Heresy 198 The Knight of the Laughing Tree

[SeaWitch]

Blue roses in the language of flowers apparently mean impossible aspirations, often of immortality, or an unobtainable, though longed for, goal.  ..??

Whichever way it is looked at, it was a very weird and risky move.

[Melifeather]

2 hours ago, JNR said:

Quite right. 

On the subject of known contacts, you can add to the oddity the fact that in the conventional RLJ Elopement scenario, Lyanna somehow never thought to notify her remaining family -- after Aerys killed her father and brother -- that she was in fact not dead and not raped. 

The usual explanations for this run the gamut from "the ToJ was not on the raven network" to "she felt too guilty about eloping to talk to her family."  But they all just seem to fall woefully short of common sense.

As does the idea that Lyanna would carry on cheerfully sleeping with the man whose father had just murdered her father and brother, and thus, months later, conceive Jon.  While it's theoretically possible, it definitely does not map to teenage girls as I have known them.

The problem with this is that we've read Selmy POV chapters and we know perfectly well he isn't a monster.

For instance, he struggles even to justify putting Hizdahr in prison, interpreting that as potentially treasonous... despite considerable evidence obtained from his own eyes and ears that Hizdahr tried to poison his queen.

Dayne is a somewhat harder call because we have no POV info representing his own thoughts, only his reputation... but that reputation is certainly a sterling one.  And, of course, Dayne is among the KG in Ned's ToJ dream who seem to have wished they could have been at the Trident (fighting for Aerys, like Selmy), but who (GRRM suggests in the Shaw interview) were prevented from doing this by Rhaegar's order.

I have no doubt that Selmy strives to maintain his honor and if he did make any deals with Tywin it was for Rhaegar. As for Arthur Dayne I think the text hints that he wasn't the shining example people remember him to be. Many times the text links the words "piss" and "pissing" with him, such as:

A Storm of Swords - Jaime VIII

"As you learned from Ser Boros and Ser Meryn?"

That arrow hit too close to the mark. "I learned from the White Bull and Barristan the Bold," Jaime snapped. "I learned from Ser Arthur Dayne, the Sword of the Morning, who could have slain all five of you with his left hand while he was taking with a piss with the right. I learned from Prince Lewyn of Dorne and Ser Oswell Whent and Ser Jonothor Darry, good men every one."

"Dead men, every one."

I had connected pissing with Arthur Dayne last year when working on my inversion theory. In the Queenmaker chapter I had noticed parallels between Lem Lemonwood and Arthur as well as Darkstar, who is a distant relative to the Daynes. Arianne's friend Drey, aka Ser Andrey Dalt, is brother to heir Ser Deziel Dalt who is the Knight of Lemonwood. In his youth he experimented sexually with Arianne and Tyene. After the conspiracy to crown Myrcella is exposed and the living members arrested, he is eventually condemned to exile for three years in Norvos under Lady Mellario’s service. Lady Mellario is the estranged wife of Prince Doran Martell. During Myrcella's abduction they stop to rest and Drey lights a campfire. The group sat around the flames passing a skin of summerwine all but Darkstar, who preferred to drink unsweetened lemonwater. Think of the ways “drink” has symbolically been used. We’ve seen trees, snows, and swords “drink” blood. Is it possible that piss, and lemonwater refer to blood?  While I acknowledge that "drink" can refer to blood being shed, I think this is symbolic of a transformation. Drey, Lem Lemoncloak, and Arthur Dayne are connected with "piss" yellow. Dayne may have had a reputation for being the greatest knight that ever lived, and yet his white cloak is symbolically getting dirty...it's turning yellow. The color yellow can also signify cowardice, and it could imply that someone is hiding, like Tansy accused Lem:

Lem, is that you? Still wearing that same ratty cloak, are you? I know why you never wash it, I do. You're afraid all the piss will wash out and we'll see you're really a knight o' the Kingguard!”

Then we have Arianne's words to Darkstar:

“How was your piss?” she asks. 

“The sands were duly grateful.” Dayne put a foot upon the head of a statue of the Maiden who’s likeness had been scoured away by the sands. “It occurred to me as I was pissing that this plan of yours may not yield you what you want.

I think it's rather telling that GRRM chose to refer to Darkstar as "Dayne" in the short paragraph above. I think it's evidence that Arthur had something to do with Lyanna's death.

[Matthew.]

3 hours ago, JNR said:

Different people think and act in different ways.  Some are far more impulsive than others.

