BRAN’S GROWING POWERS AFTER his FINAL POV in ADwD

evita mgfs · March 23, 2016

On 3/20/2016 at 10:29 PM, Wizz-The-Smith said:

Hey Tijgy, another really interesting post, some cool stuff in there as always. Keep up the good work!

:wub: Wizz-The-Smith: :wub: Here are some notes I took that you might want to build on, if you have read the gift chapter “Mercy”. These are just notes – crude – no real detailed analytical thought.

We may want to look for Bran’s presence in “Mercy” – but we may have to do it in a new thread under TWoW – I don’t know. I am not always certain about the Forum rules!

SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!

Bran’s Presence Manifested in the Grey Mists and Fog in “The Prince of Winterfell” from A Dance with Dragons and in “Mercy” from The Winds of Winter

Martin employs the grey mists and fog as a recurring motif that unifies and advances themes and plotlines in his novels of A Song of Ice and Fire. Not every mention of grey mists and fog has symbolic significance; however, several key POV’s share commonalities related to the grey mists and fog.

The “grey” mists/fog appear early in A Game of Thrones, and through Bran Stark’s POV, Martin establishes a relationship between “future-greenseer” Bran and the mists and fog, so when the grey mists and/or grey fog recur in other narratives, it is more remarkable than mere coincidence.

In “The Prince of Winterfell” from A Dance with Dragons and in “Mercy” from The Winds of Winter, the grey mists and fog insinuate Bran’s far-reaching presence as he flexes his muscles, experimenting with his powers of greensight. Nature inspires the grey mists and fog, and the grey mists are part of Lord Brynden’s visits to Bran’s dreams. It stands to reason that Bran’s magic will allow him to manipulate the mists and fog – and to manipulate other forces related to nature. He will also visit the dreams of others like Lord Brynden as Three-Eyed Crow”.

In A Dance with Dragons, Martin mentions the “[grey] mists” repeatedly in the “The Prince of Winterfell” POV, and they transform the godswood into an eerie site for a wedding. The title “The Prince of Winterfell” actually refers to, or had once referred to Theon and Bran. After Ramsay speaks his vows, the title passes to him.

Reek/Theon, as a ward of Lord Eddard Stark’, is necessary to authenticate “Arya Stark”, and to give Arya “away” to her bridegroom. Lord Bran Stark himself , the “true” Prince of Winterfell”, makes his presence in the godswood known [for the readers] through the expression on the weirwood’s face, through the murder of ravens, through the wind whispering through the leaves, calling “Theon” , and through the “grey” and “ghostly” mists commandeering the godswood.

Likewise, in Arya’s “Mercy” POV, Martin stresses the “grey fog” so much that it seemingly becomes a character indigenous to Braavos. Arya intuits that this day’s manifestation of fog unique, even exceptional for Braavos.

Martin intimates a strong connection between Theon and Arya’s mist/fog, one that points to its source – Bran, whom Martin has divulged carries a grey aura – like mist/fog and even air/wind in his 3EC dream – is now able to reach out to Theon through the heart tree of Winterfell and to Arya through dreams of hunting with her wolf, where she sees a tree watching her.

Example #1

From ADwD:

“He [Theon] had never seen the godswood like this, though – grey and ghostly, filled with warm mists and floating lights and whispered voices that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere” (487).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“She had never seen a thicker fog than this one. On the larger canals, the watermen would be running their serpent boats into one another, unable to make out any more than dim lights from the buildings to either side of them”.

“Half-light filled the room, grey and gloomy”.

Neither Theon nor Arya have ever seen their current environs so very much transformed by mists and/or fog. For Arya the mists dim lights from buildings, and for Theon the lights’ origins are enigmatic as they seem to come from everywhere and nowhere.

The fact that both Theon and Arya seek out a light – and mark, or try to mark, the location of illumination – this sign is hopeful for it hints that both of them have a shot at redemption. Since both are symbolically blinded by the mists/fog and both are searching for “light”, which is emblematic to “enlightenment” or “knowledge”, Martin suggests that they may acquire all that they need to make changes for the betterment of self and others, but only if they cast off the grey in their eyes and acknowledge the truth.

Martin bathes the godswood in a “grey” and “ghostly” ambience, and “grey” is representative of the Starks who live in the “grey” north, who often have “grey eyes”, who live in a castle made of grey stone and are buried in the crypts that are marked with grey stone statues.

Grey is a color with complex symbology, but in the instances of the “grey” in the godswood, grey fog in Braavos, and Martin’s death imagery, the GREY MISTS/FOG may symbolize “death”. Consequently, those present for the fraudulent nuptials are marked for death by the “grey mists”. In “Mercy”, a certain Lannister guard is marked for death.

Example #2

From ADwD:

“Up above the treetops, a crescent moon was floating in a dark sky, half-obscured by mist like an eye peering through a veil of silk” (ADwD 486).

From AGoT:

“The crow opened its beak and cawed at him, a shrill scream of fear, and the grey mists shuddered and swirled around him and ripped away like a veil. . .” (AGoT).

