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GRRM swears fealty to Tolkien in this ASOIAF Easter Egg


The Map Guy

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why in scrabble would we only have the letters for tolkien, you took Tolkien from 'Inn of the kneeling' in no particular order and left over nine letters unused. A place to  mark an interesting historical moment that Martin clearly wanted us to know about and remember. I can also make 'knight of lee' with the available letters, perhaps George Martin is a big Stan Lee fan. 

Is the question why is it the 'inn of the kneeling man' man over 'inn of the kneeling king/lord' really that much of a question, because the obvious answer is pretty simple, especially in my mind from a writer's perspective. Just say them aloud, inn of the kneeling man sounds much better and flows. inn of the kneeling king, sounds terrible, I imagine it's the same reason why Torrhen is remembered as the KIng who knelt not the kneeling king. A lord didn't kneel either, he was a king, and again lord does not flow as well. 

Some things just sound better.

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6 hours ago, Ser Micaelys said:

why in scrabble would we only have the letters for tolkien, you took Tolkien from 'Inn of the kneeling' in no particular order and left over nine letters unused. A place to  mark an interesting historical moment that Martin clearly wanted us to know about and remember. I can also make 'knight of lee' with the available letters, perhaps George Martin is a big Stan Lee fan. 

Is the question why is it the 'inn of the kneeling man' man over 'inn of the kneeling king/lord' really that much of a question, because the obvious answer is pretty simple, especially in my mind from a writer's perspective. Just say them aloud, inn of the kneeling man sounds much better and flows. inn of the kneeling king, sounds terrible, I imagine it's the same reason why Torrhen is remembered as the KIng who knelt not the kneeling king. A lord didn't kneel either, he was a king, and again lord does not flow as well. 

Some things just sound better.

I would love that "inn of the kneeling man" had something to do with Stan Lee ... but 2 anagrams in 1 would be SUPER genius level of GRRM.

GRRM admires Stan Lee, but idolizes Tolkien. Stan Lee was alive when GRRM first wrote IOTKM ... I can see GRRM kneeling before Tolkien than a living Stan Lee.

It doesn't matter what sounds better off the tongue. You are running a hotel business on a location with great history...out of the three names, what would sound more attractive & lucrative:

  1. Inn of the Kneeling King
  2. Inn of the Kneeling Lord
  3. Inn of the Kneeling Man

At least "Lord" meant King Torrhen Stark knelt, and rose as Lord Torrhen Stark.

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But the inn keeper didn't name it, George did, a man who is a fantastic writer. But even in world something sounding good is definitely a motivation for naming your business, you want people to like saying and hearing something, to remember it. Maybe it's due to so many years in speech therapy that the inn of the kneeling king sounds so abhorrent to me, it's the type of sentence I would avoid.  

Personally I would think that a king kneeling and becoming a lord, demoting himself, is not as meaningful as a reminder that in the end everyone is just human, that Torrhen in that moment was no higher, no better, than all the other men. The inn is in the Riverland's after all, he was not their King  nor their lord, with no power over the people of the riverlands, he was just a man who now answered to another man just like them.

Inn of the kneeling man sounds more attractive to my ears, and for the meaning above it's a more attractive image to my mind. Imo king sounds bad and not as poetic and lord just sounds and seems stupid. Push comes to shove the story is well known in universe, so it's lucrative anyway for the inn, and again I think my above meaning could have a lucrative symbolism for the people of westeros as well.

  

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27 minutes ago, Ser Micaelys said:

But the inn keeper didn't name it, George did, a man who is a fantastic writer. But even in world something sounding good is definitely a motivation for naming your business, you want people to like saying and hearing something, to remember it. Maybe it's due to so many years in speech therapy that the inn of the kneeling king sounds so abhorrent to me, it's the type of sentence I would avoid.  

Personally I would think that a king kneeling and becoming a lord, demoting himself, is not as meaningful as a reminder that in the end everyone is just human, that Torrhen in that moment was no higher, no better, than all the other men. The inn is in the Riverland's after all, he was not their King  nor their lord, with no power over the people of the riverlands, he was just a man who now answered to another man just like them.

Inn of the kneeling man sounds more attractive to my ears, and for the meaning above it's a more attractive image to my mind. Imo king sounds bad and not as poetic and lord just sounds and seems stupid. Push comes to shove the story is well known in universe, so it's lucrative anyway for the inn, and again I think my above meaning could have a lucrative symbolism for the people of westeros as well.

  

I see the point you are trying to make, but look at the next town over: Lord Harroway's Town ... does that sound like it rolls off the tongue well? GRRM named that.

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On 8/15/2018 at 12:39 PM, Rufus Snow said:

It still seems like a stretch, because if you apply your 'rule' exactly:

First of the first: G - yes, fits

Middle of the middle: is ER, not RR

And last of the last: is n, not the M.