Of course, which is why I'm genuinely asking: what might "conflict of the heart" mean to Rhaegar? 

If there's no conflict of the heart, then Rhaegar has no character arc--his entire story is just a plateau. Put another way, if a decent/intelligent character is incapable of fucking up massively, or behaving selfishly, then it severely limits the potential for interesting (and, in some cases, polarizing) choices on the part of our characters.

Some of this comes down to how we're interpreting Rhaegar, but it was always my take that he wasn't especially thrilled by his station in life, his responsibilities, the prospect of inheriting the realm (perhaps prematurely, depending on how unstable Aerys became) from a mentally ill father, the prospect of spending his life in the toxic court environment. I think Wolfmaid said it best when she proposed that Rhaegar would have been happier as a bard than as the prince of the realm.

With all of that in mind, if Rhaegar had decided to run away from his responsibilities, does this represent a contradiction, or is it the end point of his arc--did the dam finally break, and he chose himself over his responsibilities? Especially in light of the fact that the birth of Viserys might have eased some of the pressure he felt, given him an "out," now that there is an alternative heir.

To belabor the point, when an intelligent character does something stupid, a noble character does something ignoble, or a reviled character does something decent, this is not necessarily a mistake or inconsistency, but often the entire point of their character journey--in some cases, it's one of Martin's tools for surprising or upsetting the reader.
 

3 hours ago, JNR said:

Yet he did disappear for months, and so did Lyanna, and despite what the fapp says, it doesn't appear that Westeros-at-large had a sweet clue where either of them was in all that time.  So GRRM is going to have to explain this situation in due course...

I agree, regardless of what the actual answer is, this stands out as a problem. If Rhaegar has run out on his responsibilities to elope, GRRM is going to need to elaborate to make that satisfactory (and even then, will fall short for many readers)...yet even if Rhaegar has disappeared for some other reason, his absence as the realm and his dynasty falls apart seems glaring.

If Lyanna is a political hostage, why do we have no reports of Rhaegar issuing threats to the Baratheons and Starks? If Rhaegar has been falsely accused, why wasn't he out there clearing his name, why wasn't he leading the armies of the realm sooner?

For me, I'm inclined toward two answers: Either Rhaegar was purposely running away from/rejecting his obligations to House Targaryen (the "RLJ" scenario), or he considered whatever he was doing during his absence to be even more important than the political fate of House Targaryen.

[JNR]

2 hours ago, Matthew. said:

If there's no conflict of the heart, then Rhaegar has no character arc

That's true, but it's a bit of a false dichotomy.  By which I mean that Rhaegar was capable of having a conflict of the heart other than the decision to, as you put it,

2 hours ago, Matthew. said:

run away from his responsibilities

...or not.

My guess is that he did what he did because he was living up to his responsibilities... not as his father would define them, nor his wife, but as he would. 

I also think he knew too well just how Westeros would perceive his choices, would perceive him personally. He knew the potential consequences.  And he still thought doing a certain thing was more important in the long run.

So he did it.

2 hours ago, Matthew. said:

If Lyanna is a political hostage, why do we have no reports of Rhaegar issuing threats to the Baratheons and Starks? If Rhaegar has been falsely accused, why wasn't he out there clearing his name, why wasn't he leading the armies of the realm sooner?

These are both very good questions that deserve considerable thought. 

I'll tell you my answer to the first: IMO, Lyanna clearly never was a political hostage.

[JNR]

2 hours ago, Matthew. said:

when an intelligent character does something stupid, a noble character does something ignoble, or a reviled character does something decent, this is not necessarily a mistake or inconsistency, but often the entire point of their character journey--in some cases, it's one of Martin's tools for surprising or upsetting the reader.

Also, about this, I sometimes do see that happening.

A good example would be Tyrion taking credit, right to Jaime's face, for having murdered Jaime's son. 

This was a remarkably stupid thing for him to do, but I think he was so astonished and horrified to be told Tysha was not a whore... that Jaime had lied to him about that... that he was overwhelmingly motivated to hurt Jaime in whatever way he could.

Quote

It was Jaime, he thought, despairing. He was my own blood, my big strong brother. When I was small he brought me toys, barrel hoops and blocks and a carved wooden lion. He gave me my first pony and taught me how to ride him. When he said that he had bought you for me, I never doubted him. Why would I? He was Jaime, and you were just some girl who'd played a part.

 

[Melifeather]

3 hours ago, Matthew. said:

Of course, which is why I'm genuinely asking: what might "conflict of the heart" mean to Rhaegar? 

