Would Lyanna have been happy with anyone other than Robert?

[Floki of the Ironborn]

16 minutes ago, Canon Claude said:

Oh right, because Andals=Bad and First Men=Good, how stupid of me to forget!

Spare me. This is just anti-Sansa attitude mixed with pro-North posturing. 

Oh don't worry, I'm not under any illusion about the North. They have their own dark edge to them, we've been seeing their savagery coming back across the books. They're going to be the ones most prepared for winter, but they'll become beast-like. We've already seen all six of the Stark kids become wargs, plus there's Ramsay being described as a beast in human skin, Bran discovering the origins of blood sacrifice among the First Men, then Wyman Manderly, descended from Andal refugees, shows that he's of the North by feasting on the meat of those men who murdered his son, and feeding said meat to the other Northerners at Winterfell. We'll have to decide for ourselves whether we keep rooting for the Starks, because they're going to survive, but at a terrible cost to their humanity.

[Only 89 selfies today]

@James Steller

Lyanna was a wild, high-strung girl.  She would fall for Oberyn, Daario, Daemon T., Gerold, and Mance.  Men with sharp edges but still have clever wits.  Robert was a womanizer and had his edge.  But Lyanna would prefer somebody who can make her laugh and still stimulate her mind.  Robert is too direct.  Lyanna wants somebody who is a skilled womanizer.  Somebody who can turn her on from the inside.  Robert can tell a dirty joke and it will be funny to the men.  But Daemon can make a bawdy joke seem clever and sexy.  Picture the rogue prince in your mind.  He meets Lyanna and say something dirty and clever at the same time.  All that starts going through her mind.  It's a start of something.  She needs to feel alive.  A girl like that gets bored easily.  Let me tell you what she doesn't want.  Stannis, Eddard, Viserys, Willas, Jaime, and Littlefinger.  I can maybe see her toying with a pretty boy like Viserys.  But there won't be any love there.  She might go out with him strictly on looks and lay with somebody like him just for the experience.   Her man will need to be strong and capable of standing up on his own.  A Samwell has no chance.  She definitely wants an older man.  A travelled man who can excite her with stories of adventure.  She is the type to leave at the first hints of boredom.

[Lee-Sensei]

On 10/17/2020 at 10:57 PM, James Steller said:

I’m not going to have a talk about Rhaegar and Lyanna because we don’t know the situation.

What we DO know is that Lyanna was not happy about marrying Robert. Even Ned Stark knew that to be true, he just wasn’t brave enough to tell Robert the truth all those years.

I recently commented on another thread that Robert probably should have abdicated his position as Lord of Storm’s End and given the title to Stannis. But would that have changed matters? Lyanna and Stannis aren’t the first couple I’d think of, but Stannis isn’t a hedonist or a rampant adulterer (though to be fair I don’t think he’d have been comfortable with Lyanna nor she with him).
But what about other possibilities. Edmure and Viserys were too young, Jon Arryn was too old. Rhaegar was taken by the time that Lyanna came of age. Assuming we’re only looking at Great Houses, that leaves Jaime Lannister (before his Kingsguard vows anyway), Oberyn Martell, maybe Willas Tyrell, Baelor Hightower (because the Hightowers count as Great Houses, I won’t argue about it), maybe Balon Greyjoy (not that I’d pick him, for obvious reasons), and maybe that’s it? 
I feel like Oberyn Martell is the only viable candidate; he’s got no issue with women learning how to ride and fight, he’s sexually explorative and open, and he’s also got bad boy cred in buckets. Maybe if Rickard had been smart enough to see where Lyanna would be happiest, things would have been so much different.

Oberyn arguably more promiscuous than Robert and I don’t think that there’s any evidence that Robert would be against Lyanna riding horses or learning to fight.

[Arthur Peres]

8 hours ago, Lee-Sensei said:

Oberyn arguably more promiscuous than Robert and I don’t think that there’s any evidence that Robert would be against Lyanna riding horses or learning to fight.

Honestly if anything Robert is likely to support this more than any other noble in the series.

[Arthur Peres]

The problem is that we do not know the situation that lead Lyanna to go with Rhaegar, if we take that her issue with Robert is him having a bastard daughter, she comes off pretty hypocrite going with Rhaegar that has two kids with another woman.

