Becoming No One: Re-reading Arya

[The Sleeper]

Sometihng I forgot to mention. We also see a growing camaradery between Hot Pie and Arya, due to their shared predicament. They both admit their fear and vulnerablility to each other and Hot Pie apologises for his previous behaviour.

This character is often overlooked as comic relief, but consider what this kid has been through. He lost his mother, his only option is to get dragged to the Wall, he picks on hurricane Arya, faces the dangers of the road along with the rest of them, goes through the same hell as Arya and all of this has nothing ot do with him. People didn't even bother to give him a proper name. He is an innocent whose life is like floatsam to the waves made by the game of thrones. Still he manages to retain his innocense, find what ever joy he can in life and even a little courage

I think it is imprtant for Arya that, despite his failure to live up to her impossible standards, she comes to identify with him, care and worry for him and eventually miss him.

[Ragnorak]

Wonderful and very thorough summary, Rapsie! I need to go through the chapter again because you covered the entire list of things that jumped out at me.

The road as a metaphor for her journey struck me too and we even have Yoren mentioning ships while he's reminding her of false identity.

Different roads sometimes lead to the same castle. Who knows?

They both travelled the Kings Road originally and prior to this detour she was still travelling the Kings Road. This is technically the first time she takes a different road. It also stands in contrast to her trip down where the sights fascinated her.

Again we're shown Arya's perception with all her senses, the value of her prior lessons, and general awareness and attentiveness to her surroundings. She describes the camp at night by sounds. She observes the individual contributions of wolves in this new pack of hers and learns all their names as well-- a concept that will come up again later. The only one to die "on screen" is the nameless woman they find.

I get a very Old Gods weirwood sense out of the whispering as well. It was a weeping willow not a weirwood. I know weeping willows are a big rebirth symbol and they love the water, I believe Milady has a small wealth of insight into willow symbolism. My initial impression of the scene was the woman bonding with tree similar to a greenseer (and not necassarily literally) rather than a direct Bloodraven thing-- the wolf makes me wonder. Is the whispering of the one nameless dead person being frightening to Arya significant?

I wonder about Bloodraven because of why the wolves leaves Arya alone. My assumption is this is Nymeria's pack. I had originally thought Arya's scent or something else triggered her as familiar to the wolves given Nymeria. In her later dream where Nymeria finds Cat, Nymeria has to actively fight off the other wolf even though she found Cat by scent. There is no "sense" of Cat in the pack outside of Nymeria. This is what makes me start to suspect an active Bloodraven role. That's a pretty good running tally of potential Bloodravens we have in Arya so far. We know he watches Bran and can be pretty sure he watches Jon. What about Sansa? The ghost wolf and Snow Winterfell come to mind but not much else off the top of my head.

It is also interesting to note that Yoren is sharing the rabbit treat with everyone including the three from the Black Cells. He may keep them chained but he's including them. Taking the woman and the child who are pragmatically "two useless mouths," especially under the circumstances, speaks volumes about Yoren's character and humanity. This is also likely Arya's first encounter with the Tickler. I feel better about relishing her last encounter with him.

Definitely a haunting chapter. It starts off with her being afraid of what's she's running from which is slowly supplanted by what's she's running into. The way it builds is very well done. They see the fire and watch it grow worse. Then they encounter the aftermath of the fire and we think we see the full horror of what transpired. Then the one armed woman who can only say "please" implies it was far worse than even this aftermath indicated while there is still more death upstream and screams carried on the wind.

[The Sleeper]

I get a very Old Gods weirwood sense out of the whispering as well. It was a weeping willow not a weirwood. I know weeping willows are a big rebirth symbol and they love the water, I believe Milady has a small wealth of insight into willow symbolism. My initial impression of the scene was the woman bonding with tree similar to a greenseer (and not necassarily literally) rather than a direct Bloodraven thing-- the wolf makes me wonder. Is the whispering of the one nameless dead person being frightening to Arya significant?

This is a second chapter in a row where a dead person is associated with a tree. Someone threw acorns over Praed's grave, so that an oak might grow over it. Here a weeping willow is whispering with the dead woman's voice, a woman who has suffered horribly. It could be simply be that the woman's fate was so harrowing that Arya can't put her voice out of her head. This gives me the impetus to go into another bit of crackpot of mine. The weirwood grove Bran currently resides under is built over a veritable graveyard and that the trees act as a repository of knowledge for the CotF and that greenseers linger in them long. Then we have the mysterious Green Men in the Isle of the Faces who were appointed all those millenia ago to oversee the treaty between the First Men and CotF. Are they a community? Do they procreate? How can they live in isolation in the middle of Westeros for all these years? Unless they're called Green Men, because they actually became the trees with the faces, kind of like the Black Gate, the living weirwood door underneath the Wall. What if it is more than Bloodraven? What if the Stark kids are unconsciously hooked to the weirnet and the Old Gods literally watch over them, speak to them, give them strength and speak through them?