If there's no conflict of the heart, then Rhaegar has no character arc--his entire story is just a plateau. Put another way, if a decent/intelligent character is incapable of fucking up massively, or behaving selfishly, then it severely limits the potential for interesting (and, in some cases, polarizing) choices on the part of our characters.

Some of this comes down to how we're interpreting Rhaegar, but it was always my take that he wasn't especially thrilled by his station in life, his responsibilities, the prospect of inheriting the realm (perhaps prematurely, depending on how unstable Aerys became) from a mentally ill father, the prospect of spending his life in the toxic court environment. I think Wolfmaid said it best when she proposed that Rhaegar would have been happier as a bard than as the prince of the realm.

With all of that in mind, if Rhaegar had decided to run away from his responsibilities, does this represent a contradiction, or is it the end point of his arc--did the dam finally break, and he chose himself over his responsibilities? Especially in light of the fact that the birth of Viserys might have eased some of the pressure he felt, given him an "out," now that there is an alternative heir.

To belabor the point, when an intelligent character does something stupid, a noble character does something ignoble, or a reviled character does something decent, this is not necessarily a mistake or inconsistency, but often the entire point of their character journey--in some cases, it's one of Martin's tools for surprising or upsetting the reader.
 

I agree, regardless of what the actual answer is, this stands out as a problem. If Rhaegar has run out on his responsibilities to elope, GRRM is going to need to elaborate to make that satisfactory (and even then, will fall short for many readers)...yet even if Rhaegar has disappeared for some other reason, his absence as the realm and his dynasty falls apart seems glaring.

If Lyanna is a political hostage, why do we have no reports of Rhaegar issuing threats to the Baratheons and Starks? If Rhaegar has been falsely accused, why wasn't he out there clearing his name, why wasn't he leading the armies of the realm sooner?

For me, I'm inclined toward two answers: Either Rhaegar was purposely running away from/rejecting his obligations to House Targaryen (the "RLJ" scenario), or he considered whatever he was doing during his absence to be even more important than the political fate of House Targaryen.

I think there is evidence to suggest that Rhaegar had noble plans for the realm that he had decided to take upon himself to improve. He said so to Jaime right before leaving for the Trident. If his intentions were to right his father's wrongs and take it upon himself to be a better ruler, then it seems contradictory to me to kidnap Lyanna and alienate the north. They were already alienated and upset enough to have forged marriage alliances and taken in wards.

Rhaegar has been built up in the books and in the various character's minds as a tragic hero, put upon a pedestal, and his woulda-coulda-shoulda-reign is a lost Camelot. Not many spoke ill of him other than King Bob.

[Black Crow]

23 hours ago, Prof. Cecily said:

So specific it only grows in the Winterfell glass gardens, IIRC. 

I don't think so. As told by Ygritte its easy to get that impression, but its a folk tale about Bael the Bard and the Winter Rose and as such not to be taken literally in details such as that - or the hiding out in the crypt for a year and a day.

Blue roses are or were cultivated in the glass gardens at Winterfell and were no doubt prize blooms that would sweep the board at the County Show, but they were not, I would say, unique.

Conversely, if they were, then we have the explanation for the consternation when Rhaegar presented them - a universal cry from the Starks and everybody else of "how the $%#@ did he get them out of the glass garden at Winterfell?"

[Prof. Cecily]

12 minutes ago, Black Crow said:

I don't think so. As told by Ygritte its easy to get that impression, but its a folk tale about Bael the Bard and the Winter Rose and as such not to be taken literally in details such as that - or the hiding out in the crypt for a year and a day.

Blue roses are or were cultivated in the glass gardens at Winterfell and were no doubt prize blooms that would sweep the board at the County Show, but they were not, I would say, unique.

Conversely, if they were, then we have the explanation for the consternation when Rhaegar presented them - a universal cry from the Starks and everybody else of "how the $%#@ did he get them out of the glass garden at Winterfell?"

Very true about the folk tale.

I wonder if the upcoming books will explain this thorny question.

[Black Crow]

4 hours ago, Prof. Cecily said:

Very true about the folk tale.

I wonder if the upcoming books will explain this thorny question.

Whilst I can't quote chapter and verse I understand that GRRM has said that all will be revealed about the tournament by the end.

[Brad Stark]

16 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

I think there is evidence to suggest that Rhaegar had noble plans for the realm that he had decided to take upon himself to improve. He said so to Jaime right before leaving for the Trident. If his intentions were to right his father's wrongs and take it upon himself to be a better ruler, then it seems contradictory to me to kidnap Lyanna and alienate the north. They were already alienated and upset enough to have forged marriage alliances and taken in wards.