If whoring is the problem, than Edmure and Oberyn are also out of the picture. 

Robert inflatulation with her also seems off place to me, Ned does not think that Robert knew her well, and Robert behaviour towards Ned makes me belive what he wanted on his marriage with Lyanna was being a family with Ned. He goes as far as to waste "his heir" on a match with Sansa, despite being the safest alliance he has in the realm.

[Lee-Sensei]

30 minutes ago, Arthur Peres said:

Honestly if anything Robert is likely to support this more than any other noble in the series.

"My late husband loved the forest too." In the early years of their marriage, Robert was forever imploring her to hunt with him, but Cersei had always begged off. His hunting trips allowed her time with Jaime. Golden days and silver nights. It was a dangerous dance that they had danced, to be sure. Eyes and ears were everywhere within the Red Keep, and one could never be certain when Robert would return. Somehow the peril had only served to make their times together that much more thrilling.

"Still, beauty can sometimes mask deadly danger," she warned the little queen. "Robert lost his life in the woods." Go and hunt, Cersei had urged Robert, half a hundred times. My brother keeps me well protected.

This is worth mentioning.

[Manderly's Rat Cook]

On 10/19/2020 at 9:45 AM, Lee-Sensei said:

Oberyn arguably more promiscuous than Robert and I don’t think that there’s any evidence that Robert would be against Lyanna riding horses or learning to fight.

I agree, but my guess is that he wouldn't mind his wife doing the same, whereas Robert would be a hypocrite about it. It seems to be pretty much acceptable for Arianne to be promiscuous, as long as she doesn't get pregnant at least. The same would probably be expected of Lyanna, because inheritance. 

That being said it's basically unclear what puts her off about Robert. His promiscuity is the reason we're given, but it's unclear if that's all there is to it. Somehow I think there's more to it than just that, but as long as we don't know more about it, it's just wild guesses. Perhaps he's simply not her type. Perhaps she sensed that he liked the idea of her more than who she was (which is probably more than she could've expected from any match made for, and not by her). Perhaps she was just pissed off that she didn't have a say in the matter. Perhaps all of those reasons, it something entirely different. Who knows...

Maybe you're right about the riding and fighting, but I do think that their relationship would've turned sour after a while when Robert realized that she didn't admire him. Perhaps that's why he was so into her in the first place.. His manic pixie dream girl, who was also hard to get, but was cooler than all the other girls, so he had to have her. But he never could, because she just wasn't into him.

17 hours ago, Lee-Sensei said:

"My late husband loved the forest too." In the early years of their marriage, Robert was forever imploring her to hunt with him, but Cersei had always begged off. His hunting trips allowed her time with Jaime. Golden days and silver nights. It was a dangerous dance that they had danced, to be sure. Eyes and ears were everywhere within the Red Keep, and one could never be certain when Robert would return. Somehow the peril had only served to make their times together that much more thrilling.

"Still, beauty can sometimes mask deadly danger," she warned the little queen. "Robert lost his life in the woods." Go and hunt, Cersei had urged Robert, half a hundred times. My brother keeps me well protected.

This is worth mentioning.

I think Robert and Lyanna COULD have been a great match; both being wild and spirited, if only Lyanna would've been into him. He may have even been relatively loyal to her, more than to Cercei anyway, although I do think that he would've slipped up when he was away from her.

I do think they could've connected with hunting. I think Lyanna might have missed some depth in him, but at least they had more in common than him and Cercei, and I don't think he would've become such a fat drunk, as with Cercei. Just a slightly chubby, often - but not always - drunk.

It's hard to say though. Assuming that Lyanna did have a lot in common with Arya, they would probably have heated arguments on a regular basis. I think that Robert would either find this endearing, and funny, or he would start to resent her, like he resented Cercei. If Lyanna would never love him, it care about him, my money is in resentment after a few years of desperately trying to swoon her. But Lyanna isn't Cercei, and with Robert making actual efforts to win her love, she may in time have grown to love him anyway. I can imagine them as being slightly older versions of Arya and Gendry, with Lyanna calling him stupid and trying to hit him when she's angry, and him just laughing at her efforts, while holding her at arms length, thinking what a lucky bastard he is to have her as his wife. At the very least Robert would've been happier than he was with Cercei, albeit possibly not as happy as he imagined.. and I think Lyanna may actually have been happier than she imagined, after some time.

