Heresy 204; of cabbages, prophecies and kings

[JNR]

15 hours ago, Matthew. said:

you are still speaking as an attorney; you are not factually demonstrating that Howland was at Harrenhal, you are advocating for why Meera's story should be believed

It's theoretically possible Howland made the whole thing up based on historical evidence and then repeatedly told it to Meera and Jojen so that they both memorized it, yes.  

Whether this concept is too implausible, mainly due to lack of any apparent motive, must fall to the individual reader to determine.

I'll also say this.  Meera's story being true doesn't IMO support my position that Howland was the knight.  Because Jojen, also IMO, doesn't believe that, and he knows the story too.  I think Jojen believes it was Lyanna.

15 hours ago, Matthew. said:

As to Barristan and Robert, I don't know that it is accurate to say their stories contradict each other--their interpretations of Rhaegar contradict each other, but both agree that he was infatuated with Lyanna

I dunno.  A man can rape a woman hundreds of times... or a man can consider that woman his "lady" and "love" her... but I don't see how a man can do both.   

I guess if he were a complete sociopath, he might never notice, any of those hundreds of times, that she wasn't enjoying herself.  If he noticed and didn't care, that seems the death of the argument he loved her.

15 hours ago, Matthew. said:

What nobody, anywhere (so far) has suggested is that Rhaegar was a man falsely maligned, that the whole thing of linking Rhaegar with Lyanna is just revisionist history

True.  Another thing nobody anywhere in the story has suggested is that Rhaegar and Lyanna might have had a little baby... although it seems to the reader perfectly obvious that they might have.

Here's the thing about Selmy (IMO, of course).  

From Selmy's standpoint, Rhaegar loving Lyanna should seem the world's most obvious fact.  Why?

Because we know Selmy wanted to win the tourney so he could name Ashara the Queen of Love and Beauty... exactly because he was madly in love with her.

So if he sees Rhaegar name Lyanna the Queen of Love and Beauty, what will Selmy conclude in two seconds?  That Rhaegar is madly in love with Lyanna.

[wolfmaid7]

18 minutes ago, JNR said:

rue.  Another thing nobody anywhere in the story has suggested is that Rhaegar and Lyanna might have had a little baby... although it seems to the reader perfectly obvious that they might have.

Here's the thing about Selmy (IMO, of course).  

From Selmy's standpoint, Rhaegar loving Lyanna should seem the world's most obvious fact.  Why?

Because we know Selmy wanted to win the tourney so he could name Ashara the Queen of Love and Beauty... exactly because he was madly in love with her.

So if he sees Rhaegar name Lyanna the Queen of Love and Beauty, what will Selmy conclude in two seconds?  That Rhaegar is madly in love with Lyanna.

This is it,this is it right there.Perfectly put.

[Matthew.]

1 hour ago, wolfmaid7 said:

Rhaegar: I ran off/ kidnapped a High Lord's daughter/bethrothed and i am calling on you loyal men to defend your king/prince.

Errr, I am not proposing that it was some sort of rallying cry--merely that, like Robb breaking his oath to the Freys, Rhaegar may have had to publicly own up to making a mess of things.

An important question here would be at what point the "Rhaegar stole Robert's betrothed" idea (which is history as Bran and Dany know it) first appeared and became widespread; the closest guide to a chronology we have is Jaime Lannister recounting the details of Brandon's execution to Catelyn. Like everything else, it is not a confirmation, but it plants the premise that rumors were already flying before the Rebellion had even started.

While I appreciate your perspective that Rhaegar was not actually missing throughout the Rebellion, I don't believe that aligns with either the general picture, or more specific commentary, such as this:

Jamie III, A Feast for Crows

Quote

 It all came back to him. Jon Connington had been Prince Rhaegar's friend. When Merryweather failed so dismally to contain Robert's Rebellion and Prince Rhaegar could not be found, Aerys had turned to the next best thing, and raised Connington to the Handship. But the Mad King was always chopping off his Hands.