Rhaegar has been built up in the books and in the various character's minds as a tragic hero, put upon a pedestal, and his woulda-coulda-shoulda-reign is a lost Camelot. Not many spoke ill of him other than King Bob.

The great houses wanted to get rid of Aerys, and Rheagar was the obvious choice for King.  That doesn't mean Rheagar had grand plans for the realm, he could have been a nice guy or not so nice guy at any level of involvement. 

[Brad Stark]

Another character had motive to choose roses to insult the Starks - Littlefinger.  He was obsessed with marrying Cat, what if the whole rebellion started just becuase he wanted to get Brandon killed?

[Melifeather]

35 minutes ago, Brad Stark said:

The great houses wanted to get rid of Aerys, and Rheagar was the obvious choice for King.  That doesn't mean Rheagar had grand plans for the realm, he could have been a nice guy or not so nice guy at any level of involvement. 

Here is Jaime's memory....

The day had been windy when he said farewell to Rhaegar, in the yard of the Red Keep. The prince had donned his night-black armor, with the three-headed dragon picked out in rubies on his breastplate. "Your Grace," Jaime had pleaded, "let Darry stay to guard the king this once, or Ser Barristan. Their cloaks are as white as mine."

Prince Rhaegar shook his head. "My royal sire fears your father more than he does our cousin Robert. He wants you close, so Lord Tywin cannot harm him. I dare not take that crutch away from him at such an hour."

Jaime's anger had risen up in his throat. "I am not a crutch. I am a knight of the Kingsguard."

"Then guard the king," Ser Jon Darry snapped at him. "When you donned that cloak, you promised to obey."

Rhaegar had put his hand on Jaime's shoulder. "When this battle's done I mean to call a council. Changes will be made. I meant to do it long ago, but...well, it does no good to speak of roads not taken. We shall talk when I return."

[Matthew.]

17 hours ago, JNR said:

That's true, but it's a bit of a false dichotomy.  By which I mean that Rhaegar was capable of having a conflict of the heart other than the decision to [run away from his responsibilities]

Sure, which is why I ask "what was Rhaegar's conflict of the heart?" in sincerity, and not as a lead up to the implication that my answer is the answer. 

As an observation, it's somewhat interesting to me that so much of the debate over Rhaegar seems to stem from an attempt to reconcile his ignoble (purported) actions with his noble reputation--with, seemingly, a great deal of credence given to the way he's perceived by others, rather than what he has actually done. Fans often employ a similar approach with Stannis, judging him by his reputation, rather than his actions. 
 

17 hours ago, JNR said:

My guess is that he did what he did because he was living up to his responsibilities... not as his father would define them, nor his wife, but as he would. 

I also think he knew too well just how Westeros would perceive his choices, would perceive him personally. He knew the potential consequences.  And he still thought doing a certain thing was more important in the long run.

This is what I was alluding to in suggesting that he considered whatever he was doing during his absence to be even more important than leading the Targaryen forces, or protecting his reputation.

To be generous, we might suggest that he thought fulfilling TPTWP prophecy was necessary for Westeros' salvation, and that that took precedence over political concerns; less generously, we might speculate that the return of the dragons would restore all of the clout and authority that House Targaryen has lost. 

[Black Crow]

1 hour ago, Brad Stark said:

Another character had motive to choose roses to insult the Starks - Littlefinger.  He was obsessed with marrying Cat, what if the whole rebellion started just becuase he wanted to get Brandon killed?

It has been brought up before, but Littlefinger was out of it at this stage and in any case not powerful enough to swing something like this when he was just a kid.

[Matthew.]

17 hours ago, Feather Crystal said:

I think there is evidence to suggest that Rhaegar had noble plans for the realm that he had decided to take upon himself to improve. He said so to Jaime right before leaving for the Trident.

That was my take on that passage as well.

The specific quote is: 

Quote

Rhaegar had put his hand on Jaime's shoulder. "When this battle's done I mean to call a council. Changes will be made. I meant to do it long ago, but . . . well, it does no good to speak of roads not taken. We shall talk when I return."

Those were the last words Rhaegar Targaryen ever spoke to him.

I'll grant, I'm making a big leap here, but I've always taken this as a sign of Rhaegar's reluctance to rule--that he had supporters urging him to convene a Great Council and remove Aerys II, but he'd been unwilling to go down that road, and now it's too late to fully undo all of the damage that Aerys (and Rhaegar himself) have done.