If this is the case another interesting contrast arises. The First Man and CotF give the dead faces while the FM take them away.

This is also likely Arya's first encounter with the Tickler. I feel better about relishing her last encounter with him.

The stump makes me think Hoat.

[Ragnorak]

This is a second chapter in a row where a dead person is associated with a tree. Someone threw acorns over Praed's grave, so that an oak might grow over it. Here a weeping willow is whispering with the dead woman's voice, a woman who has suffered horribly. It could be simply be that the woman's fate was so harrowing that Arya can't put her voice out of her head. This gives me the impetus to go into another bit of crackpot of mine. The weirwood grove Bran currently resides under is built over a veritable graveyard and that the trees act as a repository of knowledge for the CotF and that greenseers linger in them long. Then we have the mysterious Green Men in the Isle of the Faces who were appointed all those millenia ago to oversee the treaty between the First Men and CotF. Are they a community? Do they procreate? How can they live in isolation in the middle of Westeros for all these years? Unless they're called Green Men, because they actually became the trees with the faces, kind of like the Black Gate, the living weirwood door underneath the Wall. What if it is more than Bloodraven? What if the Stark kids are unconsciously hooked to the weirnet and the Old Gods literally watch over them, speak to them, give them strength and speak through them?

If this is the case another interesting contrast arises. The First Man and CotF give the dead faces while the FM take them away.

The stump makes me think Hoat.

My understanding is that the trees do retain the knowledge so I don't think that's at all crackpot. I like the rest, but I can't find enough text evidence for it. I was focused on the "please" and connected that to the Tickler. Good catch on Hoat.

The tree and death connection is interesting. She'll leave Sandor under a tree too and the House of Black and White has weirwood doors. There's a something there. Ned was killed at the Sept. I need to ponder how that fits in.

[The Sleeper]

There isn't any text evidence, because it involves a lot of conjecture in my part. There is evidence that something is going on. All the Stark kids, besides Bran, have lapses in their thinking processes from time to time. Individually they can be attributed to mundane reasons, but put together they cannot be discounted. Arya hearing the dead woman is an instance I had missed. Sansa says things at times without knowing why and Jon goes berserk. Arya seems to do both with the added feature of hearing the voices of dead people. Bran has had conversations with a three-eyed crow and his dead father in dreams. I don't think all these are random.

It seems to me that skinchanging boils down to the consciousness escaping the confines of the body. But why assume it only goes one way? Maybe the kids can act as recipients of other consciousnesses as well. Maybe when Jon and Arya go berserk, it's their wolves taking over. Maybe something prompted Sansa to save Dontos so that he could take her out of the Red Keep. Bran being a greenseer and an order of magnitude above the rest is not actually unconscieous of this connection, but can initiate it willingly and have some control over it. And this does not seem to be confined locally.

In short, it is obvious there is something up with those Starks, but we have been given very few clues as to what exaclty it is and it's significance.

[1234567]

@ just an other and Ragnarok

Definetly agree about the trees. We don't know about Rickon, but as far as we have seen Bran, Jon and Arya have very strong Warg connections to their wolves (Sansa I think is meant to develop her wargging skills in a different way to them, perhaps using it to read people). The idea that Bloodraven has been guiding / watching over the Stark children makes more and more sense. As of ADWD, we know that Bloodraven was almost certainly wargging Mormont's Raven, giving more strength to the idea that R+L=J (if there could be any doubt).

Also interesting given the Acorns on Pread's grave and the Willows mentioned in this chapter and the whispering are several things that Bran is told about in ADWD once they reach Bloodraven.

Jojen talking about the secrets of the old gods

"Earth and water, soil and stone, oaks and elms and willows, they were here before us all and will still remain when we are gone."

and later

Instead they had the trees, and weirwoods above all. When they died, they went into the wood, into leaf and limb and root, and the trees remembered. All their songs and spells, their histories and prayers, everything they knew about this world.

Jojen also says

It is given to a few to drink of that green fountain whilst still in mortal flesh, to hear the whisperings of the leaves and see trees as the gods see.

Then Bloodraven also tells Bran that he will learn to see first with Weirwoods, but then all trees. We also know blood sacrifices were performed to the old Gods, which makes me wonder if the screaming that Arya thinks she can hear at the end of the chapter is also connected to the slaughter and people who died, or whose bodies were thrown in the woods.

