. We can also see the mockingjay come out when she defies President Coin at the end of the trilogy. While President Coin and the other rebels helped lead Katniss’s way, the same way jabberjays created the mockingjays, Katniss defies following their plans because she does not want to see President Coin simply take over for President Snow.

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