ravenous reader Posted August 4, 2016 Share Posted August 4, 2016 17 hours ago, Feather Crystal said: HOLY COW! First of all, of course I remember evita mgfs...where is that girl any-who? Just stopping by to let you know that I am not ignoring you. There is just so much here to read and digest. I really can't add anything of substance until I know what you guys are doing here. Thank you for linking my essays. The inversion project has taken most of my attention for the last six months, and is only a third of the way complete...I've got a long way to go, and as I go along I find new information that sends me back to make edits and changes to the earlier chapters. I used to hate the Ironborn chapters my first couple reads of the series, but after discovering that the titled chapters were what I call "inversion" chapters, that all changed. Now the Ironborn chapters are my favorites! If I can answer any questions just PM me, or visit me on Hobaw. If there's anything that you think I can contribute to this discussion then I need somebody to give me a short(ish) description of what this thread is all about. Is it still about Bran's growing powers? A friend of mine is currently enmeshed in all things "Bran". Her name is @LynnS on Westeros, and min on Howbaw. She's currently working on compiling evidence of Bran's attempts at meddling in the present in order to change the future. Hi FC, and welcome! Although @evita mgfs is the founder of this re-read, since she hasn't been active on the site recently Wizz ( @Wizz-The-Smith ), who has a long history of keeping the site ticking along with Evita, will be writing you a short intro in due course re: what we do here. You will probably find it quite different to what you do -- your 'grand crystal geometry project'! -- but I find it interesting how we've been able to reach some similar insights to yours coming at the text from a different angle. Basically, the idea was to examine possible evidence for Bran's time-and-space-travelling presence in the text, starting with the prologue. While we weren't quite spelling out an inversion theory as such, we did discover some parallels of the North with respectively the Iron Islands and Braavos, for example. The hook which we found useful for this exploration was the wind with its connection to the old gods/Bloodraven, etc. And that's basically what we did: a close inspection of the text, letting ourselves go where the wind blows in the text-- so nothing was out of bounds (we even found ourselves talking about Catholicism, communion and cannibalism)! Then we added trees, birds, fog, wolves, etc. There's a lot of free associating here which I find fun. You'll notice my interests are eclectic and I tend to stray off-topic and enjoy playing with the text in my own baroque style, while Wizz's contributions are far more focused and plot-based, and a breath of fresh air after my dense meditations! What we both share is a love for delving into GRRM's words. All perspectives are welcome here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 4, 2016 Share Posted August 4, 2016 16 hours ago, Feather Crystal said: HOLY COW! First of all, of course I remember evita mgfs...where is that girl any-who? Just stopping by to let you know that I am not ignoring you. There is just so much here to read and digest. I really can't add anything of substance until I know what you guys are doing here. Thank you for linking my essays. The inversion project has taken most of my attention for the last six months, and is only a third of the way complete...I've got a long way to go, and as I go along I find new information that sends me back to make edits and changes to the earlier chapters. I used to hate the Ironborn chapters my first couple reads of the series, but after discovering that the titled chapters were what I call "inversion" chapters, that all changed. Now the Ironborn chapters are my favorites! If I can answer any questions just PM me, or visit me on Hobaw. If there's anything that you think I can contribute to this discussion then I need somebody to give me a short(ish) description of what this thread is all about. Is it still about Bran's growing powers? A friend of mine is currently enmeshed in all things "Bran". Her name is @LynnS on Westeros, and min on Howbaw. She's currently working on compiling evidence of Bran's attempts at meddling in the present in order to change the future. Hi Feather Crystal. Thanks for popping in to let us know you're interested, and for your concern about the flow/topic of the thread. This thread doesn't really have a structure like the other re-reads do, the contributors have just been replying as they see fit with ideas/information in response to the OP. Rather than concentrate on just Bran's 'growing' powers, we have been looking at anything and everything Bran. As Ravenous Reader outlined in her essay, it seems that to study one idea invariably leads to another, and another. So as George would say, the tale of this thread has grown in the telling. Some of the ideas throughout the thread have been based around the personification of the wind, trees and how Bran/BR can manipulate such techniques. Bran the time traveller, which Evita posted about over a year ago. The poetic justice handed out by the old gods as they listen to various conversations, Words are Wind. The wolves, their howling, WF's crypts etc. All that encompasses Bran, BR, and the old gods. Which leads me onto our new essay series. I spotted some clues in the AGOT prologue that linked the wind, trees and wolves together. Those clues/techniques are the subject of my opening essays 'Rustling leaves - voice connection', the 'howling wind and wolf connection' and 'a presence in the wind'. After some brainstorming we were able to progress these ideas, finding evidence around the True Tongue, the song it sings and those who sing it. Furthermore, some ideas surrounding Bran the Builder, forgotten languages etc. So anything goes basically, if you have any ideas around this subject at all then go ahead and post. We would love to hear from you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melifeather Posted August 4, 2016 Share Posted August 4, 2016 You should contact wolfmaid for "those who sing". That was a subject she mused about! I can relate to the "growing with the telling". When I started the inversion project I wrote fairly short summaries for The Prophet and the next couple chapters, but The Queenmaker ended up having 3 parts, all very long, and now I'm deeply entrenched in The Reaver...3 parts completed and into a 4th! I just worry that when they get too long, nobody will want to read them. But, first and foremost the discovery is what's important to me and I can share small bits and pieces when relevant on other people's threads. If I stumble upon anything to fit wind, trees, and wolves I'll circle back. Seems like I was late for the party regarding the Ironborn and Euron (my favorite subjects). I like Bran, wargs, skinchangers, and greenseers too. I would love to contribute more, but I may not be able to since I'm engrossed in completing the inversion chapters. They'll take most of my attention for at least a year. I do pop in on a couple threads from time to time and I'll try to catch up on this one if I can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wolfmaid7 Posted August 5, 2016 Share Posted August 5, 2016 Holy shite!!! I just saw a mention in this thread,and i'm glad else a gem would have gone unnoticed forever.Great job Evita with interesting topic.Now i'll have to and try and read the whole thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 5, 2016 Share Posted August 5, 2016 17 hours ago, wolfmaid7 said: Holy shite!!! I just saw a mention in this thread,and i'm glad else a gem would have gone unnoticed forever.Great job Evita with interesting topic.Now i'll have to and try and read the whole thread. Hi wolfmaid, and welcome! I like your surprised reaction, and also Feather Crystal's Holy cow!! I know what you mean, Ravenous Reader has some truly great ideas around this subject, and I had a similar reaction when I first read her musings, supposedly in support of my essay. I think it's fair to say that they progress my essays rather than just support them. You're right about this thread being a gem, we are lucky to have RR, and we have spoken recently of how inspirational Evita's ideas and friendship have been. Her OP is great, and we have added a lot to the ideas throughout the thread. However, some of the stuff RR has just posted are newer thoughts not really touched on before here. The True Tongue, the song it is singing and those who sing it, is stuff we have been brainstorming about recently in reaction to text we are finding. Hence the reason RR linked you and your thread in her essay. Anyhoo, I hope you enjoy our thread. And I'm also hopeful that you will be inspired by some of our new ideas, which are ultimately a culmination of all that went before here in Bran's growing powers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 7, 2016 Share Posted August 7, 2016 A RUSTLE OF LEAVES. THE WIND. AND THE HOWL OF WOLVES. Osha studied him. "You asked them and they're answering. Open your ears, listen, you'll hear." Bran listened. "It's only the wind," he said after a moment, uncertain. "The leaves are rustling." "Who do you think sends the wind, if not the [old] gods?" PART II: THE HOWLING WIND AND WOLF CONNECTION Hi everyone, in this section I will attempt to link the wind, or more specifically the howling wind, to the wolves. I hope to show that the wind is sent by the old gods/BR/Bran. The Stark’s are synonymous with the wolves and we can easily link Bran to a wolfish wind. And for the sake of this essay here are a couple of examples in the text where the CotF and Bloodraven are linked to wolves. In the White Wood, where supposedly the children of the forest emerged from beneath a hollow hill to send hundreds of wolves against an Andal camp. [TWOIAF] How many eyes does Lord Bloodraven have? The riddle ran. A thousand eyes and one. Some claimed that the King’s Hand was a student of the dark arts who could change his face, put on the likeness of a one-eyed dog, even turn into a mist. Packs of gaunt grey wolves hunted down his foes, men said, and carrion crows spied for him and whispered secrets in his ear. [The Mystery Knight] The children use the wolves against the Andal’s… As for BR and his description, we have seen him change his face in D&E, skinchange one-eyed creatures and there’s talk of him using the mist, again in D&E. We also know that carrion crows spy for him and whisper their secrets in his ear [Or Coldhands ear] The wolf/wind connection started back in the AGOT prologue, and I think George subtly insinuates that the wind has a presence through clever use of personification. Here’s that text from the prologue…….. [Gared] ‘’Everyone talks about snows forty foot deep, and how the ice wind comes howling out of the north, but the real enemy is the cold.’’ A small time later…. Somewhere off in the wood a wolf howled. This is the first time in the series that the wind is howling, Martin then gives us the wolf howl almost instantly, just a page or two later in fact. I think it is an early hint at the howling technique. This idea is strengthened further when we get this next passage in the prologue……… Will could feel it. Four years in the Nights Watch and he had never been so afraid. What was it? ‘’Wind. Trees rustling. A wolf. Which sound is it that unmans you so Gared?’’ The wind. Trees rustling. And a wolf. We’ve looked at rustling trees in Part one. Add to this the wolf and wind mentions, and we have all three facets central to the clues I’m looking for in these essays. And we have it all from the first chapter in the entire series. This is another great wolf/wind example from AGOT…………… Above snow, the wind was a living thing, howling around them like a wolf in the waste, then falling off to nothing as if to lure them into complacency. [Catelyn VI, AGOT] The wind was a living thing and howling like a wolf! This is a potential link, so I needed some more examples. With that in mind here are two more good examples of this technique before we explore some other options…. That night the wind was howling almost like a wolf and there were some real wolves off to the west giving it lessons… [ASOS, Arya VIII] I particularly like this one, the wolves are giving the wind lessons, awesome! But most importantly for this line of enquiry, they are working together. Strengthening the idea that this relationship between wolf and wind is one to follow. The howling wind is showing wolfish attributes again. ----------------------------------------------- ‘’You were on Pyke not long ago, and saw the King,’’ said Goodbrother. ‘’Did Balon say aught to you of the succession?’’ ‘’Aye’’. They had spoken in the Sea Tower, as the wind howled outside the windows and the waves crashed restlessly below. Balon had shaken his head in despair when he heard what Aeron had to tell him of his last remaining son. ‘’The wolves have made a weakling out of him, as I feared. I pray god that they killed him, so he cannot stand in Asha’s way.’’ [The Prophet. AFFC] We are hearing Aeron/Damphair’s thoughts here, so a slightly different angle. But notably The howling wind was present for this important discussion regards Iron Isles succession. Then we get a wolf reference when Balon refers to the Stark’s. Again the wolves are mentioned next to a howling wind. And these particular wolves are the symbol of the North and old gods belief…the Stark family itself. There are various ways an author could hint at this wolfish wind… HERE ARE SOME OTHER EXAMPLES Tyrion remembered a cold night under the stars when he'd stood beside the boy Jon Snow and a great white wolf atop the Wall at the end of the world, gazing out at the trackless dark beyond. He had felt—what?—something, to be sure, a dread that had cut like that frigid northern wind. A wolf had howled off in the night, and the sound had sent a shiver through him. Don't be a fool, he told himself. A wolf, a wind, a dark forest, it meant nothing. And yet . . . [Tyrion VI, ACOK] Tyrion thought of the northern wind and then he remembered the wolf howling off in the night. Again the two mentioned so closely in the text. Subsequently, when evaluating his thoughts, we have those three familiar descriptions again. A wolf, a wind, a dark forest… This is very similar to the trio we see in the AGOT prologue. Wind. Trees rustling. A wolf… I definitely think we are supposed to link these three things together. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the godswood she found her broomstick sword where she had left it, and carried it to the heart tree. There she knelt. Red leaves rustled. Red eyes peered inside her. The eyes of the gods. "Tell me what to do, you gods," she prayed. For a long moment there was no sound but the wind and the water and the creak of leaf and limb. And then, far far off, beyond the godswood and the haunted towers and the immense stone walls of Harrenhal, from somewhere out in the world, came the long lonely howl of a wolf. Gooseprickles rose on Arya's skin, and for an instant she felt dizzy. Then, so faintly, it seemed as if she heard her father's voice. "When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives," he said. [Arya X, ACOK] Forgive the second use of this passage, I like this one. The leaves are rustling when Arya asks the old gods what to do? And before she faintly hears what sounds like her father’s voice, we get all three clues again. The wind. The creak of leaf and limb. [Rustling leaves] And the howl of a wolf. It seems all three were activated before the faint answer from the old gods was enabled. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The press of spectators parted. A narrow weirwood door stood between two slender marble pillars, a crescent moon carved in the white wood…..One man removed the heavy bronze bars; the second pulled the door inward. Their blue cloaks rose snapping from their shoulders, caught in the sudden gust of wind that came howling through the open door. [Tyrion V, AGOT] As Ravenous Reader mentioned in her previous essay, there are examples of the wind using gates and doors throughout the series, showing a civility beyond a normal wind. This one caught my eye as the howling wind uses a weirwood door to announce itself and it is showing wolfish tendencies by way of snapping in the wind. The howling wind seems very active in The Vale and the Eyrie. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There was ice underfoot, and broken stones just waiting to turn an ankle, and the wind was howling fiercely. It sounds like a wolf, thought Sansa. A ghost wolf, big as mountains. [Alayne II, AFFC] This one’s similar to the Cat example in AGOT, we are given the howling wind and then the plain explanation that it’s a wolf, or sounds like a wolf in this case. We get the added bonus of the ghost connection as well, this time it’s a ghost wolf. Cool. If the earlier representations do resemble BR/CotF then this chapter is late AFFC and therefore could involve Bran. The ‘ghost wolf’ hint certainly supports this idea. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Across the river wolves were howling, and the wind was gusting through a stand of willows, making their branches writhe and whisper. [Jaime V, AFFC] The howling wolves and gusting wind are followed by the branches writhing [rustling] All three of the clues for this essay series laid out closely in the text again. There is also a whisper which supports my first essay, the rustle of leaf enabling that voice. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ They were on the far side when they heard the howl, a long rising wail that moved through the trees like a cold wind. Bran raised his head to listen. ‘’Summer’’, he said. No sooner had he spoken than a second voice joined the first. [Bran V, AGOT] This howl is compared to the wind directly. Not just that, but a wind that moves through trees as Bran and BR do. There are other examples of this type, but are there any different clues to add variety to this wolfish wind idea any further? SOME BITING EXAMPLES Another way to keep subtly insinuating a wolfish presence in the wind is to give it a bite… He found a comfortable spot just beyond the noise of the camp, besides a swift-running stream with waters clear and cold as ice. A grotesquely ancient oak provided shelter from the biting wind. [Tyrion II, AGOT] Keeping it simple with this example, just using the phrase the biting wind. There are plenty of these, and this subtle change to a bite works well with the howling wind/wolf examples. But there are other avenues to explore…… ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The dogs huddled together miserably on the riverbank as the wind snapped at them. Chett felt it too, biting through his layers of black wool and boiled leather. [Prologue, ASOS] This one is rather more descriptive. Before the wind is biting it snapped at them. [The dogs] The term snap or snapped has been used to describe a lunge or physical warning from the wolves throughout the series. Grey Wind snapped at his arm, teeth ripping at his sleeve and tearing loose a scrap of cloth I had to use Grey WIND as my example. Snapping teeth and tearing at the sleeve leads me nicely into the next example………………… ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- At four hundred feet the wind had teeth, and tore at his black cloak so it slapped noisily at the iron bars. At seven hundred it cut right through him. [Jon VII, ADWD] This works really well. The wind had teeth, and tore at more clothing insinuating that biting wind again. And this text is very similar to the Grey Wind example I gave above, snapping teeth tearing at a sleeve/cloak. The wind replicates the wolf’s actions, and there are subtle language choices repeated between wolf and wind. Snap, tear, bite, teeth etc……….. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- When at last day came to Braavos, it came grey and dark and overcast. The girl had hoped for fog, but the gods ignored her prayers as gods so often did. The air was clear and cold, and the wind had a nasty bite to it. [The Ugly Little Girl, ADWD] The Ugly Little Girl is after Bran III, his last chapter. Therefore we could perhaps expect to see Bran in some of these techniques we have been examining. Possibly a training in progress if you will. The day is described as grey, a Stark colour. And the wind had a nasty bite, as befits an actual wolf of the north, Brandon Stark. This example has possible Bran connections and we will examine this idea further in my final essay ‘A Presence in the Wind’. For now our co-host Ravenous Reader will examine some of these thoughts further in her supporting/progressing essay for Part two. So to add some fascinating depth to these ideas, RR it’s over to you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ravenous reader Posted August 8, 2016 Share Posted August 8, 2016 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: This example has possible Bran connections and we will examine this idea further in my final essay ‘A Presence in the Wind’. For now our co-host Ravenous Reader will examine some of these thoughts further in her supporting/progressing essay for Part two. So to add some fascinating depth to these ideas, RR it’s over to you. Thank you @Wizz-The-Smith! SHADOW ASSASSINS OF THE NORTH 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: the wind was a living thing, howling around them like a wolf in the waste, then falling off to nothing as if to lure them into complacency. [Catelyn VI, AGOT] I agree this is a key example of the wolf-wind personification which you have identified cropping up here and there and everywhere! Moreover, the wolf-wind is described as using a sneaky kind of 'paramilitary' tactic of ambush-and-retreat...'howling around them in the waste, then falling off to nothing as if to lure them into complacency.' 