Heresy 169

[Black Crow]

Exactly, but what I may think is different here, is that Kurtz went to the natives and told him he was a god. Whereas with BR, the children may have sought him out and told him he was a god(greenseer.) Or maybe BR walked up to them and said, hell yeah I'm a god.

Ah, well that's where the danger lies for Bran. Kurtz never set himself up for a god per se but the natives came to think he was and perhaps he in turn believed them before finding himself trapped in a mutual fantasy. He wants to die and the natives want another god. Could Marlow have filled that gap? He didn't and probably never could but as I recall he fears he might have done. What then of Bran? He has powers certainly and when Kurtz shuffles off and he replaces him will he be tempted to use those powers in a godlike manner? His readiness to use Hodor suggests he might, and then what?

[Sly Wren]

Well this thread has most certainly been a treat for one interested in the Others and wider scale. Brilliant notion regarding the Seven and the respective parallels to the main PoV characters in the endgame.

Welcome, welcome! Jump on in.

[TheMiddleHero]

Ah, well that's where the danger lies for Bran. Kurtz never set himself up for a god per se but the natives came to think he was and perhaps he in turn believed them before finding himself trapped in a mutual fantasy. He wants to die and the natives want another god. Could Marlow have filled that gap? He didn't and probably never could but as I recall he fears he might have done. What then of Bran? He has powers certainly and when Kurtz shuffles off and he replaces him will he be tempted to use those powers in a godlike manner? His readiness to use Hodor suggests he might, and then what?

You know, it makes me think on the pact made long ago. Did the First Men have a Kurtz-like arrangement with the Children? Did they themselves present themselves as gods? Were certain arrangements made to present themselves as such and over time preserve it?

[Sly Wren]

I suppose one possible interpretation, given the way GRRM mixes his metaphors, is that they may collectively represent Marlow who ultimately was an innocent who thought he was simply taking the steamer up the river and only at the end fully realised what he was getting into

That works--though Bran and the scoobies are younger than Marlow would have been--Bran especially. Still, it at least leaves hope that Bran will figure this out.

Well, if Jojen is helmsman, god bless Jojen paste theory, lmao.

HA!

[Sly Wren]

Its an interesting thought. Kurtz "unsound" methods essentially came down to stravaighing about the countryside making war on everybody he met acquiring the ivory by force rather than through trade; hence the pilgrims' fear that he was ruining the business. I rather like your suggestion that the children in the cave are as much trapped in that hell as the natives were trapped in Kurtz' heart of darkness. While I don't for a moment trust the tree-huggers I wonder if perhaps they are down there because Kurtz, in his madness, has triggered something.

And how much were the children drawn into his cause? It was made pretty clear in the Heart of Darkness that trust in Kurtz was setting the natives up for destruction.

I like this to a point and i will add.Lets consider everthing BR was said to be.Now he's hooked up to what equates a Westrosi version of Brainiac,Skynet and maybe Vikki from IRobot. Do we think he drank the Koolaid?,do we even know what the Koolaid is and if there was any to begin with. Or did he BR hit the motherload and as i said and still believe its all him mixed up with all who may have gone before in that seat.

This is potentially a version of your "greenseers have the real power" theory I think I can go with. If BR is caught up in his own brilliance (real or imagined) and chasing magics, I could see him convincing both the Children and himself that he's spectacular. And the Children also may be using BR and being used by him. (I now have Annie Lennox in my head).

I do think especially all the greenseers in the cave are in some special kind of hell--and I like the idea that BR as potential magic-power-chasing fanatic could have helped triggered additional madness in the cave. Not that BR is the only reason for all this--he's not actually a god. But everyone (including BR) in the cave getting trapped in the mutual belief that he is--that works.

Exactly, but what I may think is different here, is that Kurtz went to the natives and told him he was a god. Whereas with BR, the children may have sought him out and told him he was a god(greenseer.) Or maybe BR walked up to them and said, hell yeah I'm a god.

Am now very much hoping Bran in a vision gets to see BR say, "hell yeah I'm god."

[Phillip Frye]

Care to expand? Reasoning?

Reasoning? He ain't got no reasoning. He don't need no reasoning. He don't have to show you any stinking reasoning.

[Phillip Frye]

I ask this with the sincerest trepidation of kicking a hornet's nest:-

But why such certainty?

Actually, despite my mockery in the previous post, I think that Addicted to Unreliable Narrators has the right of it regarding Theon. Theon's doom is to return to the Iron Islands to undo the Kingsmoot and sit as a godly man on the Seastone Chair. He will be broken by everything, spend hours conversing with Nagga's ribs, and be ruled over by his sister. His heir will be the child of his salt wife from the Myraham.

[Black Crow]

You know, it makes me think on the pact made long ago. Did the First Men have a Kurtz-like arrangement with the Children? Did they themselves present themselves as gods? Were certain arrangements made to present themselves as such and over time preserve it?

