by V. Arrow
In reality, a race like the Seam’s, in which (per Collins) “many races” have mixed, would always have a breadth of natural variations in skin tone, eye color, hair color, and facial structure. A set of biracial sisters like Katniss and Prim could—not with a huge degree of likelihood, but certainly plausibly—look as different from one another as they are described. British twins James and Daniel Kelly and Marcia and Millie Biggs prove that natural-born, naturally conceived siblings of mixed parentage can present visually as two different races. However, in Panem, the people of the Seam are described as a unified race with singular presentation: olive skin, straight black hair, gray eyes. It is Katniss and Gale, not Katniss and Prim, who “could look like siblings.” The merchants are described with similar consistency: blonde-haired, blue-eyed, fair-skinned.
Katniss may tell us that “[her mother] must have really loved [her father] to leave her home for the Seam.”THG8 And Mrs. Everdeen may have spent years in a heavily depressive state, including a year of what Katniss describes to be near catatonia after Mr. Everdeen’s death, lending credence to her feelings for him; her love must have been strong for her to feel such grief. But it’s important to note here that it is Katniss who ascribes Mrs. Everdeen’s withdrawal to depression; it could just as easily have been caused by guilt.
This is an issue that will draw supporters on both sides of the fandom forever, and that’s wonderful.
6
Family Life in Panem
The most important things in Katniss’ life are survival and family, perhaps not in that order. The entire journey of the Hunger Games series begins because of Katniss’ devotion to Prim and her sense of duty to (and love for) family. However, as she tells the reader, “family devotion only goes so far for most people [in Panem] on reaping day.”THG31
A total of 1,776 children (73 Games × 24 tributes each, plus an additional 24 tributes in the Fiftieth Hunger Games) have been a part of the Hunger Games before Katniss volunteers in Prim’s place, and from the way Katniss tells it, very few—if any—have been spared their fate by family members before. Indeed, most of the nuclear families that we as readers encounter through the series are deeply dysfunctional and unhappy, and it’s hard to imagine them sacrificing so much for each other. What do we know about what other families in Panem are like? How have they adapted to the threat of the Hunger Games? What do other families value, and what does Panem value in its families?
As we saw in chapter four, family structure in District 12—and, by extrapolation, in Panem as a whole—seems to be related to socioeconomic class, with the specialty-class families more likely to be single-parent households and merchant-class families more likely to include two parenting units. (We are shown no examples of Capitol families, and know very little save that Snow has a granddaughter and, per Finnick’s secrets, many high-ranking Capitol families commit incest.) In looking at the four main families we encounter over the course of the series—the Everdeens, the Hawthornes, the Mellarks, and the Undersees—we get a deeper window into life in Panem, especially the role that tesserae and status play on its families.
The Everdeens
Katniss spends the majority of her pre-Games life (and much of her life between and after the Games, even into the epilogue of Mockingjay) angry at her living situation. She is—rightfully—angry that her father was killed by the job that their race and class forced him into and that there is no way for her family to receive compensation or even independently livable welfare. She is angry with her mother for withdrawing. She is angry that she had to become the sole provider for her family: “At eleven years old, with Prim just seven, I took over as head of the family. There was no choice.”THG27
Despite her anger, the concept of family is Katniss’ primary motivator and is present in all of her actions and decisions. From the first sentence of The Hunger Games, Katniss’ sole concern is for her family’s—specifically, Prim’s—welfare:
When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold. My fingers stretch out, seeking Prim’s warmth but finding only the rough canvas cover of the mattress. She must have had bad dreams and climbed in with our mother.THG1
Katniss’ first instinct is always to check for Prim’s “warmth”—her presence, her safety and security.
Family—taking care of Prim—is the source of Katniss’ meaning and positive sense of self. Although Katniss views herself very harshly in most respects, she does seem to acknowledge her capacity for tenderness when it comes to Prim and expects for that tenderness to function as something of a saving grace regarding the humanity she views herself as missing in other respects—especially in her relationships with people.
This is heavily reflected in regard to Katniss’ feelings about her mother. Because Katniss views her status as Prim’s caregiver as a function of her love for her sister, she interprets her mother’s lack of caregiving in parallel; because Mrs. Everdeen withdrew and was not able to provide functional care for Katniss, Katniss perceives her as being unloving. To Katniss, at least at the beginning of the series, the subversion of those roles is tantamount to betrayal. (This may illustrate a Seam cultural value regarding parent/child relationships and the boundaries of them; perhaps adults in the Seam rarely live long enough to require their children’s care. Katniss and her mother’s relationship could also be intended as a foil for the relationship subversions within another family group in the Hunger Games series: Finnick caring for Annie and Mags.)
There’s one other important member of the Everdeen family who sheds (no pun intended) some light on Katniss and her relationship with her mother: Buttercup the cat. Although Katniss loathes him at the outset of the series, he is the only reminder of her pre-Games life she accepts into her new post-rebellion life, after Prim has died and her mother has moved to District 4.
Buttercup functions as a symbol for Katniss throughout the series, most notably in the “Crazy Cat” scene in Mockingjay, in which Katniss actually explains the symbol as it is being used: Katniss explains full-out that she feels like she is engaged in a game of Crazy Cat with the Capitol, and she is Buttercup trying to reach the elusive light that is Peeta while the Capitol dangles him out of her reach. But Katniss’ views of Buttercup most often seem meant to mirror her perception of herself and her role in her family, particularly how her mother views her and her correlative duty to provide food and service.
Sitting at Prim’s knees, guarding her, is the world’s ugliest cat. Mashed-in nose, half of one ear missing, eyes the color of rotting squash. Prim named him Buttercup, insisting that his muddy yellow coat matched the bright flower. He hates me. Or at least distrusts me. Even though it was years ago, I think he still remembers how I tried to drown him in a bucket when Prim brought him home. Scrawny kitten, belly swollen with worms, crawling with fleas. The last thing I needed was another mouth to feed . . . [Buttercup]’s a born mouser. Even catches the occasional rat. Sometimes, when I clean a kill, I feed Buttercup the entrails. He has stopped hissing at me.
Entrails. No hissing. This is the closest we will ever come to love.THG3-4
Contrast the instinct that Katniss has towards Prim with her learned reaction to her mother. When Prim feels pain, “I protect Prim in every way I can, but I’m powerless against the reaping. The anguish . . . wells up in my chest and threatens to register on my face.”THG15 However, Katniss’ reaction to her mother’s psychological pain is that even years after Mrs. Everdeen’s recovery, “I kept watching, waiting for her to disappear on us again. I didn’t trust her. And some small gnarled place inside me hated her for her weakness, for her neglect, for the months she had put us through.”THG52-53 Although Katniss took it upon herself to provide for both of her remaining family members, it is only her mother she feels is a burden.
This provides evidence that, although Katniss fully understands the necessity of caring for her mother, she doesn’t equate it to taking care of a child, like Prim. It is clear that in Katniss’ mind, family members have set roles and that her mother, with
her disability, has compromised the integrity of those roles. For Katniss, despite the extreme sense of duty that she feels towards Prim, the distinction between “parent” and “child” is strict.
Katniss’ resentment of her mother also suggests that she sees familial love as being predicated on the fulfillment of perceived duties. She has taken over as head of the Everdeen household, and appears to see her taking on the parental role in their family as both the most applicable way for her to show love and the only way for her to earn love in return. And because Katniss is the one performing the adult role in the household, she rather than her mother makes the rules of the Everdeen home: “I wouldn’t let [Prim] take out any tesserae.”THG15
Despite blaming Mrs. Everdeen fiercely for a perceived lack of contribution to the household, Katniss does not seem to want any help taking care of their small family. She does not expect her mother to find work outside of their home, and she does not seem to expect financial contributions from Prim, either, viewing her sale/trade of goat’s milk and cheese with gratitude and some pity rather than as provisional support. Further, she will not allow for Prim to take any tesserae, despite being of age and despite their home situation remaining precarious even after Mrs. Everdeen’s recovery. Katniss is unwilling to share the parental role with her mother or anyone else because to allow someone else to take care of Prim would, in Katniss’ mind, mean that Katniss might no longer be able to earn, through her caretaking, the same “right” to receive love.
The Hunger Games trilogy would be vastly different—or just not exist—if family weren’t so important to Katniss. We can see its impact in more than just her volunteering in place of Prim. She survived the arena, the Quell, and the war because of advice given to her by her father before his death and becomes renowned for a nickname that recalls his revolutionary ideals and love of the woods: the mockingjay, a bird that the Capitol never expected to exist, born out of the will to survive.
The Hawthornes
Though Katniss points out the limitations of family ties when it comes to the reaping, family does seem to be especially important in the Seam. Though perhaps in part a response to the fragility of life in the Seam—because their primary vocation is highly dangerous and the chances of their children being reaped are so much higher compared to merchant children’s—Seam families, at least in Katniss’ perspective, take their roles and duties seriously. Those who are caregivers remain caregivers for as long as needed: Greasy Sae, for example, seems to be her “simple” granddaughter’s primary guardian. Greasy Sae, like Katniss, Gale, and even Haymitch—as illustrated by his lifelong sense of guilt and mistaken responsibility for his family’s deaths—display a deep-rooted need to provide for and protect their families.
The definition of family in the Seam doesn’t seem to be limited just to immediate blood relations. In fact, it’s likely that Katniss learned her belief in family-above-all, blood-above-nation from non-nuclear family member Gale, her slightly older “cousin” and the person to whom she is closest. (Although Katniss/Gale shippers argue that their close friendship and like mindset make them a more believable endgame than Katniss/Peeta, Katniss/Peeta shippers are likely to point out that Katniss thinks similarly to Gale because she spent her formative years in his tutelage, listening to his opinions and beliefs out in the woods. As Katniss states in Catching Fire, “Gale is mine. I am his. Anything else is unthinkable.”)
The Everdeens and the Hawthornes appear to have been a merged family unit since not long after the mine explosion, despite Gale and Katniss’ lack of romantic entanglement. We know that Gale and Katniss share food, look after each other’s siblings, and consider themselves mutually obligated to each other. Despite being distrustful of each other at first, and then for some time seeing the other only as a business partner, by the time the Hunger Games series begins, Gale and Katniss are reliant on each other for emotional sustenance, as well as physical necessities like food and medicine.