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: In the White Wood, where supposedly the children of the forest emerged from beneath a hollow hill to send hundreds of wolves against an Andal camp. [TWOIAF] How many eyes does Lord Bloodraven have? The riddle ran. A thousand eyes and one. Some claimed that the King’s Hand was a student of the dark arts who could change his face, put on the likeness of a one-eyed dog, even turn into a mist. Packs of gaunt grey wolves hunted down his foes, men said, and carrion crows spied for him and whispered secrets in his ear. [The Mystery Knight] The children use the wolves against the Andal’s… We’ve already encountered other instances where wolves have been strategically employed as important auxiliary forces or weapons in service of the north and old gods. As a prime example, Robb Stark, ‘the Young Wolf’ warrior of the north, ‘rides to battle on a wolf’ (ACOK – Arya II). Grey Wind is always in the thick of the battle, and with his equivocal name suggests that both wolf and wind are weapons typically associated with the north and old gods’ vengeance. Ironically, the decimation of the north ushers in a profitable time for wolves, which the populace with further irony terms ‘a bad year for wolves’ -- by which is meant a bad time for the others, not the wolves! (ACOK – Arya II). Thanks to Nymeria’s recruiting skills and perhaps some additional magical backing, packs of wolves are proliferating near the Gods Eye, a sacred spot associated with the children of the forest, weirwoods, greenseers and the old gods; the pack acting from their base in the dark woods there as an efficient guerrilla fighting force, augmenting the efforts of the human resistance in the Riverlands. In fact, the pack of wolves can be said to constitute an additional ‘brotherhood without banners’! This fraternal solidarity is reflected in how the wolves are often referred to as ‘grey sisters… brothers… and cousins’ of both their wolf and human counterparts. Despite for the most part operating in silence, this grey shadow force also seems to enjoy a range of musical expression every bit as lively as the ‘merry band’ of human rebels! 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: That night the wind was howling almost like a wolf and there were some real wolves off to the west giving it lessons… [ASOS, Arya VIII] I've always felt that these are singing lessons! The words of the following song which suggestively segues into a dream of wolves (actually a warging dream for Arya) could almost apply to the band of wolves as much as men: Quote ASOS -- Arya III The brothers of the Kingswood, they were an outlaw band. The forest was their castle, but they roamed across the land. No man’s gold was safe from them, nor any maiden’s hand. Oh, the brothers of the Kingswood, that fearsome outlaw band . . . Warm and dry in a corner between Gendry and Harwin, Arya listened to the singing for a time, then closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep. She dreamt of home; not Riverrun, but Winterfell. It was not a good dream, though. She was alone outside the castle, up to her knees in mud. She could see the grey walls ahead of her, but when she tried to reach the gates every step seemed harder than the one before, and the castle faded before her, until it looked more like smoke than granite. And there were wolves as well, gaunt grey shapes stalking through the trees all around her, their eyes shining. Whenever she looked at them, she remembered the taste of blood. There is a parallel between the outlaws and the wolves. Given that Nymeria has been responsible for marshaling the wolf forces -- 'a fearsome outlaw band' -- it's interesting that she too is a literal outlaw, having been unjustly banished on account of the Crown (which also mirrors Arya's status). As is the case for the other outlaws, the forest is now her castle -- her home base -- from which she roams with her brothers and sisters across the land seeking plunder and retribution. The wood provides ideal cover for the 'gaunt grey shapes stalking through the trees.' As Catelyn once observed, in the woodland gloom all banners look grey and indistinguishable: Quote A Clash of Kings - Catelyn IV They rode in silence through sparse woodland where the trees leaned drunkenly away from the sea. The nervous whinny of horses and the clank of steel guided them back to Renly's camp. The long ranks of man and horse were armored in darkness, as black as if the Smith had hammered night itself into steel. There were banners to her right, banners to her left, and rank on rank of banners before her, but in the predawn gloom, neither colors nor sigils could be discerned. A grey army, Catelyn thought. Grey men on grey horses beneath grey banners. Similarly, ‘a grey army…beneath grey banners’ might equally be a fitting description of the shadow army of grey wolves lurking in the dark woods – the color grey strongly associated with wolves and Starks and being 'bannerless.' In the above example, the ‘nervous whinny of horses’ might even be due to the presence of wolves that may be watching in the woods, going by similar nervous behavior among horses whenever they sense Grey Wind weaving among their ranks. 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: As for BR and his description, we have seen him change his face in D&E, skinchange one-eyed creatures and there’s talk of him using the mist, again in D&E. We also know that carrion crows spy for him and whisper their secrets in his ear [Or Coldhands ear] Bloodraven and the Children of the Forest are both presented as practitioners of unconventional warfare, or wielders of dark magic. These unconventional weapons include wolves, dogs, mists, crows – and as we'll show in this essay, winds, and in another, trees. All of these weapons may take both literal and figurative forms. As an example of the wordplay involved, when Bloodraven was Hand of the king, his famous fighting force of archers was called ‘the Raven’s Teeth.’ The employment of these shadow assassins got me questioning Bloodraven’s background as ‘a student of the dark arts who could change his face.’ So, whose student was he? Where did he study these dark arts? The Citadel? Essos? Is there perhaps a connection between his ability to ‘change his face’ and being a ‘Faceless Man’? In his capacity to take on various guises, he could be said to be both a kind of ‘faceless man’ and a ‘many-faced god.’ The 1000-eyed bridge, the grey and the fog and ‘half-blind’ references associated with Braavos, which were previously identified by @evita mgfs and the rest of you, seem to hint at Bloodraven’s presence there at one time or another. The House of Black and White is associated with magical weirwood and ebony doors and chairs which might point to Bloodraven and/or allow him access. It’s implied that his likely ‘failed’ renegade greenseer protégé Euron had some kind of Braavos/Faceless Man connection. For example, the faceless man on the bridge associated with the ‘storm’ that killed his brother Balon has been interpreted by many to point to Euron. In addition, there are other subtle indications of Euron’s Braavos connections, like the characteristic Braavosian idiom ‘Just so’ with which Euron frequently punctuates his sentences, reminiscent of ‘the kindly man’ at the House of Black and White, and Arya’s other ‘dancing teacher’ Syrio Forel, among several other characters who may have ulterior motives. After a time in Braavos, even Arya consciously or unconsciously starts using this idiom in her speech as a way to blend in to her surroundings. Although the ‘just so’ marker is not applicable in Bloodraven’s case, is it possible nevertheless that Bloodraven has a connection to Braavos, and to the Faceless Men specifically? Braavos is referred to as 'the bastard child who ran away from home,' which might also be applicable to Brynden Rivers as the famous Targaryen bastard who ended up being exiled to the Watch for being a traitor to his family (he like the wolves in his employ is an outlaw!). Intriguingly, Braavos is a city of secrets, masks and whispers (sounds right up Bloodraven’s alley…the weirwoods are wont to speak in whispers for example...and as former Spymaster of King's Landing Bloodraven would've been au fait with many secrets, etc.), not to mention the fog. Interestingly, we're told of Braavos that 'its very existence had been a secret for a century' – coincidentally, that's also how long most people assume Bloodraven has been dead (see Dareon's take in the quote to follow): Quote A Feast for Crows - Cat Of The Canals Braavos was a city made for secrets, a city of fogs and masks and whispers. Its very existence had been a secret for a century, the girl had learned; its location had been hidden thrice that long. "The Nine Free Cities are the daughters of Valyria that was," the kindly man taught her, "but Braavos is the bastard child who ran away from home. We are a mongrel folk, the sons of slaves and whores and thieves. Our forebears came from half a hundred lands to this place of refuge, to escape the dragonlords who had enslaved them. Half a hundred gods came with them, but there is one god all of them shared in common." "Him of Many Faces." A Feast for Crows - Samwell II "Bloodraven?" said Dareon. "I know a song about him. 'A Thousand Eyes, and One,' it's called. But I thought he lived a hundred years ago." THE ‘W-‘ CONSPIRACY—THE OLD GODS’ TRIFECTA 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: Tyrion remembered a cold night under the stars when he'd stood beside the boy Jon Snow and a great white wolf atop the Wall at the end of the world, gazing out at the trackless dark beyond. He had felt—what?—something, to be sure, a dread that had cut like that frigid northern wind. A wolf had howled off in the night, and the sound had sent a shiver through him. Don't be a fool, he told himself. A wolf, a wind, a dark forest, it meant nothing. And yet . . . [Tyrion VI, ACOK] Another almost-verbatim Tyrion example of the same configuration: Quote A Game of Thrones - Tyrion I Somewhere in the great stone maze of Winterfell, a wolf howled. The sound hung over the castle like a flag of mourning. Tyrion Lannister looked up from his books and shivered, though the library was snug and warm. Something about the howling of a wolf took a man right out of his here and now and left him in a dark forest of the mind, running naked before the pack. According to the pattern you've identified, first we have the ‘wolf,’ followed immediately by ‘howling,’ which by now automatically evokes the wind for the reader, after GRRM’s repetitive priming throughout the text ever since the foundations he laid in the prologue. So, although wind is not stated explicitly in this specific passage, it’s present implicitly in the ‘howling,’ as well as the image of a flag above Winterfell. Subsequently, further reinforcement of the wind association is provided by Tyrion’s reaction to that howling, which is to ‘shiver’ as if a cold wind had entered the library. He feels ‘naked’ in the face of this sound, as if his clothes have been stripped from him, as we’ve often observed winds and wolves doing, e.g. those numerous references to ‘plucking,’ ‘yanking’ and ‘snapping’ at people’s sleeves and hoods etc. In addition to an association with the wind, the howling is associated with a forest. Wolf, wind, and wood work together against their enemies, presumably in service of the old gods. At Winterfell, Tyrion feels set upon by this trifecta of old god weapons –pursued by the pack of wolves, violated by a chill wind, and trapped in a dark wood. In the same scene, he’s also incidentally reading an old book on the changing of the seasons, which should remind us that this is indeed the province of the Starks and the old gods: Winter is coming! In fact, it’s possible that we might be able to add a fourth – namely winter -- to GRRM’s trio, to make a quartet: ‘wolf, wind, wood, and winter.’ For example, all four are present in Nan’s warning to Bran: Quote A Game of Thrones - Bran IV "Oh, my sweet summer child," Old Nan said quietly, "what do you know of fear? Fear is for the winter, my little lord, when the snows fall a hundred feet deep and the ice wind comes howling out of the north. Fear is for the long night, when the sun hides its face for years at a time, and little children are born and live and die all in darkness while the direwolves grow gaunt and hungry, and the white walkers move through the woods." Identifying all these ‘W-‘ elements GRRM is so fond of alliterating, I’m tempted to include an additional fifth to our configuration, namely ‘white walkers’ (although perhaps that’s equivalent to winter)! I’m still unsure, however, how the white walkers relate to the old gods. Any suggestions? There seem to be contrary indications. For example, in the prologue Will the ranger who seems most respectful and sensitive to nature and the old gods takes shelter in a tree, and even says a prayer to 'the nameless gods of the woods' for protection, but gets slaughtered by the walkers nevertheless. That would seem to indicate that the old gods and walkers are opposed; however, they often seem to make an appearance together, e.g. the cold + wind, woods + walkers…even Jon’s wolf ‘Ghost’ an emissary of the old gods with his weirwood coloring is described as a silent white shadow, not unlike the walkers, hinting at some kind of deeper old gods-white walker connection. In the prologue, I couldn’t help noticing that the walkers are not pure white, but dressed instead in the camouflage of the trees: Quote A Game of Thrones - Prologue It was cold. Shivering, Will clung more tightly to his perch. His face pressed hard against the trunk of the sentinel. He could feel the sweet, sticky sap on his cheek. A shadow emerged from the dark of the wood. It stood in front of Royce. Tall, it was, and gaunt and hard as old bones, with flesh pale as milk. Its armor seemed to change color as it moved; here it was white as new-fallen snow, there black as shadow, everywhere dappled with the deep grey-green of the trees. The patterns ran like moonlight on water with every step it took. Will heard the breath go out of Ser Waymar Royce in a long hiss. "Come no farther," the lordling warned. His voice cracked like a boy's. He threw the long sable cloak back over his shoulders, to free his arms for battle, and took his sword in both hands. The wind had stopped. It was very cold. On the one hand, the walkers mimic nature. For example, the ‘deep grey-green’ is typical for sentinels, and ‘tall and gaunt and hard as old bones with flesh pale as milk’ sounds very like the description of a weirwood tree. On the other hand, by mimicry it's implied that nature is not their real substance, but a mask, ‘armor,’ or camouflage dress they wear for battle. Significantly, in the final paragraph of the passage, the walkers are directly opposed to the wind, in that they take away the wind and breath – I’ve discussed previously how the life-giving movement of breath is a kind of wind. Confronted with the walker, Ser Waymar Royce, once so loud and cocky, abruptly finds himself at a loss for words. He can only hiss and crack – prefiguring his transformation into a thrall of the white walkers whose speech has also been described as ‘ice cracking’ (AGOT-Prologue). Notably, GRRM follows up the appearance of the white walker with the subsequent extinguishing of the breath/wind ‘the wind had stopped,’ implying a causal relation between the two events. Are we to conclude from this therefore that the white walkers are the enemies of the old gods who use wind as their avatar? As we’ve previously identified on this thread, there are at least a further two instances of someone losing his voice (voice, breath, and wind are equivalent for the purposes of this argument): Quote A Game of Thrones - Prologue Royce did not move. He looked down at the empty clearing and laughed. "Your dead men seem to have moved camp, Will." Will's voice abandoned him. He groped for words that did not come. A Game of Thrones - Prologue Will saw movement from the corner of his eye. Pale shapes gliding through the wood. He turned his head, glimpsed a white shadow in the darkness. Then it was gone. Branches stirred gently in the wind, scratching at one another with wooden fingers. Will opened his mouth to call down a warning, and the words seemed to freeze in his throat. Perhaps he was wrong. Perhaps it had only been a bird, a reflection on the snow, some trick of the moonlight. What had he seen, after all? "Will, where are you?" Ser Waymar called up. "Can you see anything?" He was turning in a slow circle, suddenly wary, his sword in hand. He must have felt them, as Will felt them. There was nothing to see. "Answer me! Why is it so cold?" THE WINGED WOLF 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: The press of spectators parted. A narrow weirwood door stood between two slender marble pillars, a crescent moon carved in the white wood…..One man removed the heavy bronze bars; the second pulled the door inward. Their blue cloaks rose snapping from their shoulders, caught in the sudden gust of wind that came howling through the open door. [Tyrion V, AGOT] As Ravenous Reader mentioned in her previous essay, there are examples of the wind using gates and doors throughout the series, showing a civility beyond a normal wind. This one caught my eye as the howling wind uses a weirwood door to announce itself and it is showing wolfish tendencies by way of snapping in the wind. The howling wind seems very active in The Vale and the Eyrie. The delightful image of the personified wind entering via a door or gate was first highlighted by @evita mgfs and you. Thanks for bringing that to my attention! At other times, the wind dispenses with civility, peering into windows (one might say snooping) and accosting people who venture onto its own turf: 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: There was ice underfoot, and broken stones just waiting to turn an ankle, and the wind was howling fiercely. It sounds like a wolf, thought Sansa. A ghost wolf, big as mountains. [Alayne II, AFFC] In these particular examples the wind is personified as a predatory creature, embodied in their ‘snapping and flapping’ cloaks. Thus, not only is a ghost wolf present, but the ‘flapping’ implies an animal with wings, a bird of some kind, a dragon, or bat. Could it be a combination of both: a ‘winged wolf’? After all, a wind capable of bringing a ghost wolf all the way from Winterfell to the Eyrie is a wolf in flight! In addition to this image inevitably indicating Bran’s presence as the prime messenger and mover, I also think ‘ghost wolf’ might equally apply to Jon or even Sansa herself. Besides Jon who has ‘Ghost’ the white shadow as his companion, Sansa is the other child who more literally has a ‘ghost wolf,’ in the form of Lady’s shade. Could the wind in question be trying to tell Sansa something, in a similar vein to the Bran-Theon interchange we've previously discussed, namely reminding Sansa of what she has forgotten. Like Theon, Sansa is a broken creature who has forgotten who she is. At this particular moment in the Eyrie she, like Theon, is going under another name, essentially having relinquished her identity to Baelish. In fact, she’s masquerading as his bastard daughter. She is dancing to Baelish’s tune, a tune which the ghost wolf wind is perhaps attempting to interrupt with its own interjected music. In the distorted guise of Alayne Stone, Sansa is yet another character in the saga who must be awakened from stone. Indeed, GRRM inserts seemingly innocuous elements like wind, stone, and ice into the scene as clues in order to reveal something about Sansa’s psychic predicament. Sansa is just as broken as the ‘broken stones just waiting to turn an ankle.’ This could also be an indication that Littlefinger –a man associated in many ways with broken stones (e.g. ‘the Fingers,’ Harrenhal, Titan of Braavos Baelish’s original family sigil, the Eyrie itself)– is waiting to trip her up. Besides all his other numerous connections to stones, his name ‘Petyr’ even means stone/rock from the Latin ‘petrus’ as in ‘petrify,’ which means at once turn to stone and terrify (literally overwhelm someone with fear so that they are unable to move or think…). Gloomy prognostications notwithstanding, GRRM gives us a measure of hope for Sansa in the presence of the ghost wolf wind as well as the ‘ice [a Stark reminder] underfoot.’ While the stony soil in the Eyrie is not conducive to weirwoods taking root there, which means there is no godswood in the Eyrie from which Bran can operate, Bran is nevertheless able to make himself known through a wolfish wind! Quote A Feast for Crows - Jaime III The world grew ever greyer as they drew near to Harrenhal. They rode beneath slate skies, beside waters that shone old and cold as a sheet of beaten steel. Jaime found himself wondering if Brienne might have passed this way before him. If she thought that Sansa Stark had made for Riverrun . . . Had they encountered other travelers, he might have stopped to ask if any of them had chance to see a pretty maid with auburn hair, or a big ugly one with a face that would curdle milk. But there was no one on the roads but wolves, and their howling held no answers. Across the pewter waters of the lake the towers of Black Harren's folly appeared at last, five twisted fingers of black, misshapen stone grasping for the sky. Though Littlefinger had been named the Lord of Harrenhal, he seemed in no great haste to occupy his new seat, so it had fallen to Jaime Lannister to "sort out" Harrenhal on his way to Riverrun. In light of the old gods utilizing the howling wind to deliver messages, it’s ironic that Jaime believes that the howling wolves hold no answers. Note, 'the world grew ever greyer...' 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: they heard the howl, a long rising wail that moved through the trees like a cold wind. Bran raised his head to listen. ‘’Summer’’, he said. No sooner had he spoken than a second voice joined the first. [Bran V, AGOT] ... a wind that moves through trees as Bran and BR do. Nice! In support of this idea of a voice ‘moving through the trees,’ I’d like to quote a passage which you’ve pointed out before, I think on the ‘Riverlands Web’ thread: Quote A Dance with Dragons - Bran I From a nearby oak a raven quorked, and Bran heard the sound of wings as another of the big black birds flapped down to land beside it. By day only half a dozen ravens stayed with them, flitting from tree to tree or riding on the antlers of the elk. The rest of the murder flew ahead or lingered behind. But when the sun sank low they would return, descending from the sky on night-black wings until every branch of every tree was thick with them for yards around. Some would fly to the ranger and mutter at him, and it seemed to Bran that he understood their quorks and squawks. They are his eyes and ears. They scout for him, and whisper to him of dangers ahead and behind. 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: are there any different clues to add variety to this wolfish wind idea any further? A wolf has teeth and claws! Quote A Feast for Crows - Sansa I When their footsteps died away there was no sound in the High Hall of the Eyrie. Sansa could hear the night wind moaning outside and scratching at the Moon Door. She was very cold and very tired. Must I tell the tale again? she wondered. In addition to expressing itself by howling and biting, a wolf -- and wind -- can also scratch against a door or enclosure when it wants to get out (or come in). THE BITE IN THE WIND AND THE WIND IN THE BITE 18 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: He found a comfortable spot just beyond the noise of the camp, besides a swift-running stream with waters clear and cold as ice. A grotesquely ancient oak provided shelter from the biting wind. [Tyrion II, AGOT] ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The dogs huddled together miserably on the riverbank as the wind snapped at them. Chett felt it too, biting through his layers of black wool and boiled leather. [Prologue, ASOS] ... Grey Wind snapped at his arm, teeth ripping at his sleeve and tearing loose a scrap of cloth ... ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- At four hundred feet the wind had teeth, and tore at his black cloak so it slapped noisily at the iron bars. At seven hundred it cut right through him. [Jon VII, ADWD] ... ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- When at last day came to Braavos, it came grey and dark and overcast. The girl had hoped for fog, but the gods ignored her prayers as gods so often did. The air was clear and cold, and the wind had a nasty bite to it. [The Ugly Little Girl, ADWD] The Ugly Little Girl is after Bran III, his last chapter. Therefore we could perhaps expect to see Bran in some of these techniques we have been examining. Possibly a training in progress if you will. The day is described as grey, a Stark colour. And the wind had a nasty bite, as befits an actual wolf of the north, Brandon Stark. As @evita mgfs would say, grrrreyt! Let me get my ravening reader’s teeth into this one! I love the pick-up of ‘Grey Wind’ the wolf snapping at people’s sleeves juxtaposed with the grey wolfish wind doing the same. The wolfish attributes of biting and howling, etc., apart from serving as a kind of literary marker to reveal a Stark or Bloodraven presence in the wind, go further in betraying a certain intentionality with respect to the scene in which they are present. The wolfish wind is an active not passive presence, as demonstrated by how it seems to take sides in the action. The response of ‘snapping’ can refer both to a bite and a verbal retort in response to something. In other words, the wolf wind has something to say, a commentary to offer on what is transpiring. For any given instance, the particular stance taken by the wind can be read in examining how the biting and howling, etc. is directed. Thus, GRRM invests the wind with emotion and judgement. You’ve already touched on this with your observation that the wolves use snapping throughout the series as a way to warn their human counterparts. Similarly, they would use nipping to communicate affection, and more aggressive manoueuvres for their enemies. Consider for example, this instance where the wind, likened to a wolf, seems displeased with Theon after his having violated Winterfell: Quote A Dance with Dragons - The Prince of Winterfell Suddenly he did not want to be here. Once outside the godswood the cold descended on him like a ravening wolf and caught him in its teeth. He lowered his head into the wind and made for the Great Hall, hastening after the long line of candles and torches. Ice crunched beneath his boots, and a sudden gust pushed back his hood, as if a ghost had plucked at him with frozen fingers, hungry to gaze upon his face. Winterfell was full of ghosts for Theon Greyjoy Here again the critical trio of wood, wolf, and wind is reiterated. The cold wind is personified as a ‘hungry,’ ‘ravening wolf’ (we’ve previously discussed ‘ravening’ as an expressive allusion to Bran as both wolf and raven in one) which expresses its displeasure with Theon by catching him in its teeth. This point is reinforced by the very next sentence where Theon literally lowers his head into the wind, which taken in conjunction with the preceding sentence, paints a picture of Theon’s head in the jaws of a wolf! With his head in its jaws so to speak, the wolfwind rips off Theon’s hood and the ghost plucks at him with frozen fingers. Since wolves do not have fingers, this is another indication of an additional human presence, perhaps Bran, in the wind. By plucking at people’s hoods, trying to undress their faces in particular, the wind-wolf also seems eager to reveal their ‘true faces,' in figurative terms uncover their hypocrisy and betrayal, akin to Sandor’s comment to the effect that a ‘dog can sniff out a lie’. Theon ‘turncloak’ has turned against the Starks and Bran wants to expose his true intentions by ripping off his false cloak. Alternatively, perhaps the wind wishes Theon to shed his false Reek identity and 'become' Theon again, and urges him accordingly. People pull up their hoods for practical reasons to shield themselves against the cold as well as to disguise themselves when they’d prefer not to be recognized: Quote A Feast for Crows - The Soiled Knight The night was unseasonably cool, even for autumn. A brisk wet wind was swirling down the alleys, stirring up the day's dust. A north wind, and full of chill. Ser Arys Oakheart pulled up his hood to cover his face. It would not do for him to be recognized. Another example of the wind trying to reveal someone’s true identity; here Sansa is posing as Baelish’s daughter: Quote A Feast for Crows - Alayne II Beyond the walls, the wind picked up sharply. They were above the tree line here, exposed to the elements. Alayne was thankful that she'd dressed so warmly. Her cloak was flapping noisily behind her, and a sudden gust blew back her hood. She laughed, but a few yards ahead Lord Robert squirmed, and said, "It's too cold. We should go back and wait until it's warmer." "It will be warmer on the valley floor, my lord," said Mya. "You'll see when we get down there." Sansa is an interesting figure, despite what her detractors might say. Everything that’s been done to her in order to turn her into someone else notwithstanding, Sansa is still very much a northerner. Here, Sansa seems to be strangely in synch with the wind and the cold, unlike her southern compatriots. What's more, she seems to enjoy the wind’s attentions, as if it were family. When the wind tugs at her cloak and blows back her hood, she laughs instead of being affronted! For all we know, she might be playing with Bran: Quote A Storm of Swords - Sansa VII She scooped up a handful of snow and squeezed it between her fingers. Heavy and wet, the snow packed easily. Sansa began to make snowballs, shaping and smoothing them until they were round and white and perfect. She remembered a summer's snow in Winterfell when Arya and Bran had ambushed her as she emerged from the keep one morning. They'd each had a dozen snowballs to hand, and she'd had none. Bran had been perched on the roof of the covered bridge, out of reach, but Sansa had chased Arya through the stables and around the kitchen until both of them were breathless. She might even have caught her, but she'd slipped on some ice. Her sister came back to see if she was hurt. When she said she wasn't, Arya hit her in the face with another snowball, but Sansa grabbed her leg and pulled her down and was rubbing snow in her hair when Jory came along and pulled them apart, laughing. The wind tries to blow out a fire: Quote A Dance with Dragons - Jon X R'hllor," sang Melisandre, her arms upraised against the falling snow, "you are the light in our eyes, the fire in our hearts, the heat in our loins. Yours is the sun that warms our days, yours the stars that guard us in the dark of night." "All praise R'hllor, the Lord of Light," the wedding guests answered in ragged chorus before a gust of ice-cold wind blew their words away. Jon Snow raised the hood of his cloak. The snowfall was light today, a thin scattering of flakes dancing in the air, but the wind was blowing from the east along the Wall, cold as the breath of the ice dragon in the tales Old Nan used to tell. Even Melisandre's fire was shivering; the flames huddled down in the ditch, crackling softly as the red priestess sang. Only Ghost seemed not to feel the chill. In an attempt to disentangle the various vying parties in this passage, we may conclude for a start that the wind is not a fan of R’hllor -- it tries its best to blow out R’hllor’s fires! The rising wind essentially blows away the praises to R’hllor and silences Melisandre’s fires. We know that when her flames die down, her power is waning. The flames huddle down in the ditch, cowering from the presence in the wind. Then close on the heels of that comment we’re given a clue as to the identity of this wind who is opposed to R’hllor in that the wind is likened to ‘the breath of the ice dragon.’ Both Bloodraven – as half Blackwood-half Targaryen -- and Jon assuming R+L=J -- as half Stark-half Targaryen -- could be ‘ice dragons.’ With his Targaryen-hued hair, burning eyes and fiery thermostat within, Ghost could also be said to be an ice dragon as well. Another example of a biting wind: Quote A Game of Thrones - Catelyn IV The strong winds in the Bite and the roughness of the narrow sea had not agreed with him, and he'd almost gone over the side when the storm seized them unexpectedly off Dragonstone, yet somehow he had clung to a rope until three of Moreo's men could rescue him and carry him safely below decks. ... The winds had been against them much of the voyage, and without the galley's oars they'd still be beating their way past the Fingers, instead of skimming toward King's Landing and journey's end. The captain was just telling me that our voyage is almost at an end," she said. Playfully, GRRM switches it around, so instead of a strong bite in the wind, we have the ‘strong winds in the Bite’—a reversal technique which GRRM uses frequently serving to accentuate the equivalence of the terms -- which ‘seize them unexpectedly’ as if in its jaws, almost throwing Ser Rodrik overboard. I like to think of this as the wolfish wind which is trying valiantly, though in vain, to dissuade Catelyn from pursuing her various catastrophic ‘southron’ ambitions and follies. The wind’s opposition to their mission is suggested by the equivocal phrasing that the winds ‘had not agreed with him’ and ‘the winds had been against them’! Quote The captain was just telling me that our voyage is almost at an end," she said. An ominous prognostication. Indeed, Catelyn…your ‘voyage’ is almost at an end. It shall end at the Twins where you shall pay the proverbial ferryman, despite the attempts of a wolfish wind to thwart your and Robb’s foolhardiness, to no avail: Quote A Storm of Swords - Catelyn VI There was more trouble at the gatehouse. Grey Wind balked in the middle of the drawbridge, shook the rain off, and howled at the portcullis. Robb whistled impatiently. "Grey Wind. What is it? Grey Wind, with me." But the direwolf only bared his teeth. He does not like this place, Catelyn thought. Robb had to squat and speak softly to the wolf before he would consent to pass beneath the portcullis. They failed to listen to the song of the wind, and the rest is history. The wolves, and by extension wolfish winds, are an early warning alarm system, which is not heeded by their human counterparts at their peril: Quote A Game of Thrones - Bran II The wolf did as he was told. Bran scratched him behind the ears, then turned away, jumped, grabbed a low branch, and pulled himself up. He was halfway up the tree, moving easily from limb to limb, when the wolf got to his feet and began to howl. Bran looked back down. His wolf fell silent, staring up at him through slitted yellow eyes. A strange chill went through him. He began to climb again. Once more the wolf howled. "Quiet," he yelled. "Sit down. Stay. You're worse than Mother." The howling chased him all the way up the tree, until finally he jumped off onto the armory roof and out of sight. Summer and the rest of the wolves are strangely prescient. Here Summer seems to predict that Bran is in immediate danger, which he communicates by howling. Bran feels 'a strange chill go through him,' almost as if the howl like a wind had penetrated through his clothes to his core. However, Bran heeds neither wolf nor wind, and continues climbing. Although Summer is earthbound, his howling 'chases Bran all the way up the tree.' as if the sound had taken form like a wind wanting to pluck Bran back down from the tower and bring him to safety. Bran is too quick though; he escapes his guardian and jumps out of sight. He's quicker than the wind! Another example of the warning wind occurs in the Eyrie when Catelyn is doing the most foolhardy thing of all, dancing to Littlefinger’s tune and leading Tyrion up the mountain to Lysa for judgment. The wind’s judgement as to the wisdom of that occasion was as follows: THE WOLF WIND VS. THE MOCKING BIRD Quote A Game of Thrones - Catelyn VI So young, Catelyn thought, trying to remember if she had ever been like that. The girl had lived half her life in summer, and that was all she knew. Winter is coming, child, she wanted to tell her. The words were on her lips; she almost said them. Perhaps she was becoming a Stark at last. Above Snow, the wind was a living thing, howling around them like a wolf in the waste, then falling off to nothing as if to lure them into complacency. The stars seemed brighter up here, so close that she could almost touch them, and the horned moon was huge in the clear black sky. As they climbed, Catelyn found it was better to look up than down. The steps were cracked and broken from centuries of freeze and thaw and the tread of countless mules, and even in the dark the heights put her heart in her throat. When they came to a high saddle between two spires of rock, Mya dismounted. "It's best to lead the mules over," she said. "The wind can be a little scary here, my lady." Catelyn climbed stiffly from the shadows and looked at the path ahead; twenty feet long and close to three feet wide, but with a precipitous drop to either side. She could hear the wind shrieking. Mya stepped lightly out, her mule following as calmly as if they were crossing a bailey. It was her turn. Yet no sooner had she taken her first step than fear caught Catelyn in its jaws. There's definitely a bite in the air..! Quote She could feel the emptiness, the vast black gulfs of air that yawned around her. She stopped, trembling, afraid to move. The wind screamed at her and wrenched at her cloak, trying to pull her over the edge. Catelyn edged her foot backward, the most timid of steps, but the mule was behind her and she could not retreat. I am going to die here, she thought. She could feel cold sweat trickling down her back. "Lady Stark," Mya called across the gulf. The girl sounded a thousand leagues away. "Are you well?" Catelyn Tully Stark swallowed what remained of her pride. "I … I cannot do this, child," she called out. "Yes you can," the bastard girl said. "I know you can. Look how wide the path is." "I don't want to look." The world seemed to be spinning around her, mountain and sky and mules, whirling like a child's top. Catelyn closed her eyes to steady her ragged breathing. The wind –which has a decidedly Northern flavor – shows all the signs of disapproving of Cat’s latest misadventure, and is trying to knock some sense into her and get her to reconsider. Finally, Catelyn seems to ‘get wind of’ how unwise her enterprise might be, shown here by her feeble last-minute attempt to withdraw, ‘edging her foot backward the most timid of steps…” However, it’s typically a case of ‘too little too late’ whenever she tries to backtrack. ‘She could not retreat’ – which might almost be her epitaph --certainly defines Cat’s personality and fate. “The mule was behind her’ could be a reference to Cat’s singleminded stubbornness which tends to get her into her various binds -- unless ‘mule’ is a new name for Littlefinger! From a certain viewpoint, the ‘mule’ could be interpreted as one of Littlefinger’s proxies. Mules are pack animals which do the heavy lifting and dirty work on another’s behalf. More colloquially, ‘mules’ are a euphemism for those agents used to smuggle contraband, e.g. drugs, over borders, in order that the ones who are really pulling the strings behind the scenes can keep their hands clean and avoid getting caught. According to this interpretation, Cat herself has been goaded into performing her job as Littlefinger’s mule! Critically, she’s delivering an important package, namely Tyrion, into the ‘impregnable’ castle and thereby hopefully with him the war Littlefinger wants. By sowing the suggestion of the Lannister conspiracy to her, together with his deliberate misinformation about the dagger, Littlefinger essentially set her on this course up the mountain. Despite the wind’s efforts to reset her course, Cat has irretrievably lost her bearings. Her world is ‘spinning whirling like a child’s top’ set into motion by someones little fingers. A pack-mule or a spinning-top, she’s one of Littlefinger’s playthings. Figuratively, her last thought there, after realizing the impossibility of retreat, is quite prescient, ‘I am going to die here.’ She sealed her fate by going up that mountain with Tyrion and not coming back down with him. One thing’s for certain going forward: the wind in the Eyrie is no friend to Littlefinger. He should tread carefully over there! Quote A Game of Thrones - Tyrion V "Behold the king's justice," Lysa Arryn said. Torch flames fluttered like pennons along the walls, and here and there the odd torch guttered out. "Lysa, I think this unwise," Catelyn Stark said as the black wind swirled around the hall. Enough said. I think the black wind agrees with that sentiment! