Katniss
the
Cattail
An Unauthorized Guide to Names and Symbols in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games
Valerie Estelle Frankel
COPYRIGHT
Katniss the Cattail: An Unauthorized Guide to Names and Symbols in Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games
© 2012 Valerie Estelle Frankel
Smashwords Edition
Katniss the Cattail is an unauthorized guide to The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. None of the individuals or companies associated with this series or any merchandise based on this series has in any way sponsored, approved, endorsed, or authorized this book.
First Edition 2012
Other Books by Valerie Estelle Frankel
Henry Potty and the Pet Rock: An Unauthorized Harry Potter Parody
Henry Potty and the Deathly Paper Shortage
From Girl to Goddess: The Heroine’s Journey in Myth and Legend
Buffy and the Heroine’s Journey (forthcoming)
Harry Potter: Still Recruiting (forthcoming)
Teaching with Harry Potter (forthcoming)
CONTENTS
ALLUSIONS TO LITERATURE AND LIFE
INTRODUCTION
As with series like Harry Potter, names have great significance in Suzanne Collins’s books, temptingly referencing characters out of Shakespeare, myth, and American life. The entries offered here provide a deeper understanding of the characters, along with their namesakes and literary origins. There are Roman names and flower names, set as opposites in a world poised on revolution. There are military names, echoing battles in our own history and their link to the battles of Panem—history will never stop cycling. Some of the symbolism is simplistic on the surface but more deeply complex. Bread is a sacred food used to save lives and even make a marriage in District Twelve. It is also the meaning of Panem, as Collins named her world after the spoiled Romans glutted with Bread and Circuses. Katniss becomes the Girl Who Was on Fire, but she is Cinna’s creation, dressed like a doll in the early books. Only with her flame arrows of Mockingjay does she truly embrace that role.
Districts 11 and 12 offer nature names: The cat Buttercup; Gale’s mother Hazelle Hawthorne and her children Posy and Gale; Rue, Thresh, Chaff, and Seeder from District 11; and of course, Prim and Katniss. All these link the heroes to the simplicity and bounty of the country, filled with the wholesome beauty of nature. Some of the flower names, especially Rue and Primrose, appear in Shakespeare with heavy symbolism.
By contrast, the Capitol is full of Roman names, echoing their obsession with heedless luxury: Claudius Templesmith, Cressida, Portia, Messalla, Fulvia, Romulus, Lavinia, Purnia, Titus, Plutarch Heavensbee, Coriolanus Snow. There’s Katniss’s Prep Team: Flavius, Octavia, and Venia, headed by Cinna. And there are the Career Tributes with Roman names to honor the Capitol: Cato, Brutus, and Enobaria, while names like Glimmer and Marvel show how valued and spoiled the Careers are. Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar offers nine characters who appear in the Hunger Games series (Brutus, Cinna, Portia, Purnia, Flavius, Messala, Cato the Younger, Claudius, and Caesar himself). Shakespeare’s other Roman plays have at least seven more, covering nearly all the Roman character names. The Roman biographer Plutarch, too, wrote on many of the named characters. Thus Collins casts the traitors from Shakespeare and history against Roman emperors and their allies, building a world that echoes ancient Rome and those who defied it.
It’s also important to remember the series is told from Katniss’s point of view. Characters have prophetic or appropriate names, but they also have names based on how Katniss perceives them. To Katniss, Gale is a strong wind of revolution, willing to blow down all in his path. But Prim is a delicate flower needing protection. Peeta’s parents and Katniss’s parents, while major characters, never have their first names revealed. Their function in the story is simply to exist and be left behind as their children grow into heroes. Ultimately, Katniss’s own perceptions fuel the deeper meanings of characters’ names within the series, even as they reflect characters from our own history.
BIG THREE
Katniss
“Katniss” is of course the cattail root, as she tells us. But it is a heavily nourishing plant, important to Katniss who sees herself as the provider for her family. Her entire life is devoted to nourishing, first as a hunter/gatherer, and then as the wealthy Victor of the games.
Katniss describes her special plant as tall with white blossoms and “leaves like arrowheads” (HG 52). Of all the nourishing plants in the world, Katniss is probably the most arrowlike—a perfect match for our heroine. She adds that the roots don’t look like much, but are as nourishing as a potato (HG 52). Katniss, from District Twelve, likewise doesn’t look like much, but she’s just as good, it turns out, as any of the children from the wealthier districts.
