Bread and Circuses: The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
Today marks the much-awaited release of the movie The Hunger Games, based on Suzanne Collins’s enormously popular trilogy of young-adult novels. (You may have seen the film’s stars grace magazine covers well in advance of this week.)
John M. Cunningham | Encyclopedia Britannica Blog | March 23, 2012
Spartacus, 19th-century illustration. Credit: Photos.com/Jupiter Images
In the books, Collins imagines a dystopian future in which children from each district of the nation of Panem fight to survive a barbaric competition (the Hunger Games) in large part for the entertainment of the all-powerful Capitol, which televises the event. Many critics have noted analogies with the modern fad of reality TV, and there are myriad sci-fi details (hovercrafts, genetically designed creatures) that speculate beyond the present day.
However, the Hunger Games series also has plenty of antecedents in the ancient world, especially Rome. While the books easily stand alone as gripping adventure narratives, these historical resonances (which Collins herself has readily noted) provide deeper insight into some of the series’ embedded themes. They also suggest that there may be no better way to achieve contemporary popularity than to retell stories of the distant past.
In examining the connections of The Hunger Games with ancient history, I’ll take a look first at the sociopolitical context in which the titular Games occur and then (in a separate post) at some of the names Collins chooses for her characters.
The Games
In the backstory of The Hunger Games, modern civilization collapsed at some unspecified point in our future, and the North American nation of Panem emerged from the rubble. Seventy-four years beforeThe Hunger Games begins, the 13 outlying districts of Panem revolted against the oppressive Capitol, but the resistance movement died out after the Capitol’s forces essentially wiped District 13 off the map. The Capitol instituted the annual Hunger Games as a perpetual reminder to the districts of the power it wields over them. Significantly, though, the decadent Capitol is also highly dependent upon the districts, from which it imports large amounts of agricultural and manufacturing products.
That this sociopolitical milieu has certain similarities with ancient Rome may be observed by Britannica’s article on the Roman Republic (the precursor to the Roman Empire):
The Romans organized [their] conquered peoples into provinces—under the control of appointed governors with absolute power over all non-Roman citizens—and stationed troops in each, ready to exercise appropriate force if necessary.
(In Panem, the military police posted in the districts are known as Peacekeepers.)
The article further notes that farmers in Rome proper “were unable to raise crops to compete economically with produce from the provinces” and that “the common people were placated by bread and circuses.”
The phrase “bread and circuses” was coined by the Roman satirist Juvenal in reference to the way the ruling class pacified the commoners by diverting them from contemplating their subjugation. In ancient Rome, the “bread” was distributions of grain, and the “circuses” were public games and other mass spectacles. In interviews, Suzanne Collins has admitted she was directly inspired by this bit of history in creating the world of The Hunger Games. Juvenal’s original Latin phrase, some might recall, is panem et circenses.
As a result, both bread and circuses factor into the dynamics of the Hunger Games themselves. Taking place in an outdoor “arena,” the Games bear a distinct resemblance to the gladiatorial games of ancient Rome, in which slaves and criminals engaged in bloody and sometimes-fatal combat before large crowds of riveted spectators. Those in the outlying districts of Panem watch the Games in a state of tense anticipation, since the home district of the eventual victor (i.e., the Games’ sole survivor) is rewarded with food and other gifts by the Capitol (“bread”). Those in the Capitol, with nothing at stake, watch purely for pleasure (“circuses”).
It’s also worth noting, perhaps, that the adolescents who fulfill their civic duty by competing in the Hunger Games are known as “tributes,” a word used in ancient Rome (“tributa”) to refer to the taxes paid to the central government for protection. What’s more, the word is used in Greek mythology (known throughout the ancient world) to refer to the “seven Athenian youths and seven maidens” who, as a form of punishment, were “sent every ninth year (or, according to another version, every year) to be devoured by the Minotaur.” Indeed, Collins has specifically cited this gruesome tale as precedent forThe Hunger Games, in which 12 girls and 12 boys are annually sacrificed for their people’s supposed misdeeds.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment