I was as thrilled as most writers and parents with the
success of Suzanne Collins’ remarkable trilogy, The Hunger Games and its sequels, and their inevitable morphing into a film franchise—but the first film
didn’t give me many of the joys of Collins’s prose.
It did reinforce my opinion, seeing the characters made
solid, that Collins is the new Jane Austen.
Like the best Austen novels, Hunger Games matches up a headstrong, balanced, resourceful and
courageous female with a guy who needs to grow a pair.
If you’ve never read an Austen, do not wait—go grab Emma (my favorite), Pride and Prejudice, Sense
and Sensibility or Mansfield Park, all free from your
library if you don’t want to pay the 99 cent download fee, and you’ll find the
astounding heroine Katniss Everdeen in Austen’s pages, most especially in the
first two books.
Unfortunately, you’ll also find the barely adequate,
weeps-at-a-moment’s-notice Peeta Mellark by that heroine’s side. In Emma,
the male paramour is Mr. Knightley; in Pride
and Prejudice, Mr. Darcy.
They’re nice enough guys, and as masculine as their times
allow them to be. But they seem to be
matched up with Austen’s superlative heroines simply because they’re the most
available men, and the best of a bad lot, from the pitifully vain,
socially-warped wretches that make up her male character roster.
Austen wasn’t a man-hater or even much of a feminist—she simply
knew the age wherein she lived, where a man, even if not desirable physically or emotionally or morally, was still desirable as a husband.
Because, well, women need men. Jane
knew it; most modern movies still relish the idea. Suzanne
Collins—and Hollywood—didn’t stray from that formula.
Still, no one has ever equalized the playing field.
No one has ever matched up a truly brave, strong female
character with a truly brave, completely adequate male. It simply doesn’t happen.
Hermione in the Harry Potter books? Ten times the brains and courage of Ron
Weasley.
Eowyn in Lord of the
Rings? Slaughtered the Witch
King. Can even Aragorn boast that?
Edward and Jacob and Bella?
You’re kidding, right?
Consider the eligible men Katniss has to choose from, all
two of them. It’s Peeta or Gale Hawthorne,
both alike as twin toy grooms on a stale wedding cake, each with no more erotic
excitement, mental stimulus or material promise than the other.
Baker boy Peeta spends the better part of the games laid up
in a cave in tears, waiting for his emotional dough to rise; Gale spends the
whole book (and movie) mooning over Katniss’s video images, as if he were missing
his Mommy (at least the Twilight guys
had erotic awareness going for them).
Every non-eligible older man in the book, from the mentor Haymitch
Abernethy to the brutish villain Marvel, seems more competent and attractive
than these two.
Even the vile president Snow has all that cool power and
cash.
And there are no other strong females anywhere else except
for the wicked ones in the manhunt. All
we get are Katniss’s washed-out mother, tremulous younger sister and the
scarily vapid Effie Trinket.
It’s as if it would take away from the protagonist’s courage
by surrounding her with brave people.
It’s quite a conundrum, this lack of courageous balance
among the sexes; even Shakespeare never solved it.
Anthony and Cleopatra?
She’s got him firmly by the balls.
Macbeth and Lady M? She collapses
by Act Four. Even Romeo is a waterfly
up against the superb Juliet, with her utter love of loving at the expense of
all else.
So the playing field—or hunting arena—will probably never
achieve equilibrium. If old Bill couldn’t
do it, who can?
Meanwhile, it’s nice to have Katniss around; the
self-sufficient, powerful female protagonist is so rare that a good one makes
us doubly joyful.
If only there were one good, brave male out there hunting with
her.
Or for her.
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