Jump to content

The Three-Eyed-Crow is Old Nan, not Bloodraven


LiveFirstDieLater

Recommended Posts

 

17 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

I don't mean to be rude, so forgive me if I am here but are you a native English speaker?  Leaf is speaking to Meera, Jojen, Bran and Hodor and is replying to Meera when she explains that she speaks the Common Tongue "for him.  For the Bran boy".  Then she explains where and how she learned.  She is not explaining she learned Common so she could chat with human visitors who just happened to drop in on a buried cave an almost unreachable distance north of the Wall.  She doesn't say "for you.  For our human visitors", her meaning is far greater and far more specific in that she learned to be able to talk with Bran in furtherance of their plans or visions or however you choose to phrase it.

You are making an easy to make leap of logic...

Leaf speaks common for Bran. Leaf Learned common during two hundred years roaming the lands of men. Does not necessarily mean Leaf learned common for the express purpose of speaking to Bran.

17 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

I’m inclined to agree she means Aegon the conqueror, but we don’t know it.

17 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

And God help us, Cat did not start any civil war or abuse any power.  She was told by the Minister of Finance in the presence of the Head of MI5 that the dagger used in the assasination attempt on her son and in her wounding was owned by Tyrion which led her to arrest him pending trial.  I have zero appetite for a pointless debate on this but would suggest your read the Catnapping thread by Butterbumps which was the best discussion I remember on this forum.  Equating arrest on reasonable grounds with execution or murder based on realpolitik is not a good comparison to make.

She doesn’t have the right to make arrests on the Kingsroad because she has suspicion. She uses her dad’s power to make the arrest which directly leads to the start of the war. Bloodraven got the Kingsguard sent after Daemon before he ever announced his claim.

17 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

 And what's this about friends? I guess you have it in for introverts then :stunned:

Ha ha ha

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 5/29/2018 at 4:57 PM, LiveFirstDieLater said:
Quote

First up I argued that Bloodraven was not mentioned in story at all because I have no recollection of him being mentioned and clearly ascribed no significance to those mentions at all.  On reread of ADWD I will likely notice any mention of him due to all these theories but having read AGOT, ACOK and ASOS at least three times and AFFC twice I genuinely do not remember him and only know who he is from this forum mentioning the side novels. 

 

Well he wasn’t invented until later (after the first few books), like the Blackfyres and Bittersteel... so I’m not sure what you are saying is relevant... Illyrio is still important to the story and deeply involved with the Blackfyre plot... and Jon Connington even became a POV.

...

 

and George has said point blank he didn’t have it all written before hand or even laid out if that’s what you meant. But I agree the general strokes were there, including the Weirwood and 3EC being separate distinct entities right from Bran’s first falling dream. And the distinction between crows and ravens.

Ran clarified that Bloodraven had been "invented" (or GRRM had him in mind) from the beginning of the creative process, but he worked out the details as he was writing ACoK.

On 5/27/2018 at 6:04 PM, Ran said:

As George has said, when ACoK started proving a much longer book than intended, he paused work to basically do something like a rough outline to give himself a better sense of the length of the series. The result was that it went from 4 to 6 books (it was 3 originally, and then AGoT itself proved so long that he cut off a part of it and used it to start ACoK). I think it's clear that he then worked in some things that were pointers for what he would flesh out in more detail later.

So, for example, I think in ACoK the mummer's dragon vision is one of the clearest examples of his noodling around with some more Targaryen related stuff, but it's only after ACoK was published that he sat down and actually came up with all the specifics. Similarly, he mentioned in an interview I did with him that he'd always had the idea of the last greenseer being someone like Bloodraven (aka someone connected to the Targaryens), but that he didn't have the details worked out initially but by 1999 he seems to have done so when he fleshed out the family tree.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, Seams said:

Ran clarified that Bloodraven had been "invented" (or GRRM had him in mind) from the beginning of the creative process, but he worked out the details as he was writing ACoK.

No surprise to me there, the Three Eyed Crow and the Brooding Weirwood are both in Bran’s original falling dream from Game. Not to mention the distinction between crows and ravens starts as early as Game. I’d even suggest the connection between Nan and the Targaryens starts way back then as well, but only gets more so as the story progressed into Clash:

Though Old Nan did not think so, and she'd lived longer than any of them. "Dragons," she said, lifting her head and sniffing. She was near blind and could not see the comet, yet she claimed she could smell it. "It be dragons, boy," she insisted. Bran got no princes from Nan, no more than he ever had.

But the backstory for Bloodraven himself clearly came later... and with it Seastar, our Old Nan of the Sea?

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

The Children in the thrones aren’t nothing but bones... they have red and can move... which is all Bloodraven can say... I cannot follow your leap of logic to them not existing? The bones of children who are not green seeds are littering the caverns, the ones in thrones are different... why don’t you think they exist? Or don’t count? I really don’t understand...

The one tries to talk to them... even Bloodraven has difficulty speaking, and he speaks common not the True Tounge which sounds like the sounds of nature.

Why do you know Bloodraven is there to speak for them? It seems to me there is power in King’s Blood (and probably in human blood/sacrifice as a whole)... there are plenty of other reasons for the Children and Bloodraven to work together, or one for the other.

Why? I don’t think they brought Bran there to be tutored per day so much as raised as a lamb to the slaughter (or to have his body taken, which as we learn from Varamyr includes the Warging powers, they are part of the blood/body not the mind/spirit).

As a warg/greenseer to be possessed. For his blood.

Yes, I’m not saying they are piping out... you claimed they didn’t exist... I pointed out they not only exist, we’ve seen them, here’s a quote, they’re the ones in Weirwood thrones, and by the way there are other possible places they could still be hiding.

I don’t see the textual evidence to be so sure this is the case. I do think it would be a strange title to give a guy if you’ve spent hundreds of years ostensibly looking for his replacement. 

Well, you wanted quotes so...

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

The last greenseer, the singers called him, but in Bran's dreams he was still a three-eyed crow. When Meera Reed had asked him his true name, he made a ghastly sound that might have been a chuckle. "I wore many names when I was quick, but even I once had a mother, and the name she gave me at her breast was Brynden."

I wonder why this might be if the other greenseers are active?  It simply doesn't make sense.  Given Bran and Hodor can and do explore the cave and find other throned singers it would be an odd lie to tell if it was so easily found out.  Unless of course, those guys are so far absorbed into the tree that they no longer function independently.  And then we see the process and have it explained to us

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

"Your uncle may have been named for me. Some are, still. Not so many as before. Men forget. Only the trees remember." His voice was so soft that Bran had to strain to hear.

"Most of him has gone into the tree," explained the singer Meera called Leaf. "He has lived beyond his mortal span, and yet he lingers. For us, for you, for the realms of men. Only a little strength remains in his flesh. He has a thousand eyes and one, but there is much to watch. One day you will know."

We can agree that most of Bloodraven has gone into the tree, I hope.  And he lingers for a reason, for the children, for Bran, for the realms of men.  As to the other greenseers and how active / independent they might be:

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

"Only one man in a thousand is born a skinchanger," Lord Brynden said one day, after Bran had learned to fly, "and only one skinchanger in a thousand can be a greenseer."

"I thought the greenseers were the wizards of the children," Bran said. "The singers, I mean."

"In a sense. Those you call the children of the forest have eyes as golden as the sun, but once in a great while one is born amongst them with eyes as red as blood, or green as the moss on a tree in the heart of the forest. By these signs do the gods mark those they have chosen to receive the gift. The chosen ones are not robust, and their quick years upon the earth are few, for every song must have its balance. But once inside the wood they linger long indeed. A thousand eyes, a hundred skins, wisdom deep as the roots of ancient trees. Greenseers."

So, allowing for some mathematical inaccuracy, one in a million is a greenseer and their lives are shorter than normal except they can be preserved in the weirnet.  To what extent they are alive or not once absorbed, or retain independent action once absorbed into the Godhood, or during the process of absorption, seems where we are disagreeing.

Bloodraven is called the last greenseer by the Children and even he is mostly gone into the tree, only a little strength remaining in the flesh, hence his inability to move and the faintness of his voice.  The child greenseers, who have been enthroned for much longer, are fully or almost fully absorbed and part of the godhood and incapable of independent action.  That is the way I read the description of the greenseers in the cave, the explanation from the Children and Bloodraven as to how the process works, their story of dwindling numbers leading to extinction and their referrence to Bloodraven as the last greenseer.  Ignoring or discounting what the Children tell us - particularly as it dovetails with what we see in the cave - seems to me the wishing away of inconvenient information.

14 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

You are making an easy to make leap of logic...

Leaf speaks common for Bran. Leaf Learned common during two hundred years roaming the lands of men. Does not necessarily mean Leaf learned common for the express purpose of speaking to Bran.