Martin compares the mists to a silk veil, which echoes his first comparison of the [grey] mists to a “veil” in AGoT, when Bran first dreams of the Three-Eyed Crow.

A “crescent moon” is an eye “peering through a silk veil.” The veil covering the eyes suggests a “mask” designed to disguise someone’s appearance. The concept of a “mask” arouses the description of Braavos as a city of “masks and whispers”.

“No One”, aka Arya of House Stark, resident of the House of Black and White located in Braavos, parallels her brother Bran watching through the eyes carved in the trunks of weirwoods, only Arya watches through the hooded “skins” from those who died in the temple.

Example #3

From ADwD:

“The mists were so thick that only the nearest trees were visible; beyond them stood tall shadows and faint lights. Candles flickered beside the wandering path and back amongst the trees, pale fireflies floating in a warm grey soup” (487).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“If the fog was thick there was nothing to see but grey, so today Mercy chose the shorter route to save some wear on her poor cracked boots”.

“Braavos was a good city for cats, and they roamed everywhere, especially at night. In the fog all cats are grey, Mercy thought. In the fog all men are killers”.

Both excerpts describe the mists and fog as “thick” and touch upon the difficulties of discerning with certainty what is not far in front of them.

Theon’s narrative presents details, and he conveys the extent of the opaqueness of the fog with an example that he could only see trees directly in front of him. Martin chooses language that is poetic, especially when aligned with his language choices for “Mercy”. Theon’s POV covers “shadows and faint lights”, “Candles flickered,” a path wandered, “pail fireflies” floated”, and the fog is “warm pea soup”. Arya’s diction, in stark contrast, is matter-of-fact. Martin’s word choices for her are not immersed in modifaction.

To Arya, her cracked boots beg her attention, and she avoids walking to excess if it can be avoided to spare her well-used footwear. Arya’s ability to disassociate herself from events and from people around her is a symptom that bodes ill for Arya’s future. She also is classifying cats and men as they rank in conjunction with grey fog.

The mists are “a warm grey soup”, a phrase Martin coins in his world of ice and fire that is similar to a popular phrase that compares a dense fog to the thickness of pea soup.

Example #4

From ADwD:

“Then the mists parted, like the curtain opening at a mummer show to reveal some new tableau” (487).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“The fog opened before her like a tattered grey curtain to reveal the playhouse. Buttery yellow light spilled from the doors, and Mercy could hear voices from within”.

“The mists seemed to part before her and close up again as she passed”.

Martin engages the theatre arts, or the performance arts, as a motif throughout the novels in his series. References to theatre arts occur often in Martin’s texts, although not all mention of the theatre arts are rich in symbolic significance.

Here are two examples of visual images that Martin uses quite often: a curtain parting to reveal “something” significant. In ADwD, Martin like curtains to expose the wedding of Ramsay and “Arya” as a fraud.

In “Mercy”, Martin describes the fog as “opening”, employing the simile comparing the fog to a “tattered GREY curtain”. The poor condition represents the “poor quality” of the moldy costumes and performance choices of the Gate mummers. The “tatters” could be emblematic of Arya’s choices and her situation. Who had once been a strong-willed, opinionated girl-child who loved having her hair messed up by her half brother Jon Snow is now older, tougher, wiser, and deadly. Arya Stark’s life is in tatters, as are the lives of her family. Arya was once a girl from Winterfell , and her crooked stitches foreshadow her future in Braavoa with its crooked streets and alleys of Braavos.

Curtains work for a while to conceal what rests behind them. In Theon’s case, he is a witness to a fraudulent marriage since he knows that “Arya Stark” is “Jeyne Poole”. He remains mute, too frightened to act.

Bran’s presence is felt through the mists parting, and the young lord witnessing a horror. It will be Bran who assists in guiding Theon to see “the truth” and who is “father confessor” to his sins.

Example #5

From ADwD:

“All the color had been leached from Winterfell until only grey and white remained. The Stark colors. . . Even the sky was grey. Grey and grey and greyer. The whole world grey, everywhere you look, everything grey except the eyes of the bride” (489).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“Braavos was lost in fog”.

“Braavos was a good city for cats, and they roamed everywhere, especially at night. In the fog all cats are grey, Mercy thought. In the fog all men are killers”.

Martin’s language, once again by comparison, narrates each POV, but Martin deliberately changes his tone, style, and diction to distinguish Theon from Arya. Theon’s POV has impressive verbs, like “leached”, followed by how the whole world is GREY. Once more, Theon owns poetic qualities, and his passage grow more and more tense every time he uses the word grey,

On the contrary, “Mercy’s” POV states the facts, and she does not elaborate with colorful details.

Example #6

From ADwD:

“ It [the godswood] felt like some strange underworld, some timeless place between two worlds, where the damned wandered mournfully for a time before finding their way down to whatever hell their sins had earned them” (487).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“The last bridge was made of rope and raw planks, and seemed to dissolve into nothingness, but that was only the fog. Mercy scampered across, her heels ringing on the wood”.

“She could see the green water of the little canal below, the cobbled stone street that ran beneath her building, two arches of the mossy bridge… but the far end of the bridge vanished in greyness”.

