Hi, Selam!
This is actually my old thread. Of course this version is much more organized and has added more analysis. In short, this is an extended version of the my old thread.
I could not edit my old thread (because it's old topic), so I decided to reopen it, I hope this is not a problem in general. After all I rewrote the original from scratch. Let's begin.
______
Now you all know Martin's letter he wrote in '93. When this letter was written and sent to the editor, the first 13 chapters (170pages) were already written(Of course, Martin was angry at the release of this letter, because technically it contains spoilers about the story line and the plot). In addition, the book consisted of three volumes of the first stage, but as you know, but its 7 volumes now.
Naturally, as a "first outline", it is being spread and spread on the internet. It was touted on news sites and forums as "Martin actually wanted to write the first stage books this way!". What has been repeated ever since is "Martin has completely abandoned the first outline. Only one or two things stayed the same." When I heard that, of course I took the letter and read it and put it aside without questioning it, but then lightning struck me. So I went back to the letter and went through it.
*~~Let's go through it again together and find out if Martin has completely abandoned the first outline.~~*
1) Martin plotted the story around 3 main conflicts.
a) The Stark-Lannister War.
The war between House Stark and House Lannister, which set off a domino effect that ignited the 7 kingdoms... That was the plot of the first book.
b) The Invasion of Dany.
The exiled princess across the Narrow Sea, gathering the Dothraki and attempting to invade the 7 Kingdoms... Since the series was originally conceived as 3 books, Dany was arrive during book 2, The Dance of the Dragons.
c) The Others.
This was designed to be the subject of the last book, The Winds of Winter. The final battle will also bring together characters and narrative threads from the first two books, and they will all be resolved in a huge climax. So we will see all our characters together in the last book, that's for sure.
*These remain exactly as they were originally designed.*
But as you know, the series grew to 7 books, which in itself was an endeavor for the author. When he finished the first book, he had too much subject matter for the first book, that is, he had written the story in a very wide way that he could not tell in the first book, so he divided the remaining parts and the 2nd book, A Clash of Kings, came out, and our series went to 4 books. You know, the same thing happened for the 4th book, and then he divided the book in half again and wrote the 4th and 5th books, bringing the series to 6 books. At last he realized that it was not working, the subject was too wide, it would not end in 6 books... It became 7 books. I hope it won't be 8, this is a serious problem considering the speed of writing... He also wanted to do a 5-year jump after the 3rd book because he wanted Arya and Bran to finish their training and grow up, and the dragons would also grow up in this process.
He actually wrote the 4th book in this way with a 5-year jump... In fact, this part will be a spoiler, so skip it if you don't want to hear it... In book 4, Tommen was dead and Cersei's daughter Myrcella was already on the throne and was queen. What happened in 5 years was written in flashback scenes, but GRRM realized that this was not working, especially the silence of the Wall for 5 years could not be handled in a logical way, so GRRM gave up on this 5-year skip, even though he tried very hard and pushed the limits, and started to rewrite the book from scratch and turned it into Feast of Crows and then Dance of Dragons. If I remember correctly, according to Linda and Eliot, Martin's sidekicks, the current story timeframe coincides with the timeframe Martin wanted for Arya and Bran to complete their training, so our babies will be back with a bang. Actually, let me open another parenthesis, another reason for this time jump is that Martin finds it boring to write the training scenes, at least for Bran, because as you know, Bran's mobility is very limited because he's crippled and that makes it a bit challenging to write, let's not forget that he has a lot of magical scenes, so for Martin, writing Bran scenes is not that enjoyable.
**2) Martin's Big Five**
~OUTLINE~: There are, of course, many main characters in the story, but among ASOIAF readers there are key characters who are Martin's Big Five; Jon, Arya, Bran, Dany and Tyrion. What sets these five characters apart from the other main characters and turns them into key characters is their importance for "key" points in the story.
In Martin's words:
~~IN BOOKS:~~ The presence and importance of this big key five is still the same in the books. There is no change.
After that, Martin goes into more detail about what happened in the FIRST BOOK, during A Game of Thrones.
3) The Fall of the Starks
~~OUTLINE:~~ Martin was talking about the Starks going down in a serious way. In the first stage, Cat seems to have gone to King's Landing with her family, and Tyrion returned with them, not to the Wall. Here Tyrion made friends with Arya and Sansa. Ned finds out why Jon Arryn died, but before he has a chance to use the information, the king dies and then the new king Joffrey takes the throne and of course he doesn't react well to Ned's action and that's that.
Martin says that from the very beginning Sansa chose Joff and his son over her family, and of course she's going to regret it later. So Sansa is the unfaithful one for the Starks and Jaime and Tyrion for the Lannisters.
~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now, broadly speaking, the fall of the Starks happened in the same way; Ned dies and Arya flees the city and sets out to return to Winterfell, but she hasn't arrived yet. Of course her mother Cat is not here from the beginning. Tyrion spends time in the Wall instead of the capital and befriends Jon Snow. *I think for Martin, one way or another, he cared that Tyrion befriended one of the Starks*. Jon was probably the best choice, given who he is and what's to come. Sansa doesn't marry Joff and have his baby, but she chooses him over her family and has to deal with regrettable troubles. But then she marries Tyrion in book 3 and it seems that Martin has not given up on his desire to marry her off to a Lannister.
