#asoiaf thoughts

[sabiartrin]

Sansa. A Golden Child.

It simply breaks my heart that Catelyn creates such a rift between her children. And I'm not even talking about Jon right now. I'm talking about Sansa and Arya.

Sansa has always been Catelyn's golden child, the future queen and mother of rulers of all of Westeros. She admires her daughter, and in the later chapters, when Sansa is married off to Tyrion, it's as if Catelyn feels like she's losing her. She speaks of her in her thoughts in a similar way to how she talks about Bran and Rickon, whom she believed were dead.

Also, remember how Ned protested when Catelyn mentioned that Sansa could become queen. "Sansa is only eleven, and Joffrey..." Yes, Sansa is still a child who needs family, love, and care, and certainly not Joffrey. But Catelyn is only concerned about the fact that Joffrey is the heir to the throne, and her daughter could become queen. Sansa is hardly a child to her, just an extension of herself; she is captivated by the idea that her grandchildren will rule the Kingdoms.

Catelyn's initial thoughts about Arya are simply that the girl needs to learn some manners, and that's it. Right after Catelyn's chapter comes Arya's, which is filled with resentment and jealousy towards her sister. Yes, I think Arya was jealous of Sansa. She didn't give up trying to connect with Sansa, engaging her in conversation, inviting her to ride horses. But the Septa did everything to turn Sansa into a proper lady, and complained to Catelyn, fully aware of the scolding Arya would later receive for it. "Nymeria loved her, even if no one else did." Come on, would a child loved by her mother indulge in such thoughts?

Catelyn wanted the best for her children, but as a mother of daughters, she seriously messed up, let's be honest.

#artists on tumblr #fantasy art #art #fanart #sansa #sansa stark #asoiaf fanart #asoiaf thoughts #i was high writing it dont take it seriously #unless??? #catelyn stark #ned stark #arya stark #nymeria #joffrey baratheon #a song of ice and fire #a game of thrones

[hieronymph]

Had to see another post in Elia Martell tag about how Elia is a silent victim and how we don't know if she was really angry or upset with Rhaegar's infidelity.

A woman who was a Princess of a progressive kingdom which values women for being more than child incubators

Had to move to a racist court to marry a man who was delusional and who forced her to become a broodmare and got her pregnant in quick succession even after she was bedridden

Had to deal with said husband being a deadbeat father who didn't protect her and their daughter from his racist father and stayed silent

Was kept as a hostage by her racist FIL so he can blackmail and extort from her brother to send her kingdom's men to fight and die in a war that wasn't theirs

This definitely sounds like something a woman from a progressive nation, who is ridiculed and treated with distrust for her race, would be ok with. Right?

There are so many blanks in the books about so many things yet we all come up with detailed and nuanced theories to

fill those blanks.

Yet, some of yall can't fill the very simple gaps left about Elia's response to her husband's infidelity, disrespect and forced impregnation.

You operate under this belief that GRRM didn't mention that she wasn't upset so of course, she wasn't angry at Rhaegar or his actions.

Sure that is exactly the way to digest whatever content GRRM writes.

Are yall deliberately this obtuse?

Please get out of Elia Martell tags with such shit takes.

#princess elia martell #elia martell #elia martell deserved better #asoiaf #asoiafwomensource #asoiaf meta #asoiaf thoughts #anti rhaegar targaryen #princess of dorne #dorne kingdom

[serjaimelannister]

A Storm of Swords, Jaime IV || A Feast for Crows, Brienne VII

#🫠 #sorry having Thoughts today #🎵 two knights dissociating leagues apart because they're not in love 🎵 #jaime x brienne #asoiaf thoughts

[lagosbratzdoll]

On Daenerys, Colonisation and Race Discourse within the ASOIAF Fandom

This has been on my mind for a good long while and honestly, as much as I would like to leave discourse in the pits, it has been bugging me intermittently over the past few weeks.

Far too many of you get on here and call people who like the fictional dragon-riding family, neo-Nazis and that sentiment is so prevalent, that white people feel comfortable telling me a black woman that I am a neo-Nazi for rooting for Daenerys Targaryen. I am upholding neo-Nazi power fantasies for wanting to see a little girl live at the end of a story. I am a neo-Nazi for wanting to see the rape survivor have the family she aches for and children with the man (or men) she loves.