 

When you declare a pattern, then have to hand wave over the bits it doesn't fit, I tend to consider it 'pattern broken'. And a broken pattern is not a pattern.

An anagram is a lot more impressive when you don't have to remove one word and a random subset of the letters to make it fit. What does the unused 'nnfheeingman' signify? And where on the map is the missing J that would complete the JRR Tolkien?

If this is what GRRM was doing, is this really the best he could do???

Humans are a pattern-seeking species, that's what makes Rorschach images so useful. And at the moment this looks more like a Rorschach projection than a high-fidelity crafted artwork. I'm afraid it doesn't snap into focus for me at all. That's why you need people to buy into it to see it.

Well said. There's a lot of hand waving to gloss over the fact that his stated pattern doesn't actually work. (My guess is that he didn't think anyone would have such a keen eye)

To demonstrate the ridiculousness of this - If all you could do is hand-wave, I can state that there is a pattern of the titles of the series!

  • A Game of Thrones 
  • A Clash of Kings
  • A Storm of Swords
  • A Feast for Crows
  • A Dance with Dragons
  • The Winds of Winter
  • A Dream of Spring

Looking at the bold letters we get "GRRM." It's not hard to make up something and say that it is how the author intended it with 100% certainty.

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Im still waiting for the theory that would break my ASOIAF heart, that would put GRRM on witness protection.. All that i keep reading of this guy are uber convuluted texts that only himself can make sense of.. At wich point does this post are considered spam..? A daily thread with nothing but bull... 

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6 hours ago, StarkofWinterfell said:

Well said. There's a lot of hand waving to gloss over the fact that his stated pattern doesn't actually work. (My guess is that he didn't think anyone would have such a keen eye)

To demonstrate the ridiculousness of this - If all you could do is hand-wave, I can state that there is a pattern of the titles of the series!

  • A Game of Thrones 
  • A Clash of Kings
  • A Storm of Swords
  • A Feast for Crows
  • A Dance with Dragons
  • The Winds of Winter
  • A Dream of Spring

Looking at the bold letters we get "GRRM." It's not hard to make up something and say that it is how the author intended it with 100% certainty.

 

6 hours ago, VenezuelanLord said:

Im still waiting for the theory that would break my ASOIAF heart, that would put GRRM on witness protection.. All that i keep reading of this guy are uber convuluted texts that only himself can make sense of.. At wich point does this post are considered spam..? A daily thread with nothing but bull... 

Just because you guys didn't understand it, doesn't mean no one else didn't understand it.

Just because you guys didn't like it, doesn't mean no one else didn't like it too.

In fact, a lot of people understood it and liked it.

And is that all you guys are good for? Mocking? Harsh personal criticism? E-bullying? I hope you guys are better than this in real life.

Anyways if you thought Top Secret Theory was a joke, it was a joke that GRRM hid for himself. I only deciphered it.

And guess what ... I got the last laugh. I got my validation to all my theories and pattern deciphering on page 287 of Fire & Blood. So to the few individuals who enjoy mocking me...go ahead and keep mocking me. But I got what few people get when they craft theories: a validation point like page 287. I got a two for one. I feel like I won the lottery. So go ahead, keep mocking the person who won the lottery ... even though I felt like I earned it.

Now I'm going to spin the table on you bullies. Demostrate your intelligence. Who do you think The Last Hero, Azor Ahai, Hyrkoon the Hero, Yin Tar, Neferion & Eldric the Shadowchaser are. Link each one with a common pattern. Link them and demonstrate your intelligence.

 

But some fair advice: be careful what answer you post. Some people may mock your answer and bully you personally StarkofWinterfell &VenezualanLord.

Anyways, demostrate your intelligence. Or are your brains only good for mocking?

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It is far easier to criticize than innovate.  That being said I don't see these guys being as harsh as all that.  I've seen, and experienced, much worse here. 

 

I was a doubter on the Top Secret Theory and I was swayed. Maybe not every facet but in general.  There's just so many coincidences and parallels. By volume alone it starts to defeat Occam's Razor.

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Im reall out of the loop with the new features so i dont know how to properly @ 

Now if i came as offensive i apologize, but i wont apologize for telling you off in your theories, yeah let me answer your question, I DONT KNOW, so i dont go around saying that i cracked the code, that GRRM hid something so dark in between the lines that everybody and their mothers vision of his work would change, something so polemic that his own life would be at risk... Thats why im calling you out, your theory cant hold its water, that much has been proved in this thread alone,  but thats not why i took my time to comment... Its because you've created 2 threads (that i know of) building around this theory, both threads resulted in some debate,( wich its good i wouldnt want the tinfoil to stop, at worse, its more entertaining to see people poking holes in them, at best it could result on really good constructive debate ) some destructive and constructive criticism, but and overall overflown of spam... And let us be honest, you didnt need the whole "build the council" crap.. 