4) Bran, Coma Dream and his abilities
~~OUTLINE:~~ Bran was in a coma and after a strange dream he woke up to find that he was crippled. At first he hopes it will cure his legs, but then he turns to "magic" because he likes it. When Ned is executed, Bran sees the disasters that will befall his family, but nothing he says makes Robb take him seriously, so Robb calls his bannermen and the north goes to war with the south. Robb will win many glorious victories, but after crippling Joff on the battlefield, he will be defeated and killed by the Jaime-Tyrion alliance. (*By the way, Tyrion will later lose faith in his family)
Now, from the details here, the cause of Jon Arryn's death is again the Jaime-Cersei relationship... Martin didn't feel the need to mention the twin here, but the fact that Bran fell and was crippled shows us a bit of that. Probably Cersei didn't have a very important role at first, Martin collected all the good and bad aspects in Jaime, but then he transferred the bad aspects to Cersei and made her more prominent and brought her into the war for the throne, while Jaime, on the contrary, changed as someone who chooses to stay away from these wars as much as possible and does not like to rule.
~~But let's not forget that Martin has said that he conceived Jaime as a complex character from the very beginning.~~
~~IN BOOKS:~~ Bran's coma and dream and powers remain the same and Robb doesn't listen to the boy in any way, no one does. He hopes that his Green Seer abilities and the Crow will heal him, but in the last book we can see that he is slowly starting to like the powers he has.
There's no sign of Rickon, so he must be an afterthought.
Robb wins some serious victories, fights a war and at the end of the day he is killed at the Red Wedding, not in a battle. Honestly, it's a more tragic scene than him dying in battle. But the important point is that the key moment of Robb winning the battles and then being killed is preserved in the same way...
5) The Story of Jon Snow
~~OUTLINE:~~ Now, according to the letter, Jon Snow goes to the Wall and grows up as a brave guard, matures and will eventually follow in his uncle's footsteps as Lord Commander. When Winterfell is burned by Tyrion's attack ^((presumably Tyrion enters the North after the battle in which Robb was killed)), Cat, Arya and Bran take refuge at the Wall as the Lannisters come after them. Jon and Benjen cannot help them because of their oaths and Jon has to suffer for it. This will cause a rift between Jon and Bran. Arya will be more forgiving towards Jon, but then she will realize with horror that she is in love with Jon Snow, and since Jon is not only her half-brother, but also someone who has taken a vow of celibacy to the Watch, her love will be impossible anyway. Of course, Jon realizes that he is in love with Arya in the same way. In the next two books, this love will be an pain for both of them until the truth about Jon's family is revealed.
~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now we can actually see that Jon's story is almost unchanged. Jon still comes to the wall, grows up and becomes Lord Commander at the end of book 3. ~~The KEY moment of Jon being torn between his family and his oath remains the same;~~ in the first book he tries to run away to help Robb and Ned, but then he gives up and comes back. But in book 5 he is torn between helping Arya and his oaths, and we see him really agonize over this throughout book 5, and in the end he breaks his oaths for Arya and is killed.
*~~What's different is that~~* it's Theon and Ramsay who bring down and burn Winterfell. Bran, Rickon and the Reed children are the ones who escape. They come to the Wall, but instead of seeking refuge with Jon, they go beyond the Wall, unseen, to find the Three-Eyed Crow. Rickon, of course, leaves them before that. Arya is trying to reach Winterfell after fleeing the city, but she STILL doesn't make it through the 5 books, getting into a separate adventure on the way. Cat's story is parallel to Robb's story and she is killed along with her son. She dies anyway.
As far as I understand here, Benjen was originally conceived as Lord Commander and is killed by the author so that Jon can become Lord Commander. *"Following in his uncle's footsteps..."* is what I inferred from this sentence, but obviously this happens in the next book because in the first book, Cat and her children take refuge in the wall and Benjen is there. But instead of Benjen being killed, at least obviously... he went to beyond the Wall and disappears. Jon loses another family member and is left alone on the Wall.
The love affair between Jon Snow and Arya remains a mystery "^(for now)" According to the story, this love affair is revealed when Arya and Jon leave Winterfell and reunite on the Wall. [There are many hints and even foreshadowings of Jon-Arya love] throughout the five books, and according to Martin, the first book is too foreshadowing in many ways, something he regrets a little bit, as I recall. For example, a sentence in the first half of the book is a foreshadowing that points to the end of the series. On the other hand, there are even signs that Jon will die and be resurrected, and of course the Jon-Arya thing I mentioned, which couldn't be more natural because even if the first outline is completely abandoned as claimed, the signs will continue in the same way because this is something that will be true for after the first and probably the first two books. So I find it a bit funny when people say that the arguments in the first two books are far-fetched and not foreshadowing, because they are obvious signs. Anyway.