Regardless of whether or not rumors about Lyanna specifically were circulating at the time of the Trident, Rhaegar certainly had something to answer for: why is it that, as his House found itself in its greatest peril, he could not be found? Granted, nobody in the realm save Aerys was really in a position to press him on the matter, but we might wonder whether he was at least saying something of his absence, even if that something was only a cover story.
______
 

51 minutes ago, JNR said:

I dunno.  A man can rape a woman hundreds of times... or a man can consider that woman his "lady" and "love" her... but I don't see how a man can do both.   

It's not that he can do both of those things simultaneously, it's that in both scenarios the same lady and the same man are under discussion--one presenting Rhaegar as a villain that took what he wanted, the other more generous. They paint contradictory pictures of Rhaegar, specifically, but they are not unrelated stories.
 

56 minutes ago, JNR said:

Here's the thing about Selmy (IMO, of course).  

From Selmy's standpoint, Rhaegar loving Lyanna should seem the world's most obvious fact.  Why?

Because we know Selmy wanted to win the tourney so he could name Ashara the Queen of Love and Beauty... exactly because he was madly in love with her.

So if he sees Rhaegar name Lyanna the Queen of Love and Beauty, what will Selmy conclude in two seconds?  That Rhaegar is madly in love with Lyanna.

My point of contention is not whether Barristan's opinion might be wrong, it's that judgment of his opinion seems premature. For many characters, we have already had their "final word" on Rhaegar (certainly with the dead ones, like Kevan), but I consider Barristan to be a story in progress--with at least two more books left to write, and Barristan being the only POV that was on the Targaryen side of the Trident, does he really have nothing more to 'say' on the subject? 

For some readers, the context that makes Barristan seemingly uninteresting is his perceived intellect, biases, or the fact that he wasn't among Rhaegar's trusted confidants; for me, he's potentially interesting because of his occupation and his place in the chronology of Rhaegar's death...emphasis on "potentially."

If you'll forgive the analogy, if I heard that a member of the Secret Service believed that the President was compromised by a foreign power, I'd at least want to hear a little bit more about those beliefs before I shrug and say "whatever, that opinion probably just comes from following the news."

[Brad Stark]

On 2/9/2018 at 6:26 PM, LynnS said:

I'm not getting that jousting is for girls or anyone who hasn't been sufficiently trained even if they do ride at rings .  LOL.

Unless Martin imagines a kindler, gentler form of jousting;  I don't see Lyanna taking out three knights even if she could skinchange a horse.  I have my doubts about Howland as well.

 

GRRM isn't a big believer in training.   He clearly has no personal experience with martial arts, medievl weaponry or fighting.  Dunk falls back on flea bottom brawling and still wins.  We have many examples of how big and strong someone is triumphing over someone better trained.  And of untrained fighters fighting dirty against better trained fighters and winning.  GRRM also has a feminist view with women equal to men, and doing everything they can.  I don't doubt in his mind a strong, healthy girl trained in horse riding can beat a few weak spoiled brats who may not have been all that well trained themselves.

I am not a great fighter, and I am sure a 150lbs mma champ could easily put me in my place, but I could easily do the same to a 300lbs bodybuilder who had no fighting training at all.   But in GRRM's world, that doesn't work that way.

[Melifeather]

4 hours ago, wolfmaid7 said:

The fact that Bael didn't steal the Maiden.No doubt he slept with her because he assumed the child was his according to Ygritte's story.She would have had helped from inside the castle to aid her while she was there for a year.

 

My point is that Bael isn't actually a certain character. We're given the Bael story as a sort of outline to follow, but with each maiden Bael is someone different. Sansa's Bael is Petyr. Arya's Bael was Yoren. Myrcella's Bael was Arianne, and I think Lyanna's Bael was Tywin and Cersei. They don't even have to be there physically to abduct the maiden from the castle. They just make the arrangements. Even in the original story the maiden might not have actually been taken by a person named Bael. She could have been plucked by her own father and the singer blamed in order to cover the incest. We already know about another instance where the singer was blamed for something he didn't do when Petyr pushed Lyssa out the moon door. She too was found among the dead.

