star-crossed lovers, my ass (a total Neverlark entry)
lithiumlaughter posted a really interesting analysis of Romeo & Juliet and how it isn't a love story, but a tragedy with a love story in it. She very convincingly argues that the story of the teenage romance merely serves as an example to show the fucked up nature of their environment - ranging from their parents and their complete disinterests in their children's happiness, to the adults' incapability of taking the younglings' point of view, to the overall political situation of the rivaling families, consuming the adults and leaving the children to fight for themselves.
What I found so fascinating about that was the fact that in The Hunger Games, Peeta and Kat are connected to Romeo & Juliet by the star-crossed lovers metaphor. Because just like their Shakespearean blueprint, they also experience a romance within a tragedy, their romance serving as an illustration of the terrible world surrounding them. And what's really fun about that is, THG gets mistaken for a romance in exactly the same way, thanks to the exact same psychological mechanism. Both of these texts have thousands of fans reading them as romance, taking the actual tragedy as mere romantic complication, rather than putting the romance in the context of the actual tragedy that is being narrated.
Of course, the Capitol people in THG keep doing the same - reading the Games as complication of the individual tribute's story unfolding on the screen, rather than understanding that the Games are the true story (read: problem). So while I in no way have a problem with the Everlark fans, or with anybody who feels drawn to that pairing in any way, fact is that they make up an overwhelming part of THG fandom. And I do find it fascinating that fan reception of THG, as such, illustrates the problem Susanne Collins tried pointing out in THG - our tendency to lose sight of the ugly bits in favor of the pretty. Somewhere out there, that woman must be sitting and crying like a baby.
What I found so fascinating about that was the fact that in The Hunger Games, Peeta and Kat are connected to Romeo & Juliet by the star-crossed lovers metaphor. Because just like their Shakespearean blueprint, they also experience a romance within a tragedy, their romance serving as an illustration of the terrible world surrounding them. And what's really fun about that is, THG gets mistaken for a romance in exactly the same way, thanks to the exact same psychological mechanism. Both of these texts have thousands of fans reading them as romance, taking the actual tragedy as mere romantic complication, rather than putting the romance in the context of the actual tragedy that is being narrated.
Of course, the Capitol people in THG keep doing the same - reading the Games as complication of the individual tribute's story unfolding on the screen, rather than understanding that the Games are the true story (read: problem). So while I in no way have a problem with the Everlark fans, or with anybody who feels drawn to that pairing in any way, fact is that they make up an overwhelming part of THG fandom. And I do find it fascinating that fan reception of THG, as such, illustrates the problem Susanne Collins tried pointing out in THG - our tendency to lose sight of the ugly bits in favor of the pretty. Somewhere out there, that woman must be sitting and crying like a baby.