Tl;DR: i dont dislike the fact that you build theories that are overly convuluted, i disliked  the fact that you spammed the forum with a soap opera and then delivered ... This.. But in any case, keep on with your theories, just humble yourself when youre selling it

 

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23 minutes ago, VenezuelanLord said:

Im reall out of the loop with the new features so i dont know how to properly @ 

Now if i came as offensive i apologize, but i wont apologize for telling you off in your theories, yeah let me answer your question, I DONT KNOW, so i dont go around saying that i cracked the code, that GRRM hid something so dark in between the lines that everybody and their mothers vision of his work would change, something so polemic that his own life would be at risk... Thats why im calling you out, your theory cant hold its water, that much has been proved in this thread alone,  but thats not why i took my time to comment... Its because you've created 2 threads (that i know of) building around this theory, both threads resulted in some debate,( wich its good i wouldnt want the tinfoil to stop, at worse, its more entertaining to see people poking holes in them, at best it could result on really good constructive debate ) some destructive and constructive criticism, but and overall overflown of spam... And let us be honest, you didnt need the whole "build the council" crap.. 

Tl;DR: i dont dislike the fact that you build theories that are overly convuluted, i disliked  the fact that you spammed the forum with a soap opera and then delivered ... This.. But in any case, keep on with your theories, just humble yourself when youre selling it

 

 I'm quoting because I don't know how to work the @ either. 

 I agree he really went over the top selling the various theories. I will say about the top secret theory in following it all way to the end and then with a little Googling I can see what hes talking about in regards to GRRM taking flak. He points at sex with an under age Alyssa Milano as part of the as Azor Ahai inspiration. I wasn't aware at the time but Alyssa Milano has somewhat recently come out and said that she was in fact assaulted as a minor and she is a leading member of the #MeToo movement so yeah that looks pretty bad if true and in my opinion there's too much to discount offhand without motive to do so.

Personally I love reading any decent theory.  What else would we do on these forums?

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3 minutes ago, The WolfSpider said:

 I'm quoting because I don't know how to work the @ either. 

 I agree he really went over the top selling the various theories. I will say about the top secret theory in following it all way to the end and then with a little Googling I can see what hes talking about in regards to GRRM taking flak. He points at sex with an under age Alyssa Milano as part of the as Azor Ahai inspiration. I wasn't aware at the time but Alyssa Milano has somewhat recently come out and said that she was in fact assaulted as a minor and she is a leading member of the #MeToo movement so yeah that looks pretty bad if true and in my opinion there's too much to discount offhand without motive to do so.

Personally I love reading any decent theory.  What else would we do on these forums?

I cant see the connection, yeah, its a jarring coincidence but if there were any proof that GRRM had anything to do with it, it would be public, one of the biggest book franchises and TV shows ever created.. And im not big on tabloids and such, but isnt Alyssa Milano far away from GRRM circle? I mean personal and professional.. 

I do too! Im more into character analysis than tinfoil but everybody enjoys an entertaining read, and i guess this thread would've been, but i found it disappointing after the previous thread..  

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4 hours ago, The Map Guy said:

Just because you guys didn't understand it, doesn't mean no one else didn't understand it.

Just because you guys didn't like it, doesn't mean no one else didn't like it too.

In fact, a lot of people understood it and liked it.

 

It's just like religion! I can claim stuff and anyone who doesn't believe is an unworthy heathen who can't believe.

I'm not here to mock but in GRRM's own words, you are the lord who promises ten thousand men and turns up with a hundred and two.

Quote

He had assumed the promise of ten thousand jars was a wild boast, like that of the bannerman who vows to marshal ten thousand swords for his lord and shows up on the day of battle with a hundred and two. If they can truly give us ten thousand . . .

You clearly work on your content which I appreciate but your contents are lacking in, well, proper content.

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1 hour ago, The WolfSpider said:

 I'm quoting because I don't know how to work the @ either. 

 I agree he really went over the top selling the various theories. I will say about the top secret theory in following it all way to the end and then with a little Googling I can see what hes talking about in regards to GRRM taking flak. He points at sex with an under age Alyssa Milano as part of the as Azor Ahai inspiration. I wasn't aware at the time but Alyssa Milano has somewhat recently come out and said that she was in fact assaulted as a minor and she is a leading member of the #MeToo movement so yeah that looks pretty bad if true and in my opinion there's too much to discount offhand without motive to do so.

Personally I love reading any decent theory.  What else would we do on these forums?

This is getting off topic and I think it's time for this to die - the theory thread has been removed and the teaser thread has been locked.

