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Do we think George passed 1500 manuscript pages?


Quaithe from Asshai

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15 hours ago, Lord of Blackhaven said:

A two volume Winds of Winter would be fine (awesome!) as long as they are published simultaneously or within 6 months of each other.

Martin chose poorly when he decided to end Dance without the battles of Ice and Fire. All that buildup for nothing.

He didn't do that with any other battle through the first four books and then he does it twice at the end of Dance? Lame.

They really need to be published simultaneously , or near enough, because otherwise, George might feel the second volume isn't as perfect as he thought and he ends up embarking on a massive rewrite that would cost another 2-3 years...

But it looks like he's going to write until he reaches that "satisfactory conclusion", even if it ends up being way past the 1500 MP mark. But once he reaches that conclusion, the manuscript will be ready and completed, and it might then be cut in two volumes, so if the two volumes have different release dates, I think it'll be for marketing and practical reasons. 

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17 hours ago, Lord of Blackhaven said:

A two volume Winds of Winter would be fine (awesome!) as long as they are published simultaneously or within 6 months of each other.

Martin chose poorly when he decided to end Dance without the battles of Ice and Fire. All that buildup for nothing.

He didn't do that with any other battle through the first four books and then he does it twice at the end of Dance? Lame.

  Maybe, but there's this analysis of the two battles:

On 2/10/2021 at 3:59 PM, BlackLightning said:

After all, it is strange how GRRM made them the narrative and thematic centerpieces of the Battles of Ice and Fire only to completely remove them from the situation just before the actual battles begin. What were they supposed to be doing during the fighting? Were we just not going to get another chapter from them until The Winds of Winter?

  • Dany is an easy enough explanation until you start actually trying to bring her back into the story. When you factor in how far away she is and the time it'll take for her and her new allies to get back even in the best of circumstances you run into problems. And on top of that, how long is it going to take for Dany to do whatever she is about to do? If it's too short, it will be implausible and everyone who reads it will groan and gouge out their eyes and set the books aflame. If it's too long she will show back up months (or half of a year or a whole year) after the Battle of Fire ended which will again make audiences groan and gouge out their eyes and burn the book literally or figuratively with scathing reviews. With Dany, it's an issue of location and time and how to not create plot holes and glaring inconsistencies by ignoring or minimizing them.
  • But then there is Jon who presents a large series of big problems. (1) Is he supposed to be dead the entire time or is he supposed to be living a second life in Ghost? (2) If he is stuck in Ghost, is he still at the Wall or has he left the Wall? (3) If GhostJon is still at the Wall, is he captive, free or hidden away by Melisandre (the latter option being mostly boring and pointless)? (4) If GhostJon has left the Wall, is he going beyond the Wall, south to get involved with the Battle of Winterfell or west to the Shadow Tower to do something else? (5) Even so, the Battle of Winterfell is too closely tied to what happens at the Wall. It is impossible to tell the story of the Battle of Winterfell without laying out what is happening at the Wall.

Honestly, it makes the Meereenese Knot look like an open-and-shut case.

The scope of the events needed to show the two battles of Ice and Fire lead to a few possible conclusions:

  • Significant cuts were made of completed text, not just the battles, but much of the lead-up as well.
  • There wasn't much of a build-up (Dany just appears, etc.) so the cuts weren't significant in terms of page count.
  • The writing was incomplete, and the statement that the battles were cut may not be entirely accurate. We know the sample chapters, but they're also being revised.

The latter isn't saying that GRRM did no writing on this, just that it wasn't finished (not all POVs written, not enough drafts, etc.) and wouldn't have made publication anyway. The editor may have noticed that there was ADWD was going to be at the page count guidelines without the battles, and there was a decision made to polish and publish what they had, instead of GRRM trying in vain to reduce ADWD enough to include all the lead-up to, the battles of, and perhaps some immediate aftermath of, both battles.

So while the battles may have been cut, it's also very possible that not much was written about either battle, and the decision to move the battles to TWOW was made long before GRRM was finished with the battles.

Think about what could GRRM needed to have cut to fit in a theoretically complete accounting of both battles. Quentyn? JonConn? Both?

And that may lead us to the ultimate conclusion: these battles were never going to be in ADWD.

