So for School we were working on the play Julius Caesar by Shakespeare. As we were reading the play my sister and I started to pick up on things that made us think of The Hunger Games. We had several discussions amongst ourselves as to who was who, and this character really doesn't fit, and how they aren't exact replicas but the similarities are really cool. Now I am going to share with you some of the things I, and my sisters, noticed.
I am going to go through it character by character from the Hunger Games comparing them to character(s) in Julius Caesar. I would like to note that if you have not read the books do not read any further. There are spoilers.
Cinna: Cinna was the first to draw us in, it was his name. There are two Cinnas in Julius Caesar, one is a conspirator, the other a poet. Cinna in the Hunger Games designs cloths that are so beautiful it is a kind of poetry, but he also is later in the series a rebel hence a conspirator. It was interesting to see two characters in one.
Katniss: After much thought my sisters and I decided that Katiniss best fit with Brutus. They are both the tragic heroes of the story. They are both caught between two groups. One is persuaded to stab Caesar; the other is brought to rebellion.
Now am going to go off on a tangent for a minute so bear with me. In Shakespeare's time to kill a leader in such a way was completely intolerable. It was considered down right wrong, it didn't really matter how bad they were, though people could be brought to a point were it might be exusable but even that was thought of as a very extreme. People would automatically dislike Brutus when he kills Caesar, so Shakespeare had to make Caesar as dispicable in his play as possible. Now in our day and age people might not have as much of an issue with overthrowing a leader. We have seen some very bad leader who should, and sometime are overthrown(Hitler for example). Because we have seen such things as dictatorship, we would have less of a problem with people rising up against a leader. Brutus has become more understandable for us now.
Capitol (or Snow): This was a difficult one. eventually I decided that Caesar was the Capitol/Snow. If you read the paragraph above it might make more sense.
Rebels (or Coin): For rebels/Coin I have decided that that would be Cassius and the other conspirators. They bring Brutus to their side so that they may use in image of goodness, honesty, and honor to make their cause seem good to the people(which it may or may not be, though Cassius's reasons for killing Caesar are of a jealous nature).
Peeta: Peeta was the most difficult to identify. As far as I can really tell Peeta has not counterpart in the the play Julius Caesar. Though he shares some characteristics with a few characters.
Mark Antony is talented with words. It is most easily seen in the famous speech he makes "Friends, Romans, countrymen! Lend me your ears!." He manipulates the crowd with his words so that they want to kill Brutus and the conspirators. Peeta is good with works as well and can manipulate crowd just as well as Antony can, but Antony is never really close to Brutus. In this case Portia is like Peeta. Portia is loyal to Brutus. She loves him and cares deeply about what troubles him. In this They are alike. Peeta is not one character, his is several characters mixed up together.
That is really all I have. I am sure there are more characters I could put together, but those were the ones that stuck out to me.
Blessings
~Elizabeth