Its certainly something we've discussed in the past both in terms of a blood sacrifice and a binding in servitude, which is where we've speculated the Stark connection to Winter may come in. Another point worth considering in this connection is the identity of the last hero. He was quite literally the last of thirteen heroes who set out on a Parsifal-like quest. Eventually the children helped him, but we don't know how they helped him and the most likely reason we don't know his name is that he never came back.

[Black Crow]

Actually, despite my mockery in the previous post, I think that Addicted to Unreliable Narrators has the right of it regarding Theon. Theon's doom is to return to the Iron Islands to undo the Kingsmoot and sit as a godly man on the Seastone Chair. He will be broken by everything, spend hours conversing with Nagga's ribs, and be ruled over by his sister. His heir will be the child of his salt wife from the Myraham.

Well he's certainly damaged enough to qualify as a holy man :devil:

[Black Crow]

I do think especially all the greenseers in the cave are in some special kind of hell--and I like the idea that BR as potential magic-power-chasing fanatic could have helped triggered additional madness in the cave. Not that BR is the only reason for all this--he's not actually a god. But everyone (including BR) in the cave getting trapped in the mutual belief that he is--that works.

That after all was the point about Kurtz; he went to Africa as a brilliant, learned man; a paragon of civilisation standing head and shoulders above the rest of the wretched pilgrims, but then turned, abandoned and rejected civilisation to become more barbaric than the barabarians; and there too we have an echo of Bloodraven, turning against his Targaryen upbringing to become the embodiment of the old gods of Westeros. In that sense Kurtz, although dying is very dangerous indeed because the dead man in the tree is Kurtz not Bloodraven and that in turn means that Bran has not been groomed and summoned to the cave to be the saviour of a humanity Kurtz has rejected.

[Matthew.]

Actually, despite my mockery in the previous post, I think that Addicted to Unreliable Narrators has the right of it regarding Theon. Theon's doom is to return to the Iron Islands to undo the Kingsmoot and sit as a godly man on the Seastone Chair. He will be broken by everything, spend hours conversing with Nagga's ribs, and be ruled over by his sister. His heir will be the child of his salt wife from the Myraham.

This sounds like a fair prediction. And, with the way he's described post-torture, he might even look like the second coming of the Grey King :dunno:

[Yield.]

I don't think any of us ever did follow notion of the Night's King as the leader of the blue-eyed lot. Connected yes, and sacrificing to them and thus pointing to the nature of the Stark connection to Winter, but we never considered him as their leader. That only comes from the mummers' version and even then I would say not until recently.

Thanks that's what I remember.

I don't know, he found his "true calling" awfully late in life--he would have been almost 80 when he disappeared. I'm not at all convinced that BR gave a hoot about any gods until he went to the Wall, and had access to the Watch's library, or was reached out to by the CotF (how he arrived at his present position is unclear).

It's not even clear that he was necessarily raised as a Blackwood, or even embraced by the Blackwoods, with the exception of his own mother; all we know is that he was born in King's Landing, and that by the time he was age 9, Daeron the Good had taken the throne and was attempting to establish a good relationship with the Great Bastards.

By the time of the Blackfyre rebellion, BR's relationship with the crown is strong enough that he's being entrusted with Dark Sister, acting as a commander, and has taken a white dragon with red eyes as his sigil--all things that indicate he spent a good amount of time in King's Landing during his formative years. It seems likely that, as far as his loyalty to the crown goes, the Brother he Loved was just as much a motive as the Brother he Hated.

Given his implied relationship with Shiera Seastar, I've always thought it may be more accurate to view Bloodraven as a Marwyn the Mage figure, someone who's interested in everything arcane and magical, rather than him being a zealot like Mel who perceives himself as a part of Team Fire, or Team Earth. Is his choice to be a greenseer driven by any particular loyalty to the CotF, or is he simply working with the gifts he's been given?

That's what I was referring to. There is much more connection with Brynden being a Targ than with his being a Greenseer. Yeah he is a talented skinchanger but even that is used to advance the crown's agenda. As I said who knows how much he learned from Aemon and what kind of influence it had on him. Might have changed his motivations, as would being in the Black Cells with time to reflect. And I agree the only real expression (that we see clearly in the D&E books) of his being a Blackwood is his hatred of the Bracken half brother. Granted there is jealousy in there as well.

[Matthew.]

I really just can't get on board with the idea that Bloodraven, pre-greenseer, is a Kurtz figure. Kurtz is a charismatic renaissance man from whom people expect extraordinary things, while Bloodraven is almost universally reviled and feared. There may be some blatant aesthetic homages in the way the cave of bones and BR have been described, but I think that's where it ends--I wouldn't trust such an homage to inform us of BR's true motives or nature, nor those of the CotF. Looking at his actual characterization and life-story, I'm not sure that BR is Kurtz anymore than Oberyn Martell is Inigo Montoya, or Samwell Tarly is Samwise Gamgee.

[Black Crow]

There is much more connection with Brynden being a Targ than with his being a Greenseer. Yeah he is a talented skinchanger but even that is used to advance the crown's agenda. As I said who knows how much he learned from Aemon and what kind of influence it had on him. Might have changed his motivations, as would being in the Black Cells with time to reflect. And I agree the only real expression (that we see clearly in the D&E books) of his being a Blackwood is his hatred of the Bracken half brother. Granted there is jealousy in there as well.