 

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It just occurred to me: It's been a while since we saw a TWoW sample chapter. If I'm reading the Wiki correctly, the last one to be revealed was "The Forsaken", or Aeron I, on May 29, 2016. By then, it had been a little over 4 years 10 months since ADwD was released (or 58 months). May 2016 is already 4 years 9 months ago (57 months). On a timeline between ADwD and the current, only one of the sample chapter releases would be after the halfway point, and then only barely.

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1 hour ago, Kyll.Ing. said:

It just occurred to me: It's been a while since we saw a TWoW sample chapter. If I'm reading the Wiki correctly, the last one to be revealed was "The Forsaken", or Aeron I, on May 29, 2016. By then, it had been a little over 4 years 10 months since ADwD was released (or 58 months). May 2016 is already 4 years 9 months ago (57 months). On a timeline between ADwD and the current, only one of the sample chapter releases would be after the halfway point, and then only barely.

George said he will not publish any more sample chapters. 

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5 minutes ago, sifth said:

He did at one point, but then I thought he changed his mind on it.

I don't know. It might be, but I tought this is why he haven't published any. And also because he said he even rewrote the published sample chapters. Or it might be that he planned publishing the book.

It would've been really good to know how far is he currently. At least giving a number, that 'proves' he's not feeding everyone with lies.

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On 2/10/2021 at 11:59 PM, BlackLightning said:

 

  • Dany is an easy enough explanation until you start actually trying to bring her back into the story. When you factor in how far away she is and the time it'll take for her and her new allies to get back even in the best of circumstances you run into problems. And on top of that, how long is it going to take for Dany to do whatever she is about to do? If it's too short, it will be implausible and everyone who reads it will groan and gouge out their eyes and set the books aflame. If it's too long she will show back up months (or half of a year or a whole year) after the Battle of Fire ended which will again make audiences groan and gouge out their eyes and burn the book literally or figuratively with scathing reviews. With Dany, it's an issue of location and time and how to not create plot holes and glaring inconsistencies by ignoring or minimizing them.
  • But then there is Jon who presents a large series of big problems. (1) Is he supposed to be dead the entire time or is he supposed to be living a second life in Ghost? (2) If he is stuck in Ghost, is he still at the Wall or has he left the Wall? (3) If GhostJon is still at the Wall, is he captive, free or hidden away by Melisandre (the latter option being mostly boring and pointless)? (4) If GhostJon has left the Wall, is he going beyond the Wall, south to get involved with the Battle of Winterfell or west to the Shadow Tower to do something else? (5) Even so, the Battle of Winterfell is too closely tied to what happens at the Wall. It is impossible to tell the story of the Battle of Winterfell without laying out what is happening at the Wall.

Honestly, it makes the Meereenese Knot look like an open-and-shut case.

I can't see any way that Dany can plausibly be brought into the Battle of Meereen.  My impression is that the coup that overthrows Hizdahr and then, Barristan's attack take place only three to four weeks after Daznak's Pit.  That may be ahead of the end of her last chapter, but she has to reach Vaes Dothrak, take control of some part of the Dothraki and return.  She might get back in time to fight the Volantenes, but most likely to carry the fight to Yunkai and Volantis itself. 

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1 hour ago, Daeron the Daring said:

I don't know. It might be, but I tought this is why he haven't published any. And also because he said he even rewrote the published sample chapters. Or it might be that he planned publishing the book.

It would've been really good to know how far is he currently. At least giving a number, that 'proves' he's not feeding everyone with lies.

We've seen with Dance that the number of completed pages is very often not definitive, and it hypes people even though the book is still months or even years from being released. And at this point, it seems like anything GRRM says triggers almost everyone, and I can already imagine the amount of complaints that would emerge if he revealed a page count. Having a page count would be cool, though, but anyone who thinks we're going to have one before the release of TWOW is fooling themselves, imo. 

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2 hours ago, Daeron the Daring said:

I don't know. It might be, but I tought this is why he haven't published any. And also because he said he even rewrote the published sample chapters. Or it might be that he planned publishing the book.

It would've been really good to know how far is he currently. At least giving a number, that 'proves' he's not feeding everyone with lies.

Nah, because he can still change his mind and throw away half of his writing. And then everyone would be completely pissed off.

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17 minutes ago, The Winged Griffin said:

Having a page count would be cool, though, but anyone who thinks we're going to have one before the release of TWOW is fooling themselves, imo. 