These are the sorts of passages that go a long way toward making me disinclined to view Rhaegar's actions as political--he just strikes me as a little too unwilling to pull the trigger. For all the high opinions that in-world characters have of Rhaegar, I personally suspect that he would be a morose king, inclined to spend lots of time fucking around at the ruins of Summerhall, while he leaves the day-to-day running of the realm to his Hand.

[Black Crow]

5 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

To be generous, we might suggest that he thought fulfilling TPTWP prophecy was necessary for Westeros' salvation, and that that took precedence over political concerns; less generously, we might speculate that the return of the dragons would restore all of the clout and authority that House Targaryen has lost. 

I think that in fairness his ultimate motive was indeed to unleash the Prince that was Promised on the world, and as a means to that end believed that the Targaryen dynasty had to survive and prosper, whatever the consequences.

What we don't know is what was actually happening. Setting aside Aerys in a palace coup supported by the great houses might be the ideal solution, in his eyes, but the Arryn plot, with Robert as a figurehead* was dangerous because it would spell the end of the dynasty, hence Rhaegar had a huge motive for getting them on side. 

Given Rhaegar's apparent lack of megalomania its worth considering that a co-operative effort would imply a more powerful Council.

The question of course is where Lyanna comes into this and its possible that she remained a political hostage. Holding her was obviously no deterrent to rebellion, but possession of her remained a powerful tool in any negotiated settlement.

*A factor not sufficiently discussed in this is why Aerys demanded that he be surrendered when it was the Starks who were causing trouble - or was it the Blessed St. Jon of Arryn who included him in Aerys' demand in order to justify calling his banners?

[Melifeather]

32 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

That was my take on that passage as well.

The specific quote is: 

I'll grant, I'm making a big leap here, but I've always taken this as a sign of Rhaegar's reluctance to rule--that he had supporters urging him to convene a Great Council and remove Aerys II, but he'd been unwilling to go down that road, and now it's too late to fully undo all of the damage that Aerys (and Rhaegar himself) have done.

These are the sorts of passages that go a long way toward making me disinclined to view Rhaegar's actions as political--he just strikes me as a little too unwilling to pull the trigger. For all the high opinions that in-world characters have of Rhaegar, I personally suspect that he would be a morose king, inclined to spend lots of time fucking around at the ruins of Summerhall, while he leaves the day-to-day running of the realm to his Hand.

I took it more as he was reluctant to face his father, not a reluctance to rule. Removing one's own father would be harder for an heir to the throne to do rather than say a distant relative or usurper. He knew his father was a problem, but he wasn't looking forward to having to deal with it. I think this is different than not wanting to rule.

[JNR]

46 minutes ago, Matthew. said:

so much of the debate over Rhaegar seems to stem from an attempt to reconcile his ignoble (purported) actions with his noble reputation--with, seemingly, a great deal of credence given to the way he's perceived by others, rather than what he has actually done. Fans often employ a similar approach with Stannis, judging him by his reputation, rather than his actions.

That's true, but it's not really even possible to use the same algorithm to assess Rhaegar and Stannis with any accuracy. 

Mainly, this is because we have the advantage of actually seeing Stannis at work in many POV chapters -- live in the moment.  We can easily say "Stannis did X, Y, and Z" and know it to be irrefutable truth and then judge him.

Rhaegar, in contrast, we only see through other characters' memories... which as we should all know by now, are the beloved tool of a writer who loves unreliable narration about as much as he loves New Jersey pizza.

This means that it's much fairer and more accurate to judge Stannis by his actions than to judge Rhaegar by his.  Some of what we think of, when we imagine Rhaegar's actions, is not factually established, can be shown as doubtful through a combination of SSM and canonical content, and in short, quite possibly flat-out never happened.

And other things he did, only fainted hinted here and there, or requiring fans to figure out something else first before they can even see he did it, aren't often incorporated into any assessment of his nobility, when they certainly should be.

[JNR]

15 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

He knew his father was a problem, but he wasn't looking forward to having to deal with it. I think this is different than not wanting to rule.

[Black Crow]

40 minutes ago, Feather Crystal said:

I took it more as he was reluctant to face his father, not a reluctance to rule. Removing one's own father would be harder for an heir to the throne to do rather than say a distant relative or usurper. He knew his father was a problem, but he wasn't looking forward to having to deal with it. I think this is different than not wanting to rule.

Add to which it sets a dangerous precedent