Then, those same people go on spiels about how the systemic erasure of those who sing the song of the earth and other old races is not colonialism. That their removal from their home is not displacement but an agreement between two equal parties. The fact that the only place where those who sing the song of the earth exist in the present timeline is north of the wall, surrounded by the bones of their dead, is not a travesty. That the expulsion of the old races from their home isn't that bad and should not be condemned. 

Instead, people argue, completely seriously, that the harm that the First Men and Andals have caused is centuries in the past, so essentially the slate has been wiped clean. The logical leaps that are required to arrive at such a boneheaded conclusion are truly mind-boggling, and those who make such arguments are not good people. 

I am unsure how one could read those books and come away with the impression that the old races do not mourn the loss of their home. I am unsure how one could read The Last of the Giants[1] and Ygritte’s reaction to both the song and Jon’s dismissal of the ethnic cleansing of the giants then believe that the old races and the free folk have moved past their displacement. 

In Westeros, from the Wall to the broken arm of Dorne, they all speak one language despite the fact they are all different ethnicities and they all landed on the shores at different times. That is not the case in Essos, we have been introduced to at least six languages and in A Dance with Dragons, Tyrion notes that the Valyrian spoken in the Free Cities has evolved into nine distinct dialects, and they are well on their way to becoming different languages.

How would a continent as large and diverse as Westeros maintain its hegemony over the people if not for forced assimilation, discriminatory practices and violence? The brutal repression required to keep one house in power for thousands of years is nothing to sniff at. The suppression required to keep the vast majority of Westeros worshipping one (or seven) gods. The systems in place ensure that language does not grow or evolve amongst the highborns at least.

Centuries before Aegon's Landing the maesters were the definitive educational authority and even now centuries after, nothing has changed. The grey rats still decide who learns what and when they learn it. There's one in every highborn home, all correspondence passes through them, they are the healers and the councillors.

The circular logic gets even more blockheaded when you factor in the fact that Daenerys is far from the only white character in the books. She is not the only character who wishes for home. She is not the only character who draws strength from her ancestors, her bloodline and her magical creatures. 

Cersei draws strength from her family’s iconography, and the Stark children (Jon included) all draw strength from their direwolves, their home and their blood. Sansa, Arya and Bran wish to return home and their home was built on the indiscriminate murder and displacement of the indigenous peoples. Their home is built on centuries of rape, murder, exclusionary practices and sexual slavery. 

However, if we give the nonsensical argument that time erases crimes air; the Starks, Lannisters and Tullys are warring to settle personal grievances in the present timeline. As a consequence of that war, thousands (a modest guesstimate) of small folk, minor nobles and even some major ones have been raped, tortured, maimed and killed.

Despite all this, no one writes meta after meta about how Sansa and her siblings must surely die for justice to be had for those who sing the song of the earth, the free folk, the giants and all the old races that fled beyond the wall.  

People write meta about Cersei and how she must die, but those are typically more misogynistic nature. They typically argue that she must die not for the “crime” of being Lannister, but for the “crime” of being Cersei and “ruining” Jamie. 

I would not mind criticisms of Dany and her peace-focused approach to ending slavery because the approach is naïve and she gives the slavers far too much ground. However, she is learning, growing and self-critiquing. At the end of A Dance with Dragons, she has decided to embrace fire and blood, her knight is breaking the false peace which is a necessary step forward.

What I find offensive is people saying that she should have planned better before she abolished slavery. And that the death, violence, and sickness that arises from her quest to eradicate slavery is somehow worse than the death, violence, and sickness that already existed in Slaver’s Bay. 

This argument often downplays the horrific conditions and suffering that exist(ed) under the slave system in Slaver's Bay. Such arguments are often in poor taste and prioritise the lives and comforts of the slavers more than the people they have enslaved.

I would not mind criticisms of Dany if people applied that same critique even-handedly. The same people who believe that Jon and Bran have done much to rectify the evil that their ancestors perpetuated believe that Dany has not done anything to right the wrongs of her ethnic kin. They praise them for the non-existent steps that they have taken, but in the same breath, they condemn Dany for not being able to immediately end the plague that is slavery. 

It is perfectly alright to not like fictional characters, no law requires you to like certain fictional characters over others. However, what is not right is making broad accusations about those who do, it is beyond the pale. It is disgusting, and annoying, and trivialises real-world issues to score cheap points against fictional characters.