On the other hand, the issue of Jon's parents... this is actually the biggest twist of the story, and even though it hasn't been revealed in the books yet(^(but D&D confirmed it's the same in the books)), it's obviously continued in the same way. So Jon is not Ned Stark's son. Until this information is revealed, Jon and Arya in pain because their love, but then they are both relieved because the obstacle that prevents them from living their love freely is removed.
6) Journey Beyond the Wall
~~OUTLINE:~~ With no help, Cat and her children cross the Wall and fall into the hands of Mance, king of the Wildlings. While there, they are attacked by the Others and Cat is killed by them. Bran and Arya manage to escape thanks to Bran's powers and Arya's sword named Needle. After that, no information was shared even about what happened here.
~~IN BOOKS:~~ As I said before, Cat's story progresses with Robb and she is killed with her son at the Red Wedding, so instead of being with Ayra and Bran, she is with her other son Robb. Cat is then resurrected as a fire wight. Here I thought Cat would be resurrected as the first ice wight, although I'm not sure if she would be someone like Coldhands or if she would be resurrected as a dead-body bag who essentially stays dead. If it's the second one, it wouldn't matter in the story, but if it's the first, she would have an important role because now Martin has said that Stoneheart has an important role in the series. So the character of Coldhand, who is highly likely in the first plan, could be Cat herself. I don't have any evidence for that, but the math of the fiction led me to think that; clearly Martin didn't intend to get rid of the character of Cat.
Bran crosses the Wall with the Reed children, but instead of the Others, he encounters its dead puppets and is taken to the Crow with the help of an ice wight named Coldhands. Here he is in training. We also see him trying to protect himself at the first stage by using his powers, of course, and he even helped Jon when he was on the Wall.
While Arya's adventure was limited to a narrow area in the first phase, it is now spread over a much wider area. Arya's first stage is to go north to reach home and get "revenge". Martin has probably continued to follow the template of keeping each character separate from each other in order for them to grow and mature. We see that Arya has the Needle. This means that the scene where Jon gives her the Needle is exactly in the first plan.
On the other hand, it is very difficult to say something general about Arya and Bran's story because Martin did not give any information about them after the Wall in the letter, so it is impossible to determine how much change there is in their adventures. And *99% of the events described in the letter belong to the first book.
7) Dany and Essos
~~OUTLINE:~~ We see Dany married off to Drogo in the first stage. Her husband is not very interested in invading the kingdom. Viserys finally breaks the rules of courtesy and Drogo kills him. So Dany will remain the sole representative of her house and the sole heir to the throne and she will not forget and she will bide her time. When the moment is right, she will kill her husband to avenge her brother and run away with a friend(Jorah probably). The Dothraki are after them... One sentence here is censored. The next sentence says she will find dragon eggs in the sand. The birth of a baby dragon will give Dany the power to rule the Dothraki lands as she wishes. Then her plans to invade Westeros will begin.
~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now, in general, there is only a 5% change in the first part; Dany kills her husband, but it is for "mercy", not for Viserys. In the second part, there is only a 5% story similarity, but the KEY MOMENT, the birth of the dragon and the plans to dominate and occupy remain the same. The dominance here is different; Dany's first stage is not directly dominating the Dothraki, but first Astapor, then Yunkai and Meereen with her conquests. Actually, this was an inevitable change because, as I said at the beginning, the author envisioned 3 books when he first designed it and in book 2, Dany was coming to Westeros, so she should have come to the Realm in the Dance of the Dragons book. But the books multiplied, and this caused the story of each character to expand. Dany eventually confronted the Dothraki again, and with them behind her, she will finally set out.
8) Tyrion's Transformation
~~OUTLINE:~~ Tyrion will be involved in intrigue and games for the throne... his scheming personality etc. is obvious but in the end he will dethrone Joffrey, disgusted by his nephew's brutality... Then Jaime kills all the candidates who stand in his way of succession and blames it on Tyrion and becomes Joff's heir, and then Tyrion is exiled. After his brother's betrayal, he will change sides and join forces with the Starks. Meanwhile, Tyrion will fall in love with Arya. It will be an unrequited love and will lead to a deadly rivalry with Jon. There's a paragraph here that's censored. And then it ends with "but that will happen in the second book". Possibly the "banishment" could be a matter of being sent to the wall, I can't think of any other way, but he could also be banished to Essos, of course, but since Tyrion found himself directly in the north, the wall seems to be a more appropriate punishment for this crime.
On the other hand, Jaime kills everyone who could have succeeded Joffrey to the throne so that he could sit on the throne, so that means he even killed Joff's son and Sansa. Sansa is never mentioned again after giving birth to a son. This shows that she did not have a very prominent role in the first plan. Later, she is given a prominent role and takes her place as one of the main characters.
