What is Panem?
Panem is a fictionalized, future version of the United States. People in the country’s 12 districts, which loosely correspond to regions of the U.S., toil to supply resources to the Capitol, where the rich and powerful live. (“In school, they tell us the Capitol was built in a place once called the Rockies. District 12 was in a region known as Appalachia,” Katniss says in “The Hunger Games.”)
In the poorest district, 12, people regularly starve to death or die in coal mining accidents. Capitol citizens, on the other hand, are so wealthy that some people take tonics to make themselves throw up so they can feast on even more food. They are known for their outlandish fashion and are waited on by avoxes, enslaved people who have had their tongues cut out as punishment for treason.
About 74 years before the events of the first “Hunger Games” book, the districts rebelled against the Capitol. The ensuing civil war culminated in the Capitol obliterating the most powerful district, 13. After the rebellion, the government created the Hunger Games to punish and control the remaining districts.
What are the Hunger Games?
Every year on July 4, all district children between the ages of 12 and 18 are entered into a lottery, and one boy and one girl from each region are selected to compete in the Hunger Games. The “tributes” must battle one another in an arena to the death; the one left standing is rewarded with riches, as is his or her district.
In “The Hunger Games,” Katniss competes in the 74th Hunger Games. The televised competition, which is required viewing for all citizens, includes a macabre sort of athlete’s parade, interviews, opportunities for betting on and sponsoring the tributes and technical spectacle within the arena, including planned weather events and bioengineered creatures, or “mutts.” Katniss and Peeta Mellark, the other District 12 tribute, become the first joint victors; in “Catching Fire,” they and other previous winners must return to the arena to compete in the 75th Games, also called the third Quarter Quell.