Equating the survival of a teenage survivor to the restoration of a fascist house or neo-Nazi power fantasy when such designations do not exist in the world of ice and fire is strange behaviour. Saying that the teenage survivor will eventually be manipulated and raped (again) before ending up dead on her manipulator's blade is also strange behaviour. 

Dismissing the horrors of colonialism, especially when the text shows you that the involved parties are still affected by it, is not normal and often veers into real-world imperialism apologia. While criticism and analysis of characters and their actions are valid and even encouraged, it is essential that we do not resort to sweeping generalisations about other people and that we keep criticisms of characters grounded in the text. 

[1]  

Ooooooh, I am the last of the giants, my people are gone from the earth.

The last of the great mountain giants, who ruled all the world at my birth

Oh, the smallfolk have stolen my forests, they’ve stolen my rivers and hills.

And they’ve built a great wall through my valleys, and fished all the fish from my rills

In stone halls they burn their great fires, in stone halls they forge their sharp spears.

Whilst I walk alone in the mountains, with no true companion but tears.

They hunt me with dogs in the daylight, they hunt me with torches by night.

For these men who are small can never stand tall, whilst giants still walk in the light.

Oooooooh, I am the LAST of the giants, so learn well the words of my song.

For when I am gone the singing will fade, and the silence shall last long and long.

#I do not like most of y’all. #Do not call people of colour you do not know neonazis to win points against a fictional character. #It is not my fault that most of your faves are boring and do nothing to drive the plot forward #take it up with george rr martin and stop villifying dany and her (mid) family. #The insistence that we must mind fandom etiqutte is tired as hell too especially because people use it as silencing tools. #“Yes I called you a neonazi but you are the real weirdo for finding my post so really it’s on you that you saw that.” #that’s how y’all sound. #If I see another post that equates enjoying dany to being a neonazi #i will make it everybodys problem. #Took a long break from this fandom because the rancid takes were overshadowing the good takes #and i’ve been back less than a year and the takes are even more rancid than before. #hotd opened an evil door that should’ve remained shut. #Cause why the fuck are there criston cole apologists? Why are there aemond and aegon ii apologists? It is a dark world we live in. #put the last giant at the bottom for my homies who have not read the books which if we're speaking real is more than half of y'all #now that i have gotten this out of my system #it is time to get back to demon slayer #daenerys targaryen #asoiaf #asoiaf thoughts #asoiaf nonsense #if you saw the typos in the first version #no you didn't #edited this to add some thoughts I originally put in the tags because I felt it worked better there.

[sad-endings-suck]

Varys: Ah, now that Young Griff is old enough, I can finally enact my 956 step plan that took me 20 years to concoct to place him on the iron thro— wtf is that?

The literal mother of dragons and Rhaegar Targaryen’s surprise secret bastard: A smoothie.

#asoiaf #daenerys targeryan #jon snow #young griff #jon x daenerys #lord varys #asoiaf meme #asoiaf thoughts

[starogeorgina]

My top ten unanswered questions in asoiaf books

10. What do the others want?

9. Who wrote the pink letter?

8. Is Ashara Dayne really dead?

7. Is Harrenhal really cursed?

6. What really happened at Summer hall?

5. Did Oberyn Martell poison Tywin Lannister?

4. Who specifically was involved in ordering blood and cheese?

3. Is young Griff really Aegon Targaryen?

2. What caused the Doom of Valyria?

1. What happened to Balerion the black Dread and Aerea Targaryen?

#asoiaf #house of the dragon #game of thrones #house of the dragon thoughts #asoiaf thoughts #top 10

[fandom-puff]

Sandors thighs, send tweet

Omg they’re so BIG and MUSCLY and I can just visualise these tree trunks fuckin flexing as he fucks reader 🤤🤤🤤 and the TWITCH when he’s about to cum/cumming fuuuuckkkkk

Send ​smutty thoughts about fictional men x

#Sandor Clegane smut #Sandor Clegane thoughts #smutty thoughts about fictional men #ASOIAF thoughts

[mneiai]

People going "both sides were equally bad" with Cat and Jon are so disturbing because one was literally an adult and the other was literally a child. One was an adult who made a child terrified of her and who basically told him she wished he was dead and the other was a child who did his best to stay out of the adult's way and to never antagonize her, and who was being blamed for something he had no part in.