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 9, 2016 Share Posted August 9, 2016 On 08/08/2016 at 3:19 PM, ravenous reader said: By plucking at people’s hoods, trying to undress their faces in particular, the wind-wolf also seems eager to reveal their ‘true faces,' in figurative terms uncover their hypocrisy and betrayal, akin to Sandor’s comment to the effect that a ‘dog can sniff out a lie’. Theon ‘turncloak’ has turned against the Starks and Bran wants to expose his true intentions by ripping off his false cloak. Alternatively, perhaps the wind wishes Theon to shed his false Reek identity and 'become' Theon again, and urges him accordingly. People pull up their hoods for practical reasons to shield themselves against the cold as well as to disguise themselves when they’d prefer not to be recognized: Hi RR, great essay again. I love your thoughts regards the hoods being pulled back in an attempt to 'reveal their true faces'. The two characters in question here, Theon and Sansa, were perfect examples given their false identities. I remember a chat @LongRider and I had on the subject of Theon's hood being plucked back in that scene. We were speculating that perhaps this is another sign of susceptibility on his part. His broken state was enabling Bran and the elements to have greater effect in their attempts to subtly contact him. Is the removing/blowing back of the hood also a sign that perhaps these characters do indeed have a slightly greater affinity with nature and it's message. We then moved on to another character in the series with a 'secret identity' the wind/old gods seem to watch, Jon Snow. We noticed how many times in the series that Jon pulls his hood up, or hides his face. Following our discussion, we wondered if this was a sign that Jon was not yet able to be engaged as Theon was, and he was shying away from the possibility of contact. The total opposite of having the hood down while having subtle influence from the wind/old gods. It would also suit Jon's refusal to acknowledge his abilities as a Warg etc, cutting himself off from everything around him. There are a lot of examples of Jon pulling his hood up, here are a few... ''Ghost, with me.'' Jon Snow raised the hood of his cloak and pulled at the door. The white wolf followed him back into the night. Whenever the wind kicked up, sprays of loose snow filled the air and stung their eyes. Jon pulled his scarf up over his mouth and nose and raised the hood on his cloak. ''Not far now,'' he told the men. No one replied. ''All praise R'hllor, the Lord of Light'' the wedding guests answered in ragged chorus before a gust of ice cold wind blew their words away. Jon Snow raised the hood of his cloak. Anyway, your essay had me pondering these thoughts again. Hoods down or blown off signifying an openness to a subtle message or contact from the wind/old gods. Or hoods being pulled up displaying a reluctance/inability to believe or to be engaged in such contact. I haven't thought about this for a while, but your wonderful Sansa example added to my belief there may be something to it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ravenous reader Posted August 10, 2016 Share Posted August 10, 2016 21 hours ago, Wizz-The-Smith said: Hi RR, great essay again. I love your thoughts regards the hoods being pulled back in an attempt to 'reveal their true faces'. The two characters in question here, Theon and Sansa, were perfect examples given their false identities. I remember a chat @LongRider and I had on the subject of Theon's hood being plucked back in that scene. We were speculating that perhaps this is another sign of susceptibility on his part. His broken state was enabling Bran and the elements to have greater effect in their attempts to subtly contact him. Is the removing/blowing back of the hood also a sign that perhaps these characters do indeed have a slightly greater affinity with nature and it's message. We then moved on to another character in the series with a 'secret identity' the wind/old gods seem to watch, Jon Snow. We noticed how many times in the series that Jon pulls his hood up, or hides his face. Following our discussion, we wondered if this was a sign that Jon was not yet able to be engaged as Theon was, and he was shying away from the possibility of contact. The total opposite of having the hood down while having subtle influence from the wind/old gods. It would also suit Jon's refusal to acknowledge his abilities as a Warg etc, cutting himself off from everything around him. There are a lot of examples of Jon pulling his hood up Hi Wizz, thanks! We can go further and say that 'pulling back the hood' is akin to opening ones 'third eye'. Previously on this thread @evita mgfs engaged us in many eye-opening discussions on the symbolism of doors and windows as spiritual thresholds. Going with this analogy, if the eyes are the windows to the soul, as the saying goes, then shutting ones eyes by lowering ones eyelids is analogous to drawing the curtains or blinds; and shielding ones third eye would require putting up a hood to cover ones forehead in particular. Vehicles by which we've seen the old gods exerting influence and gaining access to the 'window' include crows pecking their way through, as well as winds and trees stirring that curtain or hood and plucking it aside. I agree with you and Long Rider that GRRM envisages a correlation between someone's susceptibility to receiving old-gods messages and a certain 'brokenness' in that person (hence his fondness for cripples, bastards, and broken things). To quote Leonard Cohen: 'there is a crack in everything; that's how the light gets in...' We saw how Bran's third eye was opened by the crow pecking at his forehead after he'd fallen from the tower and shattered his back/legs. After Theon's literal and symbolic castration, Bran in turn was able to access Theon's third eye via the touch of a leaf, described as the benediction of the red bloody hand of the Winterfell heart tree gently brushing Theon's forehead. Likewise, the severing of Jaime's swordhand (again a symbolic castration) facilitated the dismantling of his slick facade, so that the weirwood stump against which his head was resting was in a position to open his eye/s, prompting him to turn around his life, embodied in that moment of turning around the horses to go back to Harrenhal for Brienne -- i.e. in the opposite direction to Cersei. In addition to providing useful logistical information (e.g. Jon's scouting of the wildling encampment via Ghost via Bran), the third eye is a moral compass. Although many on these forums react negatively to the idea of old gods influence because they feel such omniscience and omnipresence detracts from the free will of the characters, the concept of moral guidance is not necessarily incompatible with individual moral agency. The old gods can only sway those receptive to being swayed. Jaime, for example, before losing his hand was in a state of moral blindness, so no amount of wind, wolf or weirwood could have stopped him from throwing Bran from that window -- unless you believe Bran had to be thrown and therefore that Jaime's swordhand was wielded by another... Supporting this viewpoint of a measure of free will, as you have pointed out, Jon is initially resistant to such windy 'mumbo-jumbo' (he also 'pooh-poohs' Melisandre's fire powers), yet he nevertheless ends up being 'baptised' by Bran-in-the-weirwood sapling (likewise, he succumbs to being 'kissed by fire'!). Quote A Clash of Kings - Jon VII A weirwood. It seemed to sprout from solid rock, its pale roots twisting up from a myriad of fissures and hairline cracks. The tree was slender compared to other weirwoods he had seen, no more than a sapling, yet it was growing as he watched, its limbs thickening as they reached for the sky. Wary, he circled the smooth white trunk until he came to the face. Red eyes looked at him. Fierce eyes they were, yet glad to see him. The weirwood had his brother's face. Had hisbrother always had three eyes? Not always, came the silent shout. Not before the crow. He sniffed at the bark, smelled wolf and tree and boy, but behind that there were other scents, the rich brown smell of warm earth and the hard grey smell ofstone and something else, something terrible. Death, he knew. He was smelling death. He cringed back, his hair bristling, and bared his fangs. Don't be afraid, I like it in the dark. No one can see you, but you can see them. But first you have to open your eyes. See? Like this. And the tree reached down and touched him. Although it's not explicitly stated, the 'tree' likely touches Jon on the forehead, as it did for Theon, in order to awaken Jon's third-eye capacity. The symbolism of the eye as window permeates our language, culture and even biology. Biologically speaking, the eye is technically an embryological outgrowth of brain tissue, so a doctor looking through the window of your eye with an opthalmoscope is actually staring at a portion of your naked brain looking back at him! Seen thus, the mundane becomes magical. Doing a little etymological archaeology, the word 'window' itself -- one of the oldest words in the English language (these are my favorite) -- is derived from Middle English from Old Norse vindauga, from vindr ‘wind’ + auga ‘eye.' Literally, a 'window' therefore is an eye to the wind, in the wind, or of the wind. Seeing and wind are connected, at least etymologically! As the window is an opening between two worlds, the 'eye' or 'I' in question -- the point of reference for the 'seer' -- is twofold. The consciousness at home in the 'house' uses the window to look out on the world, as a person would look out of his or her skull. This relationship is obvious; however what's not immediately apparent is the reciprocal relation, whereby another may equally peer into the house or skull (as in the case of the doctor) from the 'outside' vantage point. GRRM locates the greenseer in the wind and playfully shows how the wind, and by implication the seer using the wind as a vehicle, attempts to gain access via windows and doors. Here are a few examples, of which there are many, of a wind-seer potentially attempting to spy/eavesdrop on proceedings through a window. Specifically, the use of the words ‘plucking’ and 'stirring' -- which we've been primed by GRRM to associate with the old gods, especially when used in conjunction with the wind -- should alert us to this possibility: Quote Dance with Dragons - The Prince of Winterfell She broke off as Roose Bolton rose to his feet, pale eyes shining in the torchlight. "My friends," he began, and a hush swept through the hall, so profound that Theon could hear the wind plucking at the boards over the windows. Quote AFFC -- The Reaver Euron turned to face him, his bruised blue lips curled in a half smile. "Perhaps we can fly. All of us. How will we ever know unless we leap from some tall tower?" The wind came gusting through the window and stirred his sable cloak. In the following, the godswood 'vapors' -- another name for mists, fog, winds, or breath-- are keen on seeing rather than being seen (plucking rather than being plucked...), as is evidenced by how they 'draw grey curtains across watching windows': Quote A Dance with Dragons - The Prince of Winterfell Theon Greyjoy was no stranger to this godswood... ... He 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. Beneath the trees, the hot springs steamed. Warm vapors rose from the earth, shrouding the trees in their moist breath, creeping up the walls to draw grey curtains across the watching windows. in addition, this reminds me of yet another vehicle which we've been discussing for ripping aside those curtains, namely the direwolves with their teeth (like the crows) and their howls (like the wind): Quote A Clash of Kings - Bran I And still the direwolves howled. The guards on the walls muttered curses, hounds in the kennels barked furiously, horses kicked at their stalls, the Walders shivered by their fire, and even Maester Luwin complained of sleepless nights. Only Bran did not mind. Ser Rodrik had confined the wolves to the godswood after Shaggydog bit Little Walder, but the stones of Winterfell played queer tricks with sound, and sometimes it sounded as if they were in the yard right below Bran's window. Other times he would have sworn they were up on the curtain walls, loping round like sentries. He wished that he could see them. He could see the comet hanging above the Guards Hall and the Bell Tower, and farther back the First Keep, squat and round, its gargoyles black shapes against the bruised purple dusk. Once Bran had known every stone of those buildings, inside and out; he had climbed them all, scampering up walls as easily as other boys ran down stairs. Their rooftops had been his secret places, and the crows atop the broken tower his special friends. The wolves, like future Bran, although based in the godswood are not thereby confined. Instead, they rise as if on wings, finding Bran's window and breaching the curtain walls. They are the seers, the sentries, the sentinels -- the watchers on the walls, who in turn facilitate 'sight' in others, e.g. via 'wolfdreams.' We've already discussed in the first installment of this essay series, regarding the song of the earth, how Robb intuitively knows what his brother needs (because deep-down he's a warg) and opens the windows of the chamber in which Bran is lying in his coma, in order to provide access for Grey Wind and Summer's healing howling which penetrates the chamber, much to Catelyn's distress (although later when Summer penetrates the chamber saving their lives from the would-be assassin, she relents and allows the wolf permanent access and pride of place!). Like a spiritual defibrillator or pacemaker, the wolves singing in chorus resuscitate Bran's heart and perhaps join with the wind and crow in facilitating the opening of his third eye. On a final musical note, by opening ones third eye, one creates a passage for the wind/old gods, faciltating the song of the earth, in other words 'the True Tongue,' much as the openings on a musical instrument especially that of a wind instrument create the sound. 'Being played' need not always be nefarious, as I hinted in my essay on 'plucking.' Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fattest Leech Posted August 10, 2016 Share Posted August 10, 2016 2 hours ago, ravenous reader said: Hi Wizz, thanks! We can go further and say that 'pulling back the hood' is akin to opening ones 'third eye'. Previously on this thread @evita mgfs engaged us in many eye-opening discussions on the symbolism of doors and windows as spiritual thresholds. Going with this analogy, if the eyes are the windows to the soul, as the saying goes, then shutting ones eyes by lowering ones eyelids is analogous to drawing the curtains or blinds; and shielding ones third eye would require putting up a hood to cover ones forehead in particular. Vehicles by which we've seen the old gods exerting influence and gaining access to the 'window' include crows pecking their way through, as well as winds and trees stirring that curtain or hood and plucking it aside. I agree with you and Long Rider that GRRM envisages a correlation between someone's susceptibility to receiving old-gods messages and a certain 'brokenness' in that person (hence his fondness for cripples, bastards, and broken things). To quote Leonard Cohen: 'there is a crack in everything; that's how the light gets in...' We saw how Bran's third eye was opened by the crow pecking at his forehead after he'd fallen from the tower and shattered his back/legs. After Theon's literal and symbolic castration, Bran in turn was able to access Theon's third eye via the touch of a leaf, described as the benediction of the red bloody hand of the Winterfell heart tree gently brushing Theon's forehead. Likewise, the severing of Jaime's swordhand (again a symbolic castration) facilitated the dismantling of his slick facade, so that the weirwood stump against which his head was resting was in a position to open his eye/s, prompting him to turn around his life, embodied in that moment of turning around the horses to go back to Harrenhal for Brienne -- i.e. in the opposite direction to Cersei. In addition to providing useful logistical information (e.g. Jon's scouting of the wildling encampment via Ghost via Bran), the third eye is a moral compass. Although many on these forums react negatively to the idea of old gods influence because they feel such omniscience and omnipresence detracts from the free will of the characters, the concept of moral guidance is not necessarily incompatible with individual moral agency. The old gods can only sway those receptive to being swayed. Jaime, for example, before losing his hand was in a state of moral blindness, so no amount of wind, wolf or weirwood could have stopped him from throwing Bran from that window -- unless you believe Bran had to be thrown and therefore that Jaime's swordhand was wielded by another... Supporting this viewpoint of a measure of free will, as you have pointed out, Jon is initially resistant to such windy 'mumbo-jumbo' (he also 'pooh-poohs' Melisandre's fire powers), yet he nevertheless ends up being 'baptised' by Bran-in-the-weirwood sapling (likewise, he succumbs to being 'kissed by fire'!). Although it's not explicitly stated, the 'tree' likely touches Jon on the forehead, as it did for Theon, in order to awaken Jon's third-eye capacity. ~~snipped some good stuff~~ I always wondered about that third-eye thing in this moment. I just have quick minute because I have to run onto something else, but wanted to add this real quickly. If you keep reading past the tree touching Jon on the forehead, awakening his third knowing eye, the next thing that happens is Jon finds the wildlings. Jon already had one experience with the wildings at Craster's, and while Craster is a grumpy bird, Jon realizes then that wildlings are just people. Jon is chosen to be the one to unite the realms of men (with some help) and this is his awakening. To continue on with that passage: Don't be afraid, I like it in the dark. No one can see you, but you can see them. But first you have to open your eyes. See? Like this. And the tree reached down and touched him. And suddenly he was back in the mountains, his paws sunk deep in a drift of snow as he stood upon the edge of a great precipice. Before him the Skirling Pass opened up into airy emptiness, and a long vee-shaped valley lay spread beneath him like a quilt, awash in all the colors of an autumn afternoon. A vast blue-white wall plugged one end of the vale, squeezing between the mountains as if it had shouldered them aside, and for a moment he thought he had dreamed himself back to Castle Black. Then he realized he was looking at a river of ice several thousand feet high. Under that glittering cold cliff was a great lake, its deep cobalt waters reflecting the snowcapped peaks that ringed it. There were men down in the valley, he saw now; many men, thousands, a huge host. Some were tearing great holes in the half-frozen ground, while others trained for war. He watched as a swarming mass of riders charged a shield wall, astride horses no larger than ants. The sound of their mock battle was a rustling of steel leaves, drifting faintly on the wind. Their encampment had no plan to it; he saw no ditches, no sharpened stakes, no neat rows of horse lines. Everywhere crude earthen shelters and hide tents sprouted haphazardly, like a pox on the face of the earth. He spied untidy mounds of hay, smelled goats and sheep, horses and pigs, dogs in great profusion. Tendrils of dark smoke rose from a thousand cookfires. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ravenous reader Posted August 11, 2016 Share Posted August 11, 2016 23 hours ago, The Fattest Leech said: If you keep reading past the tree touching Jon on the forehead, awakening his third knowing eye, the next thing that happens is Jon finds the wildlings. Jon already had one experience with the wildings at Craster's, and while Craster is a grumpy bird, Jon realizes then that wildlings are just people. Jon is chosen to be the one to unite the realms of men (with some help) and this is his awakening. I like this! So, with some help from Bran, Jon is afforded a 'birds-eye' view of the world in order to understand 'the big picture' and his place in it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Fattest Leech Posted August 11, 2016 Share Posted August 11, 2016 1 minute ago, ravenous reader said: I like this! So, with some help from Bran, Jon is afforded a 'birds-eye' view of the world in order to understand 'the big picture' and his place in it. I literally just got chills reading this (I am sooo easy!) yes. I think this is exactly what happened in that situation and I like it Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 12, 2016 Share Posted August 12, 2016 On 08/08/2016 at 3:19 PM, ravenous reader said: In his capacity to take on various guises, he could be said to be both a kind of ‘faceless man’ and a ‘many-faced god.’ The 1000-eyed bridge, the grey and the fog and ‘half-blind’ references associated with Braavos, which were previously identified by @evita mgfs and the rest of you, seem to hint at Bloodraven’s presence there at one time or another. The House of Black and White is associated with magical weirwood and ebony doors and chairs which might point to Bloodraven and/or allow him access. It’s implied that his likely ‘failed’ renegade greenseer protégé Euron had some kind of Braavos/Faceless Man connection. For example, the faceless man on the bridge associated with the ‘storm’ that killed his brother Balon has been interpreted by many to point to Euron. In addition, there are other subtle indications of Euron’s Braavos connections, like the characteristic Braavosian idiom ‘Just so’ with which Euron frequently punctuates his sentences, reminiscent of ‘the kindly man’ at the House of Black and White, and Arya’s other ‘dancing teacher’ Syrio Forel, among several other characters who may have ulterior motives. After a time in Braavos, even Arya consciously or unconsciously starts using this idiom in her speech as a way to blend in to her surroundings. Although the ‘just so’ marker is not applicable in Bloodraven’s case, is it possible nevertheless that Bloodraven has a connection to Braavos, and to the Faceless Men specifically? Braavos is referred to as 'the bastard child who ran away from home,' which might also be applicable to Brynden Rivers as the famous Targaryen bastard who ended up being exiled to the Watch for being a traitor to his family (he like the wolves in his employ is an outlaw!). Intriguingly, Braavos is a city of secrets, masks and whispers (sounds right up Bloodraven’s alley…the weirwoods are wont to speak in whispers for example...and as former Spymaster of King's Landing Bloodraven would've been au fait with many secrets, etc.), not to mention the fog. Interestingly, we're told of Braavos that 'its very existence had been a secret for a century' – coincidentally, that's also how long most people assume Bloodraven has been dead (see Dareon's take in the quote to follow): There are many wonderful ideas you bring to this thread, and this essay series in particular. But I got to say I really like this one, great catch! We have been looking for BR in Braavos for ages, as you note, with some success. But I have never seen this angle brought up before, and it fits perfectly, Dareon example included. Great work! We touch on Bran and BR in Braavos in part three, and it seems Bran is becoming more of a presence across the narrow sea. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 12, 2016 Share Posted August 12, 2016 On 10/08/2016 at 7:42 PM, ravenous reader said: Doing a little etymological archaeology, the word 'window' itself -- one of the oldest words in the English language (these are my favorite) -- is derived from Middle English from Old Norse vindauga, from vindr ‘wind’ + auga ‘eye.' Literally, a 'window' therefore is an eye to the wind, in the wind, or of the wind. Seeing and wind are connected, at least etymologically! Thank you for sharing this etymological gem, it's amazing what one can 'dig up' when studying Martins words. This is something I have stumbled on when researching, and I very much like this example. It certainly rings true with all we're looking at. On 10/08/2016 at 7:42 PM, ravenous reader said: GRRM locates the greenseer in the wind and playfully shows how the wind, and by implication the seer using the wind as a vehicle, attempts to gain access via windows and doors. Here are a few examples, of which there are many, of a wind-seer potentially attempting to spy/eavesdrop on proceedings through a window. Specifically, the use of the words ‘plucking’ and 'stirring' -- which we've been primed by GRRM to associate with the old gods, especially when used in conjunction with the wind -- should alert us to this possibility: Nice, great examples. I agree these key words are ones we should always look out for, the list grows. To avoid being too repetitive George uses many different descriptions that surmount to the same thing, as we see with the branches and the leaves rustling. [stirring, creaking, groaning, branches trailing etc] All of which hint at that rustling. Then there are multiple meanings that can surround just the one word, as you've so eloquently shown with your 'plucking' section in response to my first essay. I'm sure we are just 'scratching' the surface with Martins words, but thus far the search has been a very enjoyable and rewarding process. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tijgy Posted August 20, 2016 Share Posted August 20, 2016 @Wizz-The-Smith and @ravenous reader, I just finished reading your new essays and they are really amazing work, especially because they put a huge part of the earlier of the contributors in this work together So well done. On 4-8-2016 at 10:50 PM, Feather Crystal said: I just worry that when they get too long, nobody will want to read them. But, first and foremost the discovery is what's important to me and I can share small bits and pieces when relevant on other people's threads. First, welcome. And I also want to say the posts in this thread tend here also pretty long. I will now just give some little comments on somethings I read here. I do have a few comments which will take a little longer to write and to think about and which I will write in a later post. Anyway On 4-8-2016 at 0:39 AM, ravenous reader said: Note that in this passage GRRM refers to Bloodraven by his alternative name ‘Lord Brynden,’ so that his words to Bran are literally ‘the Lord’s words’ -- a clever wordplay on both his title ‘Lord’ and the more common association with a god (e.g. ‘the gospel of the Lord [Jesus Christ]’). The Lord’s teachings are delivered in the susurrations of ‘hoarse whispers’ and ‘faint rustling’ accompanying the articulation of every word. Because he is part tree, every time he speaks or turns his head he rustles! On 3-8-2016 at 10:55 PM, Wizz-The-Smith said: I was really amazed when I read this. Great find. The whole plucking fragment was also really nice to read. On 4-8-2016 at 0:39 AM, ravenous reader said: Great pick-up of the presence of rustling despite the absence of wind! Thereby, GRRM answers the question ‘could it only be the wind?’ In terms of Bran’s development, this would be the equivalent of progressing from using physical means – hitching a ride on the air – as a way to produce a voice, to metaphysical means that may not use air at all, like mental telepathy and telekinesis in order to move the leaves. Spooky indeed! This made me remind me of another quote where we had once a windless moment: Hodor knew Bran's favorite place, so he took him to the edge of the pool beneath the great spread of the heart tree, where Lord Eddard used to kneel to pray. Ripples were running across the surface of the water when they arrived, making the reflection of the weirwood shimmer and dance. There was no wind, though. For an instant Bran was baffled. And then Osha exploded up out of the pool with a great splash, so sudden that even Summer leapt back, snarling. Hodor jumped away, wailing "Hodor, Hodor" in dismay until Bran patted his shoulder to soothe his fears. "How can you swim in there?" he asked Osha. "Isn't it cold?" While the dancing of the weirwood can be explained by Osha swimming in the pool, GRRM does create here also the image of a dancing tree without any wind. The dancing reflection is actually created by a human. On 4-8-2016 at 0:39 AM, ravenous reader said: THE TRUE TONGUE AND BRAN THE BUILDER This is another interesting quote regarding the true tongue, a song and wolves (or rather Summer) He could feel the high stone calling him. Up he went, loping easy at first, then faster and higher, his strong legs eating up the incline. Birds burst from the branches overhead as he raced by, clawing and flapping their way into the sky. He could hear the wind sighing up amongst the leaves, the squirrels chittering to one another, even the sound a pinecone made as it tumbled to the forest floor. The smells were a song around him, a song that filled the good green world. On 8-8-2016 at 4:19 PM, ravenous reader said: The words of the following song which suggestively segues into a dream of wolves (actually a warging dream for Arya) could almost apply to the band of wolves as much as men: Quote This song reminded me of the fact Summer is calls himself Prince of the Green: Prince. The man-sound came into his head suddenly, yet he could feel the rightness of it. Prince of the green, prince of the wolfswood. He was strong and swift and fierce, and all that lived in the good green world went in fear of him. These woods belonged to them, the snowy slopes and stony hills, the great green pines and the golden leaf oaks, the rushing streams and blue lakes fringed with fingers of white frost. But his sister had left the wilds, to walk in the halls of man-rock where other hunters ruled, and once within those halls it was hard to find the path back out. The wolf prince remembered. Both Nymeria and Summer are claiming their domain. Shortly after that, Summer actually fights an old wolf and beat him down to submission. I just want to end with to say I really loved the things you said about Bloodraven and Braavos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melifeather Posted August 20, 2016 Share Posted August 20, 2016 I really must make the time to join this thread. Ravenous Reader's post on Heresy regarding gargoyles was so interesting! I may have some time coming up after the end of the month where I can take more time to savor longer posts. It requires more time and patience and I don't have either right now. Soon, though, soon... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tijgy Posted August 20, 2016 Share Posted August 20, 2016 Okay, here are some additional thoughts. It is more like to be used for brainstorming than something really conclusive. Wood, Wind, Wolves and Winter(fell) I am starting this more general comment on the essays of @Wizz-The-Smith and @ravenous reader by an amazing quote of RR: “In fact, it’s possible that we might be able to add a fourth – namely winter -- to GRRM’s trio, to make a quartet: ‘wolf, wind, wood, and winter.” (x) Those four things can be indeed seen as the four weapons of the old gods (like Ravenous Reader describe in her essay). In this comment I just want address quickly those four things are not only present in the godswood of Winterfell but the entire castle of Winterfell is highly associated with those four "weapons". Winterfell as a tree Winterfell is literally described by Maester Luwin as a tree: “To a boy, Winterfell was a grey stone labyrinth of walls and towers and courtyards and tunnels spreading out in all directions. In the older parts of the castle, the halls slanted up and down so that you couldn't even be sure what floor you were on. The place had grown over the centuries like some monstrous stone tree, Maester Luwin told him once, and its branches were gnarled and thick and twisted, its roots sunk deep into the earth” (AGOT, Bran II). During ACOK Bran looks frequently over Winterfell through his windows. Those windows can be seen as the eyes of a tree. So it can be said Winterfell is similar to a hearttree, a tree with eyes through which a greenseer, Bran, is looking. Winterfell and wind Sometimes the wind is also moving things in the castle; moving through parts of the castle. Some examples: - “Wind sighed faintly against the shutters” (ACOK, Theon IV) - “A brisk autumn wind was swirling through the battlements” (ACOK, Theon V) - “When the drawbridge was lowered, a chill wind sighed across the moat. The touch of it made him shiver. It is the cold, nothing more, Theon told himself, a shiver, not a tremble. Even brave men shiver. Into the teeth of that wind he rode, under the portcullis, over the drawbridge. The outer gates swung open to let him pass. As he emerged beneath the walls, he could sense the boys watching from the empty sockets where their eyes had been.” (ACOK, Theon VI) - She broke off as Roose Bolton rose to his feet, pale eyes shining in the torchlight. "My friends," he began, and a hush swept through the hall, so profound that Theon could hear the wind plucking at the boards over the windows. "Stannis and his knights have left Deepwood Motte, flying the banner of his new red god. The clans of the northern hills come with him on their shaggy runtish horses. If the weather holds, they could be on us in a fortnight. And Crowfood Umber marches down the kingsroad, whilst the Karstarks approach from the east. They mean to join with Lord Stannis here and take this castle from us." (ADWD, Prince of Winterfell) Winterfell and wolves Winterfell is of course the house of wolves. In Bran I, ACOK, the howling of the wolves do have pretty strange effects: “Shaggydog's were more savage. Their voices echoed through the yards and halls until the castle rang and it seemed as though some great pack of direwolves haunted Winterfell, instead of only two . . . two where there had once been six. Do they miss their brothers and sisters too? Bran wondered. Are they calling to Grey Wind and Ghost, to Nymeria and Lady's Shade? Do they want them to come home and be a pack together?” Ser Rodrik had confined the wolves to the godswood after Shaggydog bit Little Walder, but the stones of Winterfell played queer tricks with sound, and sometimes it sounded as if they were in the yard right below Bran's window. Other times he would have sworn they were up on the curtain walls, loping round like sentries. He wished that he could see them.” “when Summer and Shaggydog had drowned out Luwin with their howls.” It sounded stupid, high and hollow and quavering, a little boy's howl, not a wolf's. Yet Summer gave answer, his deep voice drowning out Bran's thin one, and Shaggydog made it a chorus. Bran haroooed again. They howled together, last of their pack It is interesting that the wolves are here first compared to ghosts and later to sentries, while trees are also several times compared to sentries. Winter-fell Winterfell is of course the ancient house of the Kings of Winter. Further there is also the mystery of the name. What does Winter-fell actually mean? Conclusion Winterfell is a place where those four things come together: wood, wind, winter and wolf. Like the wind goes through the wood, the wind also goes through parts of the castle which makes the shutters move, … Wolves create strange sounds in the castle and the place is heavily associated with winter. Bran as genius loci of Winterfell In the following I just want to add something to Ravenous Reader’s part of Bran as a genius loci. She wrote: “Brandon Stark, like so many of his namesakes before him, particularly Winterfell’s and House Stark’s founding father, namely Brandon the Builder, is the protective spirit of Winterfell and the heart-- like the heart tree which embodies him—of House Stark. I’m not going to elaborate on the symbolism of the cornucopia, patera/libation bowl or snake, since that’s not my primary intention here. However, you’ll be able to recognize that each of these symbols is applicable, and has already been applied by the author, to Bran.” (x) This part of the essay reminded of something I wrote earlier in this thread on the crypts of Winterfell. During the harvestfeast of Winterfell Bran has the following memory: “Bran took another sip of the spiced honey wine from his father’s goblet, grateful for something to clutch. The lifelike head of a snarling direwolf was raised on the side of the cup. He felt the silver muzzle pressing against his palm, and remembered the last time he had seen his lord father drink from this goblet.” (Bran remembers the feast at Winterfell with King Robert and his family) And now they are all gone. It was as if some cruel god reached down with a great hand and swept them all away, the girls to captivity, Jon to the Wall, Robb and Mother to war, King Robert and Father to their graves, and perhaps Uncle Benjen as well …(He remembers than ‘his old friends’ down on the benches – the servants who are gone) He looked up and down the benches at all the faces happy and sad, and wondered who would missing next year and the year after. He might have cried then, but he couldn’t. He was the Stark in Winterfell, his father’s son and his brother’s heir, and almost a man grown. At the foot of the hall, the door opened and a gust of cold air made the torches flame brighter for an instant. Meera and Jojen enter the Hall. Theon also dreams of the feast for Robert at Winterfell (ACOK, Theon V). Jon has constantly dreams of them (AGOT, ASOS, Jon V and Samwell IV). Ned visits with Robert the crypts (AGOT, Eddard I) and also dreams of them (AGOT, Eddard XIII). In this earlier post I made a comparison of those different fragments of the books. Out of this comparison came the following conclusion: It iwas clear that all those dreams, memories and visits had similar elements. Some of them can be associated with the old gods or in this case more likely with the Kings of Winter and the death of House Stark, the crypts, cold air, the Great Hall/Door/Walls and wolves. All of them are at the same time associated with happiness and sadness (for Ned these feelings are present with his visit to the crypts with Robert). In all of them death has an important place. However there is a big difference to the tone of Bran’s reminiscences and the dreams of Theon, Jon and Ned. Bran is very melancholy about this. But unlike the others, he is not afraid of the Old Kings or of the wolves and doesn’t feel unwelcome, he actually takes comfort in their lineage and in the lifelike figures of wolves (and he actually wants his living direwolf at his side). It is even possible to say Bran is representing them at that moment. He is sitting on the throne, he is just hailed as the Stark in Winterfell and as his brother’s heir. While Theon, Jon and Ned are scarred away by the Old Kings, the protectors of Winterfell, Bran is one of them. Before the harvestfeast, he also took the role of protector when he yelled at Rickon for allowing the Freys, the outsiders, to enter the crypt (You had no right!" Bran screamed at his brother when he heard. "That was our place, a Stark place!"But Rickon never cared.”) Bran can be here seen as the protective spirit or at least taking this role upon him. Another interesting thing to remark about those dreams, nightmares, .. is that in one way it is possible to say the “four weapons” of the old gods were sort of present. 1. Wind (cold air): Theon: “the cold winds were rising outside” (…) The sight of them sent fear shivering through Theon sharp as a knife” (…) a freezing gale. Jon: . A chill wind was blowing on his neck Ned: It was always cold down here. Bran: a gust of cold air 2. Wolves Theon: Grey Wind stalked beside, eyes burning, and man and wolf alike bled from half a hundred savage wounds. Jon: But it was only a direwolf, grey and ghastly, spotted with blood, his golden eyes shining sadly through the dark... (here is the wolf just sad) Ned: "the direwolves at their feet turned their great stone heads and snarled." Bran: "The lifelike head of a snarling direwolf was raised on the side of the cup. He felt the silver muzzle pressing against his palm." 3. Winter => Dead Kings of Winter Theon: “Along the walls figures halfseen moved through the shadows, pale shades with long grim faces.” Jon: “the stone kings on their thrones. Their grey granite eyes turned to follow him as he passed, and their grey granite fingers tightened on the hilts of the rusted swords upon their laps” Ned’s dream: “The Kings of Winter watched him pass with eyes of ice” Bran: No dead Kings for Bran … except during the feast he is the living representative of the Kings of the Winter and of the House Stark (He was old enough to know that it was not truly him they shouted for—it was the harvest they cheered, it was Robb and his victories, it was his lord father and his grandfather and all the Starks going back eight thousand year - He was the Stark in Winterfell, his father's son and his brother's heir, and almost a man grown.) 