#this meta was inspired by another meta which talks of how Jaime chose to keep cersei bound within the norms of society as it then provided

[buttercuparry]

I have never thought about it before but Jon giving Needle to Arya is more than a mere indulgence. It's more than a symbol of Arya's home ( though at present this symbolism is what is most important of all).

Jon giving Arya Needle is an expression of all that he could never do for himself. I don't know for how long Jon had this project going on. I literally googled "how long would it take to make a sword during medieval times" and I got this;

A cheap sword could take a day or two to make, while a master worked Pattern Welded sword could take a week or more to make. In addition to just the blade itself, a true work of art weapon would have expensive pommel made with a work of art scabbard which combine could take a month or even longer at times.

Arya's blade is of course castle forged. It would have Mikken's expertise. But still it was requested by Lord Stark's bastard without the knowledge of his father. Maybe it was done in secrecy or maybe Mikken didn't think much of it: so it can be something that was in work for a long time or something that struck Jon with Arya's "The woman is important too" and his own "Girls get the arms but not the swords. Bastards get the swords but not the arms. I did not make the rules, little sister."

Jon truly didn't make the rules. He didn't ask to be born a bastard. He didn't ask for humiliation, the disgust, the coldness with which society treated him. He didn't ask for Catelyn's loathing. He didn't ask for being made to feel as if his existence was chipping away at that which was meant for Lord Stark's true born children. And yet this was his reality. So I wonder if Jon saw his little sister hurting. Hurting because she didn't ask for this. Asked to be born a woman who no matter her talent, her abilities, was kept tightly bound within gender norms. Whose ultimate identity was to be known as someone's wife. Who struggled with mockery because she couldn't fit into what was demanded of her. Trying to bundle up all the hurt in her heart and keep it there.

So maybe Jon thought; " I cannot change the rules for you. I cannot break this system. But by Gods I can try to loosen the tether that is keeping you bound. There is no one who would take the time to loosen the noose around my neck but I see you Arya and by giving you this sword I am trying to chip away what little I can from that which the world so forcefully demands of you. I love you. I see you."

This particular line caught my attention,

Jon looked her over with all his fourteen-year-old wisdom. "You're too skinny," he said. He took her arm to feel her muscle. Then he sighed and shook his head. "I doubt you could even lift a longsword, little sister, never mind swing one."

Jon was right when he said that a traditional sword won't do Arya any good. She didn't have the build for it. This conversation about why "logically" Arya could not participate in the same activities as her brothers quickly dissolved into the conversation about the coat of arms. And then stopped altogether with Joffrey being a dick in the training yard.

I find the progression interesting because Jon here firstly had his own logic of why it wasn't feasible for Arya to get to the training yard, then he had his opinion regarding pride and how much of it was allowed to women, and finally Joffrey and Robb's tiff brought an end to this interlude, once again reminding Jon why he wasn't down there standing with Robb and facing off Joffrey. He was a bastard.

So I wonder if this wasn't Jon's lightbulb moment. If this wasn't when Jon thought-well maybe not a longsword but can't there be something else? I cannot break the system but there has to be a cheat code!!

Needle is as much a representation of Arya's home as it is a symbol of her being seen. It binds her to her identity and at the same time is a proof of the love that would readily offer Arya her freedom. I have now got a newfound appreciation regarding the name of the blade ( something which Jon came up with no less!! of course Arya then rightly guessed it ) . Needle, the name, is a brilliant choice to act as a subversive device and the joke between the siblings then goes on to become all the more nuanced and beautiful, because of the empathy and the thoughtfulness that have gone behind the gesture.

#arya stark #jon snow #he said here lil sister #I got you a cheat code #I cannot break break the rules for you :( #and then 3 or so books later he went like #fuck it #I am going to break every rule for you #you can take the relationship as you want #romantic or platonic #but goddamn if it isn't something that's capable of shaking the world #this meta was inspired by another meta which talks of how Jaime chose to keep cersei bound within the norms of society as it then provided #a stability to his idea of knighthood #and here we have Jon arming Arya #is this another parallel?

[wackygoofball]

you once talked about the parallels between sigurd and jaime I have to point out hat sigurd is a dragonslayer who killed fafnir ( who was a dwarf who became a dragon after killing his own father fafnirAsked his father for gold. tyrion Asked his father for his inheritance (Casterly Rock). fafnir Murdered his father upon refusal. Tyrion Murdered his father in light of multiple grievances. tyrion will end up helping dany with her dragons and/or riding one so what if jaime kills tyrion

Hi megashadowdragon and thanks for the question.

I realized I didn’t meta in quite a while, but ohwell, real life calling and all.