~~IN BOOKS:~~ Tyrion's wars for the throne and intrigue continue in the same way. He doesn't dethrone Joffrey, but he is accused of murdering him and there is an exile to Essos, the only difference is that he exiles himself for his own survival. Also, there is no joining forces with the Starks for now, of course there is no fight for Jon and Arya's love, there is not even a scene where he talks to Arya, but there is a scene that I see as a little waving hand from the author. In book 6, in Arya's Mercy POV, there is a scene between the dwarf who plays Tyrion and Arya (who probably plays Shae); Arya squeezes the nose of the dwarf who is hitting on her and says "another nose will not grow"... Although I see this as a waving hand to the first plan, you never know, maybe this love triangle will turn into reality, but I doubt it. Tyrion is also marrying Sansa and will join forces with the Targaryens in the future.
Still, I expect Tyrion to join the Starks/ Jon, in the future. This friendship is not designed for nothing. So we can foresee a Stark-Tyrion collaboration like in the outline.
So even though there have been changes in the events, the overall story has remained basically the same; the KEY MOMENTS are still intact; Tyrion is accused of Joff's death, he is betrayed by Jaime over Thysa and by Cersei and his father over other matters, which puts him in a position against his own family and pushes him to collaborate with his family's enemies, leading to his exile. Even Tyrion thinks exile to the Wall,but of course it doesn't happen that way.
On the other hand, although Jaime seems to be the main villain of the story, the author creates more villains by diversifying and Jaime's evil side is transferred to his twin Cersei, so that the queen's character has a prominent storyline. The sibling who wants Tyrion's dead is also shown as Cersei and her father instead of Jaime. Since Sansa didn't marry Joff and have her baby, there is no massacre within House Lannister, there is only a prophecy that Cersei's children will die, which sort of highlights the issue of those in the order of succession dying, but in different ways and by others. But there's also some kind of massacre within the Lannister side. Tywin, the children and Kevan are dying.
THE RESULT
The letter ends here. As we can see, there is actually very little change in the story that Martin mentions in the letter. I think the point that misleads people is that some events have undergone serious changes; I mean, the plot of Jaime and Bran and even the changes in some events in Tyrion's story are remarkable, especially the Jaime issue, I guess people just can't quite interpret the difference in character arc/thema and plot.
*If we make a rough summary*; while the arcs/thema refers to things like the Big Five being betrayed and tested as they change both the world and themselves on their way from childhood to adulthood, the plot is the sequence of experiences about what these events are. Let me go into a little more detail.
So things like Jon going to the wall as a bastard and suffering and growing up between his oaths and his family is his arc/thema, while things like being elected Lord Commander at the wall and saw the Others and being killed are the plotline. Martin has made some changes and even expansions in the plots while remaining faithful to the overall arcs/thema. In other words, the parts I mentioned as KEY MOMENTS, even though he made some plot changes in some characters, he remained faithful to the arc/thema in the same way. While Tyrion's being betrayed by his family and being an enemy to them is the storyline that has never changed, there have been changes in the plots that explain how this will happen, some of them have never happened, while some of them have had minor changes. In summary, as planned, those who should have been betrayed were betrayed; those who should have suffered between their oaths and their loved ones suffered again; those who should have turned against their family turned against them again... THE KEY MOMENTS continued to unfold in a different, similar or identical way to what was originally planned.
Key moments continued to be handled differently, similarly or the same as originally planned.
Martin has already said many times before that he knew the end of the main character, the end of the story, who was going to die, who was going to get married and who was going to sit on the iron throne since 1991, so he said that he continued the story as he had originally planned. He said that the main key moments continue in the same way, that he knew this from the very beginning, but in ~~my interpretation;~~ he says that he discovered the side roads, so to speak, that lead to the main roads over time. Likewise, how the story of the minor characters will take shape... He always knew how the story of some of the big characters; Arya, Tyrion and Jon will end... it was always planned.
Martin knows the fate of the key five characters, and Sansa, and big Lannisters. He also said wrote that some major character's arcs as he had planned from the beginning. He keeps his end.
To be more detailed and specific, questions were asked in previous years about whether there was a deviation in the story. Here are those questions and his answers.
I mentioned in the beginning when I was talking about the writing process of the book that as Martin increased the number of books, the plot of the characters started to expand. For example, if Dany was going to come to Westeros in book 3, she would never sit in Meereen and go through what she went through, and if it had continued as the first three books, it would have been a sign that she would come in book 2 and we would never have read the Astapor, Yunkai and Meereen chapters. As the number of books increases, the plot of events that the characters go through and its effect on the overall story also expands and increases. This is inevitable, but looking at this, it is not right to say that Martin's initial plans have completely changed, that he abandoned the outline totally, because it is obvious that both the storyline is almost the same and the statements he made with his own mouth show that he did not abandon it.
Anyway, if you pay attention, there are some parts of the letter that were censored, that is, they avoided spoilers about the events that are still surprising and that they expect to happen, but frankly, they also gave good spoilers by not censoring some issues such as Jon's parents. They probably didn't feel the need to cover it up because there were theories that most people guessed and accepted as true. Also, as I said, 99% of what is told in this letter is about what happened in the first book, so i guess they acted with the logic of "this happened anyway, this part is not considered a spoiler".
That's all. Thank you for read and I apologize for my grammatical mistakes. Bye.