It's not at all.  She is replying to Meera, who does not speak the True Tongue, and nor do any of Jojen, Hodor and Bran yet she states clearly that it is "for him, for Bran".  You must realise that explaining she is speaking Common for the benefit of people who don't speak her langauge is a redundant explanation and would only make sense if Meera, Jojen and Hodor spoke the True Tongue but Leaf had to speak Common for poor ignorant Bran.  And she doesn't...She explains how, where and why she learned Common all as part of one statement that begins with "for him", not "for you".  I think you understand what her reply to Meera signifies but are trying hard to discount it.

14 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

I’m inclined to agree she means Aegon the conqueror, but we don’t know it.

It's the only meaning we can take from it without being confused and speculating about dragons in primordial Westeros  As they have no place in any of the myths or old wives tales of Westeros and are universally understood to have arrived with Aegon the Conqueror I think the meaning is clear.  If you are insisting on a calendar date you can keep this open for as long as you wish but there is only one explanation that we can come up with that fits.

14 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

She doesn’t have the right to make arrests on the Kingsroad because she has suspicion. She uses her dad’s power to make the arrest which directly leads to the start of the war. Bloodraven got the Kingsguard sent after Daemon before he ever announced his claim.

She is the Lady of Winterfell, she has been told by credible sources who owned the attempted murder weapon and she has grounds to make an arrest.  The catnapping is just one incident on the path to war and the Starks and Lannisters were heading for conflict regardless.  I really don't want to waste any more time and energy on the catnapping, it's like groundhog day and we've gone back a decade here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

52 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

Well, you wanted quotes so...

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

The last greenseer, the singers called him, but in Bran's dreams he was still a three-eyed crow. When Meera Reed had asked him his true name, he made a ghastly sound that might have been a chuckle. "I wore many names when I was quick, but even I once had a mother, and the name she gave me at her breast was Brynden."

But the Three Eyed Crow is still only in Bran’s Dreams... and how does calling BR the last green seer while looking for Bran before BR was even born make sense?

Quote

I wonder why this might be if the other greenseers are active?  It simply doesn't make sense. 

I agree there is deception going on and that there has to be something about the title the last greenseer we don’t understand... but Bran is right there and he’s a greenseer, right? This creates the same inconsistancy you are pointing out with the Children Greenseers. It simply doesn’t make sense.

Now if Bloodraven is going to plan on living indefinitely by body snatching future greenseers, the title all of a sudden makes sense... but that’s just an idea.

Quote

Given Bran and Hodor can and do explore the cave and find other throned singers it would be an odd lie to tell if it was so easily found out. 

They were told not to explore... and Bran doesn’t explore except by taking Hodors body.

Quote

Unless of course, those guys are so far absorbed into the tree that they no longer function independently.  And then we see the process and have it explained to us

Or you’re misinterpreting what you are being told... 

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

"Your uncle may have been named for me. Some are, still. Not so many as before. Men forget. Only the trees remember." His voice was so soft that Bran had to strain to hear.

"Most of him has gone into the tree," explained the singer Meera called Leaf. "He has lived beyond his mortal span, and yet he lingers. For us, for you, for the realms of men. Only a little strength remains in his flesh. He has a thousand eyes and one, but there is much to watch. One day you will know."

This description fits both Bloodraven and the Children in thrones.

Quote

We can agree that most of Bloodraven has gone into the tree, I hope.  And he lingers for a reason, for the children, for Bran, for the realms of men.  As to the other greenseers and how active / independent they might be:

Lingering “for us, for you, for the realms of men” could be benevolent or malevolent.

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

"Only one man in a thousand is born a skinchanger," Lord Brynden said one day, after Bran had learned to fly, "and only one skinchanger in a thousand can be a greenseer."

"I thought the greenseers were the wizards of the children," Bran said. "The singers, I mean."

"In a sense. Those you call the children of the forest have eyes as golden as the sun, but once in a great while one is born amongst them with eyes as red as blood, or green as the moss on a tree in the heart of the forest. By these signs do the gods mark those they have chosen to receive the gift. The chosen ones are not robust, and their quick years upon the earth are few, for every song must have its balance. But once inside the wood they linger long indeed. A thousand eyes, a hundred skins, wisdom deep as the roots of ancient trees. Greenseers."

 

So, allowing for some mathematical inaccuracy, one in a million is a greenseer and their lives are shorter than normal except they can be preserved in the weirnet.  To what extent they are alive or not once absorbed, or retain independent action once absorbed into the Godhood, or during the process of absorption, seems where we are disagreeing.

Yes, I’m not sure why you are so certain their condition is different from Bloodraven’s?

Quote

Bloodraven is called the last greenseer by the Children and even he is mostly gone into the tree, only a little strength remaining in the flesh, hence his inability to move and the faintness of his voice.  The child greenseers, who have been enthroned for much longer, are fully or almost fully absorbed and part of the godhood and incapable of independent action. 

They moved, they reacted to light... I don’t know why you keep saying they are incapable of action... those are actions.

It wasn’t much, but it’s comparable to what Blooraven does... I’m just not at all understanding why you think they are so different from bloodraven when he says they last so long in the tree and there isn’t any reason to think they are even as rotted as he is, his skull is showing, there’s nothing like that about them.

Quote

That is the way I read the description of the greenseers in the cave, the explanation from the Children and Bloodraven as to how the process works, their story of dwindling numbers leading to extinction and their referrence to Bloodraven as the last greenseer.  Ignoring or discounting what the Children tell us - particularly as it dovetails with what we see in the cave - seems to me the wishing away of inconvenient information.

Except the explanation was that they last a long time... for a people who love at least hundreds of years... And the Children in the cave react to light... how the hell did you put those fact together to get that children greenseers don’t exist?

Forget wishing away, how about willful ignorance pretending they don’t exist or didn’t react to Hodor.

Quote

It's not at all.  She is replying to Meera, who does not speak the True Tongue, and nor do any of Jojen, Hodor and Bran yet she states clearly that it is "for him, for Bran".  You must realise that explaining she is speaking Common for the benefit of people who don't speak her langauge is a redundant explanation and would only make sense if Meera, Jojen and Hodor spoke the True Tongue but Leaf had to speak Common for poor ignorant Bran.  And she doesn't...She explains how, where and why she learned Common all as part of one statement that begins with "for him", not "for you".  I think you understand what her reply to Meera signifies but are trying hard to discount it.

That’s an interpretation... or she doesn’t care about the rest of them and only about Bran... which makes sense 

Quote

It's the only meaning we can take from it without being confused and speculating about dragons in primordial Westeros  As they have no place in any of the myths or old wives tales of Westeros and are universally understood to have arrived with Aegon the Conqueror I think the meaning is clear.  If you are insisting on a calendar date you can keep this open for as long as you wish but there is only one explanation that we can come up with that fits.

Serwyn of the Mirror Shield lived before the Targaryens came to Westeros and slew the dragon Urrax. Riddle me that oh Mr only one explanation...

mans then there are Ser Galladon and Clarence Crabb who both are said to have killed a dragon.

Quote

She is the Lady of Winterfell, she has been told by credible sources who owned the attempted murder weapon and she has grounds to make an arrest.  The catnapping is just one incident on the path to war and the Starks and Lannisters were heading for conflict regardless.  I really don't want to waste any more time and energy on the catnapping, it's like groundhog day and we've gone back a decade here.

The Lady of Winterfell doesn’t have the authority to make arrests in the Riverlands... there are many reason for respecting the rule of law, preventing abductions of travelers is one, and avoiding the inevitable retaliation by the victims family is another... and the resulting civil war.

Even if cat’s accusations were true, and they were not, she was in the wrong to capture Tyrion. It wasn’t justice it was misguided vengeance perpetrated by using daddy’s name. You can make all the excuses you want, or let it go, I doubt I’ll be changing my mind on that one, and it’s not really relevant to this topic.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I may be taking my life in my hands, stepping into this, but part of the disagreement here may hinge on a fundamental difference of opinion about the purpose of greenseeing. I think it's fair to say that GRRM hasn't overtly explained to the reader why the CotF want or need to have access to the lives of the people inhabiting the countryside. Is the ability to see entirely visual, or is it accompanied by other powers?

Similarly, there may be some ambiguity in the term "last greenseer". The most obvious definition might seem to be that there are no remaining greenseers other than Bloodraven and that the death of the sole remaining greenseer will result in the extinction of this magical role. But what if it means only the "topmost" greenseer? The ultimate greenseer? This would be more consistent with the apparent training up of a successor greenseer, which seems to be what is happening with Bran.

I can see the arguments both ways that the CotF who are seated in weirwood thrones in the cave are either greenseers who are almost completely tapped out or that they are still active and doing some kind of work we don't understand: just because they don't talk to humans doesn't mean they are dead or dying. Maybe they are concentrating on other tasks, such as helping direwolves to find buried dragonglass caches, keeping dragon eggs out of the wrong hands on the Isle of Faces, or watching wildling refugees stream toward Castle Black.

