From Pawn to Player? Rereading Sansa IV

[brashcandy]

I have a quick question. Why was Cersei having the dress made for Sansa again? Is it for Joffrey's upcoming wedding?

I seem to recall that people mentioned it was for her own wedding, yet that makes little sense. In Sansa II: First, she's fitted with the dress. Then, she goes out hawking with her 'friends'. She has such a good time that she tells Dontos to not bother with the rescue plan due to going with the Tyrells. ***Dontos tells LF.*** Later, in Tyrion III, Tywin tells Tyrion that LF had 'only yesterday' told them about the Tyrel's plans, which shocks Cersei. She didn't yet know that Sansa was to be wed.

Perhaps I'm confused but it seems to contradict that LF was in on any Sansa/Willas plot with the Tyrells as people have put forward here (now pages ago, alas).

Sid 2,

The events of Tyrion III actually came before Sansa II. And during Sansa II she was recollecting the time spent with Margaery, hawking and talking to the Tyrell cousins, it wasn't happening in real time. She would have told Dontos at some point during this period, but there's still evidence that suggests LF may have either been told by the Tyrells about the plot, or he may have been the one to recommend it in the first place.

[Lyanna Stark]

Compare this to Sansa, whose mother got pregnant the first time she slept with someone and her aunt who got pregnant either the first or second time she slept with someone. The Tully side of the family seems quite fertile.

Woah, I can't remember that Cat got knocked up that quickly, is that mentioned in AGOT?

Regarding Lysa, I am not so certain LF only had sex with her the once. It's certain he at least mixed up Lysa and Cat at least once, but I always got the feeling Lysa/LF had something going on for a bit longer.

If not tho...poor Sansa had better be careful! :eek: (Although I suppose it's practical to be very fertile if you want to off your husband quickly after getting married.)

[Fragile Bird]

Woah, I can't remember that Cat got knocked up that quickly, is that mentioned in AGOT?

Regarding Lysa, I am not so certain LF only had sex with her the once. It's certain he at least mixed up Lysa and Cat at least once, but I always got the feeling Lysa/LF had something going on for a bit longer.

If not tho...poor Sansa had better be careful! :eek: (Although I suppose it's practical to be very fertile if you want to off your husband quickly after getting married.)

Yes, Robb is born 9 months after the wedding. IMHO, they did "it" (haha) more than once, though. :blushing: She and Ned get married, and he leaves for war. And Lysa, as far as I can tell, had only that one night with LF, which he remembers as being Cat, and thereby tells everyone at court he deflowered her.

Edit: Rapsie, I was just thinking that LF brags he deflowered both the Tully girls, doesn't he? So there would have to be a 2nd time with Lysa, one he remembered. Or am I imagining that.

[1234567]

@ Lyanna Stark

I think it's in ACOK, After Robb is worrying about Jeyne not Being pregnant yet. Cat tells him not to worry, but reflects that she was pregnant with him after the wedding night as Eddard rode off to war the day after the wedding. Similarly I think Lysa recounts two times she slept with Petyr...including the one where he was drugged up after the fight with Brandon and mistook Lysa for Cat.

It's not the relevant chapter yet, but this maybe part of some Sansa foreshadowing in her Vale chapters. It will be interesting to look at the connection when we come to reading them. :)

[bgona]

I agree with Chavalah that what Tyrion wants is to be loved. All things considered, I doubt he ever has been, since his mother died giving birth to him and his father always hated him. Through the novels, this is also Tyrion's main weakness (which is why I get the old Meatloaf song "I will do anything for love (but I won't do that)" on my head while writing this post up. :P )

In any case, onwards to the chapter.

It illustrates clearly how Tyrion and Sansa are completely wrapped up in their own misery and unable to care for one another at all. As stated previously, the rift between House Lannister and House Stark is too deep. While Sansa later ponders that Tyrion was kind to her, in his own way, at this stage they just cannot, and will not, reach eachother.

I can't agree with everyone who thinks Tyrion is only selfish and bad here: to me he comes across as thoroughly depressed. He may be older and more mature than Sansa, but his dreams have got crushed, just like hers. On many levels he also knows his relationship with Shae is unhealthy, and it does feel as if he has to lie harder to himself all the time not to notice. While Tyrion does not make a huge amount of effort to befriend Sansa, I don't think he actually could do it even if he tried. She wouldn't let him (and rightly so, poor Sansa). Sansa does not trust Tyrion at all. In return, he doesn't trust her, so the poison planted by Cersei and Joffrey is a barrier between them.

You got me just with the Meatloaf song!! Lol.