The thick mist educes otherworldliness. “Underworld” is the Greek Hades, where the dead souls “wander mournfully”, but eventually Hermes locates his charges to escort them to the afterlife.

Likewise, the fog in Braavos causes things to “vanish” in the “greyness”, and “to dissolve into nothingness” – “greyness” and “nothingness” intimate a state after death, which suggests a grey and gloomy underworld.

Homer describes the souls of the suitors as chattering like “bats” on their arrival to Hades’ Gates, their escort Olympian Hermes, who passes on his charges to Charon, the boatman, whose job it is to transport the dead cross the River Styx, after which they are judged. This determines their assignments for eternity. When a soul dies, whether good or bad, he or she goes to Hades for judgment.

Many scholars on Westeros have compared Arya to mythological figures associated with the dead. In Homeric mythology, Hermes guides the dead, Charon boats them. Arya is similar to either, and with her nearness to and her relationship with water, she may be an inspiration drawn from many cultural mythologies that attempted to understand death and the soul’s passage to the afterlife.

ravenous reader · March 23, 2016

beautiful thread, evita mgfs! Have read some of your posts elsewhere, and always enjoy them (I had actually wanted to comment on some of your interesting thoughts regarding Jaime's karmic/poetic justice in relation to Bran ('Take my hand...') in one of the other threads, before it was removed...). Regarding this thread, I don't have much to add apart from a few associative leaps that sprung to mind as I was reading! Not having commented on a 're-read' thread before, and being relatively new to the forum, I'm not sure whether my observations are appropriate here; I tend to think 'out of the box,' so I may be inadvertently 'breaking' some 'rules'...(you will have to orient me, should you feel these observations would be more relevant elsewhere), since I will link several texts and passages rather imaginatively-- moreover, I will not directly discuss Bran, though the astute reader will be able to identify that the themes developed here do follow on from previously-raised and -discussed ones, and indeed do have a bearing for Bran and those close to him:

On ‎7‎/‎11‎/‎2015 at 5:04 PM, evita mgfs said:

Grey is a color with complex symbology, but in the instances of the “grey” in the godswood, grey fog in Braavos, and Martin’s death imagery, the GREY MISTS/FOG may symbolize “death”. Consequently, those present for the fraudulent nuptials are marked for death by the “grey mists”. In “Mercy”, a certain Lannister guard is marked for death.

The 'grey-fog/death/curtains/masks/deception/fraudulence/mummery' motif reminded me of three famous quotations from elsewhere in the literary canon, drawn from sources as diverse as the Bible, Shakespeare, and that great poetic mystic 'seer' William Blake:

Quote

-- From the Bible King James Version,1 Corinthians 13:12:

'For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.'

-- From Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act II Scene VII:

'All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages...'

-- From Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell:

'If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.'

Thus, there is a hitch in human perception itself -- at once obfuscating and revealing; an opening and a closing; redemptive and damning -- preventing us from discriminating effectively, while at the same time paradoxically allowing any discrimination (of details, of understanding, of sifting the 'light' from the 'dark,' 'good' from the 'bad, the 'true' from 'the false,' all the false dichotomies etc., i.e. of the potential for 'sense-making' itself) at all to take place. The images you highlighted, some of which I've selected below, vividly outline this darkly scintillating paradox:

On ‎7‎/‎11‎/‎2015 at 5:04 PM, evita mgfs said:

“Braavos was lost in fog”.

“Braavos was a good city for cats, and they roamed everywhere, especially at night. In the fog all cats are grey, Mercy thought. In the fog all men are killers”.

On ‎7‎/‎11‎/‎2015 at 5:04 PM, evita mgfs said:

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“The fog opened before her like a tattered grey curtain to reveal the playhouse. Buttery yellow light spilled from the doors, and Mercy could hear voices from within”.

“The mists seemed to part before her and close up again as she passed”.

Martin engages the theatre arts, or the performance arts, as a motif throughout the novels in his series. References to theatre arts occur often in Martin’s texts, although not all mention of the theatre arts are rich in symbolic significance.

Here are two examples of visual images that Martin uses quite often: a curtain parting to reveal “something” significant. In ADwD, Martin like curtains to expose the wedding of Ramsay and “Arya” as a fraud.

In “Mercy”, Martin describes the fog as “opening”, employing the simile comparing the fog to a “tattered GREY curtain”. The poor condition represents the “poor quality” of the moldy costumes and performance choices of the Gate mummers. The “tatters” could be emblematic of Arya’s choices and her situation. Who had once been a strong-willed, opinionated girl-child who loved having her hair messed up by her half brother Jon Snow is now older, tougher, wiser, and deadly. Arya Stark’s life is in tatters, as are the lives of her family. Arya was once a girl from Winterfell , and her crooked stitches foreshadow her future in Braavoa with its crooked streets and alleys of Braavos.

Curtains work for a while to conceal what rests behind them. In Theon’s case, he is a witness to a fraudulent marriage since he knows that “Arya Stark” is “Jeyne Poole”. He remains mute, too frightened to act.

Bran’s presence is felt through the mists parting, and the young lord witnessing a horror. It will be Bran who assists in guiding Theon to see “the truth” and who is “father confessor” to his sins.

