Compare the ways in which The Handmaid’s Tale and The Hunger Games use connections between character and setting to convey ideas.
Films and novels have always been a medium to express the human condition and convey its connoting ideas. The Handmaids Tale and The Hunger Games are similar in the context that they explore a dystopian society where the government has absolute power and control in what they do on a day to day basis. Ross and Atwood explore the themes of gender roles, power, how the heroes overcome their challenges and hardships and relationships in their texts through techniques such as setting, characterization, camera angles to convey their ideas of dystopia in their respective texts.
Atwood uses setting to explore gender roles in her novel. In The Handmaid’s Tale, the role of the woman is status quo, in a never-changing brutal Christian authoritarian regime; “Handmaids” are the product of “Commanders” who are men in full control of their household. Every single woman in the society have a specific role to fulfill and are stripped of individuality and even the privilege of a name; as a way to completely forget their past and accomplish what the government has established for them. The household is used as a setting to explore gender roles as it’s structured like a ‘family’ where women do their part and the one man (The Commander) resides at the top. Most women cannot bear children as they are infertile, instead using “Handmaids” as a surrogate. The audience emphasizes with Offred as they go through her journey in the novel, exploring the depths of her thoughts and the role she plays in her society. When Offred sits in the bath, naked, and contrasts the way she used to think about her body to the way she thinks about it now.“I used to think of my body as an instrument, of pleasure, or a means of transportation, or an implement for the accomplishment of my will . . . Now the flesh arranges itself differently. I’m a cloud, congealed around a central object, the shape of a pear, which is hard and more real than I am” Before, her body was an instrument, an extension of her self; now, her self no longer matters, and her body is only important because of its “central object,” her womb, which can bear a child. In similar reference, Ross explores gender roles in The Hunger Games through Katniss Everdeen, the text’s primary protagonist; using camera angles, flashback and the use of dialogue. Katniss has had a troubled upbringing, being the only person in her family to have the proper training to hunt and search for food. In one scene, a picture frame of her father is seen hanging from a wall in her house. Ross using flashback scenes that informs the audience about his tragic death and the pain and grief that still lingers in the family. Katniss becomes a fierce and independent woman due to this and strives to fill in the hole that her father left behind. “It was slow-going at first, but I was determined to feed us. I stole eggs from nes...