Given that this definition of family—a communal unit brought together by trauma and circumstance, as well as affection—is mirrored by Finnick, Annie, and Mags, as well as by Beetee and Wiress, this non-nuclear family structure seems to be common in Panem. Why? One reason may be to compensate for the loss of natural-born family members (to the Games, to death in specialty professions, etc.). Although Gale could have provided for his family without Katniss, the aid of her hunting prowess with a bow and arrow proved highly beneficial. For Katniss, knowing that Gale was taking care of Prim and her mother while she fought in the arena helped keep her centered and focused on her own situation, ultimately aiding her survival. Finnick relied on Mags to help him make sure that Annie was safe from the Capitol while he was away from District 4, and Mags’ sacrifice in volunteering in Annie’s place for the Quell saved Annie’s life (and, given his mental state while Annie is missing in Mockingjay, likely helped prolong Finnick’s life as well).
However, although the blended family model helped the Hawthornes and Everdeens alike to survive, only the Hawthornes seem to display full emotional health as a nuclear family unit. After all, Katniss and her mother live on opposite sides of an emotional chasm.
As such, Katniss’ feelings about having her own children someday are—until the epilogue of Mockingjay—highly negative. Gale, despite coming from the same socioeconomic and cultural circumstances, looks favorably on the idea of marriage and children. (Family might actually be the only thing that Gale is optimistic about in the series, all things considered.) Although Katniss spends the majority of her time figuring out ways to keep Prim from having to participate in the reaping, Gale is unconcerned enough to be thinking about having children of his own someday—even as the seventy-fourth reaping is only a few hours away:
“I never want to have kids,” I say.
“I might. If I didn’t live here,” says Gale.
“But you do,” I say, irritated.THG9
It’s wholly possible that Gale’s ability to hope enthusiastically for a domestic future comes down to gender rather than his stronger emotional bond with his mother. Because Gale is a man, even if his spouse were to die, he would be more likely able to support children on a miner’s salary, whereas Katniss, as a widowed mother, would be left further open to needing tesserae. In Panem, as much as family is a source of pride and happiness, it is in equal measure a burden to fear.
The Mellarks
Because he grew up in the District 12 Bakery, Katniss assumes that Peeta has led a life of leisure. However, both she and we, the readers, learn that, although Peeta may never have been starving, his living situation was, like Katniss’, still predicated on weighing food’s relationship to need and need’s relationship with pain. Peeta is the most detailed example we have that having two living, employed merchant-class parents does not mean your family life is functional or loving. Peeta’s home situation was better than the Everdeens’ only in that there was more food available for consumption.
Yes, Peeta is a baker, and may well be the best baker in his family. But he is still the youngest son of three in a nation-state where, per Katniss’ inference that her mother learned the apothecary trade from her own merchant parents and per the Seam’s coal-mining tradition, we can assume jobs are handed down from parent to child. Peeta will probably never own Mellark Bakery, and he probably feels as much responsibility to be an asset to his family—so they keep him on at all and he doesn’t have to become a miner—as Katniss feels to be the sole provider for hers. Peeta is as much a “family man,” as invested in his family’s welfare, as Gale; it’s just expressed within a different familial structure.
Families in both District 12 and District 11 are almost solely written as multiple-child homes, and fandom assumes that, although Capitol citizens have easy access to reliable birth control, the districts would be prevented from access either actively or via financial means. If you don’t have a reliable income source for food, clothing, and/or shelter, birth control would be—if known about at all—seen as a luxury g
ood. Some have suggested, too, that family planning methods may be less available in the poor districts—even to merchants—as a way to force families into needing more tesserae and becoming more dependent on the Capitol. If birth control had been available, it seems unlikely that spendthrift Mrs. Mellark would have chosen to have more children than could be easily supported or were necessary in order to ensure someone would take over the bakery. Because Peeta is the youngest Mellark, it could be assumed that his birth was accidental—and that resentment is part of the motivation behind Mrs. Mellark’s verbal and physical abuse.
Peeta’s lifelong abuse at the hands of his mother is, of course, a very large aspect of the unfortunate Mellark family dynamics. It’s very telling that in Catching Fire, Peeta immediately recognized the sound of whipping despite its unpopularity as a sanctioned punishment in District 12:
I’ve been so consumed with my own worries, I haven’t noticed the strange noise coming from the square. A whistling, the sound of an impact, the intake of breath from a crowd.
“Come on,” Peeta says, his face suddenly hard. I don’t know why. I can’t place the sound, even guess at the situation. But it means something bad to him.CF103-104
When we combine this with the overt beating Katniss remembers hearing Peeta receive at twelve after he burned the bread for her, it’s obvious that Peeta’s family life was, in some ways, more difficult to endure than Katniss’ despite his outward economic privilege.
There was a clatter in the bakery and I heard the woman screaming again and the sound of a blow, and I vaguely wondered what was going on . . . It was the boy . . . His mother was yelling, “Feed it to the pig, you stupid creature!”THG30