Hi, Selam! This is actually my old thread. Of course this version is much more organized and has added more analysis. In short, this is an extended version of the my old thread. I could not edit my old thread (because it's old topic), so I decided to reopen it, I hope this is not a problem in general. After all I rewrote the original from scratch. Let's begin. ______ Now you all know Martin's letter he wrote in '93. When this letter was written and sent to the editor, the first 13 chapters (170pages) were already written(Of course, Martin was angry at the release of this letter, because technically it contains spoilers about the story line and the plot). In addition, the book consisted of three volumes of the first stage, but as you know, but its 7 volumes now. Naturally, as a "first outline", it is being spread and spread on the internet. It was touted on news sites and forums as "Martin actually wanted to write the first stage books this way!". What has been repeated ever since is "Martin has completely abandoned the first outline. Only one or two things stayed the same." When I heard that, of course I took the letter and read it and put it aside without questioning it, but then lightning struck me. So I went back to the letter and went through it. *~~Let's go through it again together and find out if Martin has completely abandoned the first outline.~~* 1) Martin plotted the story around 3 main conflicts. a) The Stark-Lannister War. The war between House Stark and House Lannister, which set off a domino effect that ignited the 7 kingdoms... That was the plot of the first book. b) The Invasion of Dany. The exiled princess across the Narrow Sea, gathering the Dothraki and attempting to invade the 7 Kingdoms... Since the series was originally conceived as 3 books, Dany was arrive during book 2, The Dance of the Dragons. c) The Others. This was designed to be the subject of the last book, The Winds of Winter. The final battle will also bring together characters and narrative threads from the first two books, and they will all be resolved in a huge climax. So we will see all our characters together in the last book, that's for sure. *These remain exactly as they were originally designed.* But as you know, the series grew to 7 books, which in itself was an endeavor for the author. When he finished the first book, he had too much subject matter for the first book, that is, he had written the story in a very wide way that he could not tell in the first book, so he divided the remaining parts and the 2nd book, A Clash of Kings, came out, and our series went to 4 books. You know, the same thing happened for the 4th book, and then he divided the book in half again and wrote the 4th and 5th books, bringing the series to 6 books. At last he realized that it was not working, the subject was too wide, it would not end in 6 books... It became 7 books. I hope it won't be 8, this is a serious problem considering the speed of writing... He also wanted to do a 5-year jump after the 3rd book because he wanted Arya and Bran to finish their training and grow up, and the dragons would also grow up in this process. He actually wrote the 4th book in this way with a 5-year jump... In fact, this part will be a spoiler, so skip it if you don't want to hear it... In book 4, Tommen was dead and Cersei's daughter Myrcella was already on the throne and was queen. What happened in 5 years was written in flashback scenes, but GRRM realized that this was not working, especially the silence of the Wall for 5 years could not be handled in a logical way, so GRRM gave up on this 5-year skip, even though he tried very hard and pushed the limits, and started to rewrite the book from scratch and turned it into Feast of Crows and then Dance of Dragons. If I remember correctly, according to Linda and Eliot, Martin's sidekicks, the current story timeframe coincides with the timeframe Martin wanted for Arya and Bran to complete their training, so our babies will be back with a bang. Actually, let me open another parenthesis, another reason for this time jump is that Martin finds it boring to write the training scenes, at least for Bran, because as you know, Bran's mobility is very limited because he's crippled and that makes it a bit challenging to write, let's not forget that he has a lot of magical scenes, so for Martin, writing Bran scenes is not that enjoyable. **2) Martin's Big Five** ~OUTLINE~: There are, of course, many main characters in the story, but among ASOIAF readers there are key characters who are Martin's Big Five; Jon, Arya, Bran, Dany and Tyrion. What sets these five characters apart from the other main characters and turns them into key characters is their importance for "key" points in the story. In Martin's words: ~~IN BOOKS:~~ The presence and importance of this big key five is still the same in the books. There is no change. After that, Martin goes into more detail about what happened in the FIRST BOOK, during A Game of Thrones. 3) The Fall of the Starks ~~OUTLINE:~~ Martin was talking about the Starks going down in a serious way. In the first stage, Cat seems to have gone to King's Landing with her family, and Tyrion returned with them, not to the Wall. Here Tyrion made friends with Arya and Sansa. Ned finds out why Jon Arryn died, but before he has a chance to use the information, the king dies and then the new king Joffrey takes the throne and of course he doesn't react well to Ned's action and that's that. Martin says that from the very beginning Sansa chose Joff and his son over her family, and of course she's going to regret it later. So Sansa is the unfaithful one for the Starks and Jaime and Tyrion for the Lannisters. ~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now, broadly speaking, the fall of the Starks happened in the same way; Ned dies and Arya flees the city and sets out to return to Winterfell, but she hasn't arrived yet. Of course her mother Cat is not here from the beginning. Tyrion spends time in the Wall instead of the capital and befriends Jon Snow. *I think for Martin, one way or another, he cared that Tyrion befriended one of the Starks*. Jon was probably the best choice, given who he is and what's to come. Sansa doesn't marry Joff and have his baby, but she chooses him over her family and has to deal with regrettable troubles. But then she marries Tyrion in book 3 and it seems that Martin has not given up on his desire to marry her off to a Lannister. 