Katniss And Mr. Darcy

I usually don't make a habit of hating literary characters.  They are, after all, whatever I decide to make them into.  At the end of the day they are merely figments of my imagination.  They do not exist.  There is nothing tangible to despise.  Sometimes, however, these make-believe characters can add fuel to my fire and burn me in ways that I hitherto thought impossible.  Case in point: Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games and Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice.

Ever since I first read about Mr. Darcy's exploits with the Bennet sisters, I've hated him.  Maybe it has something to do with the fact all the women in my class (and trust me there were many) swooned over him.  They thought he was the greatest creation God had ever bestowed upon the earth (or something like that).  He could seemingly do no wrong.  He cared immeasurably about Elizabeth and Jane and the rest.  He would do anything to show his love.  I, on the other hand, saw him as pompous and self-serving.  When he wanted a break from Elizabeth, he ran off to increase her longing.  He paid for Lydia's wedding not because he was brutally kind but because he knew it'd make Elizabeth look upon him favorably.  Everything that he did was calculated to make Elizabeth fall in love with him.  He knew that if SHE did the falling, HE would have the control in the relationship.  When it finally happened, and she thought him the most dapper gentleman in the world, the conniving little weasel had succeeded.  He had fulfilled his personal needs at the expense of Elizabeth.  Or so I've always thought.

And that's when we come to Katniss.  Very similar.  Willing to use those closest to her to get what she wants.  When it was most beneficial to her to kiss Peeta, she'd kiss Peeta.  When she was lonely and knew that Gale would wash that loneliness away, she'd kiss Gale.  When she wanted to condemn killing to appear gentle, she would.  When she decided a bit of murder would satisfy her need for bloodlust, she'd take out a few bodies.  When she wanted to end her life to "save" the nation of Panem, it was, once again, out of complete selfishness.  She didn't want to live anymore with the guilt.  She alone had caused so much pain because she couldn't control her thoughts, couldn't control her outbursts, couldn't control her emotions, that there was nothing left to do but die.  She didn't want to live anymore with the pain.  Isn't that the ultimate selfishness?  Make everyone else suffer for the pain and anguish that she had unleashed?  She, like Mr. Darcy, played entirely by her own (self-serving) rules and parlayed it into a supportive following.

Am I cynical here?  Are these actually nice characters with only redeeming traits?  Am I creating some sort of facade because I'm jealous?  I don't think so.  What really bums me out is that these characters are so real.  They could be you or me.  These are standard human emotions.  We, by nature, want to get ahead in life.  We are inherently power hungry and typically will use others to achieve our aims.  Katniss and Mr. Darcy were no different.  That's what shakes me.  They are such plausible creations, and yet so deplorable.  Perhaps what really gets me is that humans as a whole must be like this.  I must be like this, ready to throw others by the wayside so that I may be successful.  What's even more jarring is that I don't even know it...