4. Winterfell can be seen as tree Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ravenous reader Posted August 21, 2016 Share Posted August 21, 2016 On 8/20/2016 at 11:27 AM, Tijgy said: @Wizz-The-Smith and @ravenous reader, I just finished reading your new essays and they are really amazing work, especially because they put a huge part of the earlier of the contributors in this work together Thank you for the enthusiastic response, @Tijgy! Indeed, you too are one of those valued contributors! On 8/20/2016 at 11:27 AM, Tijgy said: The whole plucking fragment was also really nice to read. Thanks. I especially enjoyed writing that one! On 8/20/2016 at 11:27 AM, Tijgy said: This made me remind me of another quote where we had once a windless moment: Hodor knew Bran's favorite place, so he took him to the edge of the pool beneath the great spread of the heart tree, where Lord Eddard used to kneel to pray. Ripples were running across the surface of the water when they arrived, making the reflection of the weirwood shimmer and dance. There was no wind, though. For an instant Bran was baffled. And then Osha exploded up out of the pool with a great splash, so sudden that even Summer leapt back, snarling. Hodor jumped away, wailing "Hodor, Hodor" in dismay until Bran patted his shoulder to soothe his fears. "How can you swim in there?" he asked Osha. "Isn't it cold?" While the dancing of the weirwood can be explained by Osha swimming in the pool, GRRM does create here also the image of a dancing tree without any wind. The dancing reflection is actually created by a human. Wow -- great connection! In turn, the quote you provided reminded me of another involving the weirwood's reflection in the pool: Quote A Game of Thrones - Bran III Bran looked down, and felt his insides turn to water. The ground was rushing up at him now. The whole world was spread out below him, a tapestry of white and brown and green. He could see everything so clearly that for a moment he forgot to be afraid. He could see the whole realm, and everyone in it. He saw Winterfell as the eagles see it, the tall towers looking squat and stubby from above, the castle walls just lines in the dirt. He saw Maester Luwin on his balcony, studying the sky through a polished bronze tube and frowning as he made notes in a book. He saw his brother Robb, taller and stronger than he remembered him, practicing swordplay in the yard with real steel in his hand. He saw Hodor, the simple giant from the stables, carrying an anvil to Mikken's forge, hefting it onto his shoulder as easily as another man might heft a bale of hay. At the heart of the godswood, the great white weirwood brooded over its reflection in the black pool, its leaves rustling in a chill wind. When it felt Bran watching, it lifted its eyes from the still waters and stared back at him knowingly. In light of the multiple references made in this passage to seeing and being seen, we are meant to pay attention to gaze relations. Evidently, Bran is the principal gaze reference point, but not the only one as we shall see. He is positioned above Winterfell looking down at everything and everyone, none of whom seems to reciprocally look back at him, or notice him looking at them, not even Maester Luwin looking up at the sky with a telescope. All are unaware of his presence -- all but one: the weirwood, who seems to 'feel' Bran even before turning to 'see' him, despite having been to all appearances deeply self-absorbed in 'brooding' at the time. How did the weirwood 'know' Bran was there? Considering the weirwood was contemplating its own reflection in the pool at the time, and Bran would've been overhead in relation to the pool which serves as a mirror, could the weirwood have caught sight of Bran's reflection captured in the pool? It stares back at him 'knowingly,' as if it not only knows Bran, but moreover knows something he doesn't. In another passage, the same weirwood is similarly described as having 'knowing eyes.' Quote A Dance with Dragons - A Ghost in Winterfell Death was the sweetest deliverance he could hope for. In the godswood the snow was still dissolving as it touched the earth. Steam rose off the hot pools, fragrant with the smell of moss and mud and decay. A warm fog hung in the air, turning the trees into sentinels, tall soldiers shrouded in cloaks of gloom. During daylight hours, the steamy wood was often full of northmen come to pray to the old gods, but at this hour Theon Greyjoy found he had it all to himself. And in the heart of the wood the weirwood waited with its knowing red eyes. Theon stopped by the edge of the pool and bowed his head before its carved red face. Even here he could hear the drumming, boom DOOM boom DOOM boom DOOM boom DOOM. Like distant thunder, the sound seemed to come from everywhere at once. Given that this is the same occasion as the 'windless night' in which Bran speaks to Theon via the weirwood, confirming both their names, it's safe to say this is Bran with 'knowing red eyes'...Compare to the weirwood in Bran's coma dream who stares 'knowingly' back at him with its red eyes, and one might conclude that the one looking out of the eyes in both cases is Bran. Should this be the case, this implies that when Bran is flying over the weirwood in his coma dream, his future self inhabiting the weirwood is the one who looks up at him! In fact, we're given a subtle indication that there's been a shift in time, namely that time has moved on, by the suggestion of 'Robb looking taller and stronger than he remembered him.' There's a symmetry in the composition which strongly suggests the conclusion that the tree and Bran are equivalent and that different 'time zones' are intersecting here. The weirwood brooding over its reflection is not only looking at its mirror image in the pool, it's also thinking about that image and therefore about itself. In other words, the weirwood is reflecting over or on its own reflection! 'Reflection' here has the dual connotation of mirror image and self-reflexive thought. If the 'seer' within the tree is 'future Bran', then he is not only reflecting on himself as reflected in the pool below, but he is also reflecting on himself as reflected by 'coma Bran' above him. Moreover, the reason he -- 'future Bran' in the tree-- already knows Bran is there is because he's already experienced this before! It's a closed time loop. On 8/20/2016 at 11:27 AM, Tijgy said: This is another interesting quote regarding the true tongue, a song and wolves (or rather Summer) He could feel the high stone calling him. Up he went, loping easy at first, then faster and higher, his strong legs eating up the incline. Birds burst from the branches overhead as he raced by, clawing and flapping their way into the sky. He could hear the wind sighing up amongst the leaves, the squirrels chittering to one another, even the sound a pinecone made as it tumbled to the forest floor. The smells were a song around him, a song that filled the good green world. Thank you for sharing that. Beautiful how GRRM uses the literary device of 'synesthesia' whereby one sense enigmatically evokes another not usually associated with it, here the 'smells' that he can 'hear,' and vice versa the 'sounds' that he can 'smell'; in combination with the 'colors' he can hear and the 'sounds' he can see. That certainly widens the concept of 'song,' implying that further senses may be involved, including magical ones -- what we'd call 'sixth-sense' or 'third-eye' capabilities. On 8/20/2016 at 11:27 AM, Tijgy said: This song reminded me of the fact Summer is calls himself Prince of the Green: Prince. The man-sound came into his head suddenly, yet he could feel the rightness of it. Prince of the green, prince of the wolfswood. He was strong and swift and fierce, and all that lived in the good green world went in fear of him. These woods belonged to them, the snowy slopes and stony hills, the great green pines and the golden leaf oaks, the rushing streams and blue lakes fringed with fingers of white frost. But his sister had left the wilds, to walk in the halls of man-rock where other hunters ruled, and once within those halls it was hard to find the path back out. The wolf prince remembered. That fits so perfectly with the song 'Brothers of the Kingswood' and Bran as a greenseer! You really have a finely 'attuned' ear for the nuances of the song filling the good green world of our text -- I name you 'Princess Tijgy of the Green'! On 8/20/2016 at 1:48 PM, Feather Crystal said: I really must make the time to join this thread. Ravenous Reader's post on Heresy regarding gargoyles was so interesting! Thank you for your kind words. Likewise, you are always welcome to drop by our thread! On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: During ACOK Bran looks frequently over Winterfell through his windows. Those windows can be seen as the eyes of a tree. So it can be said Winterfell is similar to a hearttree, a tree with eyes through which a greenseer, Bran, is looking. Great point. If I recall correctly, it was you who made this observation a while back in the thread..? Sorry if I've failed to credit you with that idea; it makes so much sense to me, I now take the windows-as-tree-eyes as canon and often mention it, including in other threads! On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: “When the drawbridge was lowered, a chill wind sighed across the moat. The touch of it made him shiver. It is the cold, nothing more, Theon told himself, a shiver, not a tremble. Even brave men shiver. Into the teeth of that wind he rode, under the portcullis, over the drawbridge. The outer gates swung open to let him pass. As he emerged beneath the walls, he could sense the boys watching from the empty sockets where their eyes had been.” (ACOK, Theon VI) That's an interesting example, where wind is additionally combined with wolf, as @Wizz-The-Smith has previously identified (the bite in the wind, etc.). The image of the portcullis waiting to come down on him is, as we've identified elsewhere, also like a mouth or the jaws of an animal, which would naturally be a direwolf at Winterfell! The 'empty sockets' up on the walls, in conjunction with your former point, reminds me of the eyes carved into, or alternatively-seen gouged out of a weirwood, representative of 'the windows' of Winterfell, from which 'the real Bran,' very much alive in contrast to the miller's boy he burnt in his stead, can see him. In fact, Bran sees and haunts Theon in subsequent chapters, especially the Ghost of Winterfell. On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: the howling of the wolves do have pretty strange effects: “Shaggydog's were more savage. Their voices echoed through the yards and halls until the castle rang and it seemed as though some great pack of direwolves haunted Winterfell, instead of only two . . . two where there had once been six. Do they miss their brothers and sisters too? Bran wondered. Are they calling to Grey Wind and Ghost, to Nymeria and Lady's Shade? Do they want them to come home and be a pack together?” Ser Rodrik had confined the wolves to the godswood after Shaggydog bit Little Walder, but the stones of Winterfell played queer tricks with sound, and sometimes it sounded as if they were in the yard right below Bran's window. Other times he would have sworn they were up on the curtain walls, loping round like sentries. He wished that he could see them.” The wolfsong reverberating and amplifying is a strange effect, hinting at some magic at play. Arya notes a similar phenomenon occurring when she's going through her 'blind-training' in the House of Black and White: Quote A Dance with Dragons - The Blind Girl Many of her other duties had remained the same, but as she went about them she stumbled over furnishings, walked into walls, dropped trays, got hopelessly helplessly lost inside the temple. Once she almost fell headlong down the steps, but Syrio Forel had taught her balance in another lifetime, when she was the girl called Arya, and somehow she recovered and caught herself in time. Some nights she might have cried herself to sleep if she had still been Arry or Weasel or Cat, or even Arya of House Stark … but no one had no tears. Without eyes, even the simplest task was perilous. She burned herself a dozen times as she worked with Umma in the kitchens. Once, chopping onions, she cut her finger down to the bone. Twice she could not even find her own room in the cellar and had to sleep on the floor at the base of the steps. All the nooks and alcoves made the temple treacherous, even after the blind girl had learned to use her ears; the way her footsteps bounced off the ceiling and echoed round the legs of the thirty tall stone gods made the walls themselves seem to move, and the pool of still black water did strange things to sound as well. "You have five senses," the kindly man said. "Learn to use the other four, you will have fewer cuts and scrapes and scabs." Interestingly, the HOBAW, like the Winterfell godswood, is built around a mysterious black pool of still water, which as you pointed out in your first quote, in which the tree was made to shimmer and dance, is not quite as 'still' as it seems (there's that saying 'still waters run deep'...). The juxtaposition of the stillness of the water and the movement of shapes and sounds is certainly disorienting and suggestive, 'the walls themselves seemed to move...and the pool did strange things to sound'. Moreover, the disorienting effects can potentially be used as a sort of unconventional weapon against enemies. On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: It is interesting that the wolves are here first compared to ghosts and later to sentries, while trees are also several times compared to sentries. Sentries...or 'sen-trees'! Ties into the guardian aspect we discussed of the genius loci. On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: Winter-fell Winterfell is of course the ancient house of the Kings of Winter. Further there is also the mystery of the name. What does Winter-fell actually mean? On @Seams thread (the link I provided you) they are playing around with all the possible connotations of 'fell' hinting at potential magical loci in the landscape (again, related to the genius loci idea we've discussed). Perhaps @Wizz-The-Smith can add some insight here -- he is very taken by the idea at the moment of all things 'fell' 'seam' 'barrow' 'hill'..! Below, I've included a summary of all the possible dictionary definitions of 'fell', as given on wikipedia, from which I'll highlight a few. Basically, 'fell' can either be a verb, noun, or adjective. Besides the obvious meaning of past tense of 'to fall' as a verb (applicable to Bran's fall from the tower) or present/past tense of 'to fell' also a verb (applicable to Bran as a kind of 'felled' tree...when he was crippled, his legs were taken from under him like a chopped-down tree), it's interesting to consider that 'fell' as a verb is also one of those ambiguous words containing two contradictory meanings at once. I've mentioned this before, but I'll reiterate: 'fall' and 'fell' can indicate opposite 'movements' of arrival as well as departure; triumph as well as defeat; paradoxically up as well as down!! For example, in our world the fall of the Berlin Wall was, depending on ones perspective. both arrival and departure, triumph as well as defeat, 'up' as well as 'down'. Likewise, the fall of evening, 'evenfall' does not mean the end of night but its advent, hence the arrival of night and departure of day in one. As far as the application of this pattern to 'Winterfell,' I'm unsure about its derivation and significance, but isn't it strange that 'Winterfell,' the Stark seat, and 'Winter is coming,' the Stark words, taken together contain these opposite movements -- namely Winter's arrival or threat thereof, as well as its departure or defeat. I don't know enough about the ins-and-outs, ups-and-downs of the history of the place, so perhaps some of you who are more thoroughly versed in that particular 'song' can help me out in order to shed further light and shade on the matter! As a noun, 'fell' has the most intriguing meanings of all. For example, a 'fell' can be a hill, mound, burrow or barrow. Here again, we can find evidence of fell's equivocal 'movement,' in that it can signify an excrescence or upward projection, usually above ground (something high), as well as something plunging down or contained in a discreet/discrete 'pocket' or 'seam' below ground (something low or hidden). Another example of a word which demonstrates this contradictory 'movement' is the word 'vault,' which can signify both a transcendent leaping arch (as in the 'pole vault' athletic event, GRRM describes sentinels as 'vaulting') as well as an underground cavern, tomb, or safe (like the crypts or a bank vault). There are many such words in English and other languages, such rich opposition contained in one word providing much poetic opportunity and avenues for interpretation. Mysteriously, as a 'seam' which involves stitching different pieces or sides of material together, a 'fell' also represents a 'join' repairing or covering a place of vulnerability, and therefore a 'rift'. Summed up, it is a presence and absence simultaneously, ripe with possibility. Accordingly, the thinking on Seams thread has lead to speculation that a fell could be representative of a pocket or rift of magic, so to speak, in the landscape. It is potentially a place where magic is both contained and released; generated and extinguished; consumed and preserved -- of ice and fire. With the GRRM 'switcheroo' of one letter, how easily Winterfell becomes a 'Winterhell' (like Summerhall and 'Summerfall')...There's a fine line between one House's ascendance and its demise; and the corresponding fortunes of another! In this sense, I think of a Winter-fell as one of those magical 'hinges' of the Earth, like the Wall, of which Melisandre spoke. Geologically speaking, Winterfell is built on an interconnected series of hot springs created by subterranean volcanic action, the geothermal energy of which is transmitted to the surface due to a major underlying rift or faultline, which I think GRRM is imaginatively imbuing with magic (analogously to what he does with other natural phenomena like 'moon meteors', 'land bridges' 'island, archipelago, and peninsula formation' etc.). There are also further meanings of 'fell' to consider. As a European, you might recognise the similarity of 'fell' to its European roots meaning 'animal skin, hide or fur,' which is intriguing considering the sewing aspect (the seams) as well as the wolfish presences and skinchanging/warging going on at Winterfell. An interesting adjective meaning of 'fell' is 'evil, wicked, savage' etc. sometimes used in conjunction with black magic, 'sorcerers cast spells to achieve their fell ends.' I have much more to write in response to your post, but perhaps this is enough for one day, and it's time silence fell. Quote fell1 fel/ past of fall. fell2 fel/ verb verb: fell; 3rd person present: fells; past tense: felled; past participle: felled; gerund or present participle: felling; verb: flat-fell 1. cut down (a tree). synonyms: cut down, chop down, hack down, saw down, clear "all the dead sycamores had to be felled" knock down. "strong winds felled power lines" synonyms: knock down/over, knock to the ground, strike down, bring down, bring to the ground, prostrate; More 2. stitch down (the edge of a seam) to lie flat. "a flat-felled seam" noun noun: fell; plural noun: fells 1. an amount of timber cut. Origin Old English fellan, of Germanic origin; related to fall. fell3 fel/ noun noun: fell; plural noun: fells a hill or stretch of high moorland, especially in northern England. "Cross Fell" Origin Middle English: from Old Norse fjall, fell ‘hill.’ fell4 fel/ adjective literary adjective: fell of terrible evil or ferocity; deadly. "sorcerers use spells to achieve their fell ends" synonyms: murderous, savage, violent, vicious, fierce, ferocious, barbarous, barbaric, monstrous,cruel, ruthless; archaicsanguinary "a fell intent" Origin Middle English: from Old French fel, nominative of felon ‘wicked (person’) (see felon1). fell5 fel/ noun archaic noun: fell; plural noun: fells an animal's hide or skin with its hair. Origin Old English fel, fell, of Germanic origin; from an Indo-European root shared by Latin pellis and Greekpella ‘skin.’ fall fôl/ verb past tense: fell 1. move downward, typically rapidly and freely without control, from a higher to a lower level. "bombs could be seen falling from the planes" synonyms: drop, descend, come down, go down; More antonyms: rise become detached accidentally and drop to the ground. "my sunglasses fell off and broke on the pavement" hang down. "hair that was allowed to fall to the shoulders" (of land) slope downward; drop away. "the land fell away in a steep bank" synonyms: slope down, slope, slant down, go down, drop, drop away, descend, dip, sink,plunge "the ground here falls away abruptly" (of a river) flow or discharge itself into. (of someone's eyes or glance) be directed downward. (of someone's face) show dismay or disappointment by appearing to sag or droop. "her face fell as she thought about her life with George" occur, arrive, or become apparent as if by dropping suddenly. "when night fell we managed to crawl back to our lines" synonyms: occur, take place, happen, come about; More 2. (of a person) lose one's balance and collapse. "she fell down at school today" synonyms: topple over, tumble over, keel over, fall down/over, go head over heels, go headlong,collapse, take a spill, pitch forward; More antonyms: get up throw oneself down, typically in order to worship or implore someone. "they fell on their knees, rendering thanks to God" (of a tree, building, or other structure) collapse to the ground. "the house looked as if it were going to fall down at any moment" synonyms: collapse, cave in, crash in, fall down; More (of a building or place) be captured or defeated. "their mountain strongholds fell to enemy attack" synonyms: surrender to, yield to, submit to, give in to, capitulate to, succumb to; More antonyms: resist die in battle. "an English leader who had fallen at the hands of the Danes" synonyms: die, perish, lose one's life, be killed, be slain, be lost, meet one's death; More antonyms: flourish archaic commit sin; yield to temptation. "it is their husband's fault if wives do fall" (of a government or leader) lose office. (in sports) lose or be eliminated from play. 3. decrease in number, amount, intensity, or quality. "in 1987 imports into Britain fell by 12 percent" synonyms: decrease, decline, diminish, fall off, drop off, lessen, dwindle; More antonyms: rise, increase find a lower level; subside or abate. "the water table in the Rift Valley fell" synonyms: subside, recede, ebb, flow back, fall away, go down, sink "the river began to fall" antonyms: rise, flood (of a measuring instrument) show a lower reading. "the barometer had fallen a further ten points" 4. pass into a specified state. "many of the buildings fell into disrepair" synonyms: become, grow, get, turn More begin to do something. "he fell to musing about how it had happened" be drawn accidentally into. "you must not fall into this common error" occur at a specified time. "Mother's birthday fell on Flag Day" be classified or ordered in the way specified. "canals fall within the Minister's brief" Origin Old English fallan, feallan, of Germanic origin; the noun is partly from the verb, partly from Old Norsefall ‘downfall, sin.’ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wizz-The-Smith Posted August 22, 2016 Share Posted August 22, 2016 On 20/08/2016 at 4:27 PM, Tijgy said: @Wizz-The-Smith and @ravenous reader, I just finished reading your new essays and they are really amazing work, especially because they put a huge part of the earlier of the contributors in this work together Hi Tijgy, and thank you. As RR said, you have been a major contributor throughout the thread, you always find cool stuff! It's good to have all our thoughts in an essay series as we move into V.2 as well. On 20/08/2016 at 4:27 PM, Tijgy said: This made me remind me of another quote where we had once a windless moment: Hodor knew Bran's favorite place, so he took him to the edge of the pool beneath the great spread of the heart tree, where Lord Eddard used to kneel to pray. Ripples were running across the surface of the water when they arrived, making the reflection of the weirwood shimmer and dance. There was no wind, though. For an instant Bran was baffled. Nice! I remember when you posted that now, pity I didn't remember it when I posted the windless leaves rustling! That was right at the start of our search for personified trees, we have found many more examples since, but your forest as a sea 'eternal and unknowable' catch is still one of my favourites. On 20/08/2016 at 4:27 PM, Tijgy said: This song reminded me of the fact Summer is calls himself Prince of the Green: Prince. The man-sound came into his head suddenly, yet he could feel the rightness of it. Prince of the green, prince of the wolfswood. He was strong and swift and fierce, and all that lived in the good green world went in fear of him. These woods belonged to them, the snowy slopes and stony hills, the great green pines and the golden leaf oaks, the rushing streams and blue lakes fringed with fingers of white frost. But his sister had left the wilds, to walk in the halls of man-rock where other hunters ruled, and once within those halls it was hard to find the path back out. The wolf prince remembered. Awesome, the Prince of the Green indeed. I like your notion that Summer and Nymeria are claiming their domains, it seems the woods do belong to them. On that note, in this case the great green pines and the golden leaf oaks are apparently in their/Summer/Bran's ownership. This is cool considering our search for personified trees, or indeed trees that are 'on' Bran's side or can be manipulated by Bran in the future. That is something we want to explore moving forward, remember the Tolkien like trees we were looking for? Well I think Bran may be able to use the trees very subtly moving forward, as sort of an army, Bran's army in the war to come. A grabbing branch here or a tripping root there, hindering the enemy. Kind of like the help Bran himself received when the tree dropped all that snow on him to hide him from the wights outside BR's cave. I shall send you some of the examples when I have them rounded up, I'm sure you could help us in our search. Oh, and I agree about RR's Braavos/BR stuff, very cool. The similarities in Braavos' description to that of BR is a great catch, with text to back the idea as well. There is definitely something more to BR and Braavos, RR has posted about a possible Faceless Man connection, or maybe that he trained there in some form? Not sure yet, but I am very curious just how that will develop, if at all. Nice to hear from you Tijgy, cool post on the 'w' connection as well, especially Winter[fell]. I will reply with some of my thoughts on the 'fell' thing soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ravenous reader Posted August 24, 2016 Share Posted August 24, 2016 Hi @Tijgy! Further notes inspired by your recent post: On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: However there is a big difference to the tone of Bran’s reminiscences and the dreams of Theon, Jon and Ned. Bran is very melancholy about this. But unlike the others, he is not afraid of the Old Kings or of the wolves and doesn’t feel unwelcome, he actually takes comfort in their lineage and in the lifelike figures of wolves (and he actually wants his living direwolf at his side). It is even possible to say Bran is representing them at that moment. He is sitting on the throne, he is just hailed as the Stark in Winterfell and as his brother’s heir. I like the distinction you've drawn-- very perceptive! It reminds me of that passage in which Winterfell is described as a tree, a labyrinth to which only Bran knows all the secret corners and passageways, as if he were its architect...you know the one. It concludes with saying that Bran was 'lord of the castle in a way even Robb would never know' (AGOT-Bran II). Since this occurs before Robb's death as well as pre-dating Robb's departure from Winterfell, Bran is the bona fide lord of the castle, and tree, even before he officially takes his place as Robb's heir. Despite being younger than his brother, he's the eternal 'genius loci' of Winterfell. He also self-identifies as a King of Winter, deriving comfort from the association here: Quote A Clash of Kings - Bran VII Meera looked to her brother for the answer. "Our road is north," Jojen announced. At the edge of the wolfswood, Bran turned in his basket for one last glimpse of the castle that had been his life. Wisps of smoke still rose into the grey sky, but no more than might have risen from Winterfell's chimneys on a cold autumn afternoon. Soot stains marked some of the arrow loops, and here and there a crack or a missing merlon could be seen in the curtain wall, but it seemed little enough from this distance. Beyond, the tops of the keeps and towers still stood as they had for hundreds of years, and it was hard to tell that the castle had been sacked and burned at all. The stone is strong, Bran told himself, the roots of the trees go deep, and under the ground the Kings of Winter sit their thrones. So long as those remained, Winterfell remained. It was not dead, just broken. Like me, he thought. I'm not dead either. As you point out, 'no dead kings for Bran': On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: 3. Winter => Dead Kings of Winter Theon: “Along the walls figures halfseen moved through the shadows, pale shades with long grim faces.” Jon: “the stone kings on their thrones. Their grey granite eyes turned to follow him as he passed, and their grey granite fingers tightened on the hilts of the rusted swords upon their laps” Ned’s dream: “The Kings of Winter watched him pass with eyes of ice” Bran: No dead Kings for Bran … except during the feast he is the living representative of the Kings of the Winter and of the House Stark (He was old enough to know that it was not truly him they shouted for—it was the harvest they cheered, it was Robb and his victories, it was his lord father and his grandfather and all the Starks going back eight thousand year - He was the Stark in Winterfell, his father's son and his brother's heir, and almost a man grown.) The 'eyes of ice' is interesting, in light of 'winter as a weapon' and that 'Ice' the ancestral sword of House Stark is an actual weapon. It also hints at some connection to the Others, doesn't it? From what you've highlighted, it's important to bear in mind that although we referred to the catchy 'quartet of w-s' as weapons, the same 'weapons' can also be comforts to the Starks. For example, let's remind ourselves of that passage I previously quoted (in the 'plucking' fragment) culminating in Sansa laughing in response to the touch of the cold wind which visits her in the Eyrie, in contrast to the reaction of most others around her who find the same visitation of said 'w-'s unbearable. Given that Sansa's life has been made a misery ever since Lady died, that she's been cornered into a kind of prison by all and sundry, and that she hardly ever laughs, I find this sequence interesting, hinting at the wisp of some kind of awakening in Sansa, perhaps urged on by representatives of all the elements of wind, wolf, winter and even wood (the moondoor is weirwood) keeping a protective eye on her (and a suspicious one on Baelish, no doubt...the weirwood door can be thought of as an additional 'eye' who witnessed Baelish's crimes and confessions, especially before he pushed Lysa to her death). It's not surprising that the wind is so active in the Eyrie, considering Sansa's following in Ned's footsteps, the parent whom she resembles most closely in demeanor if not looks. It's likely the wind is long familiar with the Eyrie having possibly followed Ned there when he was sent to be fostered by Jon Arryn (in the same way the loyal direwolves followed their human counterparts south). Like Sansa at this point, Ned sadly also had no direwolf to keep him company-- but the wolfish wind could still reach them both: Quote A Feast for Crows - Alayne II Old snow cloaked the courtyard, and icicles hung down like crystal spears from the terraces and towers. The Eyrie was built of fine white stone, and winter's mantle made it whiter still. So beautiful, Alayne thought, so impregnable. She could not love this place, no matter how she tried. Even before the guards and serving men had made their descent, the castle had seemed as empty as a tomb, and more so when Petyr Baelish was away. No one sang up there, not since Marillion. No one ever laughed too loud. Even the gods were silent. The Eyrie boasted a sept, but no septon; a godswood, but no heart tree. No prayers are answered here, she often thought, though some days she felt so lonely she had to try. Only the wind answered her, sighing endlessly around the seven slim white towers and rattling the Moon Door every time it gusted. Sansa feels alone and forsaken by the gods. She misses the godswood. Close to despair, she prays -- and is answered by the gusting wind (there may be a pun with gust/ghost too, so the gusting is the embodiment of the old gods ghostly presence). In contrast to what she asserted earlier in the paragraph that 'the gods are silent' and that 'no one sang up here,' the wind is the one who now 'speaks' to her, answers her prayer, and indeed sings (sighing, rattling, and plucking like Marillion). Also, an inspection of GRRM's endless repetition that the Eyrie is 'impregnable' is revealing, which not only suggests it's coming down for sure like Harrenhal (Black Harren like Lysa Arryn -- isn't that quaint, GRRM is rhyming their names -- was also fond of saying his castle was 'impregnable'!), it also points at how a fortress can keep people in (besieged or imprisoned within its walls, which is precisely what Baelish is doing to Sansa, his prize pawn/porn) just as much as it keeps others out. My mention of the pun on 'pawn' with 'porn' in this context is only slightly joking, since the repetition of 'impregnable' also connotes the idea of Sansa the maid's prized virginity and how the man who controls its barter (therefore acting as a brothelkeeper) is likely to profit in the game of thrones. Until he decides to pawn her out, he'll be content to keep her locked away in the Eyrie, with which the wolfish wind seems none too happy. In fact, the wind comes close to penetrating the castle, almost as if it wished to 'get through' to Sansa, free her from Baelish's clutches, and claim her for its own, 'sighing endlessly around the seven slim white towers [a very graceful, feminine image, like Sansa] and rattling the moon door [again, Sansa is a 'moon maid' symbolically]' -- proving that maybe the castle isn't so 'impregnable' after all. Quote Beyond the walls, the wind picked up sharply. They were above the tree line here, exposed to the elements. Alayne was thankful that she'd dressed so warmly. Her cloak was flapping noisily behind her, and a sudden gust blew back her hood. She laughed, but a few yards ahead Lord Robert squirmed, and said, "It's too cold. We should go back and wait until it's warmer." "It will be warmer on the valley floor, my lord," said Mya. "You'll see when we get down there." Note, the wind is 'sharp' like a weapon or teeth. Again the 'gust/ghost' is present around her. Curiously, Sansa doesn't seem to mind the cold (she's a daughter of Winter, after all)! To her delight, the wind blows back her hood...Sansa seems to enjoy the liberation the wind affords her, even if it is only a temporary reprieve from her disguise as Alayne Stone. While Robert desires to return to the relative safety and warmth of the castle, Sansa seems happy to have escaped it for now. Quote "Ser Sweetrobin," Lord Robert said, and Alayne knew that she dare not wait for Mya to return. She helped the boy dismount, and hand in hand they walked out onto the bare stone saddle, their cloaks snapping and flapping behind them. All around was empty air and sky, the ground falling away sharply to either side. There was ice underfoot, and broken stones just waiting to turn an ankle, and the wind was howling fiercely. It sounds like a wolf, thought Sansa. A ghost wolf, big as mountains. And then they were on the other side, and Mya Stone was laughing and lifting Robert for a hug. "Be careful," Alayne told her. "He can hurt you, flailing. You wouldn't think so, but he can." They found a place for him, a cleft in the rock to keep him out of the cold wind. Alayne tended him until the shaking passed, whilst Mya went back to help the others cross. Fresh mules awaited them at Snow, and a hot meal of stewed goat and onions. She ate with Mya and Myranda. "So you're brave as well as beautiful," Myranda said to her. Another curious observation. Sansa is not usually described as happy nor brave; so, has the wolf wind inspired her to be brave? Many of the Stark children, even the fiercest such as Arya, having been left as 'lone wolves' without the guidance of parents at an early age, find themselves in doubt at one time or another, in need of comfort and direction from another 'wolf'. In that situation, they often pray to the old gods and recall Ned's advice that a man can only be brave when he is afraid. Perhaps something similar is in play here with the stirrings of Sansa's transformation. Quote While Theon, Jon and Ned are scarred away by the Old Kings, the protectors of Winterfell, Bran is one of them. Before the harvestfeast, he also took the role of protector when he yelled at Rickon for allowing the Freys, the outsiders, to enter the crypt (You had no right!" Bran screamed at his brother when he heard. "That was our place, a Stark place!"But Rickon never cared.”) Bran can be here seen as the protective spirit or at least taking this role upon him. Indeed, Bran is a protective 'spirit' both literally and figuratively. He's haunting the crypt like a ghost of one of the Kings of Winter! On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: “Bran took another sip of the spiced honey wine from his father’s goblet, grateful for something to clutch. The lifelike head of a snarling direwolf was raised on the side of the cup. He felt the silver muzzle pressing against his palm, and remembered the last time he had seen his lord father drink from this goblet.” Bran feels comforted by the direwolf muzzle pressing against his palm, as if the wolf is expressing affection by nuzzling against his hand. Although Jon is equally physically affectionate with Ghost, the others you mentioned, Ned and especially Theon might find a direwolf muzzle pressing against their hand a bit threatening! The direwolf may snarl, but it forbears to bite Bran. On 8/20/2016 at 3:40 PM, Tijgy said: Theon also dreams of the feast for Robert at Winterfell (ACOK, Theon V). Jon has constantly dreams of them (AGOT, ASOS, Jon V and Samwell IV). Ned visits with Robert the crypts (AGOT, Eddard I) and also dreams of them (AGOT, Eddard XIII). In this earlier post I made a comparison of those different fragments of the books. I re-read your earlier post, as indicated. There are some lovely observations: Quote Bran leaves the feast early because it makes him sad he would never dance. “When he blew out his bedside candle, darkness covered him like a soft, familiar blanket. The faint sound music drifted through his shuttered window.”He remembers his father speaking about the Kingsguard. Bran shows here already a preference to the darkness: “When he blew out his bedside candle, darkness covered him like a soft, familiar blanket.” This does remind me of Bloodraven thinks of the darkness. The fact he hears a “faint sound of music” through his “shuttered window” can refer to the fact that he has a greenseer also hears through the weirwood. And maybe the window is shuttered because his third-eye is not yet full open? I really appreciate the subtlety you've picked up here! 'The shuttered window' as incompletely opened third eye is an evocative image which I love (recently, I had been thinking about the importance of windows as eyes and portals in relation to Bran and Jaime and others). The 'musical' component to greenseeing ties in especially nicely with my 'plucking' and 'song of the earth' musings. Also, though Bran is sad he'll never dance, he does eventually get to dance in a way via the tree (as you suggested with the image of the heart tree dancing and shimmering in the windless pool). I agree 'the soft familiar blanket of darkness' is reminiscent of Bloodraven's 'cavern in its black mantle.' Apropos the dancing and the rustling, I happened on this poem a while ago when I was contemplating Bran as one of the principal 'movers and shakers', which you might like: Quote Arthur O'Shaughnessy. 1844–1881 6. Ode WE are the music-makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams, Wandering by lone sea-breakers, And sitting by desolate streams; World-losers and world-forsakers, 5 On whom the pale moon gleams: Yet we are the movers and shakers Of the world for ever, it seems. With wonderful deathless ditties We build up the world's great cities, 10 And out of a fabulous story We fashion an empire's glory: One man with a dream, at pleasure, Shall go forth and conquer a crown; And three with a new song's measure 15 Can trample an empire down. We, in the ages lying In the buried past of the earth, Built Nineveh with our sighing, And Babel itself with our mirth; 20 And o'erthrew them with prophesying To the old of the new world's worth; For each age is a dream that is dying, Or one that is coming to birth. Quote “He went to sleep with his head full of knights in gleaming armor, fighting with swords that shone like starfire (refers to Arthur Dayne), but when the dream came he was in the godswood. In addition to being a 'sword-of-the-morning' reference, perhaps the Starks and their armory of winter-wind-wolf-and-wood are also associated with 'starfire.' For one, their name 'Star-k'...