4) Bran, Coma Dream and his abilities ~~OUTLINE:~~ Bran was in a coma and after a strange dream he woke up to find that he was crippled. At first he hopes it will cure his legs, but then he turns to "magic" because he likes it. When Ned is executed, Bran sees the disasters that will befall his family, but nothing he says makes Robb take him seriously, so Robb calls his bannermen and the north goes to war with the south. Robb will win many glorious victories, but after crippling Joff on the battlefield, he will be defeated and killed by the Jaime-Tyrion alliance. (*By the way, Tyrion will later lose faith in his family) Now, from the details here, the cause of Jon Arryn's death is again the Jaime-Cersei relationship... Martin didn't feel the need to mention the twin here, but the fact that Bran fell and was crippled shows us a bit of that. Probably Cersei didn't have a very important role at first, Martin collected all the good and bad aspects in Jaime, but then he transferred the bad aspects to Cersei and made her more prominent and brought her into the war for the throne, while Jaime, on the contrary, changed as someone who chooses to stay away from these wars as much as possible and does not like to rule. ~~But let's not forget that Martin has said that he conceived Jaime as a complex character from the very beginning.~~ ~~IN BOOKS:~~ Bran's coma and dream and powers remain the same and Robb doesn't listen to the boy in any way, no one does. He hopes that his Green Seer abilities and the Crow will heal him, but in the last book we can see that he is slowly starting to like the powers he has. There's no sign of Rickon, so he must be an afterthought. Robb wins some serious victories, fights a war and at the end of the day he is killed at the Red Wedding, not in a battle. Honestly, it's a more tragic scene than him dying in battle. But the important point is that the key moment of Robb winning the battles and then being killed is preserved in the same way... 5) The Story of Jon Snow ~~OUTLINE:~~ Now, according to the letter, Jon Snow goes to the Wall and grows up as a brave guard, matures and will eventually follow in his uncle's footsteps as Lord Commander. When Winterfell is burned by Tyrion's attack ^((presumably Tyrion enters the North after the battle in which Robb was killed)), Cat, Arya and Bran take refuge at the Wall as the Lannisters come after them. Jon and Benjen cannot help them because of their oaths and Jon has to suffer for it. This will cause a rift between Jon and Bran. Arya will be more forgiving towards Jon, but then she will realize with horror that she is in love with Jon Snow, and since Jon is not only her half-brother, but also someone who has taken a vow of celibacy to the Watch, her love will be impossible anyway. Of course, Jon realizes that he is in love with Arya in the same way. In the next two books, this love will be an pain for both of them until the truth about Jon's family is revealed. ~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now we can actually see that Jon's story is almost unchanged. Jon still comes to the wall, grows up and becomes Lord Commander at the end of book 3. ~~The KEY moment of Jon being torn between his family and his oath remains the same;~~ in the first book he tries to run away to help Robb and Ned, but then he gives up and comes back. But in book 5 he is torn between helping Arya and his oaths, and we see him really agonize over this throughout book 5, and in the end he breaks his oaths for Arya and is killed. *~~What's different is that~~* it's Theon and Ramsay who bring down and burn Winterfell. Bran, Rickon and the Reed children are the ones who escape. They come to the Wall, but instead of seeking refuge with Jon, they go beyond the Wall, unseen, to find the Three-Eyed Crow. Rickon, of course, leaves them before that. Arya is trying to reach Winterfell after fleeing the city, but she STILL doesn't make it through the 5 books, getting into a separate adventure on the way. Cat's story is parallel to Robb's story and she is killed along with her son. She dies anyway. As far as I understand here, Benjen was originally conceived as Lord Commander and is killed by the author so that Jon can become Lord Commander. *"Following in his uncle's footsteps..."* is what I inferred from this sentence, but obviously this happens in the next book because in the first book, Cat and her children take refuge in the wall and Benjen is there. But instead of Benjen being killed, at least obviously... he went to beyond the Wall and disappears. Jon loses another family member and is left alone on the Wall. The love affair between Jon Snow and Arya remains a mystery "^(for now)" According to the story, this love affair is revealed when Arya and Jon leave Winterfell and reunite on the Wall. [There are many hints and even foreshadowings of Jon-Arya love] throughout the five books, and according to Martin, the first book is too foreshadowing in many ways, something he regrets a little bit, as I recall. For example, a sentence in the first half of the book is a foreshadowing that points to the end of the series. On the other hand, there are even signs that Jon will die and be resurrected, and of course the Jon-Arya thing I mentioned, which couldn't be more natural because even if the first outline is completely abandoned as claimed, the signs will continue in the same way because this is something that will be true for after the first and probably the first two books. So I find it a bit funny when people say that the arguments in the first two books are far-fetched and not foreshadowing, because they are obvious signs. Anyway. On the other hand, the issue of Jon's parents... this is actually the biggest twist of the story, and even though it hasn't been revealed in the books yet(^(but D&D confirmed it's the same in the books)), it's obviously continued in the same way. So Jon is not Ned Stark's son. Until this information is revealed, Jon and Arya in pain because their love, but then they are both relieved because the obstacle that prevents them from living their love freely is removed. 