[LynnS]

1 hour ago, Brad Stark said:

GRRM isn't a big believer in training.   He clearly has no personal experience with martial arts, medievl weaponry or fighting.  Dunk falls back on flea bottom brawling and still wins.  We have many examples of how big and strong someone is triumphing over someone better trained.  And of untrained fighters fighting dirty against better trained fighters and winning.  GRRM also has a feminist view with women equal to men, and doing everything they can.  I don't doubt in his mind a strong, healthy girl trained in horse riding can beat a few weak spoiled brats who may not have been all that well trained themselves.

I am not a great fighter, and I am sure a 150lbs mma champ could easily put me in my place, but I could easily do the same to a 300lbs bodybuilder who had no fighting training at all.   But in GRRM's world, that doesn't work that way.

She might be able to fight the squires but I'm not so sure about the knights.  I don't think he has to be a great fighter himself; but as a student of medieval history, I imagine he would be interested in jousting and know something about it.  

[Black Crow]

10 hours ago, JNR said:

I dunno.  A man can rape a woman hundreds of times... or a man can consider that woman his "lady" and "love" her... but I don't see how a man can do both.   

I guess if he were a complete sociopath, he might never notice, any of those hundreds of times, that she wasn't enjoying herself.  

Sadly, in real life we see this all too often

[Black Crow]

8 hours ago, Brad Stark said:

GRRM isn't a big believer in training.   He clearly has no personal experience with martial arts, medievl weaponry or fighting.  Dunk falls back on flea bottom brawling and still wins.  We have many examples of how big and strong someone is triumphing over someone better trained.  And of untrained fighters fighting dirty against better trained fighters and winning.  GRRM also has a feminist view with women equal to men, and doing everything they can.  I don't doubt in his mind a strong, healthy girl trained in horse riding can beat a few weak spoiled brats who may not have been all that well trained themselves.

I am not a great fighter, and I am sure a 150lbs mma champ could easily put me in my place, but I could easily do the same to a 300lbs bodybuilder who had no fighting training at all.   But in GRRM's world, that doesn't work that way.

Dirty fighters do tend to win against "trained one"; a point very forcefully made by George Silver in his Paradoxes of Defence [1599].

George had something of a downer on Italian fencing masters, reckoning that there was more of the mummer than the practical fighter in their show - rather like professional jousters. At one point he tells of just one such fencing master demonstrating his water dancing in a London street with his riversos, stoccatas and what have you when a local blacksmith waded in and laid him out with his hammer.

Whether GRRM may have read Silver I don't know, although his work is well known and frequently quoted in books on the use of the sword, but I'm sure that he will have seen Dick Lester's 1973 version of The Three Musketeers which featured the dirtiest duelling you are ever likely to see, together with breaks while the combatants wheeze for breathe

[LynnS]

1 hour ago, Black Crow said:

Dirty fighters do tend to win against "trained one"; a point very forcefully made by George Silver in his Paradoxes of Defence [1599].

No doubt and there is a question around Howland's intervention at the ToJ.  Dirty fighting was certainly entertained in the mummer's version although the stakes were a matter of life and death.  I'm a bit surprised though, that reader's are so willing to cast Lyanna as a cheat as a means for restoring the notion of honor.  Historically, a mystery knight would appear disguised as a means for winning honor based solely on skill rather than position or title.

It's OK to cheat so long as you're teaching a righteous lesson about honor?

[LynnS]

15 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Worth considering in this case the significance of the laughing tree - presumably a weirwood. It provides an immediate connection with the Green Men and ultimately the Tree-huggers themselves, but is it a big issue so far as Lyanna is concerned? Yes there's a big weirwood in Winterfell but its not an obvious sigil, especially as the painting of it requires both skill and time - its not a quick and dirty sigil.