Here's an exercise I recently stumbled into that might help to make sense of the purpose and responsibility of the last greenseer. Everytime you see "the last greenseer" in the text, mentally substitute the term "The Stranger."

If the last greenseer is the equivalent of the grim reaper for the CotF or the Old Gods, then the tension between the CotF and the Andals might come, in part, from the confict between these two competing gods of death. "Two competing gods" might be an understatement, of course. The Shrouded Lord, the faceless men, all the religious icons Arya has seen in Braavos - this is the many-faced god. Embodying this god, carrying on this god's work, would be an important position with great power. The CotF would be anxious to find someone who can keep the job going on their terms (someone who honors the old gods) and others would probably love to see "the last greenseer" tradition come to an end.

I think it could also help us to figure out why the Night's Watch is so determined to find Benjen Stark. They have lost many men on rangings, but they talk about Benjen and seem obsessed with finding him, never mentioning the need to find the other rangers. Maybe they know that Benjen has the potential to be turned into a greenseer? A last greenseer? Or maybe to be taken by one of the other teams that wants to control the power and function of the grim reaper? The Night's Watch doesn't know that Bran is north of the Wall so keeping Benjen out of the wrong hands may be a moot point.

There is a seed of an idea in my mind that Coldhands is Ser Duncan the Tall, and that he teamed up with Bloodraven to protect this "weapon of mass destruction," to keep it from falling into enemy hands. But I would need to find more evidence. A big problem with this theory is that Bran never mentions that Coldhands is a super tall man. (Although he does ride a giant elk that can carry five people, which might make him look shorter.)

If correct, this theory could add a new layer of meaning to the "strange and stranger" line @LiveFirstDieLater cited earlier in the thread:

The gods could not kill Bran, no more than I could. It was a strange thought, and stranger still to remember that Bran might still be alive. -Theon

Link to comment
Share on other sites

42 minutes ago, Seams said:

I may be taking my life in my hands,

You cant be brave unless you are afraid!

Quote

stepping into this, but part of the disagreement here may hinge on a fundamental difference of opinion about the purpose of greenseeing. I think it's fair to say that GRRM hasn't overtly explained to the reader why the CotF want or need to have access to the lives of the people inhabiting the countryside. Is the ability to see entirely visual, or is it accompanied by other powers?

Great question, we know it includes seeing with a thousand eyes (and through time) and allows the possession of other skins like a warg... presumably it also includes some access to the memories of those who came before also... but you are absolutely right it’s unclear.

Quote

Similarly, there may be some ambiguity in the term "last greenseer". The most obvious definition might seem to be that there are no remaining greenseers other than Bloodraven and that the death of the sole remaining greenseer will result in the extinction of this magical role. But what if it means only the "topmost" greenseer? The ultimate greenseer? This would be more consistent with the apparent training up of a successor greenseer, which seems to be what is happening with Bran.

I just can’t think of “last” ever being used with that meaning in a title... but maybe I’m just unaware of it...

Quote

I can see the arguments both ways that the CotF who are seated in weirwood thrones in the cave are either greenseers who are almost completely tapped out or that they are still active and doing some kind of work we don't understand: just because they don't talk to humans doesn't mean they are dead or dying. Maybe they are concentrating on other tasks, such as helping direwolves to find buried dragonglass caches, keeping dragon eggs out of the wrong hands on the Isle of Faces, or watching wildling refugees stream toward Castle Black.

Or controlling wights...

Quote

Here's an exercise I recently stumbled into that might help to make sense of the purpose and responsibility of the last greenseer. Everytime you see "last greenseer" in the text, mentally substitute the term "The Stranger."

If the last greenseer is the equivalent of the grim reaper for the CotF or the Old Gods, then the tension between theCotF and the Andals might come, in part, from the confict between these two competing gods of death. "Two competing gods" might be an understatement, of course. The Shrouded Lord, the faceless men, all the religious icons Arya has seen in Braavos - this is the many-faced god and embodying this god, carrying on this god's work, would be an important position with great power. The CotF would be anxious to find someone who can keep the job going on their terms (someone who honors the old gods) and others would probably love to see "the last greenseer" tradition come to an end.

Interesting, not sure I totally follow... are the greenseers and Weirwoods somehow escaping death? Is that the idea? 

They are avoiding the whole “all men must die” thing?

Quote

I think it could also help us to figure out why the Night's Watch is so determined to find Benjen Stark. They have lost many men on rangings, but they talk about Benjen and seem obsessed with finding him, never mentioning the need to find the other rangers. Maybe they know that Benjen has the potential to be turned into a greenseer? A last greenseer? Or maybe to be taken by one of the other teams that wants to control the power and function of the grim reaper? The Night's Watch doesn't know that Bran is north of the Wall so keeping Benjen out of the wrong hands may be a moot point.

No great mystery to wanting to find Benjen, the watch lacks trustworthy talented leadership... and he was sent after the Royce kid... I mean shit, they reported to electing Benjen’s nephew in his absence. 

Quote

There is seed of an idea in my mind that Coldhands is Ser Duncan the Tall, and that he teamed up with Bloodraven to protect this "weapon of mass destruction," to keep it from falling into enemy hands. But I would need to find more evidence. A big problem with this theory is that Bran never mentions that Coldhands is a super tall man. (Although he does ride a giant elk that can carry five people, which might make him look shorter.)

Hmmm, not sold, as I think Dunk probably died at Summerhall... and fire... but it’s an idea!

Quote

If correct, this theory could add a new layer of meaning to the "strange and stranger" line @LiveFirstDieLater cited earlier in the thread:

The gods could not kill Bran, no more than I could. It was a strange thought, and stranger still to remember that Bran might still be alive. -Theon

Stranger things have happened!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

But the Three Eyed Crow is still only in Bran’s Dreams... and how does calling BR the last green seer while looking for Bran before BR was even born make sense?

We don't know when the Children started calling Bloodraven the last greenseer only that they refer to him that way in the current timeline.  I don't see any merit in your objection or your attempt to make a twisted pretzel out of something straightforward.

12 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

I agree there is deception going on and that there has to be something about the title the last greenseer we don’t understand.

No there doesn't.  It looks like you are caught up on the English language os seeing shapes in the shadows.

14 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

but Bran is right there and he’s a greenseer, right?

No.  He is a warg with some understanding of what that means who is embarking on the very first steps of his training to be a greenseer.  He is nowhere near a greenseer yet, merely an apprentice starting out.  You can't be serious with this.

16 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

This creates the same inconsistancy you are pointing out with the Children Greenseers. It simply doesn’t make sense.

Only if you deliberately misunderstand it.  When Bran turns up at the cave Bloodraven is and has been for some time the last greenseer.  I understand you disagree but you surely must comprehend and to keep claiming it doesn't make sense and pretending bafflement is silly.

18 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Now if Bloodraven is going to plan on living indefinitely by body snatching future greenseers, the title all of a sudden makes sense... but that’s just an idea.

Pure conjecture entirely unsupported by anything in the text and grounded in a stubborn insistence on denying the clear and simple meaning of "last greenseer".  This is how any conspiracy theory starts: a refusal to accept a straightforward premise leads to adopting a wildly implausible one based on that refusal and a wrong fork in the decision tree leads down the rabbit hole.

23 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

They were told not to explore... and Bran doesn’t explore except by taking Hodors body.

At one point they are warned about the dangers of the cave

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

The caves were timeless, vast, silent. They were home to more than three score living singers and the bones of thousands dead, and extended far below the hollow hill. "Men should not go wandering in this place," Leaf warned them. "The river you hear is swift and black, and flows down and down to a sunless sea. And there are passages that go even deeper, bottomless pits and sudden shafts, forgotten ways that lead to the very center of the earth. Even my people have not explored them all, and we have lived here for a thousand thousand of your man-years."
 
If you have ever been in a large cave system you'll know how dangerous it is, how easy to get lost in the dark or take a wrong turning.  It's actually quite straightforward advice and both the Reeds explore as does Bran through Hodor. 

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

As Hodor he explored the caves. He found chambers full of bones, shafts that plunged deep into the earth, a place where the skeletons of gigantic bats hung upside down from the ceiling. He even crossed the slender stone bridge that arched over the abyss and discovered more passages and chambers on the far side.
 
The Children warn them of the danger but make no attempt to stop them exploring so I think your implication that the children are hiding something is off the mark.  I know you want to see deception and concealment here but there is no guard or friendly guardian who actually stops or tries to dissuade them.
 
35 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Or you’re misinterpreting what you are being told... 