First of all, I am impressed that you still rememberor found a way to dig up that comment I made… years ago. Anyway, I had to revisit my own post to check, butreally, the main intention of that post was to point out the many similarities thatcan be drawn between Jaime and Brienne and Sigurd and Brynhild, less so aboutmaking predictions about how those similarities may foretell the outcome of thestory. I hope that this came across and that I didn’t make it seem like I wasfirmly believing in Jaime and Brienne fulfilling the Sigurd/Brynhild saga frombeginning to end.

After all, GRRM uses tropes and themes rather thancopying word-for-word the narrative upshots of the story he takes from. Like,JB builds on the Beauty and the Beast trope in order to subvert it, but thatdoesn’t mean it’s going exactly congruent to the original tale in terms oftrajectory (I can’t seem to recall zombie!Cat to have been amongst the ensembleof Beauty and the Beast, LOL). So Itry to be cautious when it comes to making predictions based on mythologyparallels I can spot in a narrative. After all, GRRM mixed in a lot of mythology, Norse mythology *atlarge* being the first idea that comes to my mind, wherein Jaime fits multiplecharacters. Like, you can easily parallel Jaime with Norse gods like Tyr, amongothers. Or Christian mythology with the Jacob parallels. So… I am very carefulon that territory, which is why I dare not predict future outcomes based onother story’s equivalents. It’s far too tempting to just go down the rabbithole because every story parallel you choose will give you a potentiallydifferent outcome based on the trajectory of the story itself. I am much moresold on the BatB trope and trajectory because a) GRRM has affirmed that hebased JB on that trope, and b) tropes are not the same as following a storyfrom beginning to end along the exact same lines.

However, as you rightly point out, there are greatparallels to be drawn between Tyrion and Fafnir, both taking part in patricideand developing a certain greed (hence the dwarf turning into a serpent as they aresymbols for greed) for gold, which again plays well into the Lannister gold andred theme. And I am thankful that you brought it to my attention because – alsodue to my clear JB focus – did not even think about how Tyrion very well fitsinto the Volsunga Saga in that regard, and it may well be that GRRM drewinspiration from Fafnir when creating Tyrion’s character.

Yet, strictly following that analogy (for the sakeof the argument here), Regin is the brother of Fafnir who orders for hiskilling and enlists someone else to do it (Sigurd). Now of course, we caneither substitute Regin for someone to fill into that role and order Jaime todo it or we cut out the middleman for the sake of maintaining that parallel.  

But anyway, perhaps we ought to see it not so strictin terms of how the characters are related and more in terms of what they doinstead. Again, the trajectory for Tyrion maps neatly on Fafnir, as you assert,even more so in the books wherein he has embarked on a much darker route thanin the show (I won’t dig too deeply into the matter as my knowledge remainslimited on book!Tyrion, not having read those chapters in their entirety justyet).

Though that in itself should be telling, I think, withregards to Tyrion’s outcome in the overall series. I think the general themewill be that most characters will move into a gray area in terms of morality(safe for the clear villains that we have… like, Euron won’t become a graycharacter, Cersei won’t either, I daresay). Characters like Jaime are movingtowards the lighter spots whereas supposed heroes have become/are becomingmorally corrupted or at the very least tested in their morality and balancingit with the need to maybe do acts of dishonor for the sake of the people atlarge. The show did away with the dark tidbits of book!Tyrion’s journey why? We will only know once the finalseason airs, of course, but as others have put forward before me (and far moreeloquently than I do here), it may well be that show!Tyrion will move into moremoral grayness towards the end, whereas book!Tyrion may well get a redemptivemoment of some kind to move him back towards gray.

I tend to think that the show wants to link Tyrion’shaving to make tough choices between his family (Jaime) and the woman of nametitles to the grayness of his character. This has already been party exploredin season 7 wherein Tyrion was kind of hoping for Jaime not to be offed byHighgarden and looking completely devastated when he had to see what the womanwith many titles could do with a flying nuke and a bunch of Dothraki in an openfield. It was surely not without purpose that a) she questioned his loyalties beforeand after that and that b) Tyrion looked so clearly devastated and was made tobear witness of the apparent horror that the woman he chose as the one he meansto support can cause to see the overall goal of her ascending to the IronThrone being achieved. They also could have chosen to have Tyrion stay atDragonstone to await the news, but the fact that he bore witness to both thehavoc a dragon can cause on a battlefield plus the barbecuing of the Tarlys wassurely not without purpose. Which was now a long way of saying that I wouldn’tfind it farfetched if his loyalties were to become ultimately tested in season8, and further, that he will ultimately have to choose between his brother andthe mother of nukes.