Rather its something significant and if it does speak to the Old Gods is it not more likely to be a counter to the dragons. Perhaps Aerys had good reason to throw a wobbler

It certainly singles out the Starks and any houses allied with them.  This may be why Rhaegar gave Lyanna the queen of beauty's laurel.  Mystery knights and sometimes groups of knights would fight under the same device indicating their allegiance to a certain lord or house; sometimes with a unique device or the device of the house they supported.  Although Rhaegar may have won the day; the Starks may have won the honor.  Rhaegar may have known that the tournament was thrown in his favor whether he engineered that outcome or not.  I think it unlikely that any KG would unhorse Rhaegar in front of Aerys.

The lesson is an affront to Aerys because the message is that the Northern lords think his banner lords have no honor.  Giving Lyanna the laurel  would seem to ally Rhaegar with the Starks on one hand; while insulting the Starks on the other, by casting Lyanna as Rhaegar's mistress. 

By hosting the tournament, the Whents are essentially defending the honor of their house and a daughter of the winning house received the crown.

[LynnS]

15 hours ago, JNR said:

So if he sees Rhaegar name Lyanna the Queen of Love and Beauty, what will Selmy conclude in two seconds?  That Rhaegar is madly in love with Lyanna.

Kevan Lannister makes a similar comparison when he says that Rhaegar would never have 'looked twice' at Lyanna if Cersei had been present at the tourney.  He compares Lyanna's beauty to Cersei, the rising sun.

It's the expression to look twice that interests me.   If Lyanna wasn't that great a beauty according to Kevan; why did Rhaegar look twice at her?  To me that first brief glance followed by a second look implies that something unusual or odd has caught the viewer's attention.   Looking twice and thinking twice (careful consideration of choices) might go together in this case.

 

[JNR]

14 hours ago, Matthew. said:

They paint contradictory pictures of Rhaegar, specifically, but they are not unrelated stories.

That's because they're both directly informed by Rhaegar's shocking and extremely memorable behavior at Harrenhal, that was witnessed by both men.

Is there more? Maybe.  Maybe someone saw one of these rapes occur.  Or maybe Rhaegar opened himself up to Selmy (a man he did not trust, according to Selmy), and spoke convincingly about his great love for Lyanna.

But this isn't evidence, it's only possibility.  We have to imagine this stuff.

14 hours ago, Matthew. said:

if I heard that a member of the Secret Service believed that the President was compromised by a foreign power, I'd at least want to hear a little bit more about those beliefs before I shrug and say "whatever, that opinion probably just comes from following the news."

I think it comes not from "following the news," but from having personally seen Rhaegar ride past his own wife and name Lyanna Stark his chosen Queen of Love and Beauty in front of the assembled nobles of the realm.  

[JNR]

47 minutes ago, LynnS said:

If Lyanna wasn't that great a beauty according to Kevan; why did Rhaegar look twice at her?  To me that first brief glance followed by a second look implies that something unusual or odd has caught the viewer's attention.

I think Kevan just means Cersei would have blown Rhaegar away.

Well, maybe.  

But I can't help but notice that while Rhaegar could have slept with virtually any woman in Westeros, as the crown prince and future king who was also the world's most beautiful man... there are no accounts of him ever having slept with any women before or after Elia (unless you count Lyanna).

The Elia situation was an arranged marriage, to a woman he was (according to Selmy) "fond" of.

So I think the odds are good that Rhaegar's unquestionable interest in Lyanna was not about her pretty face.

[PrettyPig]

19 hours ago, LynnS said:

I think it's highly unlikely that the KotLT is any of the usual suspects. I think we have been deliberately bamboozled by the romance tale and missed the appearance of a knight of the order of the green hand entirely.

 

18 hours ago, Black Crow said:

Worth considering in this case the significance of the laughing tree - presumably a weirwood. It provides an immediate connection with the Green Men and ultimately the Tree-huggers themselves, but is it a big issue so far as Lyanna is concerned? Yes there's a big weirwood in Winterfell but its not an obvious sigil, especially as the painting of it requires both skill and time - its not a quick and dirty sigil.

 

17 hours ago, Matthew. said:

As to the joust conversation itself, the only asterisk I would add is that the tale as presented suggests, at least to me, that the mystery knight may have had the old gods on their side, so I think that does open up the possibility to candidates that might not have a prayer of unhorsing three knights under normal circumstances--eg, Howland.

