Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Propaganda, Spectacle, and Morality
Children
Government and Power
Human Nature
Trust and Loyalty
Summary
Analysis
Coriolanus realizes Lucy Gray is right: he hasn’t thought of her as a winner, and he should be trying to save her life. They turn to coming up with a strategy. Lucy Gray notes that if she can stay alive for a few more days, she might win by default—there are only 14 tributes left, and Marcus. They decide that it’ll be best for Lucy Gray to run away and hide once in the arena so that Coriolanus can get her food. Then, they discuss the interview. Lucy Gray is excited to sing.
Because of how neglectfully the Capitol treats the tributes, the tributes’ real adversary is arguably the Capitol. But again, this doesn’t really come up in conversation. Coriolanus and Lucy Gray skip right past this and onto strategizing. This shows how successfully Panem has shifted conversations about the Hunger Games, as the bad guys in this conversation aren’t the government leaders.
Themes
When the meeting ends, the mentors head for the biology lab. Dean Highbottom takes roll as Dr. Gaul drops carrots into the muttant rabbit’s cage. She starts by grilling Sejanus on where Marcus might be (the official story is that he’s trapped underground and will be caught soon). Sejanus spits that Marcus is probably dead, or will be soon, once Dr. Gaul gets her hands on him. She’ll probably drag his body through the streets. When Dr. Gaul insists that’s her right, Sejanus snaps. He says she has no right to take people’s lives and freedoms, and he tries to leave the room. The door is locked, and after a tense standoff, Coriolanus invites Sejanus to sit next to him. Coriolanus regrets his offer immediately when Dean Highbottom gives him a funny look.
It's hard to say for sure, but it’s possible that on some level, Coriolanus agrees with Sejanus. Getting to know Lucy Gray has shown him how poorly the Capitol treats district children, and tributes in particular. However, it’s also interesting that Sejanus is, for the most part, the only person willing to call Dr. Gaul out. This is no doubt a dangerous venture for him, since Dr. Gaul clearly doesn’t care about her students (recall what happened to Clemensia). Sejanus speaks up because he’s an outsider, someone born in the districts. But it’s also safe for him to speak up because his family is so rich.
Themes
Dr. Gaul tells the class that they’ll win the war with their heads, not their hearts. When Livia and Lysistrata argue that the war is over and the killing should stop, Festus notes it doesn’t seem like it will ever be over. Dr. Gaul asks what their strategy should be if they can’t win the war. Coriolanus knows the answer: control the war forever so the Capitol has the upper hand. Sejanus deems this immoral, and Dr. Gaul taunts Dean Highbottom. Coriolanus wonders if Highbottom is like the rabbit. Cheerfully, Dr. Gaul asks the students to write an essay on everything good about war.
Livia, Lysistrata, and Festus all make it seem like the constant fighting is exhausting. But this, it seems, is the point. Dr. Gaul appears to be suggesting that it’s in Panem’s best interest to keep the war alive (so, as Coriolanus suggests, they can win). If people are too exhausted because of the constant violence, they’re probably also too tired to ask questions about why the war is even happening. This gives Panem and the Capitol even more cover to keep doing what they’re doing.
Themes
After class, Sejanus tells Coriolanus to stop rescuing him and suggests that Dr. Gaul is “evil” and should be stopped. He laments that he wants to go back to District Two. Coriolanus warns Sejanus not to run off and then asks if the Plinth family has a guitar. He spends the rest of the afternoon trying to track down a guitar for Lucy Gray. Finally, Coriolanus visits Pluribus Bell. As they chat, Pluribus says he’d love to reopen his club and have girls like Lucy Gray sing. He’s happy to lend Coriolanus a beautiful guitar. When Coriolanus promises to be a regular patron if Pluribus reopens the club, Pluribus chuckles that Coriolanus will be like Crassus—who used to be the last one in the club every night with “that rascal Casca Highbottom.” This shocks Coriolanus.
Sejanus might be wealthy, but he’s also miserable—wealth isn’t going to make him feel any better about being forced to participate in something as horrific as the Hunger Games. But again, Sejanus seems to be one of the only ones who’s entertaining this line of thought; Coriolanus, in contrast, is fully committed to making the best of his mentoring opportunity. It’s in Coriolanus’s best interest to play along, though. As he understands it, doing well is the only way to achieve prestige and wealth—things he wants. This goal also discourages him from questioning things the way Sejanus does.
Themes
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Coriolanus takes the guitar home and can’t stop thinking about what Pluribus said about his father and Dean Highbottom. Even if Crassus and Highbottom were friends once, Highbottom clearly hates Coriolanus. But Coriolanus has no chance to ask Pluribus, as he spends the next days prepping Lucy Gray for the interview. Tigris offers to clean Lucy Gray’s dress and sends a bar of soap. Lucy Gray spends the days eating and playing music.
Coriolanus realizes he doesn’t have the whole story of what happened between Dean Highbottom and his father, but now he at least knows that there’s a reason, however mysterious, that Dean Highbottom dislikes him. More importantly for Coriolanus, though, is focusing on the task at hand: getting Lucy Gray ready for the interview, which will hopefully help her chances of winning.
Themes
The interviews are aired live from the Academy auditorium. The weatherman and amateur magician Lucky Flickerman hosts and welcomes viewers. He introduces the food sponsorship and gambling programs, performs a few magic tricks, and then invites the first tribute on. The first tributes and mentors try to give memorable performances. Lucy Gray and Coriolanus wait backstage. Her lips are the same bright pink as the roses in her hair and on Coriolanus’s lapel, a sign of who Lucy Gray belongs to. She notes that “the show’s not over until the mockingjay sings,” a phrase Coriolanus doesn’t understand. Then, she steps onstage, introduces herself, and starts to sing.
The interviews are a major part of the Gamemakers’ quest to get more people to watch the Games. Through the interviews, tributes are forced to play along and sell themselves to viewers as worthy candidates—something that dehumanizes them. Lucy Gray is further dehumanized when Coriolanus makes it clear that he believes she belongs to him. But she also seems to gain the upper hand when she deploys this mysterious phrase that Coriolanus doesn’t understand.
Themes
Coriolanus has never heard this song before. Lucy Gray sings about falling in love, falling on hard times with her lover, and trying to make a “living by her charms” while her lover used all their money. The lover drops Lucy Gray, so Lucy Gray reminds him of who she is to him: the one he trusted, and now she’s going to die. She says she’s “the bet that [he] lost in the reaping” and asks what he’s going to do when she’s dead. When she finishes, the audience explodes. Coriolanus knows this will get her sponsors—but he’s jealous.
In Coriolanus’s mind, this song is both a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because it’s clearly a hit with audiences, so it’ll help boost Lucy Gray’s chances of winning the Games. But it’s also a curse because Coriolanus has to confront that Lucy Gray perhaps did have a lover in District 12—something that asserts her humanity and her agency. And since Coriolanus thinks she belongs to him, this challenges his authority over her.
Themes