[broken one]

On 10/19/2020 at 9:45 AM, Lee-Sensei said:

Oberyn arguably more promiscuous than Robert and I don’t think that there’s any evidence that Robert would be against Lyanna riding horses or learning to fight.

this is true. on the other hand he was simpleton, ignorant and wifebeater. This just  reminds me of some sort of men and their vision of where womans place is.

[Lee-Sensei]

3 hours ago, broken one said:

this is true. on the other hand he was simpleton, ignorant and wifebeater. This just  reminds me of some sort of men and their vision of where womans place is.

Robert or Oberyn? Robert hit Cersei and Oberyn hit Obara’s mother. Neither were above hitting women.

[Lee-Sensei]

5 hours ago, Manderly's Rat Cook said:

I agree, but my guess is that he wouldn't mind his wife doing the same, whereas Robert would be a hypocrite about it. It seems to be pretty much acceptable for Arianne to be promiscuous, as long as she doesn't get pregnant at least. The same would probably be expected of Lyanna, because inheritance. 

That being said it's basically unclear what puts her off about Robert. His promiscuity is the reason we're given, but it's unclear if that's all there is to it. Somehow I think there's more to it than just that, but as long as we don't know more about it, it's just wild guesses. Perhaps he's simply not her type. Perhaps she sensed that he liked the idea of her more than who she was (which is probably more than she could've expected from any match made for, and not by her). Perhaps she was just pissed off that she didn't have a say in the matter. Perhaps all of those reasons, it something entirely different. Who knows...

Maybe you're right about the riding and fighting, but I do think that their relationship would've turned sour after a while when Robert realized that she didn't admire him. Perhaps that's why he was so into her in the first place.. His manic pixie dream girl, who was also hard to get, but was cooler than all the other girls, so he had to have her. But he never could, because she just wasn't into him.

I think Robert and Lyanna COULD have been a great match; both being wild and spirited, if only Lyanna would've been into him. He may have even been relatively loyal to her, more than to Cercei anyway, although I do think that he would've slipped up when he was away from her.

I do think they could've connected with hunting. I think Lyanna might have missed some depth in him, but at least they had more in common than him and Cercei, and I don't think he would've become such a fat drunk, as with Cercei. Just a slightly chubby, often - but not always - drunk.

It's hard to say though. Assuming that Lyanna did have a lot in common with Arya, they would probably have heated arguments on a regular basis. I think that Robert would either find this endearing, and funny, or he would start to resent her, like he resented Cercei. If Lyanna would never love him, it care about him, my money is in resentment after a few years of desperately trying to swoon her. But Lyanna isn't Cercei, and with Robert making actual efforts to win her love, she may in time have grown to love him anyway. I can imagine them as being slightly older versions of Arya and Gendry, with Lyanna calling him stupid and trying to hit him when she's angry, and him just laughing at her efforts, while holding her at arms length, thinking what a lucky bastard he is to have her as his wife. At the very least Robert would've been happier than he was with Cercei, albeit possibly not as happy as he imagined.. and I think Lyanna may actually have been happier than she imagined, after some time.

I agree that they probably wouldn’t be happy even though they seemed to have shared some interests. Like most people, I think that Lyanna ran off with Rhaegar of her own volition. For whatever reason, she wasn’t interested in him.

[broken one]

2 hours ago, Lee-Sensei said:

Robert or Oberyn? Robert hit Cersei and Oberyn hit Obara’s mother. Neither were above hitting women.

was oberyn ignorant or simpleton?

or did he beat Elaria from time to time to vent his drunken anger? I doubt it.

[Lee-Sensei]

2 hours ago, broken one said:

was oberyn ignorant or simpleton?

or did he beat Elaria from time to time to vent his drunken anger? I doubt it.

That depends on what you consider a simpleton. Robert was probably of fairly average intelligence.

And Robert didn’t beat Cersei to vent his drunken anger. He hit her a handful of times in 15 years of marriage (and she hit him too). One of those times was when she threatened to murder his daughter if he brought her to the Red Keep. Even then, he he felt remorse afterwards.