6) Journey Beyond the Wall ~~OUTLINE:~~ With no help, Cat and her children cross the Wall and fall into the hands of Mance, king of the Wildlings. While there, they are attacked by the Others and Cat is killed by them. Bran and Arya manage to escape thanks to Bran's powers and Arya's sword named Needle. After that, no information was shared even about what happened here. ~~IN BOOKS:~~ As I said before, Cat's story progresses with Robb and she is killed with her son at the Red Wedding, so instead of being with Ayra and Bran, she is with her other son Robb. Cat is then resurrected as a fire wight. Here I thought Cat would be resurrected as the first ice wight, although I'm not sure if she would be someone like Coldhands or if she would be resurrected as a dead-body bag who essentially stays dead. If it's the second one, it wouldn't matter in the story, but if it's the first, she would have an important role because now Martin has said that Stoneheart has an important role in the series. So the character of Coldhand, who is highly likely in the first plan, could be Cat herself. I don't have any evidence for that, but the math of the fiction led me to think that; clearly Martin didn't intend to get rid of the character of Cat. Bran crosses the Wall with the Reed children, but instead of the Others, he encounters its dead puppets and is taken to the Crow with the help of an ice wight named Coldhands. Here he is in training. We also see him trying to protect himself at the first stage by using his powers, of course, and he even helped Jon when he was on the Wall. While Arya's adventure was limited to a narrow area in the first phase, it is now spread over a much wider area. Arya's first stage is to go north to reach home and get "revenge". Martin has probably continued to follow the template of keeping each character separate from each other in order for them to grow and mature. We see that Arya has the Needle. This means that the scene where Jon gives her the Needle is exactly in the first plan. On the other hand, it is very difficult to say something general about Arya and Bran's story because Martin did not give any information about them after the Wall in the letter, so it is impossible to determine how much change there is in their adventures. And *99% of the events described in the letter belong to the first book. 7) Dany and Essos ~~OUTLINE:~~ We see Dany married off to Drogo in the first stage. Her husband is not very interested in invading the kingdom. Viserys finally breaks the rules of courtesy and Drogo kills him. So Dany will remain the sole representative of her house and the sole heir to the throne and she will not forget and she will bide her time. When the moment is right, she will kill her husband to avenge her brother and run away with a friend(Jorah probably). The Dothraki are after them... One sentence here is censored. The next sentence says she will find dragon eggs in the sand. The birth of a baby dragon will give Dany the power to rule the Dothraki lands as she wishes. Then her plans to invade Westeros will begin. ~~IN BOOKS:~~ Now, in general, there is only a 5% change in the first part; Dany kills her husband, but it is for "mercy", not for Viserys. In the second part, there is only a 5% story similarity, but the KEY MOMENT, the birth of the dragon and the plans to dominate and occupy remain the same. The dominance here is different; Dany's first stage is not directly dominating the Dothraki, but first Astapor, then Yunkai and Meereen with her conquests. Actually, this was an inevitable change because, as I said at the beginning, the author envisioned 3 books when he first designed it and in book 2, Dany was coming to Westeros, so she should have come to the Realm in the Dance of the Dragons book. But the books multiplied, and this caused the story of each character to expand. Dany eventually confronted the Dothraki again, and with them behind her, she will finally set out. 8) Tyrion's Transformation ~~OUTLINE:~~ Tyrion will be involved in intrigue and games for the throne... his scheming personality etc. is obvious but in the end he will dethrone Joffrey, disgusted by his nephew's brutality... Then Jaime kills all the candidates who stand in his way of succession and blames it on Tyrion and becomes Joff's heir, and then Tyrion is exiled. After his brother's betrayal, he will change sides and join forces with the Starks. Meanwhile, Tyrion will fall in love with Arya. It will be an unrequited love and will lead to a deadly rivalry with Jon. There's a paragraph here that's censored. And then it ends with "but that will happen in the second book". Possibly the "banishment" could be a matter of being sent to the wall, I can't think of any other way, but he could also be banished to Essos, of course, but since Tyrion found himself directly in the north, the wall seems to be a more appropriate punishment for this crime. On the other hand, Jaime kills everyone who could have succeeded Joffrey to the throne so that he could sit on the throne, so that means he even killed Joff's son and Sansa. Sansa is never mentioned again after giving birth to a son. This shows that she did not have a very prominent role in the first plan. Later, she is given a prominent role and takes her place as one of the main characters. ~~IN BOOKS:~~ Tyrion's wars for the throne and intrigue continue in the same way. He doesn't dethrone Joffrey, but he is accused of murdering him and there is an exile to Essos, the only difference is that he exiles himself for his own survival. Also, there is no joining forces with the Starks for now, of course there is no fight for Jon and Arya's love, there is not even a scene where he talks to Arya, but there is a scene that I see as a little waving hand from the author. In book 6, in Arya's Mercy POV, there is a scene between the dwarf who plays Tyrion and Arya (who probably plays Shae); Arya squeezes the nose of the dwarf who is hitting on her and says "another nose will not grow"... Although