While characters are supposedly uniting for thegreater purpose of fighting against the White Walkers now, I am by no meansconvinced that this is smooth transition from war to the Star.garyenRestoration Period towards the end of the series, which is to say that it maywell be that we are headed for conflict among the factions and that maincharacters who offered their support last season may still find their loyaltiesquestioned in their wish to seek power and may or may not ditch the groupeffort at least for a certain amount of time. Now, I don’t want to dig intothat whole matter because that is something people have sent plenty about and Ihonestly can’t be bothered too much about either the fandom-favorite theoriesregarding the restoration period or the hype of the characters mostlyassociated with said theories. I don’t discount their overall importance to thenarrative, I am just saying that I personally have zero shits to give besidethe plot purpose they fulfill for the overall narrative, but I have no personalinvestment in the lady with many names beyond her arc contributing to theoverall series.

But I derailed now again, sorry, I suppose I justwanted to position myself so that I don’t then get questions about a character Iam not invested in and don’t want to be bothered to bash on because, really, Ijust don’t care. The point I was heading for but kind of got away from is thatI am not entirely sure whether Tyrion *will* remain Team Lady of Many Names bythe end of the series. The fact that Tyrion’s and Jaime’s conflict has not beenwholly resolved just yet (while they wereon friendlier terms again, Tyrion did only so much as dodge the big questionsstill standing between the two – namely the consequences of his killing Tywinthat had direct impact on people Tyrion did not intend to harm with that, e.g.Jaime, Tommen, etc., for his own purposes of getting revenge on his father andI think the narrative set it up in such a way that when they met again for thefirst time in the vaults of the Red Keep that it was meant to show that Tyrionwas giving Jaime the same old argument as always instead of owning up to it)has me sold on the idea that something else is still coming with regards to thequestion of where his loyalties will eventually lie.

Now, to come back to the Volsunga Saga and theparallels to GoT/ASoIaF: I would also suggest another thought experiment justto explore the many ways of looking at it: Trade in Fafnir for the woman ofmany names (undeniable, the dragon connection is strong with her… and while sheis certainly no dwarf… she is not exceptionally tall, LOL, but now I digressfor sure). She had Khal Drogo kill Viserys with gold (hence, arguably, substituting Hreidmar, the father of Reginand Fafnir, for it), hence also having the gold aspect on her side and the ideaof greed being potentially subsumed in her ongoing quest for power even aftershe achieved to establish herself as Boss in Essos. Now fast-forward to (forthe show here) season 7 and Spoils of Warand have Sigurd (Jaime) go up against Fafnir (the woman of many names) afterreceiving orders from Regin who wants to see Fafnir gone (Cersei). Yet again,gold also plays a large role, and while Jaime is not successful in killing her,he was definitely going for it right there.

So, you see, I think that you can spin this manydifferent ways (which is the wonderful thing about literary analysis that Ilove so very much) and arrive at similar results. It neatly fits with GRRM’smode of paralleling and mirror characters. So the woman of many names does wellfit Fafnir the same way you can find reasons to see Tyrion being paralleledwith the serpent/dragon.

Now, to go back to the suggestion that Jaime may killTyrion… within the narrative, I just fail to see how he would pose such a*threat* that would make it necessary for Jaime to kill him. Tyrion… is only asdangerous as is the power he is granted. If Tyrion were to go completely rogue,hotwire a dragon and ride it into battle against his brother et al., then thatwould require some… serious turnaround and it would still make the dragon the more immediate threat to get outof the way.

Now, he could use wildfire to trigger Jaime into goingagainst Tyrion and make an attempt on his life, but I have my doubts regardingthe matter. I think wildfire will be vital to the plot in defeating the WhiteWalkers, and that it won’t be only limited to being at Cersei’s disposal,because let’s be real, it kind of loses effect and is in itself a gun she issitting on, waiting to be fired. And while Jaime will certainly be triggered byit, I think it makes much more sense for him to either then help evacuate thecity or help set up the trap for the White Walkers to walk into, seeing thenecessity. Now, if we spin this into the woman of many names going rogue andwanting to torch the capitol to thus blow shit up in red and green, then Jaimewould still have more incentive to be mad at her than at Tyrion.