The tale itself has the feel of a fable or a parable, that it is not merely meant to inform, but to impart wisdom.

To these points, I have posted an essay in General that touches upon these themes and takes a closer look at the "old gods" that may have answered Howland's prayer.    It's long, but I'd love for fellow Heretics to have a look and comment.

http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/150334-gods-are-not-mocked-deals-with-the-devil-at-harrenhal/

[Black Crow]

Good one 

[Matthew.]

On 2/11/2018 at 10:46 AM, JNR said:

I think it comes not from "following the news," but from having personally seen Rhaegar ride past his own wife and name Lyanna Stark his chosen Queen of Love and Beauty in front of the assembled nobles of the realm.  

To borrow a BC-ism, I feel as though the responses I am receiving are at cross purposes with what I am actually saying. I am not attempting advocacy for how Barristan should be read (as stated previously, I'm not fond of treating theories as commitments); I am suggesting that there are contexts in which Barristan's beliefs were shaped by Rhaegar's final days, yet still false and even contradictory to the love story narrative.

More succinctly, the question is: "What if Rheagar allowed (or even endorsed) the false narrative that he was a philanderer, because that was safer than having anyone dig into the truth of what he was doing?
 

On 2/10/2018 at 6:34 PM, LynnS said:

There is an element of the criminal investigation in GRRM's comments about Sherlock Holmes and the butler.  He also studied as a journalist at one point, I believe.  I think we are being tasked in some ways to investigate the story using that lens.

I might more accurately say that it's not that I disapprove of the detective approach as an exercise, it's that there are other approaches that qualify as "reasonable" within the context of literature that would not be reasonable in a real world investigation--that premises such as "the author will actively eschew tropes (eg, the hidden heir)" constitute fair elements of discussion.

We are, in essence, attempting to predict the future--predict what the author will write...when the author himself seems to have done a fairly poor job of predicting what he will eventually write; so, from the outset, discussion is already in logically questionable territory.

We also face obstacles that "real" investigations of a crime or history would not face: that factual reality, history as it objectively happened, might change (or grow) behind us according to author whimsy--that the author might invent New History on the fly, if he has a sudden inspiration for Aegon the Conqueror or the Last Hero or whatever that he likes.

[Matthew.]

On 2/11/2018 at 11:39 AM, PrettyPig said:

To these points, I have posted an essay in General that touches upon these themes and takes a closer look at the "old gods" that may have answered Howland's prayer.    It's long, but I'd love for fellow Heretics to have a look and comment.

http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php?/topic/150334-gods-are-not-mocked-deals-with-the-devil-at-harrenhal/

As usual, incredibly interesting insights.

I don't know if this entirely relates to what you propose with the devil at Harrenhal answering prayers (rather than the spirits of the wood), but I have this vague suspicion that "the gods" as understood by the CotF might not entirely align with the gods as understood by the First Men; certain comments from Leaf give me the impression that the CotF approach is more animistic (eg, talking of the spirits of the dead going into stone), and the gods are not merely limited to the trees.

I'm also thinking of this passage from Arianne II, TWOW (spoilers):
 

Spoiler

And all at once she found herself in another cavern, five times as big as the last one, surrounded by a forest of stone columns. Daemon Sand moved to her side and raised his torch. “Look how the stone’s been shaped,” he said. “Those columns, and the wall there. See them?”

“Faces,” said Arianne. So many sad eyes, staring.

“This place belonged to the children of the forest.”

I don't know how to articulate this exactly, but if the CotF are not worshiping what is already present, but actively fashioning (and, in death, joining) their gods, then it may be that a variety of circumstances have fashioned something particularly malignant at Harrenhal.

[LynnS]

25 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

Spoiler

And all at once she found herself in another cavern, five times as big as the last one, surrounded by a forest of stone columns. Daemon Sand moved to her side and raised his torch. “Look how the stone’s been shaped,” he said. “Those columns, and the wall there. See them?”