If you want to argue that the child greenseers gain immortality when they hook themselves into the weirnet and retain the capacity for independent action eternally then you have to ignore, not misinterpret, the explanation of the process from Leaf, Bloodraven and even Jojen, Leaf's talk of looming extinction and the description of Bloodraven as the last greenseer which you absolutely refuse to accept.  If you simply want to argue that the other greenseers are still active despite what we are told and what we see then there's not much point in this as if the Children calling Bloodraven the last greenseer and explaining that even he is mostly gone into the tree isn't clear enough for you nothing will be.

45 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

This description fits both Bloodraven and the Children in thrones.

Yes indeed, and that is because Bloodraven, the last greenseer, is himself mostly gone into the tree.  The others are further along and he is close to joining them.

48 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Lingering “for us, for you, for the realms of men” could be benevolent or malevolent.

Not at all, you are deliberately inverting it's meaning as you tried to do with the port calling the kettle black.  It makes no sense for Leaf to assist Bloodraven and tell them that he is lingering "for us", i.e., the children, if his aim is malevolent.  Why would the children hook him into the weirnet and asssit him if he intended them harm?  Clearly this is not what she is saying and you must know that.

54 minutes ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Yes, I’m not sure why you are so certain their condition is different from Bloodraven’s?

Because they call him the last greenseer :mellow:.  Because he is the only one we see talk or act.  Because Bloodraven is the one who has been reaching out to Bran since AGOT not some child of the forest

He is mostly gone into the tree.  He is not far behind them.  It's a difference of degree and not that great either.  I wouldn't be surprised if Bloodraven becomes incapacitated in TWOW after or even during Bran's training (like Yoda passes on before Luke finishes his training).

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

They moved, they reacted to light... I don’t know why you keep saying they are incapable of action... those are actions.

It wasn’t much, but it’s comparable to what Blooraven does... I’m just not at all understanding why you think they are so different from bloodraven when he says they last so long in the tree and there isn’t any reason to think they are even as rotted as he is, his skull is showing, there’s nothing like that about them.

A flower respones to sunlight by opening it's petals and tracking the sun.  That is a little short of the bar required for an intelligent, self-aware and communicative being to pass on arcane knowledge and monitor his student's progress.

Come back to me when Bran and Hodor crash the annual greenseer party or debate the finer points of magic with one of them.  Or when Bran asks the children and they say, "oh, yeah, we have loads of greenseers, we call Bloodraven the last greenseer for shit and giggles".

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Except the explanation was that they last a long time... for a people who love at least hundreds of years... And the Children in the cave react to light... how the hell did you put those fact together to get that children greenseers don’t exist?

This is disingenuous.  I have explained any number of times that the state of the child greenseers who have been absorbed into the weirnet is anomalous and to debate whether they are in symbiosis with the tree or gradaully absorbed, or alive in some sense is pointless and that what matters is they have transformed to the extent that they have lost the ability for independent action as part of their journey into the tree as is explained to us by all of Jojen, Leaf and Bloodraven.  For you to pretend confusion after all the times I have stated or restated this cannot be an argument in good faith.

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Forget wishing away, how about willful ignorance pretending they don’t exist or didn’t react to Hodor.

Did they do anything a plant couldn't?  Did any of them look capable of training Bran?

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

One was full of singers, enthroned like Brynden in nests of weirwood roots that wove under and through and around their bodies. Most of them looked dead to him, but as he crossed in front of them their eyes would open and follow the light of his torch, and one of them opened and closed a wrinkled mouth as if he were trying to speak.

That's the sum of it.  Flowers tracking the sun.  One who opened his mouth as if trying to speak but did he?  No, he wasn't able to.  It's simple enough unless you are inexplicably perplexed by why the children call Bloodraven the last greenseer.

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

That’s an interpretation... or she doesn’t care about the rest of them and only about Bran... which makes sense 

Well, yes, that is what she means and it's what she says and explains.  She didn't learn the Common tongue to chat with Meera, she learned it "for him". :dunno:

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Serwyn of the Mirror Shield lived before the Targaryens came to Westeros and slew the dragon Urrax. Riddle me that oh Mr only one explanation...

LOL.  Ok, I'll grant you that.  Is your serious contention that Leaf means she was born in the time of the likely mythical and never existed dragon Urrax or are you just keen on scoring a point?

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

The Lady of Winterfell doesn’t have the authority to make arrests in the Riverlands... there are many reason for respecting the rule of law, preventing abductions of travelers is one, and avoiding the inevitable retaliation by the victims family is another... and the resulting civil war.

Even if cat’s accusations were true, and they were not, she was in the wrong to capture Tyrion. It wasn’t justice it was misguided vengeance perpetrated by using daddy’s name. You can make all the excuses you want, or let it go, I doubt I’ll be changing my mind on that one, and it’s not really relevant to this topic.

Do you have nothing else to do with your life?  I have said repeatedly I am not interested in rehashing the catnapping but you seem determined to open a whole new shitstorm with contentious and ignorant assertions.  Blaming Cat for the Wot5K, it's like being stuck with "that guy" on a long bus trip.  Give it a rest.......

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

 

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

But the Three Eyed Crow is still only in Bran’s Dreams... and how does calling BR the last green seer while looking for Bran before BR was even born make sense?

We don't know when the Children started calling Bloodraven the last greenseer only that they refer to him that way in the current timeline.  I don't see any merit in your objection or your attempt to make a twisted pretzel out of something straightforward.

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

I agree there is deception going on and that there has to be something about the title the last greenseer we don’t understand.

No there doesn't.  It looks like you are caught up on the English language os seeing shapes in the shadows.

1 hour ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

but Bran is right there and he’s a greenseer, right?

No.  He is a warg with some understanding of what that means who is embarking on the very first steps of his training to be a greenseer.  He is nowhere near a greenseer yet, merely an apprentice starting out.  You can't be serious with this.

Wait... I couldn’t make it any further... yes I’m serious!!! 

Something in his voice sent icy fingers running up Bran's back. "Time for what?"

"For the next step. For you to go beyond skinchanging and learn what it means to be a greenseer.

...

He dipped the spoon into the paste, then hesitated. "Will this make me a greenseer?"

"Your blood makes you a greenseer," said Lord Brynden. "This will help awaken your gifts and wed you to the trees."

 

Are you really claiming Bran isn’t a greenseer? 

I really don’t understand how you come to that conclusion... except for willful ignorance.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Wait... I couldn’t make it any further... yes I’m serious!!! 

Something in his voice sent icy fingers running up Bran's back. "Time for what?"

"For the next step. For you to go beyond skinchanging and learn what it means to be a greenseer.

...

He dipped the spoon into the paste, then hesitated. "Will this make me a greenseer?"

"Your blood makes you a greenseer," said Lord Brynden. "This will help awaken your gifts and wed you to the trees."

 

Are you really claiming Bran isn’t a greenseer? 

I really don’t understand how you come to that conclusion...

Well if he is already a greenseer what is he doing in the cave?  If he's already a greenseer he doesn't need any training does he?  :angry2:

His blood gives him the potential to become a greenseer just like it gave him the potential to be a warg but he needed to form the bond with Summer and learn to slip his skin, and then he needed to be taught by Jojen and now by Bloodraven, he had to open his third eye and now he needs to learn how to see through the trees and all the rest of it.  His entire arc is about his journey.

So stop making ridiculous and disingenuous objections.  This is absurd stuff

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

Well if he is already a greenseer what is he doing in the cave?  If he's already a greenseer he doesn't need any training does he?  :angry2:

So he is a greenseer?

It’s ok dont answer, I can read the text...

Like Jon is a Warg because of his blood, but lacks training, as pointed out by Varamyr...

Bran is a Greenseer even if he doesn’t understand what that means.

And it still doesn’t make sense to call Bloodraven the last greenseer if Bran is one, or training to be the next one...

Quote

His blood gives him the potential to become a greenseer just like it gave him the potential to be a warg but he needed to form the bond with Summer and learn to slip his skin, and then he needed to be taught by Jojen and now by Bloodraven, he had to open his third eye and now he needs to learn how to see through the trees and all the rest of it.  His entire arc is about his journey.

Backpedal harder...  

Quote

So stop making ridiculous and disingenuous objections.  This is absurd stuff

Go away... really, you’ve stopped contributing anything, if you ever did...

I’m over of trying to correct your misconceptions and pointing out assumptions. 

36 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

Do you have nothing else to do with your life?  I have said repeatedly I am not interested in rehashing the catnapping but you seem determined to open a whole new shitstorm with contentious and ignorant assertions.  Blaming Cat for the Wot5K, it's like being stuck with "that guy" on a long bus trip.  Give it a rest.......

You came to the thread I made and picked a fight claiming that Children greenseers don’t exist when we see them on page, and that Bran isn’t a greenseer! 

Then got annoyed when you objected to my pointing out facts about Cat?

Please stop, just go away, I’m over your ignorance and childlike confidence in your misconceptions... your insistence on falsehoods is exhausting.