The sinister aspect of these motifs is recapitulated elsewhere, for example in the images which crowd upon Catelyn's consciousness as she rides up to face her fate, at once keenly ignorant and on some level dimly aware of the horror riding up to meet her, in an evocative text which I shall unpack below:

Quote

From A Storm of Swords - Catelyn VI:

The gatehouse towers emerged from the rain like ghosts, hazy grey apparitions that grew more solid the closer they rode. The Frey stronghold was not one castle but two; mirror images in wet stone standing on opposite sides of the water, linked by a great arched bridge. From the center of its span rose the Water Tower, the river running straight and swift below. Channels had been cut from the banks, to form moats that made each twin an island. The rains had turned the moats to shallow lakes.

Across the turbulent waters, Catelyn could see several thousand men encamped around the eastern castle, their banners hanging like so many drowned cats from the lances outside their tents. The rain made it impossible to distinguish colors and devices. Most were grey, it seemed to her, though beneath such skies the whole world seemed grey.

"Tread lightly here, Robb," she cautioned her son. "Lord Walder has a thin skin and a sharp tongue, and some of these sons of his will doubtless take after their father. You must not let yourself be provoked."

Robb looked more amused than afraid. "I have an army to protect me, Mother, I don't need to trust in bread and salt. But if it pleases Lord Walder to serve me stewed crow smothered in maggots, I'll eat it and ask for a second bowl."

Four Freys rode out from the western gatehouse, wrapped in heavy cloaks of thick grey wool. Catelyn recognized Ser Ryman, son of the late Ser Stevron, Lord Walder's firstborn. With his father dead, Ryman was heir to the Twins. The face she saw beneath his hood was fleshy, broad, and stupid. The other three were likely his own sons, Lord Walder's great grandsons.

Edmure confirmed as much. "Edwyn is eldest, the pale slender man with the constipated look. The wiry one with the beard is Black Walder, a nasty bit of business. Petyr is on the bay, the lad with the unfortunate face. Petyr Pimple, his brothers call him. Only a year or two older than Robb, but Lord Walder married him off at ten to a woman thrice his age. Gods, I hope Roslin doesn't take after him."

Pregnant with significance, there is much to elaborate, so I will highlight only a few key moments:

Here, the figure looming (at once painted as lifelike and ghostly) over proceedings is 'The Twins' also known as 'The Crossing,' perhaps an ominous reference, in the sense of the bridge in actual fact representing the final crossing for Cat and Rob and Grey Wind (the latter who momentarily budged/'balked' at that bridge, mournfully howling at that fatal threshold to no avail...in the end, the direwolf's words were indeed so much grey wind, wasted as his communication was on his dazzled and deaf human counterpart; unlike Jon who heeds and is in tune with his direwolf, Rob is, at this point, lost...)-- which ironically coincides with no crossing at all in that they were barred, despite the elaborate plans they had conceived for the(ir) future/s, from proceeding further in this war and in this life -- the drab and dizzying watery world of fog and mirages constituting a reference to the passage of the dead across the river of the Underworld, mirroring the mythological motif you referenced:

On ‎7‎/‎11‎/‎2015 at 5:04 PM, evita mgfs said:

some strange underworld, some timeless place between two worlds, where the damned wandered mournfully for a time before finding their way down to whatever hell their sins had earned them” (487).

From “Mercy” TWoW:

“The last bridge was made of rope and raw planks, and seemed to dissolve into nothingness, but that was only the fog. Mercy scampered across, her heels ringing on the wood”.

“She could see the green water of the little canal below, the cobbled stone street that ran beneath her building, two arches of the mossy bridge… but the far end of the bridge vanished in greyness”.

The thick mist educes otherworldliness. “Underworld” is the Greek Hades, where the dead souls “wander mournfully”, but eventually Hermes locates his charges to escort them to the afterlife.

Likewise, the fog in Braavos causes things to “vanish” in the “greyness”, and “to dissolve into nothingness” – “greyness” and “nothingness” intimate a state after death, which suggests a grey and gloomy underworld.

Homer describes the souls of the suitors as chattering like “bats” on their arrival to Hades’ Gates, their escort Olympian Hermes, who passes on his charges to Charon, the boatman, whose job it is to transport the dead cross the River Styx, after which they are judged. This determines their assignments for eternity. When a soul dies, whether good or bad, he or she goes to Hades for judgment. Many scholars on Westeros have compared Arya to mythological figures associated with the dead. In Homeric mythology, Hermes guides the dead, Charon boats them. Arya is similar to either, and with her nearness to and her relationship with water, she may be an inspiration drawn from many cultural mythologies that attempted to understand death and the soul’s passage to the afterlife.

