Lerxst Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 Her story brings up a question I have about the book/show. Is GoT supposed to be High Fantasy, Low Fantasy or what? People in Westeros know and accept Dragons, Dire Wolves and other mythical beasts as a part of life, or recent history. In the North we have White Walkers and Giants, people also don't flinch about. When Brienne mentions the shadow that killed Many, people treat her like she was on an LSD trip or something though. I'm pretty sure if people living in Westeros know about all those other magical things, they'd more than likely just look at Brienne and shrug it off as "just another day in the life of an inexplicable magical world". Also happens again when Sandor fights against that guy (I'm horrible with the names of the secondary characters) in the cave who gets resurrected afterwards. It's like he can't believe... in a world where freakin giants, dragons and frozen zombies exist, that a person would just be able to come back to life. Is there some base line we have that we can say a certain amount of fantasy in this story's setting is commonplace, but anything beyond that is supposed to be considered unbelievable to the residents of the story world? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wyman Manderly's Meat Pies Posted May 26, 2015 Share Posted May 26, 2015 The people don't accept most of those things because they don't know they exist or they just hear rumors. Dragons haven't existed in hundreds of years, White Walkers, giants, thousands. At this point, it may as well be fairy tales to the commonfolk. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lerxst Posted May 26, 2015 Author Share Posted May 26, 2015 I suppose the best analogy I can think of would be like Shakespeare writing about Julius Caesar. The two were separated by almost a millennium and there was no technology to prove Caesar existed, only written documentation. Yet Shakespeare knew, as did most of his peers. It's a common gap in logic... or leap of faith... I see many fantasy writers make, not just GRRM. They tell us something happens a few hundred years ago and use that as the excuse for no one believing. When our own reality proves otherwise; people write down, pass stories and document what they see and do so others can know. The other flaw I often see in fantasy stories/movies is the unbelievable reactions people in the stories have. Have you sen Willow? People shoot magic out of their fingertips every second of the day and no one flinches because, "hey. that's just what some people do". In the Lord of the Rings, magic was present everywhere with a few who could wield it - no one questioned those that did. In GoT, their entire history is carved out by magic beings but when some of this magic shows up, people don't believe it's real... I just can't understand that mindset. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Direwight Posted May 26, 2015 Share Posted May 26, 2015 People in Westeros know and accept Dragons, Dire Wolves and other mythical beasts as a part of life, or recent history. In the North we have White Walkers and Giants, people also don't flinch about. Really? As far as anyone knows, direwolves are just big wolves, nothing mythical or magical about them. Dragons are a well-documented part of history, what with remaining skulls and all, and I don't see why anyone would need to assume that they're somehow magical in order to accept that they've existed or exist again. White Walkers and giants, on the other hand, are clearly something most people don't believe in. People in the North might accept them as part of ancient history, but outside of those on the Wall and Stannis' men (who would have at least seen the corpses of giants), no one's seen either and probably don't believe that they're lurking about again. However, at least White Walkers and giants are part of the westerosi mythology in the sense that everyone has heard stories about them, but basically no one's heard of shadows stabbing people. Even if you accept that dragons exist and that there's something magical about them (instead of them just being big fire-breathing lizards), that doesn't lead to completely different kinds of magic like resurrections or shadow babies being that much more easier to believe in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grievous Posted May 26, 2015 Share Posted May 26, 2015 Also, it's not like they view Dragons, Dire Wolves, Giants as really magical. We call them "magical" or fantastic because they don't exist in their world. In their world, they do exist so they're just normal. Then again, by the time of the book/series most of those things haven't been seen in quite some time by most anyone, so for many they are mythical. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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