Death:There is No Way to Avoid it

Alyssa Czerwinski

4/18/12

Death: There is No Way to Avoid it

Authors Note: This is a four paragraph essay about the main themes of coping with death and trust/isolation issues for the book The Hunger Games and the book Numbers.

In life, we’re promised one thing and one thing only: Death. The worst part though is that we will never know when it’s coming. But is knowing really that great? In The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins I doubt Katniss was pleased to know that while she was in the arena 23 tribunes were going to die. Or in Numbers by Rachel Ward is Jem’s “gift” really a gift? Having to cope with imminent death for others and trust and isolation problems are the main themes for both of these books.

Look at someone else’s eyes. What do you see? How about an eight digit number? No? Oh, I thought so. Jem from Numbers has a gift, she may not like it but she sees the dates that people are going to die in their eyes. There is no way to stop when anyone is going to die, coping with that is close to impossible. Also in The Hunger Games looking into the arena know 23 people are going to die. Not knowing who’s next, who is going to survive, but you still know it is coming and you cannot avoid any of it.

Who can you trust in the arena when you are all going to have to die in the end except for one? Even though there were a couple of alliances made, all 24 tribunes knew that there would be only one left in the end. This created trust issues and Katniss and many others isolated themselves because of it. Jem from Numbers stated isolating herself from the crowd since she found out what the number that she can saw meant. If it was her choice she probably would have never look into anyone else’s eyes every again. She cannot trust anyone with her gift. She can’t because she doesn’t want to be put in the situation where she is forced to say there number.

Life: everyone tries to live it to its full potential even though we know that someday it is all going to end.  In The Hunger Games Katniss knew that in the arena if she didn’t work hard that she would die. And in Numbers Jem trying to make the best of her gift; it’s a lot harder than it seems.  I dare you to try to live life to the fullest even though your life is based on coping with death practically 24/7 and having trust and isolation issues. Is it harder than you thought?