 

I just wanted to say, there is no controversy here, there is no flak to take.  If, and it's a big if, there is any truth in the top secret theory, Ms Milano was 20/21 in 1993 as the books were being planned.

 

#MeToo is an important movement and it's about damn time, but controversy isn't created by a man having desire for a woman, or writing about it in a top secret way (which I am 99.9999999 percent sure GRRM did not do), it's about men's entitled behaviour towards women and a hell of a lot more (Google it for someone more intelligent than me to explain).

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50 minutes ago, Neddy's Girl said:

This is getting off topic and I think it's time for this to die - the theory thread has been removed and the teaser thread has been locked.

 

On that note why would it have been removed? I don't get that.  

 

53 minutes ago, Neddy's Girl said:

just wanted to say, there is no controversy here, there is no flak to take.  If, and it's a big if, there is any truth in the top secret theory, Ms Milano was 20/21 in 1993 as the books were being planned.

 

This and some other comments make it sound like people are criticizing without having read the post. He's talking 80's (mostly) movies thematic and actor parallels. Arnold Schwarzenegger and several of his movies and he was THE 80's movie star. Alyssa Milano may have been the it girl then or maybe it was just movie roles she was in as he stated. The theory was about GRRM's influences and so her age when he started writing isn't relevant. 

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I suspect the poster may have removed it himself, but I could be wrong in that.

 

I've read it all, and while I see what you're saying, I don't believe the theory so in my opinion, there is no controversy.

 

I'm starting to feel a little silly now debating a theory that I don't believe in on a thread that doesn't have anything to do with it,  so I'll call it a day.

 

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5 hours ago, VenezuelanLord said:

Now if i came as offensive i apologize, but i wont apologize for telling you off in your theories,

I accept your apology and I ACCEPT YOUR CRITICISM TOO.

I don't mind criticism, but at some point, some people may cross the line and it becomes personally offensive ... and EVERYONE is reading it too. At that point, don't expect that person to take it up the ass & let it go while everyone is watching. If you don't like it when I decipher patterns, so be it.

In the Top Secret Theory thread, before it got deleted, you criticized all the members of the Theoryguard. Most of the members have been here over 12 years and they gave me valuable insight of what should be included in Top Secret Theory and what shouldn't. My original draft was more controversial, and the Theoryguard did their jobs by making it less.

Now that people are figuring it out, the group I was afraid of standing outside GRRM's house in Santa Fe with boycott signs is the #MeToo group. I have no issues with the #MeToo group, but they have been known to ruin people's careers. In the worst case scenario, I was afraid they may misinterpret the secret message. The Theoryguard, a committee of majority female, assured that #MeToo would not be a problem, I just had to edit some stuff out.

I was originally going to vote "No" on releasing the theory to the public. I gave George the benefit of the doubt that he did not know about #MeToo in 1998 ACOK, 2000 ASOS, 2005 AFFC, 2011 ADWD and 2014 TWOIAF. But he knew about them in 2018, and yet he pushed on with "Alyssa" by connecting it to the R+L=J&M theory in Fire & Blood. By SHEER COINCIDENCE, I found this out in the middle of the Theoryguard discussion. My "No" vote became a "Yes" vote...and so did the rest of the Theoryguard. I NEEDED THEM, so do not discount what I did in the so call "teaser" thread.

For those looking for controversy ... we did our best to leave that out. Even still, Top Secret Theory was deleted, and not by me. The Theoryguard/"teaser" thread has been lock. I have not been given a reason or a warning, I don't think I broke any rules. Yeah, there were some arguing inside the thread with other people, but its not any different than any other threads. I am left in the dark here. Anyone still looking for a controversy, now you have it.

I won't be surprised if this thread gets locked up too. I'll probably be banned in the foreseeable future too.

But whatevers ... I got my validation in Fire & Blood, I feel like I won the lottery and I'm going to take a vacation from the R+L=J&M theories. But damn, I wish I could of threw in my Bloodraven theory before the thread got deleted.

 

Anyways...back to Topic:

If GRRM had to show his appreciation to Tolkien secretly & symbolically, for the whole wide world to see ... wouldn't the best place be in the back cover of TWOIAF? It can't be any of the ASOIAF books or Dunk & Egg or Fire & Blood or TMOIAF...etc. 

TWOIAF is A BIG DEAL, and the best available spot would be the back outer cover. It is essentially the best VIP seat for someone external to ASOIAF, and he saved it for Tolkien. I think it is poetic.

 

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On 11/29/2018 at 1:13 PM, The WolfSpider said:

Arnold Schwarzenegger and several of his movies and he was THE 80's movie star.

Arnold Schwarzenegger was not the biggest movie star of the 1980's. Tom Cruise and others were considered much bigger stars. I'm not even sure Arnold was the biggest action star of the 80's with Sylvester Stallone in the mix.

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