Given the deaths and burial connections to trees, this put me in mind of Dryads and the idea of a spirit being connected to a tree. Just as Wargged animals retain something of someone who has wargged them, it seems that the trees aborb something of a dead person's spirit. The quotes above though would certainly suggest that the tree may already be taking on the memories of the woman. Arya's wargging abilities seem to let her sense that, although she doesn't know that's what it is.

NB:

I had thought it might have been Amory Lorch due to the next chapter, but both the Tickler and Hoat makes sense. Either way, all three will appear in Arya's future and all will die particularly brutal deaths.

It also struck me that Ned never took his daughters to see a man be beheaded and now Arya has seen more violent death and bloodshed than Bran, Rickon or Jon. Robb of course will have been in the thick of it already, but so far Arya seems to be the one who has been exposed to the most horror and death out of the Stark children, apart from Robb.

[brashcandy]

I wonder about Bloodraven because of why the wolves leaves Arya alone. My assumption is this is Nymeria's pack. I had originally thought Arya's scent or something else triggered her as familiar to the wolves given Nymeria. In her later dream where Nymeria finds Cat, Nymeria has to actively fight off the other wolf even though she found Cat by scent. There is no "sense" of Cat in the pack outside of Nymeria. This is what makes me start to suspect an active Bloodraven role. That's a pretty good running tally of potential Bloodravens we have in Arya so far. We know he watches Bran and can be pretty sure he watches Jon. What about Sansa? The ghost wolf and Snow Winterfell come to mind but not much else off the top of my head.

Sansa's meetings with Dontos in the KL godswood seem to have taken place under Bloodraven's auspices:

By the time she reached the godswood, the noises had faded to a faint rattle of steel and a distant shouting. Sansa pulled her cloak tighter. The air was rich with the smells of earth and leaf. Lady would have like this place, she thought. There was something wild about a godswood; even here, in the heart of the castle at the heart of the city, you could feel the old gods watching with a thousand unseen eyes...

She moved from tree to tree, feeling the roughness of the bark beneath her fingers. Leaves brushed at her cheeks.

The latter part of the quote there seems important too, as she's actually making contact with the organic material of the trees. This reminds me of a theory I have to tell you about over PM, Ragnorak.

[Ragnorak]

Sansa's meetings with Dontos in the KL godswood seem to have taken place under Bloodraven's auspices:

The latter part of the quote there seems important too, as she's actually making contact with the organic material of the trees. This reminds me of a theory I have to tell you about over PM, Ragnorak.

Thank you. I got fixated on the black cat and couldn't recall it showing up in Sansa. "A thousand unseen eyes" is not exactly a subtle hint. Revisiting the earlier quote from Ned:

When dawn broke over the city, the dark red blooms of dragon’s breath surrounded the girls where they lay. “I dreamed of Bran,” Sansa had whispered to him. “I saw him smiling.”

I think we can call this being watched over by Bloodraven. He's technically a "white" dragon but always worked for the red dragons against the black. Taking Jon as a red dragon or the threat from a Varys promoting a black dragon I think the red makes sense. The idea of breath also could be wind which ties in with Osha's explanation of the Old Gods talking to Bran-- plus the dreaming of Bran has an implication all its own.

Pass along the theory, I'd love to see it.

[Fire Eater]

I think we can call this being watched over by Bloodraven. He's technically a "white" dragon but always worked for the red dragons against the black. Taking Jon as a red dragon or the threat from a Varys promoting a black dragon I think the red makes sense. The idea of breath also could be wind which ties in with Osha's explanation of the Old Gods talking to Bran-- plus the dreaming of Bran has an implication all its own.

Pass along the theory, I'd love to see it.

Bloodraven's sigil is a white dragon breathing red flame, and the dragon's breath in that chapter is described as red.

[Elba the Intoner]

Yes this really is a haunting chapter and again there is so much foreshadowing of what is to come. I was struck by the sourleaf that Yoren chews leaving him with a red smile and also how his mouth froths as he speaks. Given what happened to Masha Heddle, the Innkeeper in AGOT, who is another character who is described as chewing sourleaf and having a red smile, it's no surprise that Yoren will come to a bloody end soon. :-(