You’ve shown a pattern insisting on your point of view without rooting your arguement in textual support, repeatedly used alternate-facts, and tried to turn around and blame me for your faults. I’m not interested in continuing to discuss this with you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 4/23/2018 at 2:10 PM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

I believe Old Nan is Shierra Seastar, Bloodraven’s half sister (oddly related as the crow is to the raven?)

Let's get back to the OP then, shall we?

As you know, I've been looking at the Great Bastards recently, and found some interesting possible parallels. Most relevant to this discussion is the Salladhor Saan scene (ACoK, Davos I) where he wears a peacock feather hat (a third eye) and a tunic with long, wing-like sleeves. (I also thought Saan had elements in common with Shiera Seastar and Bittersteel, but that may be less relevant to this discussion.)

Davos meets Saan at an inn with a gargoyle outside, perhaps similar to the gargoyles Bran used as handholds to climb the old keep at Winterfell before he saw the Lannisters and took his fall. (Edit: the carved jade monkey buttons on Saan's tunic may also be symbolic gargoyles.)

Saan tries to get Davos to eat grapes (eyeballs?) but Davos declines. In other words, he may be trying to get Davos to open his third eye, but Davos won't do it, just like Bran in his coma initially refuses to open his third eye.

Then, like Old Nan, old Saan tells Davos a story. Surely Davos must already know the Azor Ahai / Lightbringer story, after hanging out with Stannis since before the beginning of the series, and being present for the arrival of Melisandre. But the reader and Davos hear the story for the first time as Davos sips his ale with Salladhor Saan in the inn with the gargoyle.

So Bloodraven and Saan are similar in their mentor/guide roles for major characters, and Nan and Saan are both storytellers.

I was going to make a point about Davos learning to read being the equivalent of opening his third eye. As I was typing this post, I realized that Davos turning down grapes and instead ordering ale might be our clue: "lea" is a conjugated form of the Spanish word "leer," meaning "I read." So ale / lea may be a deliberate pun and an indication that Davos does things on his own terms and won't be a puppet for a pirate (or for Bloodraven).

I bet there are other parallels in the Salladhor Saan details that might help us to connect the dots between Old Nan and Bloodraven. Your idea is a good one.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, the trees have eyes said:

Pure conjecture entirely unsupported by anything in the text and grounded in a stubborn insistence on denying the clear and simple meaning of "last greenseer".  This is how any conspiracy theory starts: a refusal to accept a straightforward premise leads to adopting a wildly implausible one based on that refusal and a wrong fork in the decision tree leads down the rabbit hole.

Except, GRRM does not give us 'clear and simple meanings'.  It's the primary reason he's such a master of suspense.  In other words, the 'premise' of which you speak is anything but 'straightforward'!  GRRM does not do anything straightforwardly. His writing is not a direct path -- it is a maze designed to delight and disorientate the reader, a kaleidoscopic hall of mirrors (in which we are trapped ;)):

Quote

Those are the Stones of the Silent God, and there the entrance to the Patternmaker's Maze. Only those who learn to walk it properly will ever find their way to wisdom, the priests of the Pattern say.

ADWD The Ugly Little Girl

 

Quote

It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken
Perhaps they're better left unsung

I don't know, don't really care
Let there be songs to fill the air

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow

Reach out your hand if your cup be empty
If your cup is full may it be again
Let it be known there is a fountain
That was not made by the hands of men

There is a road, no simple highway
Between the dawn and the dark of night
And if you go no one may follow
That path is for your steps alone

 
-- from 'Ripple,' GRRM's favourite song, by The Grateful Dead

 

16 hours ago, the trees have eyes said:

Well if he is already a greenseer what is he doing in the cave?  If he's already a greenseer he doesn't need any training does he?  :angry2:

Good point.  It's a paradox!

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

You were looking through the eyes of the heart tree in your godswood. Time is different for a tree than for a man. Sun and soil and water, these are the things a weirwood understands, not days and years and centuries. For men, time is a river. We are trapped in its flow, hurtling from past to present, always in the same direction. The lives of trees are different. They root and grow and die in one place, and that river does not move them.

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

Men live their lives trapped in an eternal present, between the mists of memory and the sea of shadow that is all we know of the days to come. Certain moths live their whole lives in a day, yet to them that little span of time must seem as long as years and decades do to us. An oak may live three hundred years, a redwood tree three thousand. A weirwood will live forever if left undisturbed. To them seasons pass in the flutter of a moth's wing, and past, present, and future are one. Nor will your sight be limited to your godswood. The singers carved eyes into their heart trees to awaken them, and those are the first eyes a new greenseer learns to use … but in time you will see well beyond the trees themselves."

"When?" Bran wanted to know.

These passages imply that once Bran weds the weirwood (which we witness him doing in ADWD), past, present and future by extension become one for Bran.  Therefore, the usual assumptions of chronology or causality no longer apply to him.  Taken to its inevitable conclusion, this means that Bran was a greenseer before he learned to be one, even though he needed to train in order to become one...a paradox (represented by the notion of a half-forgotten language..."He could almost understand them . . . not quite, not truly, but almost . . . as if they were singing in a language he had once known and somehow forgotten").  The proof for this strange state of affairs is that Bran existed as an agent in the world even before his own birth, in that he was able to make an impact on his father via greenseeing (even if this was 'only' via the wind and Ned's response to it rustling the leaves), before he was even a sperm in his young father's scrotum!  It truly is mindboggling.

As for your assertion that Bran is not a greenseer, consider the following, which cannot be the work of someone whose powers are merely on the level of a warg/skinchanger:

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - A Ghost in Winterfell

And in the heart of the wood the weirwood waited with its knowing red eyes. Theon stopped by the edge of the pool and bowed his head before its carved red face. Even here he could hear the drumming, boom DOOM boom DOOM boom DOOM boom DOOM. Like distant thunder, the sound seemed to come from everywhere at once.

The night was windless, the snow drifting straight down out of a cold black sky, yet the leaves of the heart tree were rustling his name. "Theon," they seemed to whisper, "Theon."

The old gods, he thought. They know me. They know my name. I was Theon of House Greyjoy. I was a ward of Eddard Stark, a friend and brother to his children. "Please." He fell to his knees. "A sword, that's all I ask. Let me die as Theon, not as Reek." Tears trickled down his cheeks, impossibly warm. "I was ironborn. A son … a son of Pyke, of the islands."

A leaf drifted down from above, brushed his brow, and landed in the pool. It floated on the water, red, five-fingered, like a bloody hand. "… Bran," the tree murmured.

They know. The gods know. They saw what I did. And for one strange moment it seemed as if it were Bran's face carved into the pale trunk of the weirwood, staring down at him with eyes red and wise and sad. Bran's ghost, he thought, but that was madness. Why should Bran want to haunt him? 

Bloodraven, in contrast, try as he might, cannot speak to others when he is greenseeing.  He says plaintively that 'no word of mine has reached them', speaking of his 'ghosts'.  Bran, however, is able to reach his 'ghost', namely Reek, Theon's remnant, or otherwise stated the 'ghost' of Theon, in the eponymous chapter 'A Ghost in Winterfell' (an ambiguous title which can refer both to Theon as well as the one who 'haunts him', the ghost of the heart tree, Bran):  

Quote

A Dance with Dragons - Bran III

"But," said Bran, "he heard me."

"He heard a whisper on the wind, a rustling amongst the leaves. You cannot speak to him, try as you might. I know. I have my own ghosts, Bran. A brother that I loved, a brother that I hated, a woman I desired. Through the trees, I see them still, but no word of mine has ever reached them

This statement -- as Dorian keeps reminding me -- is immediately qualified by Bloodraven saying that 'the past is past' and 'cannot be changed'; however, the fact that Bran's words do reach Theon in a subsequent chapter is meant to tease us with the possibility that Bran may be capable of things of which Bloodraven can only dream (you see what I mean about GRRM being a master of equivocation?).

I'd wager, Bloodraven is neither the greatest greenseer, nor the Last.

 

Quote

His blood gives him the potential to become a greenseer just like it gave him the potential to be a warg but he needed to form the bond with Summer and learn to slip his skin, and then he needed to be taught by Jojen and now by Bloodraven, he had to open his third eye and now he needs to learn how to see through the trees and all the rest of it.  His entire arc is about his journey.

Paradoxically, his third eye was already open before he opened his third eye.  As I alluded to above, once he weds the tree and looks through its eyes, he could even conceivably watch his younger self in the godswood, like the heart tree in the so-called 'coma dream' brooding self-reflexively on its own reflection looking back at itself from the black pool with 'knowing eyes.'  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I haven't really believed anything Leaf ever said. I made the logical leap that the Singers/Children were allied/created/controlled the Others since the story about the Last Hero finding them to end the war. So, by the time the fight at the cave happened I was just laughing because it was all a show to keep Bran and Co there. Oh look, you can't leave, there are zombies outside! Summer has no trouble though. Thus I didn't take Leaf's statements seriously, she just wants to keep Bran there, and maybe the Reeds for nefarious purposes (still I don't believe Jojen paste), which is sad, I love Meera and wish she could have mentored Arya.

