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Populär Culture Review
Although this is a parody, it does give us some insight into how the
character o f Katniss is popularly understood.
Finally, we see that Katniss’s view o f relationships diminishes
her ability to show grace. Grace is initiative; it gives without thought o f
repayment. Debt is reactive; its only thought is o f repayment. Grace is
Peeta’s gift with the bread; and this is why Katniss never understands it
and feels that she can never repay it. It is an initiative act motivated by
love. Her inability to understand grace is also why she pleads with Gale
not to let her family starve as she is leaving for the hunger games in book
one. She knows that she will not be able to repay him, and she is unsure
if he will act out o f love for them.24 Katniss does not initiate
relationships; every one that she has is initiated by someone eise— Peeta,
Rue, Haymitch, Finnick. M ost o f the time Katniss would rather just be
left alone. Another relationship just means another person to owe.
W hat does all of this have to do with Katniss’s vote at the end o f
Mockingjay! We have seen that Katniss has a cold-blooded, even
vengeful side to her, and that repayment o f debts is her fundamental way
o f interacting with the world. At the time o f the Victors meeting,
someone, and she is not at that point sure who it was, has killed her
sister. Someone owes her an enormous debt. If indeed the repayment o f
violence tends to escalate the violence, then it would not be out o f the
realm o f possibility, if she thinks that the Capitol is responsible for
Prim ’s death, that she would vote to hold another hunger games as an act
o f retribution. At some point, and again it is not clearly specified in the
story, she becomes convinced that Coin was responsible for Prim’s
death. And she assassinates Coin instead. This would seem to be a
repayment o f death for death, but for Katniss this is not the only fallout
frorn Prim ’s death. She actually tries to kill herseif as well, in part to
evade the punishment and torture she thinks is coming her way, but also
in part to punish herseif for failing to protect Prim. In addition, even after
she survives, as mentioned above, her relationship with Gale is collateral
damage to Prim ’s death since he had the idea for the bomb that was used
to kill Prim. Katniss knows she will never be able to separate her feelings
for Gale frorn the death o f her sister. And knowing herseif as an
unforgiving person, she knows her relationship with Gale is over.
A one-for-one repayment is never enough when relationships are
viewed this way. Only the virtues o f love, grace, and forgiveness can end
the cycle o f violence as they eventually do when Katniss is let off the
hook for killing Coin, and she goes back to District 12 to rebuild her life.
Initially she thinks she has no life, but when Peeta arrives, she eventually