Also, I have been wondering about just what Yoren was thinking by taking Rorge and Biter away to the wall. Really, they seem like monsters in barely human form and it's hard to imagine that they could have been "reformed" at the wall. Did Yoren really think they would be useful? Or are they just there to show a contrast with Jaqen who is introduced in these last two chapters as pretty much the opposite of these two. In the last chapter Rorge and Biter are both described as animal like, Rorge as a hairy ape and Biter like a snake, as opposed to Jaqen who is handsome and smiling. Jaqen is polite and even thanks Yoren for the bit of rabbit he is given in this chapter while Rorge just insults Arya for it. Then the way Rorge and Biter laugh at the sight of the woman with her arm chopped off at the elbow just really seals the impression of them as irredeemable monsters. Did Yoren not see this when he took them from the black cells? Was he so desperate for men that he just takes them anyway? Yoren seems to have good instincts for the most part so it seems inconsistent that he would want these two for any reason and GRRM could have had these two introduced in other places in the story assuming that he wanted to have them as members of the bloody mummers eventually, so why here?

[The Sleeper]

At some point in ADWD Jon mentions that they have a cook who used to rape Septas and a man who burned his house down with his family inside. I gues the Night's Watch really take what anything they can get.

[brashcandy]

Update: I'll be posting Arya IV tomorrow, and starting a new thread then. See you there :)

[Elaena Targaryen]

I am really enjoying everyone's thoughts on this re-read so thank you all! Thank you Rapsie for pointing out Arya possibly hearing the 'woman with no name' whispering after she died. I think this may happen more so it is something to watch for, is Arya hearing the dead, how is she, why is she and what could this mean for the future plot?

Here is the quote from this instance

The one-armed woman died at evenfall. Gendry and Cutjack dug her grave on a hillside beneath a weeping willow. When the wind blew, Arya thought she could hear the long trailing branches whispering, "Please. Please. Please." The little hairs on the back of her neck rose, and she almost ran from the graveside.

Because of this quote above and the more imfamous instance later in aCoK at Harrenhal I now wonder about one from aGoT. It's from Arya's chapter with her last lesson with Syrio and the Lannister guards are killing all from Winterfell. Syrio sends Arya away, she kills the stable boy and she is terrified almost to the point of losing her nerve, then...

She had to leave now, she told herself, but when the moment came, she was too frightened to move.

Calm as still water, a small voice whispered in her ear. Arya was so startled she almost dropped her bundle. She looked around wildly, but there was no one in the stable but her, and the horses, and the dead men.

Quiet as a shadow, she heard. Was it her own voice, or Syrio's? She could not tell, yet somehow it calmed her fears.

She stepped out of the stable.

Could this mean Syrio did not survive and Arya heard him speak to her? This part has always struck me as odd but now with the others I wonder if something more is going on.

Jon, aCoK, Mormont said "The children of the forest could speak to the dead, it's said." Also I seem to remember a comment that crows or ravens can speak to the dead and I think it may be from one of Arya's chapters but I cannot find it. Anyway, Arya being associated with death in many different ways, it would be interesting if Arya can speak to the dead. Something to watch for maybe.

[1234567]

@ Elaena Targaryen

Excellent catch from AGOT. We discussed it perhaps being Bloodraven etc but your theory ties in very well.

:)

[Elba the Intoner]

Arya hearing that voice in the stable always reminded me of the end of Star Wars when Luke hears Ben's voice (after he's dead) saying "Use the force, Luke".

[Milady of York]

It was a weeping willow not a weirwood. I know weeping willows are a big rebirth symbol and they love the water, I believe Milady has a small wealth of insight into willow symbolism.

Thanks, Ragnorak. It’s true that willows are associated with rebirth, but not in all mythologies, in some it’s only a symbol of death, an interpretation Dr. Jung favoured, because he associated it with death only. This particular species, weeping willow, is a strange tree, because it’s a feminine tree in Greek mythology, and associated with the Moon and with water. There are many different interpretations and legends about this tree, but for this particular scene forget the Western interpretations and focus on this one, a Native American, which is fitting: according to this legend, the reason why it’s called weeping willow is because this tree, once standing tall and straight, bent and started to weep for the pain that men inflicted upon one another and that they will right themselves once again, when a new era of peace and kindness becomes a reality. They supposedly weep more when a person dies a violent death in its proximity or in times of distress, especially if it’s a woman, or when they’re felled, and because of that, they symbolise sorrow and sadness, but of the living, not of the dead. It’s not the spirit of the dead mourning, it’s the tree mourning for the dead. Also, the Native Americans refer to this tree as the whispering tree, or the tree that talks, because in their mythology it’s capable of wailing mournfully to express pain and grief, and only those the gods had blessed with the gift of divination could hear it. Interestingly, the Hebrews have a similar symbology attached to willow leaves: that because they're shaped like lips, they represent this part of the body, and tradition has it that prophet Jeremiah would sit under a willow tree during the Israelite exile in Babylon to hear the God of Israel whispering to him through the wind that moved the tree's leaves.