On some level, as I mentioned, Catelyn seems to be unnerved by the greyness and turbulence of the elements, presaging the trap into which they are swimming, ineluctably swept along as they are by the rising tide of all their fatal choices and their consequences ('Roslin caught a fine fat trout...'). Interestingly, since her encounter with Bran's would-be assassin, and having witnessed the otherworldly symbiosis between her fey son and his wolf-savior-summer-shadow, it is Catelyn - a Tully, adherent of the new gods -- who has grown in her ability to read behind the world at face value and sense/see/respect the portentous signs abounding the bounded world -- usually a Stark/old-gods talent. In contrast, both Rob and Ned fail to embrace their 'wolf' with fatal consequences, while Catelyn, the fish, becomes more and more 'she-wolf,' as Jaime observed! Ironically, it is Catelyn who time and time again entreaties Rob to respect and heed his wolf's sacred message. Sadly, it is Catelyn, she who once felt estranged from the weirwood at Winterfell, who grows luminously closer to the heart of the old gods, the further away from Winterfell she travels, as she nears death at the river. Perhaps her insight here at the crossing specifically is also partly due to her watery, fishlike, quicksilver, mercurial nature; Riverrun her spiritual home -- from which every Tully draws his/her life, and to which every Tully must symbolically and literally return in the Tully death-rite -- is after all also built on another critical crossing. In this light, the pathos of the shadowy banners, impossible to distinguish in the fog (of war) as friend vs. foe ('the rain made it impossible to distinguish colors and devices'), announcing her fate, 'hanging like so many drowned cats,' echoes not only Arya's 'in the fog all cats are grey...in the fog all men are killers,' and Jon's/Melisandre's 'daggers in the dark,' but also Cat's immediate fate, being hanged/almost decapitated and then tossed into the river, to become, literally, 'a drowned cat.'
Finally, a note on the mummer's farce. As you underscored, illustrating the point with numerous fine examples, there is a recurring motif in the saga of the fluidity of identity, which to some extent can be manipulated ('playing the game' or 'acting the part') -- but on another essential level (to reiterate our earlier stated paradox) is intrinsic to the given parameters of what it means to be human at the interface of the unknown, which includes the indeterminacy of both other people and other forces working beyond human comprehension/apprehension. The shifting nature of identity includes a proliferation of various guises such as: shapeshifting, skinchanging, warging, greenseeing, flame-reading, shadowbinding, masquerading as another, wearing faces false and true, characters such as parrots, mockingbirds, patchfaces, jinglebells, dragons-true-and-false, etc. In the particular passage I quoted, the Freys are described as wearing coarse, hidden, false faces which are difficult for Catelyn to place/read ('the face she saw beneath his hood...), yet nonetheless, or perhaps on account of this inscrutability, menacing (...was fleshy, broad and stupid' [the irony being that the Starks and their banners, from the perspective of their enemies and the readers, on a re-reading retrospectively, are the ones who, in this context, are easy to read as the 'thick, stupid' ones here walking into a trap like lambs, not wolves, to the slaughter). One of the faces is bearded (facial hair obscuring the features); another looks 'constipated,' hinting at some foul corruption currently withheld from view, but threatening imminent expulsion. Continuing the 'slipping-the-skins/clothing' metaphor further, the Freys and their henchmen make an appearance, wrapping their treacherous selves in 'heavy cloaks of thick, grey wool' (hinting at the lack of transparency and therefore potential 'shadiness' of their intentions) which are at the same time described as 'thin skins' (implying these tenuous coverings, though 'thick,' may be removed at will, to reveal the 'sharp tongue' lurking behind the veil)...Indeed, this is exactly what transpires at the 'false nuptials' of the Red Wedding (can any nuptials in Westeros ever be anything other than 'false,' I wonder...but, I digress!) The portcullis is raised as if in welcome (more like a guillotine), the party enters (more like being devoured by the iron jaws of the gate, as it consumes them and presages the 'bloody feast' to come); the curtain goes up on the mummer's farce (even the musicians -- fittingly called 'the players' -- are Lannister/Bolton assassins in disguise). Then, 'with scarcely a moment's respite, they began to play a very different sort of song,' the music transitions into the more somber, menacing tones of the 'Rains' of Castamere (while outside the hall, the rains lash like furious tears, together with Grey Wind lashing in furious futility to free himself from his bondage; 'Lord Walder raised a hand, and the music stopped, all but one drum. Catelyn heard the crash of distant battle, and closer the wild howling of a wolf. Grey Wind, she remembered too late.') The music has stopped, its message crystal-clear now. Thus, the farcical tragedy/tragic farce enters its final act, culminating in the sharp onslaught (as sharp as Walder Frey's sharp, remorseless tongue) of quarrels and daggers unleashed without mercy (in this respect, it is interesting that the word 'quarrels' is used instead of 'arrows,' representing both the 'quarrel' as arrow as well as the 'quarrel' as disagreement/falling-out with Walder Frey -- quarrels thus a suitable consequence of the quarrel which precipitated them). As the curtain goes up, the veil is lifted -- and the curtain comes down on Cat, Rob, Grey Wind and the rest. 'The players in the gallery had finally gotten both king and queen down to their name-day suits,' signifying that the coverings are coming off, the 'grey' ones are 'showing their true colors,' and that color is red in tooth and claw. All artifice aside-- leaving only naked silence and shattered illusions, amidst the only one true sound -- the lone cry of an abandoned wolf.