“Faces,” said Arianne. So many sad eyes, staring.

“This place belonged to the children of the forest.”

I don't know how to articulate this exactly, but if the CotF are not worshiping what is already present, but actively fashioning (and, in death, joining) their gods, then it may be that a variety of circumstances have fashioned something particularly malignant at Harrenhal.

That's very interesting.  With the trees taken or destroyed; they have no connection to their godhood but preserve themselves in stone.

[Black Crow]

1 hour ago, Matthew. said:

As usual, incredibly interesting insights.

I don't know if this entirely relates to what you propose with the devil at Harrenhal answering prayers (rather than the spirits of the wood), but I have this vague suspicion that "the gods" as understood by the CotF might not entirely align with the gods as understood by the First Men; certain comments from Leaf give me the impression that the CotF approach is more animistic (eg, talking of the spirits of the dead going into stone), and the gods are not merely limited to the trees.

I'm also thinking of this passage from Arianne II, TWOW (spoilers):
 

  Hide contents

And all at once she found herself in another cavern, five times as big as the last one, surrounded by a forest of stone columns. Daemon Sand moved to her side and raised his torch. “Look how the stone’s been shaped,” he said. “Those columns, and the wall there. See them?”

“Faces,” said Arianne. So many sad eyes, staring.

“This place belonged to the children of the forest.”

I don't know how to articulate this exactly, but if the CotF are not worshiping what is already present, but actively fashioning (and, in death, joining) their gods, then it may be that a variety of circumstances have fashioned something particularly malignant at Harrenhal.

Oh I do l essays in this direction.ike this idea and it is very consistent with what we do know of the tree-huggers and GRRM's other

[JNR]

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

What if Rheagar allowed (or even endorsed) the false narrative that he was a philanderer

Yes, if the narrative was false, it's virtually beyond doubt to me that Rhaegar did allow that narrative to go unchecked.  

Because if he had denied it, that denial could only have happened in the relatively short time between his return "from the south," and his death at the Trident.  

So Selmy -- who was also in King's Landing then and in the same circles as Rhaegar, as a Kingsguard -- surely would have heard.  And we would not find him thinking what he does in ADWD on this subject, with no qualifications or doubts in his mind.

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

We are, in essence, attempting to predict the future--predict what the author will write...when the author himself seems to have done a fairly poor job of predicting what he will eventually write

Well, we know, for sure, that GRRM has incorporated certain planned mysteries, and their planned revelations, because he's said this outright many times in many interviews and SSMs.  

For instance, in stating in 2013 that he had a revelation planned for book six, and that one or two people as far back in the nineties had guessed it.

He's backed up this kind of thinking up in slightly subtler ways with remarks like this:

Quote

My mother would always predict where the plots were going, whether it was I Love Lucy or something like that. "Well, this is going to happen," she would say. And, sure enough, it would happen! And nothing was more delightful, when something different happened, when it suddenly took a twist. As long as the twist was justified. You can’t just arbitrarily throw in twists and turns that make no sense. Things have to follow. You want the thing in the end where you say, "Oh my God, I didn’t see that coming, but there was foreshadowing; there was a hint of it here, there was a hint of it there. I should have seen it coming." And that, to me, is very satisfying. I look for that in the fiction that I read and I try to put it into my own fiction.

Those hints and that foreshadowing don't design and write themselves.  They must be planned and deliberately incorporated into the canon.

So there is really zero doubt to me that there are fixed solutions to specific mysteries and it makes perfect sense to try to work them out in advance.  It's only a question of which mysteries they are.  The fans often focus on things that may never be revealed, or really may not even be mysteries at all.

Jon's parentage is, we know, one such planned mystery with a planned revelation.  We know this because it's not known to Jon right now and yet GRRM said in a Barnes & Noble interview that Jon would eventually learn who his parents (plural) were.

I think there are several others of comparable complexity and sophistication, and greater importance to the plot, and these have gone woefully underanalyzed by the fans.  But I also have no particular reason to think revelations are coming in the next book; we'll see.