The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes

One of the book’s titular “songbirds,” Lucy Gray Baird is a force to be reckoned with: In her very first appearance, she slips a snake down the blouse of the mayor’s daughter as she makes her way to the stage on reaping day. Even as she’s sentenced to an almost certain death, Lucy Gray stands out like “a tattered butterfly in a field of moths” (24). Hailing ostensibly from District 12, Lucy Gray’s exceptionalism is partially explained by her training as a singer and performer—the other tributes failing to share her stage presence—but it is also the result of her vagabond background as a member of the Covey. While the Covey’s origins are not fully explained in the book, they are framed as an interrelated group of travelers, akin to other actual peripatetic ethnic groups such as the Romani or Irish Pavees (also known, informally and offensively, as “gypsies”). Lucy Gray is neither Capitol nor district, and she presents something of an enigma to Coriolanus and his cohort—not to mention the reader.

Lucy Gray is objectified and sexualized in ways that separate her from the other characters as well: While the reader is privy to Coriolanus’s many complicated and conflicted thoughts, the inner life of Lucy Gray is opaque at best. It is difficult to know whether her words and actions are wholly genuine, or if they are performative. Coriolanus sees her as his possession—even as he eliminates her, for the sake of his future—and his love is characterized by his jealousy regarding hints about her past sexual experience.

Like many of the other main characters, Lucy Gray’s name resonates historically (though in this case, the reference is entirely fictional). Taken from the William Wordsworth poem, the original “Lucy Gray” describes the mysterious disappearance of a young girl whose presence still permeates the landscape. The allusion is clear: Coriolanus’s Lucy Gray—whose body is never found—is destined to haunt District 12 where, eventually, a rebellion against him takes root.

Sejanus acts as a foil to Coriolanus throughout the book: He is district-born to Coriolanus’s Capitol origins; his family is wealthy to Coriolanus’s now impoverished one; and his actions are dictated by a strong moral compass, while Coriolanus always operates in self-interest. When the reader first encounters Sejanus, it is through Coriolanus’s eyes: “The Plinths and their kind were a threat to all he held dear” (17). From the beginning, Sejanus is framed as a district upstart, granted privileges only through his father’s wealth and connections, and a constant irritation to Coriolanus. Their friendship is founded on nothing more than Coriolanus’s desire, at first, to ignore him, then later to court him because of his father’s wealth and status.

Sejanus agonizes over the inhumanity of the Hunger Games and argues passionately with Dr. Gaul over how the Capitol exercises its power. When Dr. Gaul asks him why he fed the tributes, Sejanus replies, “They were starving. We’re going to kill them; do we have to torture them ahead of time as well?” (92). Later, Coriolanus observes that “this was what had always defined Sejanus’s actions, his determination to do the right thing” (227). Sejanus is the book’s principled center, as well as its tragic hero. Betrayed by Coriolanus and executed for treason, Sejanus gives voice to the ethical arguments against the Capitol’s (and, by extension, Dr. Gaul’s) philosophy of government and humanity.