A trend of thought seems to have emerged in The Hunger Games fandom. When people think Katniss Everdeen, they think of a strong, powerful heroine. Katniss has basically become the symbol of young girl without a single weakness.
Why do so many people assume Katniss Everdeen has no weakness? Where does Suzanne Collins states or implies in her Hunger Games trilogy that her heroine has no weakness?
Nowhere.
Why think of Katniss only as a cold, calculating girl with a lethal aim glaring down a bow and arrow? Sure, that's an iconic image, but Katniss is so much more than that. It's only one facet of her incredible personality. What do you think motivates her prowess for survival? Weakness, naturally.
Her weaknesses play a huge part in bringing out her strengths into sharp relief. She forces herself to be strong because she must--because she's too weak to risk losing what she loves most. Her country, her friends, and most of all, her family. Her little sister Primrose is probably the biggest driving force of the entire trilogy.
Is this weakness, tempered by love into strength, not the very essence of heroism?
Along with her emotional weaknesses, the personal flaws of Katniss mold her into a very complex, very gripping, very real character. She will linger, burned into our memories, long after we forget other supposedly popular characters from this time period in books.
If Katniss were infallible, if she were without weakness, would she spend almost every waking moment, and many of her dreaming moments, worrying for the safety of others? Would she cry herself to sleep so many nights, or force herself to go on when all her body wants was to roll over and die?
No. Katniss worries, despite the fact that she's one of the most dangerous teenage girls ever to surface in the Games, because she fears no strength of her own can overcome the sheer odds stacked steeply against her. One scared girl against the world and the cruel death sentences it sends after her, one after another.
The only thing that keeps Katniss going is not strength, which she is constantly exhausting, but weakness. All the people who she worries about are vulnerable in one way or another. They need her, and she needs to take care of them and know they'll remain safe. Mutual weakness.
Now for some closing metaphors. Think of the mockingjay as a bird soaring on high--but don't forget that it feels the fire singing its feathers all too keenly. Don't think the wings beat wind and flame merely for their own glory; realize they do so to keep the mockingjay from falling and dashing against the rocks.
Don't think the piercing, chilling birdsong floats through the air just to fill the silence.
The birdsong is shattering the silence, even though the mockingjay knows the noise will make it an easy target.
