Tyrion and Wolves

[John Suburbs]

When we first meet Tyrion, it is morning in the Library Tower and he can hear the wolves howling, and then we have this strange line:

"Something about the howling of a wolf took a man right out of his here and now and left him in a dark forest of the mind, running naked before the pack."

On one hand I can see this as just a very descriptive way of saying Tyrion is scared shitless of wolves. But if that was the case, Tyrion would not have been so cavalier around Ghost in the scene with Jon after the feast. Tyrion actually reaches out to pet Ghost, even though the wolf is alert and wary at this point. And then later when Ghost actually attacks him on the Kings Road, Tyrion is laughing about it within a seconds.

So what is it about wolves that hearing just one, and a young one at that, would cause Tyrion to slip into a kind of waking nightmare where he is being hunted by the pack?

We also have the scene during his recovery from the Blackwater where it almost seems like he is seeing the outside of the city through someone else's eyes, someone who doesn't see in color and cannot speak. A dream? And his mouth is all bandaged up? OK, but then where does the imagery for the scene outside the city come from? He hasn't seen it, so unless he's been removed from the shelter he was in to somewhere outside (maybe they are bringing him to the pyres?), he would have no real way to conjure up this image in a dream. And then, of course, he runs back to the city to find the gates closed.

We also have this:

"Ravens soared through a grey sky on wide, black wings, while carrion crows rose from their feasts in furious clouds wherever he set his steps. White maggots burrowed through black corruption. The wolves were grey, and so were the silent sisters; together they stripped the flesh from the fallen."

In the first place, we have him seeing his own steps, so he is walking through the vision, not being carried. But it doesn't say anything about walking on wolves paws either, so either he is seeing his own feet, or he is in a frame of mind where his feet being something other than his own does not strike him as odd.

Then we have both wolves and silent sisters stripping the flesh of the fallen. The sisters would be taking their clothes, which to an animal might seem like skin. But then there are also wolves running around the battlefield devouring the bodies? Really? And nobody seems alarmed by this, least of all the unarmed, tongueless women who are doing the Stranger's work? I could maybe picture wolves if this was in the Kingswood or at the Whispering Pines, but it's right outside the city along the Blackwater. How did wolves get there so fast, and why are they being allowed to run rampant through the battlefield? The Lannister-Tyrell armies are in charge now, and the last thing they would want is packs of hungry wolves roaming outside the city developing a taste for human flesh. At the very least, they should be killed for meat to feed a starving city. It aint great, but it's better than shoes.

To me, the whole thing sounds like a less-intensive version of Bran's coma dream.

All of this, of course, plays right into Tyrion's heritage, and how, if he is a Lannister, did he come to acquire such a Stark-like trait. The quick answer would be that, as a secret Targ, Tyrion has Blackwood blood, and the Blackwoods used to rule the Wolfswood until the Starks drove them out. But as a Lannister, Tyrion would have Marbrand  and Brax blood, both of which trace their heritage back to the First Men -- a weaker connection to wolves, but there nonetheless.

And of course the whole thing could be a red herring, or I am seeing things that aren't there. But I'm going to keep an eye on Tyrion and wolves and other strange thoughts or mind experiences and see where it leads.

 

 

[ravenous reader]

2 hours ago, John Suburbs said:

"Something about the howling of a wolf took a man right out of his here and now and left him in a dark forest of the mind, running naked before the pack."

This quote may be ambiguous. 'Running naked before the pack' may indicate either that Tyrion is one of the pack, specifically their leader, or alternatively that he is being hunted by them. Generally, the text favors the latter interpretation: wolves are repeatedly hostile towards Tyrion, rather than there being any mutual identification. For example, when he was surrounded and attacked by the three direwolves at Winterfell. The only wolf which has responded to Tyrion with a modicum of restraint is Ghost, who nevertheless remained wary. For someone who prides himself in his adept reading of every situation, his appreciation of the wolves' body language and behavior always struck me as clumsy and foolhardy.

The passage you quoted is similar to the following:

Quote

Tyrion remembered a cold night under the stars when he'd stood beside the boy Jon Snow and a great white wolf atop the Wall at the end of the world, gazing out at the trackless dark beyond. He had felt—what?—something, to be sure, a dread that had cut like that frigid northern wind. A wolf had howled off in the night, and the sound had sent a shiver through him.

Don't be a fool, he told himself. A wolf, a wind, a dark forest, it meant nothing. And yet . . .

 

Could this recurring motif be foreshadowing of a meeting with Nymeria (and her pack), the only remaining Stark direwolf he is yet to encounter?

Tyrion's 'half-man' status, which can be construed as a double identity, likely does not contain 'Wolf,' but rather two other predators, 'Lions' and 'Dragons.' Perhaps the wolves can sense/sniff this threat. The only time Tyrion might have been compared to a wolf is in that quote about Tyrion 'snarling' amidst the dragons. The choice of the adjective 'snarling,' which is used elsewhere in the text to describe wolves, dogs, and shadowcats, never struck me as particularly dragonesque. Was GRRM just not paying attention to adjective choice, or is something else in play? What sounds do dragons make, anyway?!