I do not know where they stand in relation to the Others now; losing control of your creations is an ancient trope but I suspect that in the end the Singers want to preserve nature over all else. Is this just the Mass Effect 3 Reapers? Do the Others just come down every 8,000 years (this being the second time) and nearly wipe everyone out? Didn't we see this in a movie recently? I have read a lot about the extinctions visited on our world, we've had 6 previously, and are in the 7th now (caused by humans). That research helped put me on this course though, so I might have some confirmation bias.

So, I don't know why the Others are attacking now, I have tried to find some convoluted way to explain it via Men breaking the treaty that ended the last war, but I can't make the leap since the one I term of the treaty I know for sure is that There Must Always Be a Stark In Winterfell, and Ned and everyone else left long after the Others kicked off the story. I think Hardhome was a violation of the treaty and nuked by the Singers, but if the invasion now is a response to that, it's 600 years late.

All in all, I fall on the side that thinks that either the Singers still control the Others, or don't care that their creation has gone wild because they are nihilists at this stage. It explains Euron. This means they are not the allies of Men, even Brynden may be a nihilist at this stage, he was hated his whole life by everyone except Aerys and Shiera (Maekar probably only tolerated him, the way Stannis is with everyone save Davos and Mel).

Bran speaking to Theon is in the present no doubt, unless you think it's Bran from a future volume calling back to the present, which is just kind of silly.

 

In the end, maybe George is writing a layered story, one for the plebes, one for the slightly more nerdy, and one for those of you who write in the Heresy thread. Plenty of forms of entertainment have tiered memberships.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 5/30/2018 at 10:01 AM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

So my point here was that the facts are clear and it’s just the “interpretation” we disagree on...

The [few] facts we have are somewhat clear. And I wasn't talking about different interpretations. Did you read my post? I said we don't have the circumstances around these few facts we have, and those few coming from one source here, another there - few and far between sources, and we never get the other side of the story. 

On 5/30/2018 at 10:01 AM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

From the world book:

The first act of Aegon's reign was the arrest of Brynden Rivers, the King's Hand, for the murder of Aenys Blackfyre. Bloodraven did not deny that he had lured the pretender into his power by the offer of a safe conduct, but contended that he had sacrificed his own personal honor for the good of the realm.

Though many agreed, and were pleased to see another Blackfyre pretender removed, King Aegon felt he had no choice but to condemn the Hand, lest the word of the Iron Throne be seen as worthless. Yet after the sentence of death was pronounced, Aegon offered Bloodraven the chance to take the black and join the Night's Watch. This he did. Ser Brynden Rivers set sail for the Wall late in the year

Now I'm sort of convinced you really didn't read my post. 

Because the only quote you are giving here completely supports what I said and does nothing to support your points... :dunno:

For instance... I said:

On 5/29/2018 at 8:33 PM, kissdbyfire said:

I mean, not really, we do have facts but not the circumstances around them, and that makes a huge difference imo. For instance, why/how do you think Bloodraven's sentence was commuted? For me, in case you're curious, it went down like this: Egg can't let BR's crime go unpunished, but he kindof gets why even if he doesn't necessarily agree. But he doesn't want to kill BR, and finds the loophole: the Wall!

and your quote says:

Though many agreed, and were pleased to see another Blackfyre pretender removed, King Aegon felt he had no choice but to condemn the Hand, lest the word of the Iron Throne be seen as worthless. Yet after the sentence of death was pronounced, Aegon offered Bloodraven the chance to take the black and join the Night's Watch.

Pretty close if you ask me...

Here's another bit of the quote you provided:

This he did. Ser Brynden Rivers set sail for the Wall late in the year of 233 AC. (No one intercepted his ship). Two hundred men went with him, many of them archers from Bloodraven's personal guard, the Raven's Teeth. The king's brother, Maester Aemon, was also amongst them.

So, 200 of his men went with him, and Egg wasn't bothered about sending his own brother with, and all escorted by LC Dunk. 

And lastly, I also said the following:

On 5/30/2018 at 10:01 AM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Another example, sorry but you cannot state BR "left his post" w/ that level certainty. We have no info other than BR went to the Wall, at one point is elected LC and 13 yrs later or whatever he "vanishes". I understand that "abandoned his post" fits w/ your theory but the truth of the matter is, we do not actually know what happened or how. 

 

And the final part of that quote you used says:

Bloodraven would rise to become Lord Commander of the Night's Watch in 239 AC, serving until his disappearance during a ranging beyond the Wall in 252 AC.

 

Again, pretty damn close. 

 

On 5/30/2018 at 2:19 PM, the trees have eyes said:

Please do, this isn't a private debate and unless the thread is petering out, more voices freshen things up and change the paradigm - which has become rather stale.

I know what you are saying... It's just that @LiveFirstDieLater and I have had the same discussions on these issues many times before, and we will never see eye to eye on any of it, I'm afraid. There are lots of readers who see things as LiveFirst, and lots (but not as many I think) who see it as we do. And both camps feel pretty strongly about their theories/interpretations, and that's fine. But sometimes I'm reading stuff here (not here, but on the forum in general) and I'm scratching my head trying to understand how did they get to "that" (whatever that might be). 

For instance, I've been mocked for saying the CotF represent nature. Seriously. Because they "look creepy", and there's this evil albino corpse tree-man working w/ them, and "embrace the darkness", etc etc. I've been told [countless times] that they are not "good elves" or whatever. And whenever I hear these arguments my eyes roll so hard I can see the back of my skull. I mean, anyone who uses this type of argument surely doesn't know nature at all, right? They watched too many of the old Disney films, where nature is Snow White singing and dancing n a flowery meadow w/ bunny rabbits and squirrels and butterflies prancing around her. Erhm, wrong. Nature is gorgeous and stunning, but also implacable and harsh and terrible, like a tsunami or an earthquake.  

Sorry, I'm rambling.

TL;DR  It's just that sometimes I feel lazy about entering a discussion I already know it's not going to get anywhere...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, kissdbyfire said:

The [few] facts we have are somewhat clear. And I wasn't talking about different interpretations. Did you read my post? I said we don't have the circumstances around these few facts we have, and those few coming from one source here, another there - few and far between sources, and we never get the other side of the story. 

You are absolutely right and I think we are misunderstanding each other more than disagreeing...

The circumstances and details matter, and we don’t know them, no doubt.

What we are working from are a few facts we can hopefully come to agreement on, then interpreting how we see them lining up.

Quote

Now I'm sort of convinced you really didn't read my post. 

Because the only quote you are giving here completely supports what I said and does nothing to support your points... :dunno:

I thought you were asking why/how I believed his sentence was commuted. 

I used the quote because being sentenced to death then being aloud to take the black is the definition of commuting a sentence.

I agree we don’t know all the circumstances, I’m presenting an alternative to the commonly accepted narrative.

Quote

For instance... I said:

and your quote says:

Though many agreed, and were pleased to see another Blackfyre pretender removed, King Aegon felt he had no choice but to condemn the Hand, lest the word of the Iron Throne be seen as worthless. Yet after the sentence of death was pronounced, Aegon offered Bloodraven the chance to take the black and join the Night's Watch.

Pretty close if you ask me...

Yes, Bloodraven’s action of granting safe passage then killing his kin was monsterous, I’m not at all surprised Aegon felt he had to sentence him to death.

However since he is also bloodraven’s kin, letting him take the black appears a reasonable solution.

Quote

Here's another bit of the quote you provided:

This he did. Ser Brynden Rivers set sail for the Wall late in the year of 233 AC. (No one intercepted his ship). Two hundred men went with him, many of them archers from Bloodraven's personal guard, the Raven's Teeth. The king's brother, Maester Aemon, was also amongst them.

So, 200 of his men went with him, and Egg wasn't bothered about sending his own brother with, and all escorted by LC Dunk. 

As much as Aemon believes it was all for him, I’m suggesting this escort was primarily to ensure Bloodraven arrived at the wall, and didn’t escape like Bittersteel.

The fact that it is compared to Nymeria sending Kings to the Wall I find an interesting and compelling comparison. Since Aemon and Bloodraven, once legitimized, had legitimate claims to the throne.

Quote

And lastly, I also said the following:

 

And the final part of that quote you used says:

Bloodraven would rise to become Lord Commander of the Night's Watch in 239 AC, serving until his disappearance during a ranging beyond the Wall in 252 AC.

 

Again, pretty damn close. 