Agreed.

 

17 minutes ago, The Winged Griffin said:

And at this point, it seems like anything GRRM says triggers almost everyone, and I can already imagine the amount of complaints that would emerge if he revealed a page count.

How couldn't it trigger someone, once he gives fix dates that noone asked for? He shouldn't do that, I'd say. Instead giving a number, but not revealing how long it will be.

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3 minutes ago, CamiloRP said:

Nah, because he can still change his mind and throw away half of his writing. And then everyone would be completely pissed off.

I'm sure he did that several times already. But he could still admit that too.

It might be that he thinks admitting such a thing could make people figuring out things, or I don't know.

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Just now, Daeron the Daring said:

How couldn't it trigger someone, once he gives fix dates that noone asked for? He shouldn't do that, I'd say. Instead giving a number, but not revealing how long it will be.

He doesn't know himself how long it will be, we've seen it plain countless times now, and it's understandable: If he has say, only 200 pages left he might feel confident, but the next day, when writing these pages he might realize that he didn't properly set up a particular plot point, which then means he has to go back in his finished pages and revise everything. Or perhaps he gets an even better idea than what was already written and modifies his pages again. That's what "It'll be done when it's done" means : It's impossible to give any reliable and exact progress estimates, because they might be invalidated at any moment after they are made. So until everything is finished, nothing is finished. 

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2 minutes ago, Daeron the Daring said:

I'm sure he did that several times already. But he could still admit that too.

It might be that he thinks admitting such a thing could make people figuring out things, or I don't know.

I get what you mean, sometimes I do weird speculating math on NotABlog like some discount BryndenBFish because at this point, I need to know man, I've been sure this books will come out 'soon' for almost a year (still think there's a fair shot that we get the release date on may). But If tomorrow he said 'I've written 1800 manuscript pages' and a few weeks later he would say 'I scrapped 1000 pages' I would fucking lose it.

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1 minute ago, CamiloRP said:

I get what you mean, sometimes I do weird speculating math on NotABlog like some discount BryndenBFish because at this point, I need to know man, I've been sure this books will come out 'soon' for almost a year (still think there's a fair shot that we get the release date on may). But If tomorrow he said 'I've written 1800 manuscript pages' and a few weeks later he would say 'I scrapped 1000 pages' I would fucking lose it.

Him doing that is the only thing that makes sense. He must have thrown away a significant number of pages if his remarks in 2015 are accurate, and his claims on the number of pages he's written since then are true.

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3 minutes ago, The Winged Griffin said:

He doesn't know himself how long it will be, we've seen it plain countless times now, and it's understandable: If he has say, only 200 pages left he might feel confident, but the next day, when writing these pages he might realize that he didn't properly set up a particular plot point, which then means he has to go back in his finished pages and revise everything. Or perhaps he gets an even better idea than what was already written and modifies his pages again. That's what "It'll be done when it's done" means : It's impossible to give any reliable and exact progress estimates, because they might be invalidated at any moment after they are made. So until everything is finished, nothing is finished. 

We're talking about manuscript pages, not finalised ones, that will be in the books. I also wasn't saying he should give information about his progress in percentage, but number of manuscript pages written.

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2 minutes ago, Cas Stark said:

I don't see any point to giving a 'number' especially since it appears that GRRM has done massive rewriting, so the 'number' is worthless, he may have written 5000 pages and discarded 4500 in the bin.  

 

1 minute ago, goodkingstannis said:

Him doing that is the only thing that makes sense. He must have thrown away a significant number of pages if his remarks in 2015 are accurate, and his claims on the number of pages he's written since then are true.

 Yep & yep.

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GRRM really, really needs a co-author who can help him finish TWOW, get the writing style and complexity down (not to mention where the story is headed.) They can then assist with, and take over if necessary, ADOS, F&B part 2, the D&E stories, etc.

And maybe they can talk him into not throwing away hundreds of pages of material each time he has a new idea.

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5 minutes ago, Daeron the Daring said:

We're talking about manuscript pages, not finalised ones, that will be in the books. I also wasn't saying he should give information about his progress in percentage, but number of manuscript pages written.

So was I, but in the end it makes little difference. 

Well in the end I feel like the concept of completion percentage is closely related to a finalized MPs number, even though it's not true, hence why it would be dangerous to give a MP number. 

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