(I remember @evita mgfs's observation that Bran himself is a 'fallen Star-k' and @Seams's note that 'Caster' derived from 'aster'=star may similarly be connected to such 'star magic' via the white walkers). Arguably, Bran himself is probably House Stark's most powerful weapon of all! As I've argued elsewhere, Bran is configured as a kind of magical sword. Quote A Clash of Kings - Catelyn VI Rymund the Rhymer sang through all the courses, sparing her the need to talk. He closed with the song he had written about Robb's victory at Oxcross. "And the stars in the night were the eyes of his wolves, and the wind itself was their song." Between the verses, Rymund threw back his head and howled, and by the end, half of the hall was howling along with him, even Desmond Grell, who was well in his cups. Their voices rang off the rafters. Here, the eyes of the wolves are compared to stars which are also associated with the wind and song. Elsewhere, the eyes of the wolves and eyes of the wood are conflated, so that's already three of the four Stark 'weapons' we've identified associated with stars. By the way, 'Rymund the Rhymer' is an allusion to the author George Raymond Richard Martin and the alliteration of his middle syllables, and cheeky self-conscious nod to how much he enjoys indulging in his wordplay. In terms of winter-star associations, the white walkers and wights have starry blue eyes, as do 'ice dragons' associated with the north: Quote A Storm of Swords - Davos VI A half moon was sliding in and out amongst thin high clouds, and Davos could see familiar stars. There was the Galley, sailing west; there the Crone's Lantern, four bright stars that enclosed a golden haze. The clouds hid most of the Ice Dragon, all but the bright blue eye that marked due north. The sky is full of smugglers' stars. They were old friends, those stars; Davos hoped that meant good luck. If Bran is a 'sword' then he is forged and honed in the crypts and the godswood. I always thought it funny that Ned confined his quirky son Bran to the godswood in order to 'cleanse' him presumably of the sin of climbing, which is a metaphor for 'flying,' 'skinchanging/warging' (climbing into the skin of animals, humans, and trees), greenseeing, and third-eye capabilities in general. Neither would Bran experience the godswood as a punishment, nor confinement, nor indeed would it 'cleanse' or rid him of his gift in any way; on the contrary, the godswood would only encourage the development of his abilities! Additionally, 'cleansing' has a watery connotation which reminds me of the integral process during forging of quenching a sword in cold water (provided symbolically by the still cold black pool at the weirwood) after tempering in order to harden the blade and optimize the edge. Quote A Game of Thrones - Bran II His mother was terrified that one day Bran would slip off a wall and kill himself. He told her that he wouldn't, but she never believed him. Once she made him promise that he would stay on the ground. He had managed to keep that promise for almost a fortnight, miserable every day, until one night he had gone out the window of his bedroom when his brothers were fast asleep. He confessed his crime the next day in a fit of guilt. Lord Eddard ordered him to the godswood to cleanse himself. Guards were posted to see that Bran remained there alone all night to reflect on his disobedience. The next morning Bran was nowhere to be seen. They finally found him fast asleep in the upper branches of the tallest sentinel in the grove. As angry as he was, his father could not help but laugh. "You're not my son," he told Bran when they fetched him down, "you're a squirrel. So be it. If you must climb, then climb, but try not to let your mother see you." Here, the elements of wood and wolf predominate. Like a disobedient wolf, Bran is 'confined' to the godswood all night. But, like them, he is not truly confined (compare that quote we discussed where the wolves seem to have flown their coop and are loping high above on the curtain walls). He appears to be fast asleep in a tree called a 'sentinel,' implying that Bran's not really 'asleep' only dreaming, which for a greenseer is the way he keeps watch. I also like the description of Bran slipping 'out his window' at night -- which as you've highlighted is a metaphor for the opening of the third eye with particular reference to the tree. The reference to Bran being a squirrel rather than a human, and 'not Ned's son,' is a pointed one, foreshadowing the Starks subsequently 'losing' him to Bloodraven, his substitute father, and the Children of the Forest who were called 'the squirrel people': Quote A Dance with Dragons - Bran II Bran knew. "She's a child. A child of the forest." He shivered, as much from wonderment as cold. They had fallen into one of Old Nan's tales. "The First Men named us children," the little woman said. "The giants called us woh dak nag gran, the squirrel people, because we were small and quick and fond of trees, but we are no squirrels, no children. Our name in the True Tongue means those who sing the song of earth. Before your Old Tongue was ever spoken, we had sung our songs ten thousand years." Quote The rattle of iron made his ears prick up. His brother heard it too. They raced through the undergrowth toward the sound. Bounding across the still water at the foot of the old white one (note: Summer sees the weirwood as the “old white one” which IMO gives the tree a personification), he caught the scent of a stranger, the man-smell well mixed with leather and earth and iron. Great catch of the personification of 'the old white one' -- like the weirwood, Bloodraven is albino. Quote Bran does enter Summer’s thoughts: “some part of him whispered, some wisp of the sleeping boy lost in the wolf dream.”. He starting to become more than just a passenger. The 'wisp' and 'whisper' is often used as a marker for the presence of magic (GRRM seems overly fond of the letter 'w-'... ). Compare to the following passages: Quote A Clash of Kings - Bran IV "Perhaps magic was once a mighty force in the world, but no longer. What little remains is no more than the wisp of smoke that lingers in the air after a great fire has burned out, and even that is fading. Valyria was the last ember, and Valyria is gone. The dragons are no more, the giants are dead, the children of the forest forgotten with all their lore. "No, my prince. Jojen Reed may have had a dream or two that he believes came true, but he does not have the greensight. No living man has that power." 'Smoke' is also a marker of Bloodraven in particular, being his special color as well as a nod to his status as an old 'smoldering' dragon, whose fire has not quite gone out, and may yet, like a supposedly 'dormant' volcano, threaten to erupt: Quote A Dance with Dragons - Bran III Seated on his throne of roots in the great cavern, half-corpse and half-tree, Lord Brynden seemed less a man than some ghastly statue made of twisted wood, old bone, and rotted wool. The only thing that looked alive in the pale ruin that was his face was his one red eye, burning like the last coal in a dead fire... Quote A Storm of Swords - Davos II When he came up on deck, the long point of Driftmark was dwindling behind them while Dragonstone rose from the sea ahead. A pale grey wisp of smoke blew from the top of the mountain to mark where the island lay. Dragonmont is restless this morning, Davos thought, or else Melisandre is burning someone else. Smoke also seems to be an integral ingredient of blood magic (burning people's sacrificial blood and other body parts over a brazier of hot coals, leaving a whiff and wisp of smoke in the air, thereby releasing the magic potential etc.). Quote A Storm of Swords - Davos IV Beneath were three large black leeches, fat with blood. The boy's blood, Davos knew. A king's blood. Stannis stretched forth a hand, and his fingers closed around one of the leeches. "Say the name," Melisandre commanded. The leech was twisting in the king's grip, trying to attach itself to one of his fingers. "The usurper," he said. "Joffrey Baratheon." When he tossed the leech into the fire, it curled up like an autumn leaf amidst the coals, and burned. Stannis grasped the second. "The usurper," he declared, louder this time. "Balon Greyjoy." He flipped it lightly onto the brazier, and its flesh split and cracked. The blood burst from it, hissing and smoking. Quote A Dance with Dragons - The Blind Girl The mists of Braavos did queer things to sounds as well, she had found. Half the city will be half-blind tonight. As she made her way past the temples, she could hear the acolytes of the Cult of Starry Wisdom atop their scrying tower, singing to the evening stars. A wisp of scented smoke hung in the air, drawing her down the winding path to where the red priests had fired the great iron braziers outside the house of the Lord of Light. Soon she could even feel the heat in the air, as red R'hllor's worshipers lifted their voices in prayer. "For the night is dark and full of terrors," they prayed. Not for me. Her nights were bathed in moonlight and filled with the songs of her pack, with the taste of red meat torn off the bone, with the warm familiar smells of her grey cousins. Only during the days was she alone and blind. Quote A Storm of Swords - Jaime VI That is the last thing I mean to do. The moonlight glimmered pale upon the stump where Jaime had rested his head. The moss covered it so thickly he had not noticed before, but now he saw that the wood was white. It made him think of Winterfell, and Ned Stark's heart tree. It was not him, he thought. It was never him. But the stump was dead and so was Stark and so were all the others, Prince Rhaegar and Ser Arthur and the children. And Aerys. Aerys is most dead of all. "Do you believe in ghosts, Maester?" he asked Qyburn. The man's face grew strange. "Once, at the Citadel, I came into an empty room and saw an empty chair. Yet I knew a woman had been there, only a moment before. The cushion was dented where she'd sat, the cloth was still warm, and her scent lingered in the air. If we leave our smells behind us when we leave a room, surely something of our souls must remain when we leave this life?" Qyburn spread his hands. "The archmaesters did not like my thinking, though. Well, Marwyn did, but he was the only one." Jaime ran his fingers through his hair. "Walton," he said, "saddle the horses. I want to go back." Jaime has had a 'weirwood conversion,' a change of heart effected by the heart tree. Suggestively, he runs his fingers through his hair, touching his head as if in remembrance of the dream, probably aware on some level of the lingering touch of the weirwood just there against his head responsible for nudging open his third eye. It's interesting that a lingering 'wisp,' 'whisper,' or 'scent' of someone would probably be picked up sooner by those with magical inclinations like greenseers, the Children and direwolves who are able to 'prick up their ears' and 'catch the scent' sooner than others. Quote A Game of Thrones - Daenerys I When she was clean, the slaves helped her from the water and toweled her dry. The girl brushed her hair until it shone like molten silver, while the old woman anointed her with the spiceflower perfume of the Dothraki plains, a dab on each wrist, behind her ears, on the tips of her breasts, and one last one, cool on her lips, down there between her legs. They dressed her in the wisps that Magister Illyrio had sent up, and then the gown, a deep plum silk to bring out the violet in her eyes. The girl slid the gilded sandals onto her feet, while the old woman fixed the tiara in her hair, and slid golden bracelets crusted with amethysts around her wrists. Last of all came the collar, a heavy golden torc emblazoned with ancient Valyrian glyphs. Magister is a 'master' or 'magician.' He also gifts her the magical dragon eggs, described as 'wisps' of magical potential elsewhere: Quote A Game of Thrones - Daenerys IX "Bring me … egg … dragon's egg … please …" Her lashes turned to lead, and she was too weary to hold them up. When she woke the third time, a shaft of golden sunlight was pouring through the smoke hole of the tent, and her arms were wrapped around a dragon's egg. It was the pale one, its scales the color of butter cream, veined with whorls of gold and bronze, and Dany could feel the heat of it. Beneath her bedsilks, a fine sheen of perspiration covered her bare skin. Dragondew, she thought. Her fingers trailed lightly across the surface of the shell, tracing the wisps of gold, and deep in the stone she felt something twist and stretch in response. It did not frighten her. All her fear was gone, burned away. A Game of Thrones - Daenerys IX "… don't want to wake the dragon, do you?" Ser Jorah's face was drawn and sorrowful. "Rhaegar was the last dragon," he told her. He warmed translucent hands over a glowing brazier where stone eggs smouldered red as coals. One moment he was there and the next he was fading, his flesh colorless, less substantial than the wind. "The last dragon," he whispered, thin as a wisp, and was gone. She felt the dark behind her, and the red door seemed farther away than ever. "… don't want to wake the dragon, do you?" Other examples of magical wisps and wispy dragons: Quote A Game of Thrones - Arya III "And when he learns the truth, what will he do?" a second voice asked in the liquid accents of the Free Cities. "The gods alone know," the first voice said. Arya could see a wisp of grey smoke drifting up off the torch, writhing like a snake as it rose. "The fools tried to kill his son, and what's worse, they made a mummer's farce of it. He's not a man to put that aside. I warn you, the wolf and lion will soon be at each other's throats, whether we will it or no." "Too soon, too soon," the voice with the accent complained. "What good is war now? We are not ready. Delay." "As well bid me stop time. Do you take me for a wizard?" The other chuckled. "No less." Flames licked at the cold air. The tall shadows were almost on top of her. Varys and Ilyrio are both caught up in sorcery and intrigue, and possibly both have some magical dragonsblood driving them too. Quote A Clash of Kings - Bran VII He padded over dry needles and brown leaves, to the edge of the wood where the pines grew thin. Beyond the open fields he could see the great piles of man-rock stark against the swirling flames. The wind blew hot and rich with the smell of blood and burnt meat, so strong he began to slaver. Yet as one smell drew them onward, others warned them back. He sniffed at the drifting smoke. Men, many men, many horses, and fire, fire, fire. No smell was more dangerous, not even the hard cold smell of iron, the stuff of man-claws and hardskin. The smoke and ash clouded his eyes, and in the sky he saw a great winged snake whose roar was a river of flame. He bared his teeth, but then the snake was gone. Behind the cliffs tall fires were eating up the stars. All through the night the fires crackled, and once there was a great roar and a crash that made the earth jump under his feet. Dogs barked and whined and horses screamed in terror. Howls shuddered through the night; the howls of the man-pack, wails of fear and wild shouts, laughter and screams. No beast was as noisy as man. He pricked up his ears and listened, and his brother growled at every sound. They prowled under the trees as a piney wind blew ashes and embers through the sky. In time the flames began to dwindle, and then they were gone. The sun rose grey and smoky that morning. Quote A Clash of Kings - Daenerys III When the fiery ladder stood forty feet high, the mage leapt forward and began to climb it, scrambling up hand over hand as quick as a monkey. Each rung he touched dissolved behind him, leaving no more than a of a wisp of silver smoke. When he reached the top, the ladder was gone and so was he. "A fine trick," announced Jhogo with admiration. "No trick," a woman said in the Common Tongue. Dany had not noticed Quaithe in the crowd, yet there she stood, eyes wet and shiny behind the implacable red lacquer mask. "What mean you, my lady?" "Half a year gone, that man could scarcely wake fire from dragonglass. He had some small skill with powders and wildfire, sufficient to entrance a crowd while his cutpurses did their work. He could walk across hot coals and make burning roses bloom in the air, but he could no more aspire to climb the fiery ladder than a common fisherman could hope to catch a kraken in his nets." Dany looked uneasily at where the ladder had stood. Even the smoke was gone now, and the crowd was breaking up, each man going about his business. In a moment more than a few would find their purses flat and empty. "And now?" "And now his powers grow, Khaleesi. And you are the cause of it." "Me?" She laughed. "How could that be?" The woman stepped closer and lay two fingers on Dany's wrist. "You are the Mother of Dragons, are you not?" "She is, and no spawn of shadows may touch her." Jhogo brushed Quaithe's fingers away with the handle of his whip. The woman took a step backward. "You must leave this city soon, Daenerys Targaryen, or you will never be permitted to leave it at all." Dany's wrist still tingled where Quaithe had touched her. "Where would you have me go?" she asked. "To go north, you must journey south. To reach the west, you must go east. To go forward you must go back, and to touch the light you must pass beneath the shadow." As we saw with the wisps of smoke, the whispers on the airwaves, the scents on the air, Quaithe's touch lingers, tingling like electricity. I wonder if the ability to conjure and 'climb' the fiery ladder with respect to the 'growing powers of the mage' is a veiled reference to Bran's growing powers (he's the quintessential climber of the piece, after all)? Quote A Dance with Dragons - Melisandre I Melisandre touched the ruby at her neck and spoke a word. The sound echoed queerly from the corners of the room and twisted like a worm inside their ears. The wildling heard one word, the crow another. Neither was the word that left her lips. The ruby on the wildling's wrist darkened, and the wisps of light and shadow around him writhed and faded. Quote A Storm of Swords - Arya III Tom Sevenstrings nodded. "Aye, that's like Lord Beric. He'll do right by you, see if he don't." Lord Beric Dondarrion. Arya remembered all she'd heard at Harrenhal, from the Lannisters and the Bloody Mummers alike. Lord Beric the wisp o' the wood. Lord Beric who'd been killed by Vargo Hoat and before that by Ser Amory Lorch, and twice by the Mountain That Rides. If he won't send me home maybe I'll kill him too. "Why do I have to see Lord Beric?" she asked quietly. "We bring him all our highborn captives," said Anguy. A 'wisp o' the wood' is probably related to the folkloric 'Will-o'-the-wisp': https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will-o'-the-wisp Quote A Storm of Swords - Samwell III Yet even so the wight's grip did not loosen. Sam's last thoughts were for the mother who had loved him and the father he had failed. The longhall was spinning around him when he saw the wisp of smoke rising from between Paul's broken teeth. Then the dead man's face burst into flame, and the hands were gone. Quote A Feast for Crows - The Drowned Man And when it seemed the sound would never end, it did. The hornblower's breath failed at last. He staggered and almost fell. The priest saw Orkwood of Orkmont catch him by one arm to hold him up, whilst Left-Hand Lucas Codd took the twisted black horn from his hands. A thin wisp of smoke was rising from the horn, and the priest saw blood and blisters upon the lips of the man who'd sounded it. The bird on his chest was bleeding too. Quote "He won't hurt me. This is not the day I die." The male walked toward them, unafraid, and reached out for his muzzle, a touch as light as a summer breeze (note: haha, Summer is getting touched by a summer breeze) . Yet at the brush of those fingers the wood dissolved and the very ground turned to smoke beneath his feet and swirled away laughing, and then he was spinning and falling, falling, falling . . . The whole chapter ends with a weird description and consequences of Jojen touching Summer: he “reached out for his muzzle, a touch as light as a summer breeze”. Jojen’s touch is compared here to a breeze, a gentle wind. You could deduct from this description that Jojen is a representative from the old gods and he does indeed become later Bran’s teacher who would introduce him into his powers (and you might say he does this more gentle than that annoying 3EC). Earlier in this chapter Meera and Jojen were already associated with wind: when they entered, “a gust of cold air made the torches flame brighter for an instant”. The connection of Meera and Jojen to the wind, and therefore appearing as old gods representatives to Bran as the initiate, is a good find. The summer breeze touching Summer is a nice echo, indicating they're on the same 'wavelength'. 'Fingers brushing' is something we've seen the personified wind do on numerous occasions (plucking, grabbing, grasping, stirring, etc.). Again, possibly wordlplay with ghost/gust. I also wonder, as you did, why Jojen's touch triggers a disorienting sensation of dissolution and falling. And who is laughing at him? Perhaps 'the falling' sensation is related to Jojen encouraging Bran not to lose himself in the wolf dream and not shrink from the hard truths, whereas the three-eyed crow prefers Bran to shut out what doesn't bear thinking about (e.g. Jaime and Cersei and the fall from the tower, Bran's desire to contact his dead family members). Perhaps there are different aspects to opening the third eye, which may be 'shuttered' as you suggested, selectively shutting out some things and allowing others in. Nor is opening it fully necessarily advisable. Therefore, opening the third eye is not necessarily a uniform experience for all, facilitating an escape into a fantasy world for some, versus a gritty coming-to-terms with the 'terrible knowledge' for others. Perhaps different teachers emphasize different aspects. Quote A Clash of Kings - Bran VII "The wolf ate," Jojen said. "Not you. Take care, Bran. Remember who you are." He remembered who he was all too well; Bran the boy, Bran the broken. Better Bran the beastling. Was it any wonder he would sooner dream his Summer dreams, his wolf dreams? Here in the chill damp darkness of the tomb his third eye had finally opened. He could reach Summer whenever he wanted, and once he had even touched Ghost and talked to Jon. Though maybe he had only dreamed that. He could not understand why Jojen was always trying to pull him back now. Bran used the strength of his arms to squirm to a sitting position. "I have to tell Osha what I saw. Is she here? Where did she go?" A Storm of Swords - Bran I Even when he went outside they could hear him through the walls, bellowing "HODOR!" as he cut and slashed at his tree. Thankfully the wolfswood was huge, and there was not like to be anyone else around to hear. "Jojen, what did you mean about a teacher?" Bran asked. "You're my teacher. I know I never marked the tree, but I will the next time. My third eye is open like you wanted . . ." "So wide open that I fear you may fall through it, and live all the rest of your days as a wolf of the woods." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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