Anyway I am one that believe that Tyrion is selfish in this marriage. I´m not saying that he is bad. Not at all. Maybe as it is pointed before this marriage is the beginning to the Tyrion on ADWD (so dark). He is selfish in the way that he wants Sansa loves her but not doing nothing really to make her love him. The not bedding at the weeding: I don´t believe that is just to be nice to Sansa, it is more to keep out Joffrey. The not consumation maybe is done for several reasons, one of them can be that he wants Sansa to want him. But if he desires that what not try to have a relationship with her (not a sexual relationship, no, they seem so separated that they only keep contact due to the fact that they have to be in the same room, but they could be in totally different worlds). He doesn´t give her any present, no try to enjoy her. He doesn´t try. He wants her love just for been Tyrion, a nice guy (but not for trying to know her, love her to be able to have a happy marriage). So it is selfish cause he wants to be loved but in return he doesn´t love her.

[brashcandy]

On the topic of fertility, it does seem as though Sansa would be able to get pregnant pretty quickly (based on Cat's experiences), but it's worth noting that Cat's mother Minisa was a Whent, and the other women in that family had terrible reproductive issues with multiple miscarriages and stillborns. Lysa Tully experiences the same challenges throughout her marriage to Jon Arryn, and Minisa herself died in childbirth, as well as Lyanna Stark.

[bgona]

Be pregnant depends in so many factors! Anyway to woman in medieval (and I believe also in Westeros) was of high risk. I don´t know how maesters (the doctors of Westeros) were good at this, of if there are any midwife to help. And in any case, it is a risk that all women take to continue with the human race.

[Grail King]

quick ?

I don't want to make answers to this long, but since LF did the deed twice with Lysa what chance do you give SR to being Balish's son?

[Fragile Bird]

On the topic of fertility, it does seem as though Sansa would be able to get pregnant pretty quickly (based on Cat's experiences), but it's worth noting that Cat's mother Minisa was a Whent, and the other women in that family had terrible reproductive issues with multiple miscarriages and stillborns. Lysa Tully experiences the same challenges throughout her marriage to Jon Arryn, and Minisa herself died in childbirth, as well as Lyanna Stark.

Whenever I read that stuff about the Whents I keep thinking to myself, what, did the builders of Harrenhall find some radioactive granite (uranium and granite are found together inplaces) to build the castle with? We know Lyanna was at Harrenhall, were Cat and Lysa?

[brashcandy]

Whenever I read that stuff about the Whents I keep thinking to myself, what, did the builders of Harrenhall find some radioactive granite (uranium and granite are found together inplaces) to build the castle with? We know Lyanna was at Harrenhall, were Cat and Lysa?

As far as I know, Cat and Lysa were not at the Harrenhal tourney, but yeah, Harrenhal is probably cursed in more ways than one.

[Gingerly Grumkin]

I always assumed Lysa was barren (or close enough) because of the forced abortion (i.e. Tansy+ Moon Tea)

[childofsummer]

:idea: On the Sansa-Tyrion marriage dynamic, it struck me that they act as pretty effective character foils for each other. They're almost polar opposites on the Myers-Briggs scale. Sansa is empathetic, while Tyrion is analytical. Sansa feels, while Tyrion thinks, and so on. Maybe that's why they have such a hard time understanding each other, though Sansa does this better than Tyrion, arguably.

These differences play out notably in their arcs, in that they react very differently to adversity. Tyrion lashes out, while Sansa internalizes. Sansa's amazing self-control and ability to show compassion to people that have hurt her help her rise from a dreadful situation a stronger, more mature future queen. She doesn't use her pain to hurt or frighten others; instead, she either shields them from it or uses it to reach out and empathize with them, thereby lessening their distress. (see frightened people in the hall, Hound, Sweetrobin, etc.) <i>ETA: This does not mean that Sansa is dim, or that she doesn't think, just that she thinks differently from Tyrion (intuitively, versus linearly).</i>

Tyrion can't understand her refusal to lash out in anger and grief, or why she chooses to lock herself alone in he room to grieve for her brother and mother, because his reaction would have been totally different. We see this in his arc later on, when he imposes his anger and pain on Penny and the slave girl.

Maybe GRRM married them not because he thought they'd stay together, but rather because it was an excellent way to highlight their natures (and get them out of KL)?

[Elba the Intoner]

I always assumed Lysa was barren (or close enough) because of the forced abortion (i.e. Tansy+ Moon Tea)

Yes, this is what I thought too. Lysa got pregnant easily the very first time, then she was forced to abort it and after that it had always been difficult for her.

(On a related note, I guess there is no such thing as a sexually transmitted disease in this world as we haven't seen anything of that).

[Fragile Bird]

Actually, Elba, there is reference to the fact that (I have just gone brain dead) the disgraced maester who now works for Cersei, um, Qyburn? was ordered to examine women very carefully because someone developed a problem and had become wary. Maybe Vargo? It is really one of the very few references to possible sexual issues, because otherwise everybody seems to fuck with abandon. Now, didn't the worst STDs come from New World, so GRRM is making a parallel here, no STDs, because no one has sailed across to the land that has them and brought them back?