evita mgfs · March 23, 2016

8 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

beautiful thread, evita mgfs! Have read some of your posts elsewhere, and always enjoy them (I had actually wanted to comment on some of your interesting thoughts regarding Jaime's karmic/poetic justice in relation to Bran ('Take my hand...') in one of the other threads, before it was removed...). Regarding this thread, I don't have much to add apart from a few associative leaps that sprung to mind as I was reading! Not having commented on a 're-read' thread before, and being relatively new to the forum, I'm not sure whether my observations are appropriate here; I tend to think 'out of the box,' so I may be inadvertently 'breaking' some 'rules'...(you will have to orient me, should you feel these observations would be more relevant elsewhere), since I will link several texts and passages rather imaginatively-- moreover, I will not directly discuss Bran, though the astute reader will be able to identify that the themes developed here do follow on from previously-raised and -discussed ones, and indeed do have a bearing for Bran and those close to him:

The 'grey-fog/death/curtains/masks/deception/fraudulence/mummery' motif reminded me of three famous quotations from elsewhere in the literary canon, drawn from sources as diverse as the Bible, Shakespeare, and that great poetic mystic 'seer' William Blake:

Thus, there is a hitch in human perception itself -- at once obfuscating and revealing; an opening and a closing; redemptive and damning -- preventing us from discriminating effectively, while at the same time paradoxically allowing any discrimination (of details, of understanding, of sifting the 'light' from the 'dark,' 'good' from the 'bad, the 'true' from 'the false,' all the false dichotomies etc., i.e. of the potential for 'sense-making' itself) at all to take place. The images you highlighted, some of which I've selected below, vividly outline this darkly scintillating paradox:

The sinister aspect of these motifs is recapitulated elsewhere, for example in the images which crowd upon Catelyn's consciousness as she rides up to face her fate, at once keenly ignorant and on some level dimly aware of the horror riding up to meet her, in an evocative text which I shall unpack below:

Pregnant with significance, there is much to elaborate, so I will highlight only a few key moments:

Here, the figure looming (at once painted as lifelike and ghostly) over proceedings is 'The Twins' also known as 'The Crossing,' perhaps an ominous reference, in the sense of the bridge in actual fact representing the final crossing for Cat and Rob and Grey Wind (the latter who momentarily budged/'balked' at that bridge, mournfully howling at that fatal threshold to no avail...in the end, the direwolf's words were indeed so much grey wind, wasted as his communication was on his dazzled and deaf human counterpart; unlike Jon who heeds and is in tune with his direwolf, Rob is, at this point, lost...)-- which ironically coincides with no crossing at all in that they were barred, despite the elaborate plans they had conceived for the(ir) future/s, from proceeding further in this war and in this life -- the drab and dizzying watery world of fog and mirages constituting a reference to the passage of the dead across the river of the Underworld, mirroring the mythological motif you referenced:

On some level, as I mentioned, Catelyn seems to be unnerved by the greyness and turbulence of the elements, presaging the trap into which they are swimming, ineluctably swept along as they are by the rising tide of all their fatal choices and their consequences ('Roslin caught a fine fat trout...'). Interestingly, since her encounter with Bran's would-be assassin, and having witnessed the otherworldly symbiosis between her fey son and his wolf-savior-summer-shadow, it is Catelyn - a Tully, adherent of the new gods -- who has grown in her ability to read behind the world at face value and sense/see/respect the portentous signs abounding the bounded world -- usually a Stark/old-gods talent. In contrast, both Rob and Ned fail to embrace their 'wolf' with fatal consequences, while Catelyn, the fish, becomes more and more 'she-wolf,' as Jaime observed! Ironically, it is Catelyn who time and time again entreaties Rob to respect and heed his wolf's sacred message. Sadly, it is Catelyn, she who once felt estranged from the weirwood at Winterfell, who grows luminously closer to the heart of the old gods, the further away from Winterfell she travels, as she nears death at the river. Perhaps her insight here at the crossing specifically is also partly due to her watery, fishlike, quicksilver, mercurial nature; Riverrun her spiritual home -- from which every Tully draws his/her life, and to which every Tully must symbolically and literally return in the Tully death-rite -- is after all also built on another critical crossing. In this light, the pathos of the shadowy banners, impossible to distinguish in the fog (of war) as friend vs. foe ('the rain made it impossible to distinguish colors and devices'), announcing her fate, 'hanging like so many drowned cats,' echoes not only Arya's 'in the fog all cats are grey...in the fog all men are killers,' and Jon's/Melisandre's 'daggers in the dark,' but also Cat's immediate fate, being hanged/almost decapitated and then tossed into the river, to become, literally, 'a drowned cat.'