It’s entirly possible there is some loophole in the Nights Watch Oath I don’t know of, but it’s equally possible there isn’t. Or it’s possible that Bloodraven is exempt from the rules governing men because he is a Targaryen. But I find these arguements require me to do more mental gymnastics than the simplest conclusion, ie, if he’s still alive, isn’t at his post, and says himself he “once” was a member of the nights watch then he broke his bow and abandoned his post.

I understand it’s not 100% certain and it’s possible to write him out of it, but that’s how it looks to me.

Quote

I know what you are saying... It's just that @LiveFirstDieLater and I have had the same discussions on these issues many times before, and we will never see eye to eye on any of it, I'm afraid. There are lots of readers who see things as LiveFirst, and lots (but not as many I think) who see it as we do. And both camps feel pretty strongly about their theories/interpretations, and that's fine. But sometimes I'm reading stuff here (not here, but on the forum in general) and I'm scratching my head trying to understand how did they get to "that" (whatever that might be). 

This is totally fair and disention isn’t a bad thing, keeps it interesting.

I do think it’s funny we both feel in the minority of readers when it comes to this, since the tv show has passed the books I feel like most people default to that interpretation.

Quote

For instance, I've been mocked for saying the CotF represent nature. Seriously. Because they "look creepy", and there's this evil albino corpse tree-man working w/ them, and "embrace the darkness", etc etc. I've been told [countless times] that they are not "good elves" or whatever. And whenever I hear these arguments my eyes roll so hard I can see the back of my skull. I mean, anyone who uses this type of argument surely doesn't know nature at all, right? They watched too many of the old Disney films, where nature is Snow White singing and dancing n a flowery meadow w/ bunny rabbits and squirrels and butterflies prancing around her. Erhm, wrong. Nature is gorgeous and stunning, but also implacable and harsh and terrible, like a tsunami or an earthquake.  

Nature isn’t good either though... it isn’t righteous or just... nor does it care about the realms of men, or honor. It’s just a description of the constant struggle of individuals and species for survival.

Survival is the single driving force behind all of evolution, survival of the fittest. In reality it is more of a fact of nature than anything really.

So when Bran astutely points out that men would be wroth, men would fight, men would swear a bloody vengeance. That isn’t just the darker side of man, it’s a natural reaction, fighting for survival, a dark side of nature, maybe the one true face of nature (as you point out, this struggle also begets all the love and beauty and majesty we hold dear, not just the tears and blood).

However, when push comes to shove, and a people face extinction, the natural reaction is to fight.

So my expectation is that the Children of the Forrest will share this natural drive to survive and share this dark side of nature... as opposed to those elegant JRRT elves choosing to sail off into the sunset because “their time has passed”.

This is the point of the distinction, not that nature is pretty or something. Roll your eyes all you like.

Quote

Sorry, I'm rambling.

TL;DR  It's just that sometimes I feel lazy about entering a discussion I already know it's not going to get anywhere...

Understandable, defeatist, but understandable.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

So he is a greenseer?

It’s ok dont answer, I can read the text...

Like Jon is a Warg because of his blood, but lacks training, as pointed out by Varamyr...

Bran is a Greenseer even if he doesn’t understand what that means.

I feel you still insist on disingenuous arguments and are really reduced to attempting semantic sleight of hand.  Bran has no idea how to be a greenseer or what it means.  We know this because he is a pov throughout the story and we have witnessed his journey, first learning to be a warg and then being taught as much as possible by Jojen before being taken to the cave, again by Jojen, to be under the tutelage of a far greater teacher. 

Yes, his blood gives him the potential but he has to learn, this is kind of the entire focus of his arc with the need to open his third eye and to travel to meet his tutor, an untrained apprentice can't do anything.  At the moment he is a warg, now he is learning to be a greenseer.

You understand all this but are raising empty objections for the sake of being argumentative.

23 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

And it still doesn’t make sense to call Bloodraven the last greenseer if Bran is one, or training to be the next one...

There is only so many times I am prepared to repeat myself.  If you choose not to agree, fine, just say so and I'll accept that, but pretending you can't possibly fathom why the Children call Bloodraven the last greenseer, say because he has been the only remaining greenseer for the last 50 or so years, is plain silly.  Particularly as I've siad it half a dozen (proably a lot more) times

23 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Backpedal harder...  

Not at all.  My argument has remained the same throughout.  You are wilfully misunderstanding here.  This is not really an accusation you can make in good faith.

23 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Go away... really, you’ve stopped contributing anything, if you ever did...

I’m over of trying to correct your misconceptions and pointing out assumptions.

Sorry, if you want uncritical acclaim start a fan group or a closed discussion group you can censor to your satisfaction.  This is a public forum for discussing the author's work and I'll take part as I see fit.  I have attempted to engage with you constructively and in good faith but have increasingly found your responses unreasonable and to deliberately misunderstand or misrepresent simple and clear points I make and I now doubt you are interested in discussion, just in quashing disagreement by whatever tactic first springs to mind and that increasingly to be disingenuous use of semantic arguments.  I understand you have put a lot of thought and time into this theory but you have to be prepared to listen and engage in good faith with people who don't see the shapes in the shadows you do.

My misconceptions?  Well, fair enough, fire away.

23 hours ago, LiveFirstDieLater said:

You came to the thread I made and picked a fight claiming that Children greenseers don’t exist when we see them on page, and that Bran isn’t a greenseer! 

This shows either an ignorance of what i have consistently and repeatedly argued throughout this thread (that the child greenseers are no longer capable of independent action and have "gone into the tree") or, what I suspect, a deliberate attempt to distort my argument to allow you a quick rejoinder.  This is bad faith on your part.

And another semantic twist with Bran.  He is starting to learn to be a greenseer but he has a long way to go yet.  Our poor little eight year old Bran has to ask of the weirwood paste "will this make me a greenseer?", so little does he know!  And yet you have seized on this as if it's a trump card to make the children's referral to Bloodraven as the last greenseer seem utterly beyond comprehension.  It's not, it has a remarkably straightforward explanation, one you seem to find too "sheeple" I guess, but that's on you....

On 5/31/2018 at 5:35 PM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Then got annoyed when you objected to my pointing out facts about Cat?

Fact or opinion?  You have a negative opinion of Bloodraven and Cat, the former driving your rather incredible theory, the latter being something you kept banging on about despite it being off topic and almost entirely wrong in my opinion but you seem to like dangling the bait out to see if I'll bite.  I keep saying I'm not interested.  How about we leave it at that?

On 5/31/2018 at 5:35 PM, LiveFirstDieLater said:

Please stop, just go away, I’m over your ignorance and childlike confidence in your misconceptions... your insistence on falsehoods is exhausting.

You’ve shown a pattern insisting on your point of view without rooting your arguement in textual support, repeatedly used alternate-facts, and tried to turn around and blame me for your faults. I’m not interested in continuing to discuss this with you.

The gracious thing to do would be to ignore this but I guess I'm not that gracious.  Everything you say describes your approach to a T and I think you need to take a long look in the mirror and accept how you have approached this discussion rather than projecting what you are dong on to me.  It must be comforting to make spurious arguments and employ the semantic tricks and disingenuous confusion you have while you absolve yourself of all those things and blame the other guy but it's not reality. 

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose but you should always shoot straight and play fair because people respect that even if they don't agree or even get along.

17 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Except, GRRM does not give us 'clear and simple meanings'.  It's the primary reason he's such a master of suspense.  In other words, the 'premise' of which you speak is anything but 'straightforward'!  GRRM does not do anything straightforwardly. His writing is not a direct path -- it is a maze designed to delight and disorientate the reader, a kaleidoscopic hall of mirrors (in which we are trapped ;)):

I take nothing away from the author's skill but I simply do not see the cave as a trap.  That leads to a different intrepreation of pretty much everything, most pertinently whether the Children and Bloodraven are lying about everything (not in my opinion) or are genuine (just so in my opinion), and by extension whether there is anything particularly confusing about the moniker they give Bloodraven.  I also don't find the English to be tricksy or ambiguous and find no issue with the "last" meaning the "last one left" / "the only remaining one" and not "the final one who can never be followed by another".  Last does not have to and rarely does mean "final forever" in English.  Anyone who has ever joined a queue will understand this well enough.  All that may be untirely unnecessary explanation and besides the point but I'm explaining things I wouldn't ordinarily feel the need to at the moment.

17 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

Good point.  It's a paradox!

These passages imply that once Bran weds the weirwood (which we witness him doing in ADWD), past, present and future by extension become one for Bran.  Therefore, the usual assumptions of chronology or causality no longer apply to him.  Taken to its inevitable conclusion, this means that Bran was a greenseer before he learned to be one, even though he needed to train in order to become one...a paradox (represented by the notion of a half-forgotten language..."He could almost understand them . . . not quite, not truly, but almost . . . as if they were singing in a language he had once known and somehow forgotten").  The proof for this strange state of affairs is that Bran existed as an agent in the world even before his own birth, in that he was able to make an impact on his father via greenseeing (even if this was 'only' via the wind and Ned's response to it rustling the leaves), before he was even a sperm in his young father's scrotum!  It truly is mindboggling.

