The Killer Snark

mushroomshirt - Oh, he must have. Being the...ahem...generously girthed gentleman that he is, I think he must have sampled the UK easy-cook delicacy of a Fray Bentos pie. Not enough meat in them nowadays, however. They used to be better years ago.

Could Martin have anticipated his Titus Andronicus moment all along and named the Freys after Fray Bentos pies? It seems quite obvious, or a coincidence he took advantage of at least.

That's right. That's what I was thinking of; the incident is alluded to in Purgatorio by Dante.

Just started reading Lord of the Rings for the first time, and am sure it's probably been brought up before, but: Common Speech/Westron = Common Tongue/Westerosi, obviously.

Did the dwarves perchance have mismatched eyes? :)

At the end of a spaghetti western called Django Kill, a.k.a. If You Live, Shoot, which is something of a cult classic, one of the villains gets his comeuppance when he tries to retrieve his ill-gotten gold from his house as it burns down in a fire. Well, he gets it - it's gone molten, and it pours down all over his head. When I first saw Game of Thrones I was reminded of this moment before I'd read the first book. It's my opinion Martin may have lifted it. There's also the story of a conquistador called Pedro Gutiérrez de Valdivia, who was allegedly killed by being forced to drink molten gold, and I think a Greek myth that refers to someone suffering the same.

That's the one. I've not read it, though, but Martin loves Jack Vance.

Spotted that as well, Winds. Martin takes bits and pieces from Shakespeare, narratively, often. Especially since it's meant to show irony and derision, the line is a deliberate direct lift.

It's actually a reference, I think, to a main character who undergoes a long period of imprisonment and torture at the hands of a sadistic villain in a Jack Vance book. I've come across this on Google, but I forget which book. There's also, probably coincidental, similarities with Theon/Reek and Ramsay in a particularly vicious short story by Norman Partridge, called The Hollow Man. I sure hope that Martin was making a homage: so as to personally avoid claims of plagiarism, because a character of mine, Lucien Cloudsquall, eventually becomes a character called Penance after suffering much the same.

They were, as appearance characters, but they were mentioned first in ASoS.

It definitely is. I noticed that as well.

The reason Uthor Underleaf gives for aiming at Dunk's eye-slit in the joust in The Mystery Knight are almost a straight transcription from the reason Walter Scott gives for Ivanhoe unhorsing Brian de Bois Guilbert by aiming at his visor. The jousting sequences in AGoT, the novella just mentioned and The Hedge Knight are obvious riffs on Ivanhoe as well, as are the melees.

The fact that Bloodraven, who is an albino, and widely distrusted, is the character who actually pulls the strings during the reign of Daeron II is probably also a reference to Steerpike in Gormenghast, who resembles an albino, though he lacks hyper-sensitivity to light. Both characters are illegitimate, and whereas Bloodraven's face is marked with a winestain birthmark, Steerpike's is similarly disfigured by a fire.

Also the three black castles against orange that are the sigil of House Peake appear to be a reference to the fact there were three Gormenghast books. Also, Martin has stated that Aegon the Unworthy is based on Henry VIII.

I never knew this till I was Internet surfing a few days back, because to find this out you need the book of maps. In Essos, there's a place called K'Dath. The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath, by HP Lovecraft, naturally.

In the second Dunk and Egg tale, The Sworn Sword, there is confirmation of the various references I've found to Frank Herbert's Dune books. When Dunk remembers Dorne, in a dream, he recalls being told not to waste water in the desert, by weeping over his dead horse, in language almost identical to that the Fremen use when telling Paul that they won't 'waste water on the dead'.

Interesting. I'm a fan of Breaking Bad and I'd never noticed that before.

Unless they both had the same facial hair, and had a similar barber, and both had a penchant for killing boars.

Erm, stretching it a bit. :D

Kushluk - It wasn't ignorant. I'm simply not up to the mark enough with world culture. I already admitted that. I don't see a problem. Re: The name Stark, it's purely representative of the nature of the family, like Greyjoy, who can't take too much pleasure from their moments of triumph, because they are totally hapless, hence 'grey joy.' The names of some of the characters and families are the big spanner in the works regarding my stance on The Common Tongue not being English, btw.

Plus Fuchsia's nanny, though it's not actually stated, just heavily hinted at different points in the text. Yes, I'd picked the same thing up myself. Perhaps later on, in Ice and Fire, we'll be treated to a scene where Littlefinger gets chased by soldiers across a series of flooded buildings, before Sansa jumps down from the battlements and stabs him through the chest.

Additionally to an ASOIAF character called Titus Peake, referring to Titus Groan in Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake, there's also a more blatant reference in Tales of Dunk and Egg, though I've not read them yet, with a character called Gormon Peake from Starpike. 'Gormon' Peake...I mean, really! And Steerpike is the antagonist in the first two Gormenghast books, of course. Starpike! Ha, ha.

Castellan - Never knew that: had to Google it. I wasn't attempting a joke, but I still think what I said does make it apposite they adopted it. Anyhoo, the seven striped version became standard as a symbol purely of the gay community, if anyone's interested, after the assassination of Harvey Milk.

Is "shartk" is ASOIAF, however? I can't remember that term. Ah, yes...forgive my density...Stark.