Finally, a note on the mummer's farce. As you underscored, illustrating the point with numerous fine examples, there is a recurring motif in the saga of the fluidity of identity, which to some extent can be manipulated ('playing the game' or 'acting the part') -- but on another essential level (to reiterate our earlier stated paradox) is intrinsic to the given parameters of what it means to be human at the interface of the unknown, which includes the indeterminacy of both other people and other forces working beyond human comprehension/apprehension. The shifting nature of identity includes a proliferation of various guises such as: shapeshifting, skinchanging, warging, greenseeing, flame-reading, shadowbinding, masquerading as another, wearing faces false and true, characters such as parrots, mockingbirds, patchfaces, jinglebells, dragons-true-and-false, etc. In the particular passage I quoted, the Freys are described as wearing coarse, hidden, false faces which are difficult for Catelyn to place/read ('the face she saw beneath his hood...), yet nonetheless, or perhaps on account of this inscrutability, menacing (...was fleshy, broad and stupid' [the irony being that the Starks and their banners, from the perspective of their enemies and the readers, on a re-reading retrospectively, are the ones who, in this context, are easy to read as the 'thick, stupid' ones here walking into a trap like lambs, not wolves, to the slaughter). One of the faces is bearded (facial hair obscuring the features); another looks 'constipated,' hinting at some foul corruption currently withheld from view, but threatening imminent expulsion. Continuing the 'slipping-the-skins/clothing' metaphor further, the Freys and their henchmen make an appearance, wrapping their treacherous selves in 'heavy cloaks of thick, grey wool' (hinting at the lack of transparency and therefore potential 'shadiness' of their intentions) which are at the same time described as 'thin skins' (implying these tenuous coverings, though 'thick,' may be removed at will, to reveal the 'sharp tongue' lurking behind the veil)...Indeed, this is exactly what transpires at the 'false nuptials' of the Red Wedding (can any nuptials in Westeros ever be anything other than 'false,' I wonder...but, I digress!) The portcullis is raised as if in welcome (more like a guillotine), the party enters (more like being devoured by the iron jaws of the gate, as it consumes them and presages the 'bloody feast' to come); the curtain goes up on the mummer's farce (even the musicians -- fittingly called 'the players' -- are Lannister/Bolton assassins in disguise). Then, 'with scarcely a moment's respite, they began to play a very different sort of song,' the music transitions into the more somber, menacing tones of the 'Rains' of Castamere (while outside the hall, the rains lash like furious tears, together with Grey Wind lashing in furious futility to free himself from his bondage; 'Lord Walder raised a hand, and the music stopped, all but one drum. Catelyn heard the crash of distant battle, and closer the wild howling of a wolf. Grey Wind, she remembered too late.') The music has stopped, its message crystal-clear now. Thus, the farcical tragedy/tragic farce enters its final act, culminating in the sharp onslaught (as sharp as Walder Frey's sharp, remorseless tongue) of quarrels and daggers unleashed without mercy (in this respect, it is interesting that the word 'quarrels' is used instead of 'arrows,' representing both the 'quarrel' as arrow as well as the 'quarrel' as disagreement/falling-out with Walder Frey -- quarrels thus a suitable consequence of the quarrel which precipitated them). As the curtain goes up, the veil is lifted -- and the curtain comes down on Cat, Rob, Grey Wind and the rest. 'The players in the gallery had finally gotten both king and queen down to their name-day suits,' signifying that the coverings are coming off, the 'grey' ones are 'showing their true colors,' and that color is red in tooth and claw. All artifice aside-- leaving only naked silence and shattered illusions, amidst the only one true sound -- the lone cry of an abandoned wolf.

RAVENOUS READER: Beautiful analytical thought! :wub: I usually take responses into word and labor over replies such as yours for a day or two. Welcome to this thread - we have an awesome group of posters here, I do think, and you will enjoy reading what they all have to say.

As far as rereads, because I am an older lady whose eyes are not as great, you will notice that I incorporate paragraphing - or spacing between every two to five sentences. It makes things easier to read.

Many of us also like to color code and highlight words and phrases for emphasis - more so because such clues makes it easier to read and determine major points. [Wizz-The-Smith is going to LOVE you! He is a loyal follower and awesome contributor! He keeps things going when I am not around - and he has written some really good things here and in his content on his profile!]

Rereads tend to attract deeper and more thoughtful analytical commentary, and everyone is usually extremely tolerant of conflicting viewpoints, We often ramble and get off track as well, so you are right at home - feel free to express yourself - we will enjoy all that you have to offer!

With that said, I will get back to you with more on point reaction to your remarkable post! I LOVE LOVE LOVE your insights and perceptions. I am sure you can tell that I am ENTHUSED!

Talk to you soon!

ravenous reader · March 23, 2016

1 minute ago, evita mgfs said:

RAVENOUS READER: Beautiful analytical thought! I usually take responses into word and labor over replies such as yours for a day or two. Welcome to this thread - we have an awesome group of posters here, I do think, and you will enjoy reading what they all have to say.

As far as rereads, because I am an older lady whose eyes are not as great, you will notice that I incorporate paragraphing - or spacing between every two to five sentences. It makes things easier to read.

Many of us also like to color code and highlight words and phrases for emphasis - more so because such clues makes it easier to read and determine major points. [Wizz-The-Smith is going to LOVE you! He is a loyal follower and awesome contributor! He keeps things going when I am not around - and he has written some really good things here and in his content on his profile!]

Rereads tend to attract deeper and more thoughtful analytical commentary, and everyone is usually extremely tolerant of conflicting viewpoints, We often ramble and get off track as well, so you are right at home - feel free to express yourself - we will enjoy all that you have to offer!