I think that his telling Bran that his mother named him Brynden may be significant, but as I've argued if we apply the Kurtz parallel his past history is of less significance than his present circumstances.

[Black Crow]

I really just can't get on board with the idea that Bloodraven, pre-greenseer, is a Kurtz figure. Kurtz is a charismatic renaissance man from whom people expect extraordinary things, while Bloodraven is almost universally reviled and feared. There may be some blatant aesthetic homages in the way the cave of bones and BR have been described, but I think that's where it ends--I wouldn't trust such an homage to inform us of BR's true motives or nature, nor those of the CotF. Looking at his actual characterization and life-story, I'm not sure that BR is Kurtz anymore than Oberyn Martell is Inigo Montoya, or Samwell Tarly is Samwise Gamgee.

What we're arguing is not what he was but what he's become.

[Yield.]

In a way this comes back to Voice's pointy stick comment about seeing the Night's King again notwithstanding GRRM's statement.

The original Night's King is certainly dead and gone, but to employ a rather over-used phrase just as Tyrion Lannister is Lann the Clever come again, so too Stannis is the Night's King come again. He is a man who knows no fear and a woman, in this case a red witch rather than a white one, is the undoing of him. He has no connection to Ice but he is sacrificing to the Others. And that I think is part of the key to this. Its not a question taking sides and of old allegiances to either Ice or Fire, but rather of the blood sacrificing to the Old Powers. Whether they are of Ice or of Fire is immaterial; it is the negation of their humanity by sacrificing their fellow man not in the name of truth or justice, however flawed, but in serving the inhuman old gods.

Right I might be I'm a bit feeble minded this morning but I have no idea what you are on about Stannis sacrificing to the Others. As I recall he does no such thing. Even when he kills loads of free folk, they are all burned along with his men on Jon's advice.

And what does Stannis have to do with Brynden Rivers? I asked for specific reasons, through my clarification, of why he is his being southern and a Targ should not play a part in this. I understand your point that associations have little to do with how a character might behave, look at Sam. But to discount a whole lot of evidence that someone is trained and gifted in a certain area is like saying Arya will never use her swordsman skills. Even Sam uses what he reluctantly learned from his father's abuse of him to some good (the CSI of Othor and Jaffer.)

I'm not picking a fight here, just asking for a discourse that was not addressed by the answer above. :)

[Black Crow]

The point I'm making in regard to Stannis is that what's important is his willingness to sacrifice make a blood sacrifice to his gods. Whether he is sacrificing to the gods of Ice or of Fire is immaterial. Hence the assertion that in this cyclical world, if there is to be a Night's King come again it is Stannis rather than the original mouldering quietly in the corner, and similarly we don't need to see Lann the Clever lurking in the arras because he is present in Tyrion.

[Yield.]

"Archmaester Rigney." LOL

Sorry lost me. Maybe I really am dimwitted this morning...

[Yield.]

I think that his telling Bran that his mother named him Brynden may be significant, but as I've argued if we apply the Kurtz parallel his past history is of less significance than his present circumstances.

And what I am arguing (and to an extent so is Matthew) is that not one character is divorced from the path what made him. To discount the entire history of the influences that bring a character to their present state is something we have never seen in these books. No character, other than those whose past we don't know about, either in the 5 books or in the short stories, is not a product -- either through rejection of, embracing of or questioning the veracity -- their past.

I understand that BR is this books version of Kurtz. And I agree with a lot of what you've shown in that essay. However, that doesn't mean it is both a 100 percent fit or that it indicates his forward trajectory. I get that he is, possibly, a puppet head for the Singer's game and that all he longs for is release. There is also the possibility that Bran was lured there in order to fulfill this and release BR. I think to limit our interpetation to only this aspect is to blinker not only the discussion around here but also the text.

What we're arguing is not what he was but what he's become.

I see all other aspects of discussion are verboten? Bligh me but that's not the Heresy of old, not what made it such a vibrant place in any case.We are in danger here of becoming very like somewhere else where certain aspects of these books are not up for discussion.

And incidentally that was not in any way whatsoever what I was discussing. Nor I think was it what drew me to conversation. Rather is was Bran's part in all this that drew me in. And it's another aspect of my original question/post that was entirely left out there on it's own.

[Black Crow]

I see all other aspects of discussion are verboten? Bligh me but that's not the Heresy of old, not what made it such a vibrant place in any case.We are in danger here of becoming very like somewhere else where certain aspects of these books are not up for discussion.

Gods no, That one was badly worded by me and I apologise. The point I was trying to make was what was at issue was that Bloodraven as he is now, [although shaped to an extent by his background as a Blackwood of Raventree Hall and latent abilities], is not the same as he was, just as the Kurtz whom Marlow meets is very different from the Kurtz who set out from Europe. What we and Bran encounter in the cave is not Brynden Rivers, as in not no more he aint.