The plants of the forest are part of Katniss, so much so that the katniss roots give her her name. “As long as you can find yourself, you’ll never starve,” her father teases (HG 52). While this is literally true, Katniss survives by keeping herself grounded—remembering who she is and what she cares for. Indeed, if she can find herself under so many costumes and identities like the Mockingjay, she will survive. Though the Capitol trains its Tributes in brutality, encouraging them to turn on each other, Katniss follows her instinctive compassion and bonds with Rue and Peeta in the Games. This saves her in the end.
Elizabeth Baird Hardy, author of Milton, Spenser, and the Chronicles of Narnia: Literary Sources for the C.S. Lewis Novels has an interesting observation on the katniss plant:
It is known as duck-potato, appropriate for someone whose sister always has a duck tail…but also as swan potato, wapatoo, tule potato, and, most commonly, as arrowhead, a name reflected in its Latin moniker—Sagittaria (or “belonging to an arrow”; the constellation Sagittarius, of course, is an archer).
Katniss’ name comes from the Zodiac sign of the archer (the sign for those born November 22 through December 21). Sagittarius, according to Greek myth, may have been the centaur Chiron, a kind and gentle figure known for forest lore and for training young heroes. More scholarly sources link Sagittarius with Crotus, the satyr or half-goat man who dwelt deep in the forest. He was a great musician and tracker, inventor of the hunting bow (“Crotus”). Centaurs and satyrs are creatures of nature and the forest, a link between man and animal, hunter and hunted. For both of these mythic figures, there’s a clear link with Katniss.
Suzanne Collins notes that “Katniss Everdeen owes her last name to Bathsheba Everdene, the lead character in Far from the Madding Crowd. The two are very different, but both struggle with knowing their hearts” (Jordan). In this classic novel by Thomas Hardy, Bathsheba Everdene is courted by a rich landowner and by a poor shepherd who proposes marriage when they’re equals but then ends up working for her. Katniss, too grows up equal to Gale, her hunting partner, but then becomes as rich as Peeta, leaving Gale and his romantic plans far behind. Bathsheba, like Katniss, struggles between two such different men, one gentle and chaste (Peeta comments that he’s never cared for a girl besides Katniss) and one more violent, temperamental, and experienced in romance. After betrayal and abandonment by the more violent man, Bathsheba finally weds the humble shepherd. The romantic pattern indeed seems to echo Katniss’s struggle between her equal in warfare, Gale, and the humble baker, Peeta.
Everdeen is also two letters off from “evergreen,” fitting well with the plant names of the outer districts. Evergreen pines are eaten several times in the series, offering another wholesome plant in a world of starvation. Like the katniss plant, evergreens are sharp and pointed, in this case with rough needles and pinecones to defend themselves. They, like our heroine, thrive in areas of low nutrition—in fact, the low nutrition prompts them to be evergreen, as losing leaves means losing nutrients (Aerts). These trees appear at Christmas as a celebration of life, as they’re healthy and strong even in the winter (and, significantly, even under vicious snow. Or President Snow). They symbolize a new beginning and reincarnation of the world into a newer, better year. Though the world is dark, sunlight and springtime will come again. This is a perfect symbol of Katniss Everdeen, remaker of the world.
Peeta
Peeta, an apparently meaningless word with Collins’s spelling, has many homophones, or sound-alikes. “Pita” is a kind of bread, a humble, simple one that’s as far from “puffed up” as it gets. “The flat dense loaves” of District Twelve (HG 7) might even resemble pita bread. If Katniss’s father, a gatherer, named her thus, and Thresh, Seeder, and other children are named for their district jobs, Peeta’s bread name in his bakery family would make sense.
In Michelangelo’s famous sculpture, the Pietà (another homophone), Mary cradles a dead Jesus. In all three books, it is Katniss’s role to nurture Peeta and unlock the gentle mothering side of her nature. In book one, he is dying from a wound in his leg (prompting much literal cradling). Book two, he momentarily dies from electric shock; book three, Katniss must help him through the Capitol’s brainwashing and learn to love him. Pietà is Italian for pity—in all three books, Katniss must connect with Peeta through pity, compassion, and love to assure their survival. Of course, Peeta is sacrificed at the end of Catching Fire, so that Katniss and the others can escape. Many scholars, particularly the “Hogwarts Professor” John Granger see this as a Christlike moment:
“Peeta,” the man of town and “Boy with the Bread,” has a name that means bread (pita) as well as a vocation as a bread baker. As a child, he gives two loaves of bread to Katniss that he purchases sacrificially (he is beaten for it by his mother), bread which saves her from physical starvation and the eating of which immediately inspires her to think of her “Family Book” and the means to provide for her mother and sister. His bread, in effect, saves her. In a world named “Bread” (Panem is the accusative case form of the Latin word for Bread), I think it is transparent that Peeta or “Peter” is an icon of the Christ, the world creator, Who in St. Peter’s church at least, is received as Bread, and Who loves the world and every soul in it sacrificially.