With that said, I will get back to you with more on point reaction to your remarkable post! I LOVE LOVE LOVE your insights and perceptions. I am sure you can tell that I am ENTHUSED!

Talk to you soon!

Thanks for the warm welcome! It's my belief that free association -- and most importantly tolerance of multiple dancing meanings -- is both in the spirit (and the letter) of that notoriously rambling gardener-architect par excellence, the Maege Martin himself. So, while we should always be vigilant, in honor of the intricacies of his wordcraft, we should also never forsake playfulness, in honor of what he has left unsaid.

evita mgfs · March 23, 2016

15 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

Thanks for the warm welcome! It's my belief that free association -- and most importantly tolerance of multiple dancing meanings -- is both in the spirit (and the letter) of that notoriously rambling gardener-architect par excellence, the Maege Martin himself. So, while we should always be vigilant, in honor of the intricacies of his wordcraft, we should also never forsake playfulness, in honor of what he has left unsaid.

:wub: YOU ARE AMAZING! Hey, the poor poster whose work was deleted by the mods messaged me - the one you mentioned in your analysis. I did not realize that his/her work was actually REMOVED! I feel bad when I hear things like that because I know that the poster worked extremely hard in his/her efforts to share ideas that he/she developed with evidences and analytical commentary.

I think you are a RAVENOUS WRITER! KUDOS TO YOU!

ravenous reader · March 23, 2016

1 minute ago, evita mgfs said:

a RAVENOUS WRITER!

ha ha...touche'!

evita mgfs · March 23, 2016

20 minutes ago, ravenous reader said:

Thanks for the warm welcome! It's my belief that free association -- and most importantly tolerance of multiple dancing meanings -- is both in the spirit (and the letter) of that notoriously rambling gardener-architect par excellence, the Maege Martin himself. So, while we should always be vigilant, in honor of the intricacies of his wordcraft, we should also never forsake playfulness, in honor of what he has left unsaid.

OKAY - IT JUST CAME TO ME! Your prose efforts remind me of the writings of one of my favorite authors - Jane Austen! And that is as big a compliment as I ever have given to anyone, methinks!

ravenous reader · March 23, 2016

Just now, evita mgfs said:

OKAY - IT JUST CAME TO ME! Your prose efforts remind me of the writings of one of my favorite authors - Jane Austen! And that is as big a compliment as I ever have given to anyone, methinks!

Wow! Yes, the writing is definitely as dense, though by no means as lyrical!

evita mgfs · March 24, 2016

7 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

ha ha...touche'!

OH RAVENOUS READER: I managed to write a few reactions to your most amazing post. You have inspired my muse – or you are my muse – and your analytical commentary is extraordinary. Thank you for taking time to compose such a striking reaction to my post. I have thoroughly enjoyed reading and sharing, and I hope to complete my reply tomorrow. This is my reply – in part – more to come.

beautiful thread, evita mgfs! Have read some of your posts elsewhere, and always enjoy them (I had actually wanted to comment on some of your interesting thoughts regarding Jaime's karmic/poetic justice in relation to Bran ('Take my hand...') in one of the other threads, before it was removed...). Regarding this thread, I don't have much to add apart from a few associative leaps that sprung to mind as I was reading! Not having commented on a 're-read' thread before, and being relatively new to the forum, I'm not sure whether my observations are appropriate here; I tend to think 'out of the box,' so I may be inadvertently 'breaking' some 'rules'...(you will have to orient me, should you feel these observations would be more relevant elsewhere), since I will link several texts and passages rather imaginatively-- moreover, I will not directly discuss Bran, though the astute reader will be able to identify that the themes developed here do follow on from previously-raised and -discussed ones, and indeed do have a bearing for Bran and those close to him:

On 7/11/2015 at 5:04 PM, evita mgfs said:

Grey is a color with complex symbology, but in the instances of the “grey” in the godswood, grey fog in Braavos, and Martin’s death imagery, the GREY MISTS/FOG may symbolize “death”. Consequently, those present for the fraudulent nuptials are marked for death by the “grey mists”. In “Mercy”, a certain Lannister guard is marked for death.

The 'grey-fog/death/curtains/masks/deception/fraudulence/mummery' motif reminded me of three famous quotations from elsewhere in the literary canon, drawn from sources as diverse as the Bible, Shakespeare, and that great poetic mystic 'seer' William Blake:

Quote

-- From the Bible King James Version,1 Corinthians 13:12:

'For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.'

-- From Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act II Scene VII:

'All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages...'

-- From Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell:

'If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.'

Thus, there is a hitch in human perception itself -- at once obfuscating and revealing; an opening and a closing; redemptiveand damning -- preventing us from discriminating effectively, while at the same time paradoxically allowing any discrimination (of details, of understanding, of sifting the 'light' from the 'dark,' 'good' from the 'bad, the 'true' from 'the false,' all the false dichotomies etc., i.e. of the potential for 'sense-making' itself) at all to take place. The images you highlighted, some of which I've selected below, vividly outline this darkly scintillating paradox: