I am a little behind the times, but . . .

I just finished Battle Royale, by Koushun Takami. I had a student, someone who's judgment I trust, tell me I had to read it and I would love it, and that it was even better than The Hunger Games. It took me a year to get past that final comparison, but I did finally read it (mainly because I've had her book for a year and it's time to get it back to her) and she was right; I loved it. I didn't, however, think it was better than Hunger Games. I don't necessarily think that Hunger Games is better than Battle Royale, either, I just find it a false comparison. Obviously, the premises are remarkably similar: kids being forced to kill kids, but the execution of those premises, and the contexts within which those premises are at work are very different for me.

For instance, in Battle Royale we are told very little about the setting--it becomes clear we are looking at an alternate history, a twentieth-century in which Japan won the second World War--or at least did not surrender--and has become a vaster and more sinister empire. The United States is the source of all things evil for the fascist government, and the romanticized source of all things free for rebellious-minded youth.

In The Hunger Games, of course, we see a post-apocalyptic North America, but are not told what apocalypse (of nature, politics, or war) has brought us to Katniss Everdeen's future, but we know what the last 70 years have looked like, and Collins offers a convincing sense of a society deeply interpellated into its own helplessness. So much so that when Katniss finds herself in the arena she cannot fathom any strategy beyond playing the game. Battle Royale offers more protagonists who wish to rebel than characters who wish to play, which I like, as throughout the first two-thirds of The Hunger Games I repeatedly begged Katniss to "for pity's sakes, think outside the box!"

Battle Royale, as my student points out, offers us myriad points of view, backstories, and personalities (many of whom appear to be in love with the closest thing we have to a single main character, Shuya). This narrative strategy pleasingly complicates the plot and conflicts--it is harder to root for a single character (or team) when so many are presented as sympathetic and engaging; it is similarly hard to hate villains when you come to understand why they are the ways they are. Yet, I don't think this approach would have been effective in The Hunger Games. Because Katniss is so centrally our protagonist, because the narrative is focalized exclusively through her point of view, and from within her worldview, it is more effective to realize with her that she does not know anything about her competitors. As she learns from her allies, her world opens up, she sees perspectives the Capitol has deliberately withheld from her, and when she finally understands that her fellow tributes are not the enemy, but that the system which placed each of them into the Reaping is, the reader feels enormous satisfaction. That processes of building empathy, of making connections and intuitive leaps, the growth from acceptance to resistance, are what make the story so compelling.

The comparison still doesn't work for me, but I am very glad I finally overcame my resistance and read Battle Royale. It is a compelling narrative in a whole other dimension from The Hunger Games; it raises its own questions of acceptance and resistance, and similarly focuses the reader on the what-ifs: What if Japan had not surrendered in World War II? What if our country had a Program pitting teenagers against one another in a battle royale, a battle to the death? What if we have an equivalent? What do we accept without question, simply because the questions are too disturbing to ask?

Hunger Games Mania Manifesting Truly Oddly

Okay, I'm going to paste in two links. The first is to a company website, the next is to a blog for nail polish aficionados. (I am not one of these; I can't wear nail polish without getting it all over myself. These links were forwarded to me be a friend.)

http://www.chinaglaze.com/products/index.php?coll=57

http://www.alllacqueredup.com/2012/02/china-glaze-capitol-colours-hunger-games-nail-polish-collection-swatches-review.html

What do you think?

Hunger Games Trailer

Many thanks to Abbey, Patrina, and Emily for posting! I am a notable slacker, and I do not anticipate that this will change anytime soon.

Here is a link to the Hunger Games movie trailer:

  http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=hunger+games+trailer&view=detail&mid=B5449E928E38A04D7B4FB5449E928E38A04D7B4F&first=0&FORM=LKVR2
 

I can already see where the movie is losing some of the book's subtlety and understatedness. These are two elements which make the books remarkable and draw me to (and back to) them. I just keep telling myself, “It’s a movie, it’s different, it has to be . . .” It’s a very effective trailer, I think, but I can already see some small, but significant, changes (and it isn't just freaking out because the actors don't look like the people in my head. Though I'm sure there's that, too). Madeleine L'Engle taught me that "comparisons are odious," but how can you stop yourself with something like this, something you're so deeply invested in? I guess that investment is the problem, which leads to the question, WHY do we (or some of us, at least) get so strongly invested in these literary texts? Do you care about every filmic translation of books you've read? I didn't like what they did to The Lightning Thief, but I was able to respond fairly philosophically--I understood why they aged Percy and why they collapsed certain characters and plot elements into others. So why does a "faithful" interpretation of The Hunger Games mean so much to me? I realize that the particular elements I'm attached to may not be the ones that lend themselves most readily to the screen, or even that others would find important enough to preserve. . . . So, what do y'all think??

Going Back to Hunger Games

I'm thinking about The Hunger Games et al (again) because I'm supposed to be writing a paper about them for a conference presentation in about ten days.  So, in re-reading Abbey's post about how well written they are, I'm intrigued.  One of my fellow panelists will be discussing the mixed reader-response to Mockingjay, and I'm very much looking forward to her thoughts.  I'll do my best to pass them on, but when I'm presenting I'm not at my note-taking, attentive peak. I will try to focus my nervous energy on taking notes, rather than on ripping my fingernails into tiny shreds, in hopes that I'll be a calmer presenter and a more reliable scholar. So I can then hear some feedback from other THG readers (that would be you).

I'm looking at the various faces of rebellion in THG, exploring how Katniss, Peeta, Gale, and Haymitch each has their own peculiar response to the capital's oppression, and none of them are what we might find "typical."  I hope I come up with more than that in the next few days.

Readings

So, outside of class requirements, I have recently finished The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay, the three book series by Suzanne Collins. All three books were incredibly well done, capturing the essence of a totalitarian society and coupling it with the beautiful heart of the adolescent characters. I was most blown away by Collins' ability to isolate what the reader could see, and the sense that there was something sinister going on outside of what Collins was letting us see. Did anyone else notice this as they were reading?

More recently, I have finished Carpe Diem by Autumn Cornwell. The book follows an uptight rule following bookworm named Vassar who has always lived up to everyone's expectations of her and is perfectly happy with who she is. Well, that's how she is in the beginning, until she's forced on a surprise trip across the world with her Grandmother. I don't want to spoil anything for those of you who haven't read it, but I loved the realism of this novel. Like most adolescent/coming of age novels, there's an exploration of a new world that eventually teaches the main character something more about themselves and gives them a new identity, but what I loved about this particular tale was that we never had to leave our world to get there. There were no elements of fantasy or magical creatures--but it still had the feel of being completely foreign in a similar way. So, if you have room on your ever growing list of books to read, add this one. (and if you've read it, what did you think?)

And now I'm out of books. I forsee a library trip in my future soon.