[David Selig]

(On a related note, I guess there is no such thing as a sexually transmitted disease in this world as we haven't seen anything of that).

IIRC Randyl Tarly punished severely one prostitute in Maidenpool because some of his soldiers caught the pox from her.

[childofsummer]

Actually, Elba, there is reference to the fact that (I have just gone brain dead) the disgraced maester who now works for Cersei, um, Qyburn? was ordered to examine women very carefully because someone developed a problem and had become wary. Maybe Vargo? It is really one of the very few references to possible sexual issues, because otherwise everybody seems to fuck with abandon. Now, didn't the worst STDs come from New World, so GRRM is making a parallel here, no STDs, because no one has sailed across to the land that has them and brought them back?

I thought it was the other way around, that the European explorers brought a lot of new diseases, STDs and others like smallpox, to the New World, thereby decimating the indigenous populations. According to the almighty Google, there's evidence in victims' bones that syphilis came from the New World, but gonorrhea symptoms and remedies were described in ancient Egyptian writings.

[bgona]

The problem with diseases is really the fact that when an illness from a culture reaches another culture that doesn´t have biological defenses that the original culture has developpe throught the generations.

A fact: Spaniards (I´m Spaniard) gave infected free blankets to Indians in the New World. The Indians died cause they didn´t posses biological defenses to the European illness.

Illness erradicate in a country can reapear due to people migration, travels, etc...

Anyway STD exists in medieval and also in Westeros.

Qyburn is only a butcher, a maester that has lose his chain cause he realize forbidden practice (poor Selyse) to kill or unkill people.

[bgona]

quick ?

I don't want to make answers to this long, but since LF did the deed twice with Lysa what chance do you give SR to being Balish's son?

Yes, Lysa couldn´t almost have children due to the Tansy (Atanasia) + Moon Tea that her father give her. Plus added to the fact that John Arryn was an old man.

And I don´t believe SR is son of LF.

[bgona]

Sansa + Tyrion marriage maybe is one of the stone to reach the peace. But I really hope that they don´t still together cause this marriage makes both unhappy.

[Woman of War]

About the topic of fertility:

I have just googled it and it is said that fertility in people with achondroplasia is normal. So in theory the fertility of Tyrion might be normal, given that

A. Martin thought of a person with achondroplasia when he invented Tyrion

B. Every man can have fertility problems and so can people with achondroplasia.

That Tyrion has never fathered a child, to his own knowledge, may mean that every woman he was with did everything to avoid the child of a monster and so saw to having drunk her moon tea. But people did not know anything about genetics and so it is quite unlikely they may know that there is a likelihood of fifty percent to have a child with achondroplasia if one parent is concerned him- or herself. Though they certainly were convinced that being with someone physically handicapped since birth made monsters and dwarfs cursed by the gods. Achondroplasia is a rather rare condition, so few people may ever had any personal experience, everything was mostly hearsay and plain superstition.

And Lanna being Tyrion's child: Tyrion made love to Tysha within the same menstrual cycle where she was raped by fifty other men. There would never be a way to find out if Lanna was Tyrion's child, though the likelihod would be considerably higher if Lanna were a dwarf herself, but apparently she isn't. Even then: people of normal height can have children with achondroplasia, see Tywin (or Aerys if you like)

Then the risks during delivery: Again, I have just asked Google and it told me that today a cesarean is indeed recommended for pregnancies if the baby has achondroplasia BUT not because of the health risk for the mother. The babies are of about normal size and weight at birth and their condition is only diagnosed by proportions different from average, actually fifteen percent of these children aren't diagnosed until some time later, which would explain why Tyrion was not killed by Tywin straightaway. A normal delivery is risky for the baby because of intracranial pressure and the danger of blocking the liquor flow in the head, thus causing hydrocephalus. The head of the child thus gets overlarge later during childhood. Meaning: Tyrion's mother got not killed by the fact that Tyrion is a dwarf but she died during childbirth or a little after like so many women did until Semmelweis' ideas about hygiene in childbed became common knowledge.

This means at the same time that any other woman being pregnant by Tyrion would not be more at risk during birth than with another father for her child.

And Sansa's fertility: as far as I know (not googled but from my own pregnancy guides ) girls who just had their menarche are not yet at the height of their fertility. Although there are - far too many - teen pregnancies the likelyhood to get pregnant is significantly lower for kids of thirteen or fourteen than it is for girls above eighteen.

I personally found the scene where Tyrion sits beside Sansa at Joffrey's wedding and sees the happy "pregnant" couple, very touching. He simply wants the same Sansa may want: a normal life. And these two were infinitely far away from each other, no bridge was possible between them though basically they had the same dreams for the future, only maybe not with each other. That was somehow heartbreaking, no matter why they were unable to reach out to each other.