[Zacker]

Thanks, Ragnorak. It’s true that willows are associated with rebirth, but not in all mythologies, in some it’s only a symbol of death, an interpretation Dr. Jung favoured, because he associated it with death only. This particular species, weeping willow, is a strange tree, because it’s a feminine tree in Greek mythology, and associated with the Moon and with water. There are many different interpretations and legends about this tree, but for this particular scene forget the Western interpretations and focus on this one, a Native American, which is fitting: according to this legend, the reason why it’s called weeping willow is because this tree, once standing tall and straight, bent and started to weep for the pain that men inflicted upon one another and that they will right themselves once again, when a new era of peace and kindness becomes a reality. They supposedly weep more when a person dies a violent death in its proximity or in times of distress, especially if it’s a woman, or when they’re felled, and because of that, they symbolise sorrow and sadness, but of the living, not of the dead. It’s not the spirit of the dead mourning, it’s the tree mourning for the dead. Also, the Native Americans refer to this tree as the whispering tree, or the tree that talks, because in their mythology it’s capable of wailing mournfully to express pain and grief, and only those the gods had blessed with the gift of divination could hear it. Interestingly, the Hebrews have a similar symbology attached to willow leaves: that because they're shaped like lips, they represent this part of the body, and tradition has it that prophet Jeremiah would sit under a willow tree during the Israelite exile in Babylon to hear the God of Israel whispering to him through the wind that moved the tree's leaves.

This is one of those times when it's uncomfortable to be a scientist. Weeping Willow, Salix babylonica, is an east asian tree species. It's abundantly cultivated in Europe and the Americas, and for a long time in Europe, but it's not spontaneously dispersing, except sometimes in hybrids. I'm sure it doesn't grow on a hillside in Westeros. Not sure what the native americans were talking about.

[Ser Duncan of Flea Bottom]

I'll give my opinion about Arya

She lost her family (she just reckon Sansa is alive)

She passed through a lot of bad stuff, she needed to survive, she was mistreated, she was kidnapped twice.

Now she's in Essos, learning to be a Faceless Men (Faceless Woman)

yes she's not Arya Stark anymore, she's a new Arya, she wants vengance

I'm afraid she will be the only alive Stark who won't return to Winterfell, because she's losing her identity

well, I know Sansa is losing her identity too, because now she's Alayne Stone, but LF has plans for her, to marry her to Lord Arryn's Heir

Arya doesn't have anything, her purpose now is, killing, killing and killing

[KittensRuleBeetsDrool]

This is one of those times when it's uncomfortable to be a scientist. Weeping Willow, Salix babylonica, is an east asian tree species. It's abundantly cultivated in Europe and the Americas, and for a long time in Europe, but it's not spontaneously dispersing, except sometimes in hybrids. I'm sure it doesn't grow on a hillside in Westeros. Not sure what the native americans were talking about.

There are references to sweet corn and pumpkins (both Native American foods) in the books so I think GRRM took some liberties with the flora and food plants of Westeros; in a series with dragons and ice zombies I'm not going to quibble about willows and pumpkins. :)

Milady - IIRC in Japanese mythology willow is associated with ghosts. Here is a tale from Japan called The Willow Wife. Note that the Willow Wife states that she has no father or mother - she is "no one." So in non-Western myth willow is also associated with death.

http://www.pitt.edu/...ove.html#willow

[Milady of York]

This is one of those times when it's uncomfortable to be a scientist. Weeping Willow, Salix babylonica, is an east asian tree species. It's abundantly cultivated in Europe and the Americas, and for a long time in Europe, but it's not spontaneously dispersing, except sometimes in hybrids. I'm sure it doesn't grow on a hillside in Westeros. Not sure what the native americans were talking about.

History runs contrary to your argument, I think. It is perfectly possible for this tree to grow in Westeros, which is based on medieval Europe, this is a tree much described in Greek and Roman mythology long before Christ, as you'd know if you read the legend about the birth of goddess Hera or the Iliad, for example, and Aristotle's works on the properties of plants as well, because in them he describes the curative properties of weeping willows. Both nations knew the tree very well because they had contact with Asian cultures for centuries; and this tree is referenced in Medieval literature and Victorian literature with the symbolism described, as well as in pre-Conquest Celtic myths. The tree the Native Americans are speaking about is the same, the weeping willow. Not all tribes have the legend I referenced, only one of the Canadian tribes that comprise the Iroquois nation.