(“Unlocking ‘The Hunger Games’”)
Peter was a humble fisherman who became Jesus’ first disciple, just as Peeta is the first to fight by Katniss’s side and believe in her. Peter may be most famous for denying Jesus when all the disciples were pursued by Romans. This echoes Peeta’s own rejection of Katniss after the Capitol’s torture and brainwashing. Peter too suffered at the hands of the Roman government. According to legend, he was executed as a scapegoat by the tyrannical Roman Emperor Nero. The Christians were rebels in the Roman Empire, but finally became its rulers, a scenario that plays out in Panem.
PETA is also the acronym for the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. For gentle, pacifist Peeta who never hunts, this too is an appropriate label. While Katniss is found gutting rabbits and shooting squirrels, Peeta bakes bread and frosts cookies, providing his friends with vegetarian bounty.
Melark might be a portmanteau (or squashing-together) of “meadowlark,” a nature symbol like so many names of District Twelve. The lark is a symbol of merriment and joy as it sings to welcome the daybreak. His last name also resembles “malarkey,” a word for misleading speech or foolishness, like “tomfoolery” or “fiddlesticks.” Katniss notes how Peeta always makes people feel better: “Ironic, encouraging, a little funny, but not at anyone’s expense” (M 299). Though Peeta jokes and lifts Katniss’s spirits, he’s not excessively foolish—but that’s what Katniss must come to realize. Before the Games, she easily dismisses him as dead weight, unable to hunt or fight. In time, however, she comes to value him and even his laughter. “This is why they’ve made it this far. Haymitch and Peeta. Nothing throws them,” Katniss thinks as the men joke loudly to distract suspicious Peacekeepers (CF 156).
Gale
Some may be surprised Gale isn’t named for a plant. In fact, he is: Sweet gale or myrica gale (also known as bayberry or bog myrtle) is a bushy shrub with bitter-tasting leaves. It’s versatile for many rural uses just as Gale himself is an excellent trapper, hunter, and gatherer: The branches can be used for beer making, and the cones, for candlewax, the leaves for scenting sheets, the bark for tanning skins. Boiling it produces a yellow dye, or it can be made into a natural insect repellent. Since beavers love eating it, they build dams near clusters of gale and in doing so create traps for fish, an echo of Gale with his excellent snares (Grieve).
The more obvious meaning of gale is a mighty wind that can blow down houses and mighty trees. Gale as a revolutionary is just such an uncontrolled force as he demands the deaths of everyone in the Capitol and in District Two in vengeance for his losses. The weapons he designs are cruel enough to worry Katniss, and are finally turned on his own side as well as the enemy. As an unrestrained gale, he harms both sides in the war.
Granger has a different take on the wind connection with his name:
Gale, the man of the woods, free and unbound except for his family obligations, is an embodiment of Nature, a “gale force wind” of spirit and the experience of natural beauty. His relationship with Katniss is platonic despite their spending years in each other’s company and both leading lives deprived of touch and love. He fosters rather than challenges Katniss’s purity, freedom, and individual strength or identity. (“Unlocking ‘The Hunger Games’”)
Further references to the name Gale appear in military history. It’s not a surprise that there are many military names in the book, as Suzanne Collins heard much about the armed forces in her youth. As she explained in an interview:
My father was career Air Force. He was in the Air Force for 30-some years. He was also a Vietnam veteran. He was there the year I was six. Beyond that, though, he was a doctor of political science, a military specialist, and a historian; he was a very intelligent man. And he felt that it was part of his responsibility to teach us, his children, about history and war…If you went to a battleground with my father, you would hear what led up to the battle. You would hear about the war. You would have the battle reenacted for you, I mean, verbally, and then the fallout from the battle. And having been in a war himself and having come from a family in which he had a brother in World War II and a father in World War I, these were not distant or academic questions for him. (Margolis)
Humphrey Gale was Chief Administrative Officer of Lieutenant General Dwight Eisenhower’s Allied Forces Headquarters (AFHQ) during World War II. The British and American administrative systems differed so greatly that separate AFHQ organizations had to be established. Gale’s job, which Eisenhower called “unique in the history of war,” was to coordinate the two (Playfair et al.). Katniss is used to the life-or-death struggle of the Hunger Games but not to District Thirteen’s army training or command system. Gale is the one to manage a grieving Katniss and help her present her demands to President Coin as he becomes liaison between the two worlds.