#anti catelyn stark #asoiaf thoughts #cw child abuse

[wildfirefruitjars]

How the fuck does Gregor Clegane not kill horses with the sheer weight of his giant, armored arse?!

So, Gregor is said to weigh 190 kg. (420 lb.)

A quick Google search tells me plate armor weighs around 30-35 kg. (66-77 lb.)

Gregor's armor is said to be the thickest and heaviest armor in the Seven Kingdoms, and that no ordinary man would be able to move in it! Therefore Gregor's armor must weigh a lot more than the average armor! Lets just be lazy say his armor weighs double that! (He's a big, strong boy, after all)

We will then end up with 60 kg. (132 lb.) worth of armor.

An armour Gregor would then be 250 kg! (551 lb!)

Playing around with a horse carry-weight calculator, I got to the results that a horse weighing 1270 kg. (2800 lb.) would be able to handle a rider weighing 254 kg. (559 lb.)

Another quick Google search says that the biggest horse, the shire horse (an absolutely gorgeous boi) in average weight between 816-1086 kg. (1800-2400 lb.) That would make their carry weigh to be between 162-216 kg. (358-477 lb.)

In conclusion, Gregor can indeed ride a shire horse Lady Godiva style (okay, he can probably wear clothes too), but even if we say his armor just weighs 30 kg. (66 lb.) He'd still be a just a little too heavy for the poor creature... though I doubt he cares. We do hear descriptions of how silly he looks mounted, as his horse looks like a pony under him!

But Gregor should value his horses more, for it can't be easy finding one strong enough for him! Though of course he lives in fantasy universe, so maybe it's not actually that difficult.

#asoiaf #asoiaf thoughts #gregor clegane #It's fantasy it doesn't have to have realistic horses! #now part of me wants to draw Gregor gracefully riding naked though town... good thing my wrist still isn't working too great!

[giveamadeuschohisownmovie]

One thing that I liked about last night’s episode of “House of the Dragon” was that the show is doing a good job in its portrayal of Aegon II. It would’ve been easy to portray him as the “rival”, but the show really honed in on what makes Aegon II a tragic character; he’s just a spoiled dumbass who wants to have fun and had no interest in the Iron Throne. It was Alicent who pushed him into the conflict.

Sure, Aegon II isn’t the most likable character. He’s weird, kinda annoying, and he bullies his younger brother. But that’s fine for the character because he’s a dumbass teenager, he’s going to do dumbass teenager things. He’s not thinking about stuff like royal politics or succession. You even see him get along with his cousins who he’s supposed to hate. Honestly, it makes you feel bad for him, even knowing what he ends up doing later on in the story.

#Aegon ii #aegon ii targaryen #house targaryen #house of the dragon spoilers #house of the dragon #hotd #hotd spoilers #asoiaf thoughts #asoiaf spoilers #asoiaf #alicent hightower #queen alicent #iron throne #lucerys velaryon #jacaerys velaryon #aemond targaryen #rhaenyra targaryen #queen rhaenyra

[alicentsgf]

the targaryens were built to burn themselves down and thats why i truly believe if Dany does take the throne in the end of asoiaf it should be without her dragons. the targaryens are conquerors. their house words are 'fire and blood'. those are not the words of a peaceful ruling house.

'we light the way' 'winter is coming' 'unbowed. unbent. unbroken.' these house words speak to longevity, not war. its why i'll never be a fan of the idea of a targaryen on the throne, no matter who it is. the most intelligent thing viserys probably ever said was 'dragons are a power men should never have trifled with'. you cannot rule peacefully if you're constantly threatening your people with fire from above.

#i like some Targs individually #like book Dany im a huge fan of #hotd #got #house targaryen #those other house words go hightower. stark. martell. in case anyone was wondering #anti targaryen #asoiaf thoughts #hotd thoughts #got thoughts #like dany isnt getting the throne... imo. hut if she Did

[thaliajoy-blog]

Oh man the realization that Rhaegar made a knight out of the man who later raped his wife and killed his children. Oh man. Oh no.