As for your assertion that Bran is not a greenseer, consider the following, which cannot be the work of someone whose powers are merely on the level of a warg/skinchanger:

Bloodraven, in contrast, try as he might, cannot speak to others when he is greenseeing.  He says plaintively that 'no word of mine has reached them', speaking of his 'ghosts'.  Bran, however, is able to reach his 'ghost', namely Reek, Theon's remnant, or otherwise stated the 'ghost' of Theon, in the eponymous chapter 'A Ghost in Winterfell' (an ambiguous title which can refer both to Theon as well as the one who 'haunts him', the ghost of the heart tree, Bran): 

As to the paradox of time travel.  Weeelllllllll.....there's thousands of years of human history and a million years of Children's history (allowing for Leaf's cavalier approach to mathematics) and I think we have been given an enormous cast of characters who have been shown again and again the importance of making their own choices, not blindly following a path so I'm uneasy both with the idea of recycling or blurring an earlier dark ages one with our own or in reducing any of our characters to puppets on leading strings.  Equally I find the paradox of time travel to be too large and powerful a factor to introduce into a story of this complexity: why not change other things or fix his legs, why would the child greenseers not have changed their fate?  The trees will grant visions but I think there will be a limited capacity to act through time - Bran may speak tree but all the other party will hear is the rustling of the leaves.

As to reaching Theon: I read that as something he has done since reaching the cave and starting his training, not as something he would have had an inkling of how to do when he was merely a warg slipping Summer's skin and running with the wolves.  I also think that his ability to speak to Theon is of huge importance (and will need to be throttled back in story to avoid becoming too powerful) but that it will not be something allowing him to change the past, merely to tap into the memories and visions that the weirnet acts as a repository of.  Given Leaf (or maybe Jojen) says that a weirwood will not die of natural causes and will last effectively forever that is a huge racial memory and experience (both children and First Men) which coupled with skinchanging and vision and communication through the trees in the present will make him a hugely important actor.

17 hours ago, ravenous reader said:

I'd wager, Bloodraven is neither the greatest greenseer, nor the Last.

Paradoxically, his third eye was already open before he opened his third eye.  As I alluded to above, once he weds the tree and looks through its eyes, he could even conceivably watch his younger self in the godswood, like the heart tree in the so-called 'coma dream' brooding self-reflexively on its own reflection looking back at itself from the black pool with 'knowing eyes.'  

Please, not the "last" thing again :crying:.  Bran has been on a path to become a greenseer since AGOT.  Bloodraven will not be the "final one of all time" and I both doubt Bloodraven has any particualrly great significance - greenseers being exceptionally rare it was probably a last chicken in the shop kind of thing for the children - and agree that I expect Bran to be of far greater power.  Otherwise Bloodraven would be the pov whose story we were following not Bran.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, Seams said:

Let's get back to the OP then, shall we?

Amen!

16 hours ago, Seams said:

As you know, I've been looking at the Great Bastards recently, and found some interesting possible parallels. Most relevant to this discussion is the Salladhor Saan scene (ACoK, Davos I) where he wears a peacock feather hat (a third eye) and a tunic with long, wing-like sleeves. (I also thought Saan had elements in common with Shiera Seastar and Bittersteel, but that may be less relevant to this discussion.)

The Saan family pops up at interesting times including as a member of the band of nine.

I’ve wondered if Serenei of Lys (after all, Sargaso Saan had the interesting title of The Last Valyrian, but we know Valyrian features are more common in Lys then elsewhere, so dunno) was a Saan, as well as Illyrio’s Serra... 

16 hours ago, Seams said:

Davos meets Saan at an inn with a gargoyle outside, perhaps similar to the gargoyles Bran used as handholds to climb the old keep at Winterfell before he saw the Lannisters and took his fall. (Edit: the carved jade monkey buttons on Saan's tunic may also be symbolic gargoyles.)

The First Keeps Gargoyals are super interesting, especially since it was presumably constructed by Bran the Builder while also fitting with Valyrian architecture.

16 hours ago, Seams said:

Saan tries to get Davos to eat grapes (eyeballs?) but Davos declines. In other words, he may be trying to get Davos to open his third eye, but Davos won't do it, just like Bran in his coma initially refuses to open his third eye.

Then, like Old Nan, old Saan tells Davos a story. Surely Davos must already know the Azor Ahai / Lightbringer story, after hanging out with Stannis since before the beginning of the series, and being present for the arrival of Melisandre. But the reader and Davos hear the story for the first time as Davos sips his ale with Salladhor Saan in the inn with the gargoyle.

Let me fixate on the tower/gargoyle/Targaryen  thing for a moment...

because Ive never felt I really understood Nan’s story about the broken tower (not the same as the first keep with the gargoyals, but right next to it, and Bran’s destination when he fell).

Old Nan told him a story about a bad little boy who climbed too high and was struck down by lightning, and how afterward the crows came to peck out his eyes. Bran was not impressed. There were crows' nests atop the broken tower, where no one ever went but him, and sometimes he filled his pockets with corn before he climbed up there and the crows ate it right out of his hand. None of them had ever shown the slightest bit of interest in pecking out his eyes.

And also,

His favorite haunt was the broken tower. Once it had been a watchtower, the tallest in Winterfell. A long time ago, a hundred years before even his father had been born, a lightning strike had set it afire. The top third of the structure had collapsed inward, and the tower had never been rebuilt. Sometimes his father sent ratters into the base of the tower, to clean out the nests they always found among the jumble of fallen stones and charred and rotten beams. But no one ever got up to the jagged top of the structure now except for Bran and the crows.

So it seems Nan wasn’t just trying to scare Bran, since the tower which was struck by lightning is right there and seems to be evidence of something... not sure what though...

Ned was born in 263 AC... let’s assume that the hundred years before he was born is a rough estimate, we have plenty of interesting things happen wing around then. 

In 153 the last Targaryen dragon died... also, Aegon the Unworthy (Son of Larra Rogare of Lys) married his sister despite her supposed love for their brother Aemon the Dragonknight.

In 170 Daemon Waters (Blackfyre) was born. In 172 Aegon was crowned after the sudden death of his father. In 175 Brynden Rivers (Bloodraven) is born.

As just a few examples of what we know... but what was happening in Winterfell? We don’t know that much about the time except that Cregan Stark (who served as Hand during the hour of the wolf in 131) was Lord of Winterfell until at least 157. He also made but never saw fulfilled the so called Pact of Ice and Fire, where a Targaryen was promised to marry into the Stark family.

And I’ll conclude this post with a section of the world book I find particularly relevant and interesting. Especially if we consider the contradictions and unreliable narrator we have...

We can dismiss Mushroom's claim in his Testimony that the dragon Vermax left a clutch of eggs somewhere in the depths of Winterfell's crypts, where the waters of the hot springs run close to the walls, while his rider treated with Cregan Stark at the start of the Dance of the Dragons. As Archmaester Gyldayn notes in his fragmentary history, there is no record that Vermax ever laid so much as a single egg, suggesting the dragon was male. The belief that dragons could change sex at need is erroneous, according to Maester Anson's Truth, rooted in a misunderstanding of the esoteric metaphor that Barth preferred when discussing the higher mysteries.

Within its walls, the castle sprawls across several acres of land, encompassing many freestanding buildings. The oldest of these—a long-abandoned tower, round and squat and covered with gargoyles—has become known as the First Keep. Some take this to mean that it was built by the First Men, but Maester Kennet has definitively proved that it could not have existed before the arrival of the Andals since the First Men and the early Andals raised square towers and keeps. Round towers came sometime later.

Hot springs such as the one beneath Winterfell have been shown to be heated by the furnaces of the world—the same fires that made the Fourteen Flames or the smoking mountain of Dragonstone. Yet the smallfolk of Winterfell and the winter town have been known to claim that the springs are heated by the breath of a dragon that sleeps beneath the castle. This is even more foolish than Mushroom's claims and need not be given any consideration.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

30 minutes ago, the trees have eyes said:

Snip

I disagree.

I’ve been told by the moderator it is abusive and against the rules to ask you not to post anymore.

So I’ll just say, I’m not interested in discussing with you any more... since it will just get me banned. 

It’s a shame people have to ruin what should be a fun and entertaining discussion and debate.

I encourage dissension, that’s why I post at all... but those who can’t base their opinions in the text and insist on taking a stance directly contradicted by the text but won’t let it go, then run to the moderators, aren’t worthy of being taken seriously nor the respect of repeated explanations. Sorry

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...