If we spin it in such a way that Tyrion commits utterbetrayal towards Jaime a second time and Jaime found himself in a position ofauthority in the post-war times, then this would come close to Jaime having tosentence Tyrion to death, which I don’t really see happening, to be honest. Atleast I can’t come up with scenarios that would map with what we have been setup for in terms of character development over the past few seasons. While Jaimesaid that he would kill him, he evidently did not whenever he had a chance forit (if he was serious, he could have offed Tyrion in that vault with even justone hand and a tourney sword). Because just as evidently, Jaime loves hisbrother still, which made Tyrion’s betrayal burn ever the harder for Jaime, butthe more organic conclusion to such a conflict is that they talk it out or that Tyrion makes good onhis promise of when Jaime freed him from the prison where he said that he owedJaime his life, which makes him indebted to Jaime.

So I can actually see self-sacrifice to a certainextent far more prominently being one possible upshot of Tyrion’s arc than himgoing rogue on a dragon to require Jaime to slay his own brother instead ofhaving Jaime go through the motions of committing an additional act ofkinslaying. Generally speaking, I just don’t see Jaime offing any more of hisfamily members (and yes, that includes Cersei, the whole valonqar thing beingJaime and then going into suicide for *reasons* is nothing I am getting behind,but yet again, I digress and, yet again, I think people have written enoughabout that by now, so I would much rather focus on literally anything else). Because it would be sovery repetitive for Jaime and the Lannister clan at large. Cersei killed Lanceland Kevan and the in-laws Margaery, Loras, Mace… and kind of gave rise toTommen’s fall by making him watch that shit show *ahem*… Tyrion killed Tywin. Jaime(at least for the show… for *reasons*) killed a cousin and in-law Olenna uponCersei’s order. Like, honest to the Seven above, I don’t see the Lannistersdoing any more internal family murder. I think another family can well take aturn now.

So… to somehow tie those loose threads of thought togetherthat I have been spewing out now, anon… I think the parallel of Fafnir andTyrion most definitely fits, and I think there is a lot to be said about thesymbolism and even potential trajectory of the overall story, especially if youlook at book!Tyrion and his dark journey which neatly maps on Fafnir’s fallingfor the gold/greed. However, such analysis only ever takes us so and so farbecause, as I hope to have highlighted, we can recreate similar parallels byexchanging the players and it still matches. Because that just correlates withGRRM’s way of writing, which heavily builds on involving themes andpre-existing tropes, mythology, and narratives. That doesn’t mean we can takeone narrative and go to the end to determine future outcomes for GRRM’scharacters, though. It may well be that it will turn out eventually to be truefor one case, but at this point of time, it is simply too hard to guess whichone he may pick or subvert or abandon.

Though more on a sidenote, I will say that I would notfind it entirely unlikely if Tyrion ended up riding a dragon, as you pointed toin your ask. In fact, I would find that muchbetter than Jesus I mean King in the North riding one because Tyrion has builtup a significant relationship with those scaly nukes and I would much rathersee the dragons being okay with being ridden by a guy they learned to trustthan one that has the right Targ smell to him. But then again, I think dragonsare dicks, so maybe that is why they are more sold on the King in the North orthey just really want their mom to bang her nephew… so, who knows?

Now, speaking more in terms of *just* the show/books,I don’t think Jaime will kill Tyrion because I just don’t see where they would getthe conflict if the show has already hinted at it that there is more things toconnect them than keep them apart. If the woman of many names is supposed to bethe reason why, then Jaime should direct his anger towards *her* rather thanTyrion, and I do think that Jaime canmake that kind of rational decision, even with all those feelings involved. Thenarrative would have to make some true 180° to go back to where we basicallywere in season 5 to have Jaime be again all “I will murder him first chance Isee him.” And all atrocities I can come up that may trigger Jaime would almostalways relate to the woman of many names instead of his brother.

So, in sum: Tyrion and Fafnir parallels are awesome and I am grateful that you brought it to my attention because I missed the connection before. Ithink Jaime and Tyrion will pull themselves back together. I hope that Tyriongets to ride a dragon to prove that you don’t have to smell of Targ in order toearn yourself a ride on a nuke. And I most certainly hope that Jaime’s andBrienne’s narrative will end on an entirely different note than that of Sigurdand Brynhild because I remain sold on the idea that they are, against whatseems to be commonly believed by many people, headed towards a happier endingthan most will have in mind. Naturally, I may be totally proven wrong on thematter, but for now I reserve for myself the luxury of being in the hiatus ofsweet, sweet oblivion, wherein I can imagine all kinds of scenarios where Jaimeand Brienne live happily ever after, to finally get started on the Braime Bunch™,and that if Tyrion is meant to live till the end of the series, will spend his daysin good companionship with his brother.

*flies away*

#anon #ask #game of thrones #jaime lannister #tyrion lannister #jaime x brienne #meta #got meta #essay #kind of #it's long enough to be one lol #thanks for the question