General Sir Richard Nelson “Windy” Gale learned enough from his ordeal in fighting World War I to challenge military thinking of the time and try to revolutionize procedures during World War II. With a suspicion of firepower-led operations, he argued for more stealth training and insisted on mobility and surprise on the battlefield (Dover 28-54). Gale Hawthorne often challenges the organizers at District Thirteen using the pain he endured at the bombing of District Twelve and his hunting knowledge to find better ways to fight. It is his plan that vanquishes District Two, and he eagerly joins Katniss’s stealth mission to assassinate Snow.
For his last name, the hawthorn is a thorny shrub in the rose family. It is called Crataegus Oxyacantha from the Greek kratos, meaning hardness (of the wood), oxcus (sharp), and akantha (a thorn) (Grieve). A “hard, sharp thorn” is a good description of Gale himself, especially for Katniss who must deal with his anger and stubbornness in the later books. Its wood is very hard and resistant to rot, marking it formidable and well-defended, also like Gale. The hawthorn root-wood makes the hottest wood-fire known (Grieve). Gale’s fire for survival, and especially for revolution, indeed burns hotter and stabs more sharply than everyone around him. Gale is willing to kill their spies and allies, civilians, and even himself to win the war, as he announces in District Two, crying, “Bring on the avalanches!” (M 205).
Every
shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
-John Milton, L'Allegro
The hawthorn was not only a country bush favored by the rural farmers of England and Ireland—it was one of the Three Sacred Trees beloved by fairies (oak and ash being the others). These three trees combine to make magic, rather like the threesome who become the heroes of Panem. As a fairy tree, the hawthorn carries many superstitions—harming the tree leads to death, but those who care for nature will be rewarded by the fairies. Those who destroy Gale’s home find themselves caught in the fury of his retribution with savage fighting and deadly traps. There’s also a belief that if all the hawthorn bushes are torn up, all goodness will leave the land and that hawthorn bushes cause lightning storms (Watts 180-183). As Gale and his family leave District Twelve behind, it’s indeed destroyed by a firestorm. Finally, carrying its thorns leads to a bountiful fishing trip or cows that produce more milk. For Katniss too, bringing Gale gets her a much greater harvest.
The hawthorn was sacred to Hymenaeus, the Greek god of marriage, who was often seen carrying a brimming basket of nuts & fruits. In myth, he never wed, but always blessed the hero’s and heroine’s marriage to each other, a reference that hints at the trilogy’s end (Shepard 245). The hawthorn has also been regarded as the emblem of hope, back to the worship of the Roman goddess Flora, mistress of flowers and life. Following this, there’s a tradition that hawthorn branches were Jesus’ crown of thorns.
At the same time, some country villagers believe hawthorn blossoms still bear the smell of the Great Plague of London, thanks to their aroma of decomposition (Grieve). The bushes are associated with death and graves, as the unlucky thorns were said to spring from dead men’s dust (Watts 181). In Teutonic ritual, funeral pyres were made of hawthorn so its smoke could guide souls to the afterlife. Gale, of course, guides his friends from the ashes of District Twelve to a new life in District Thirteen. This mixture of hope, peace for mankind, and death fits Gale’s role in the story, as his best friend Katniss watches him grow from protector of her family to a leader of the revolution to a willing murderer of civilians.
THE NAMES OF PANEM
Alma Coin
The most obvious “Alma” is the Battle of Alma, the first battle of the Crimean War. The British and French had a plan to defeat the Russians by distracting them with such an obvious attack that they would fail to notice the true danger. In the midst of the fighting, a cry of “Do not fire! They are French” as the Russians attacked threw the battle into confusion (Russell 154). Both Katniss’s own distracting attack with her small Mockingjay command disguised as Capitol civilians and President Coin’s bombing of the civilian children have a similar effect. Despite these alarming moments and possible friendly fire, the Battle of Alma became a glorious victory for the British and French, so much so that “Alma” as a girls’ name became popular as a result. So too Katniss and President Coin have a glorious victory. But all wars, even triumphs, have a painful cost.