#rhaegar targaryen #gregor clegane #asoiaf thoughts #stare at the wall for an hour

[queenlorea]

going insane over the realisation that the Chinese character for dragon ( lóng 龙 in Simplified; 龍 in Traditional) is the “root”/“base” (own words idk what the linguistics terms would be) word for the Chinese character for cage (lóng 笼/籠).* The only difference is the 竹字头 (heading) which is a Chinese radical that translates to “bamboo.”**

thinking about dragons in chinese myth— creatures of the sea and sky, their cries the thunder that shakes rain loose from from the heavens and sends it crashing to the earth below. all the rivers and seas and lakes are their domain.

and Chinese monarchs associated dragons with power and sovereignty and the mandate of heaven,,, the Emperor is the dragon god emperor on earth who would question his will? what is mightier than a dragon

but take a dragon and put a bamboo crown (grown from the ground) on it and now the dragon is locked up confined,, trapped,, the trappings of power,,, dragons are of the sea and sky but what becomes of them when bound to this earth?

*that the two words are pronounced in exactly the same tone and the same pinyin blows my mind. who did this will the og Chinese writer philosopher please stand up

** edited because i got grass and bamboo radicals mixed Up

#this one’s for house targaryen girlies and dragon girls #makes me insane #heading ​back to my Chinese music playlist #Chinese #Dragons #languages #trappings of power #asoiaf thoughts

[serjaimelannister]

takes that favor meme value over actual characterization are so boring in general. but because this blog is this blog what i mean is rewriting jaime/brienne as "badass warrior woman and her himbo" is so intensely boring and erases the nuance that makes them unique as individual characters and as a pairing. and i love gender role subversions as much as the next gal but The Point is not "lol jaime is a helpless maiden and brienne is a hypercompetent knight" the point is BALANCE !! they are both beauty and the beast, they are both the maiden and the knight! it's not about completely flipping gender roles it's about questioning + criticizing their rigid upholding!!

#not to be salty but i see these takes getting hundreds of notes and i'm like did any of u read the books #also miss me with the top/bottom debate they would switch. thank u and goodnight #local woman yells at cloud #asoiaf #jaime x brienne #asoiaf thoughts

[laufire]

I know there HAS to be amazing ASOIAF/GOT fic out there, long and plotty and flowery, centered in the female characters and preferably the (either canon or speculated) dynamics between them with little to none het romance. I’m just too lazy and too wary of the shit I might encounter in the way to go look for myself LOL.

#by this i mean: if you know some this is an invitation to send them my way #if you don't ignore this. i haven't read fics from fandoms i'm in like a year and i don't have time to do it now lol #talking to the void #my thoughts #a song of ice and fire #asoiaf thoughts #game of thrones #catelyn tully #cersei lannister #brienne of tarth #daenerys targaryen #sansa stark #arya stark #arianne martell #ellaria sand #shae #missandei #margaery tyrell #asha greyjoy #this is a cry for help so might as well xD

[sad-endings-suck]

I feel like people fundamentally misunderstand many of Catelyn and her “stupid choices”. Cat often does the right thing, but as a woman in Westerosi society, she simply does not have the power needed to back up those actions in a way that matters. Therefore, her plans don’t work.

If Catelyn had men of her own and the benefit of the doubt as a Lord when she apprehended Tyrion, she would have likely been able to question him before running off to Vale and as such Tyrion wouldn’t have been at the mercy of Lysa’s whims. Even if he was, as a Lord instead of a Lady, he would have been seen as Cat’s prisoner, not Lysa’s.

Her decision to release Jaime and trade him for Sansa and Arya would have worked if as a man and Lord she could override Robb’s word, and have men of her own escort Jaime south.

Catelyn was of course right not to allow Theon to go back home and parley (he is a hostage during war time) and again, if she were a Lord and not a Lady she could overrule Robb’s choice to let him go.

She likely would not have allowed Edmure to run off to battle, and as such Tywin likely would have fallen into Robb’s trap.

She wouldn’t have allowed Robb to forsake his vow to marry a Frey, just to marry Jeyne Westerling instead. Thus avoiding the Red Wedding.

If Catelyn were a Lord, and consequently had more power and control, a lot of her “bad decisions” wouldn’t end up being bad decisions at all, but “cautious strategic thinking”.

#catelyn stark #asoiaf #catelyn tully #asoiaf thoughts #robb stark #edmure tully #eddard stark #asoiaf analysis