I see this as a waving hand to the first plan, you never know, maybe this love triangle will turn into reality, but I doubt it. Tyrion is also marrying Sansa and will join forces with the Targaryens in the future. Still, I expect Tyrion to join the Starks/ Jon, in the future. This friendship is not designed for nothing. So we can foresee a Stark-Tyrion collaboration like in the outline. So even though there have been changes in the events, the overall story has remained basically the same; the KEY MOMENTS are still intact; Tyrion is accused of Joff's death, he is betrayed by Jaime over Thysa and by Cersei and his father over other matters, which puts him in a position against his own family and pushes him to collaborate with his family's enemies, leading to his exile. Even Tyrion thinks exile to the Wall,but of course it doesn't happen that way. On the other hand, although Jaime seems to be the main villain of the story, the author creates more villains by diversifying and Jaime's evil side is transferred to his twin Cersei, so that the queen's character has a prominent storyline. The sibling who wants Tyrion's dead is also shown as Cersei and her father instead of Jaime. Since Sansa didn't marry Joff and have her baby, there is no massacre within House Lannister, there is only a prophecy that Cersei's children will die, which sort of highlights the issue of those in the order of succession dying, but in different ways and by others. But there's also some kind of massacre within the Lannister side. Tywin, the children and Kevan are dying. THE RESULT The letter ends here. As we can see, there is actually very little change in the story that Martin mentions in the letter. I think the point that misleads people is that some events have undergone serious changes; I mean, the plot of Jaime and Bran and even the changes in some events in Tyrion's story are remarkable, especially the Jaime issue, I guess people just can't quite interpret the difference in character arc/thema and plot. *If we make a rough summary*; while the arcs/thema refers to things like the Big Five being betrayed and tested as they change both the world and themselves on their way from childhood to adulthood, the plot is the sequence of experiences about what these events are. Let me go into a little more detail. So things like Jon going to the wall as a bastard and suffering and growing up between his oaths and his family is his arc/thema, while things like being elected Lord Commander at the wall and saw the Others and being killed are the plotline. Martin has made some changes and even expansions in the plots while remaining faithful to the overall arcs/thema. In other words, the parts I mentioned as KEY MOMENTS, even though he made some plot changes in some characters, he remained faithful to the arc/thema in the same way. While Tyrion's being betrayed by his family and being an enemy to them is the storyline that has never changed, there have been changes in the plots that explain how this will happen, some of them have never happened, while some of them have had minor changes. In summary, as planned, those who should have been betrayed were betrayed; those who should have suffered between their oaths and their loved ones suffered again; those who should have turned against their family turned against them again... THE KEY MOMENTS continued to unfold in a different, similar or identical way to what was originally planned. Key moments continued to be handled differently, similarly or the same as originally planned. Martin has already said many times before that he knew the end of the main character, the end of the story, who was going to die, who was going to get married and who was going to sit on the iron throne since 1991, so he said that he continued the story as he had originally planned. He said that the main key moments continue in the same way, that he knew this from the very beginning, but in ~~my interpretation;~~ he says that he discovered the side roads, so to speak, that lead to the main roads over time. Likewise, how the story of the minor characters will take shape... He always knew how the story of some of the big characters; Arya, Tyrion and Jon will end... it was always planned. Martin knows the fate of the key five characters, and Sansa, and big Lannisters. He also said wrote that some major character's arcs as he had planned from the beginning. He keeps his end. To be more detailed and specific, questions were asked in previous years about whether there was a deviation in the story. Here are those questions and his answers. I mentioned in the beginning when I was talking about the writing process of the book that as Martin increased the number of books, the plot of the characters started to expand. For example, if Dany was going to come to Westeros in book 3, she would never sit in Meereen and go through what she went through, and if it had continued as the first three books, it would have been a sign that she would come in book 2 and we would never have read the Astapor, Yunkai and Meereen chapters. As the number of books increases, the plot of events that the characters go through and its effect on the overall story also expands and increases. This is inevitable, but looking at this, it is not right to say that Martin's initial plans have completely changed, that he abandoned the outline totally, because it is obvious that both the storyline is almost the same and the statements he made with his own mouth show that he did not abandon it. Anyway, if you pay attention, there are some parts of the letter that were censored, that is, they avoided spoilers about the events that are still surprising and that they expect to happen, but frankly, they also gave good spoilers by not censoring some issues such as Jon's parents. They probably didn't feel the need to cover it up because there were theories that most people guessed and accepted as true. Also, as I said, 99% of what is told in this letter is about what happened in the first book, so i guess they acted with the logic of "this happened anyway, this part is not considered a spoiler". That's all. Thank you for read and I apologize for my grammatical mistakes. Bye.