From Pawn to Player: Rethinking Sansa IV

[ElizaMartell]

Oh and the business quote was based on Tyrion's experience with the ledgers. Sansa's education was cut short at 12. Tyrion has had a good education throughout his adult life. If he struggles with ledgers how plausible would it be for 14/15 year old Sansa to handle those transactions?

[Lyanna Stark]

I am referring to her environment. Sansa is a 13 year old left to the wills of a man who tells her to call him 'father' but tries to sneak kisses from her. The same child who a few months prior was forced into a marriage and gropped both by her groom and the Boy king who let his guards beat her. This environment doesn't appear to be one where a healthy sexual appetite can grow as her emotional development and understanding of romance has been corruptes by outside sources.

So you are referring to the fact that Littlefinger is acting as both her father and her suitor here as something that will traumatise Sansa or has already traumatised her to the degree that she doesn't know what she desires, or cannot know what she desires. Would that be a correct interpretation?

Do you have anywhere in the text where you think that it's actually supported that a healthy sexual appetite is something she cannot have, or that her emotional development and understanding of romance have in fact been corrupted, since I am getting the opposite vibe. She does not approve of of Littlefinger, she recognises immidiately that she's not attracted to Tyrion, she recognises the fact that Loras is physically attractive and she has thoughts indicating she is attracted to Sandor. Seems like she's not very confused at all here, although at the moment she has a lot of other things on her plate, meaning these type of feelings probably takes a back seat to other issues she has to face of a more urgent nature, like surviving and posing like Alayne.

Oh and the business quote was based on Tyrion's experience with the ledgers. Sansa's education was cut short at 12. Tyrion has had a good education throughout his adult life. If he struggles with ledgers how plausible would it be for 14/15 year old Sansa to handle those transactions?

There is one surefire way of Sansa learning to handle them: by being taught by Littlefinger himself. Whether he will want to do that will remainwe cannot know. This depends on things like if Littlefinger really sees Sansa as his accomplice and partner in crime. If he does, then I don't see it as necessarily impossible. If he sees Sansa more as a vehicle for power, then no, he has no reason to.

ISomehow unless Littlefinger keeps a little black book that records essential pieces of information like that Randyll Tarly likes to dress up as a Septa and be whipped by his serving maid while she calls him a naughty little girl I doubt there will be anything that can be taken over.

0.o is this the follow up to the Kaiser Wilhelm/Stalin foray?

[bloodymime]

Isn't she playing matchmaker in her head for Mya Stone in one of the last pov's we have of her so far? That would indicate a still healthy view of relationships to me, as well as a maturing because isn't it Brune she thinks of and how what's important is that he's a good man, loyal and strong?

[Lyanna Stark]

Isn't she playing matchmaker in her head for Mya Stone in one of the last pov's we have of her so far? That would indicate a still healthy view of relationships to me, as well as a maturing because isn't it Brune she thinks of and how what's important is that he's a good man, loyal and strong?

She does. She thinks he would be a good match for a girl like Mya Stone, that he's got some good and useful qualities despite not being the most good looking guy and that he really seems to like Mya. And I agree with you, she's viewing the possible match quite realistically.

[brashcandy]

Isn't she playing matchmaker in her head for Mya Stone in one of the last pov's we have of her so far? That would indicate a still healthy view of relationships to me, as well as a maturing because isn't it Brune she thinks of and how what's important is that he's a good man, loyal and strong?

Indeed. Sansa may have suffered emotionally, but her appreciation of romantic desire in herself and others remains largely unaffected. She recognizes that Lothor is interested in Mya, that Sweetrobin is only a pathetic boy wanting to act like a man, and that Ser Loras was not fond of her in that way. Her interest in Mya/Lothor matchmaking was one of the nicer bits of evidence that despite all that has happened, Sansa remains Sansa. :)

[Lummel]

...There is one surefire way of Sansa learning to handle them: by being taught by Littlefinger himself. Whether he will want to do that will remainwe cannot know. This depends on things like if Littlefinger really sees Sansa as his accomplice and partner in crime. If he does, then I don't see it as necessarily impossible. If he sees Sansa more as a vehicle for power, then no, he has no reason to...

Those ledgers were the royal accounts, not Littlefingers personal books. A personal set of accounts would evidence his criminal activities - he'd be a fool to keep them and if he did we can be certain that Varys' little birds would have long since provided Varys with plenty of evidence about Baelish's business activities.

Littlefinger educating Sansa into his ways (no not those ways naughty readers!), the ways of his business activities, would be primarily oral (x owes me this, I trade with y for that, I've borrowed a wodge of cash from z), either way unless he is enough of an idiot to have signed and sealed contrasts there would be nothing for an Alayne Stone to inherit - not that she could prove that she was Alayne Stone if it came to that.

Ah you know Lyanna how I like Randyll Tarly, that model man. ETA who truly all lesser men should adopt as a role model.

[Lyanna Stark]

Those ledgers were the royal accounts, not Littlefingers personal books. A personal set of accounts would evidence his criminal activities - he'd be a fool to keep them and if he did we can be certain that Varys' little birds would have long since provided Varys with plenty of evidence about Baelish's business activities.

Ah but don't you think he needs a set of "official" accounts tho? For the move above board transactions, in order to hide the real stuff. Isn't this how things are normally done? Well, I wouldn't know being so lily white, etc etc. :P

Littlefinger educating Sansa into his ways (no not those ways naughty readers!), the ways of his business activities, would be primarily oral (x owes me this, I trade with y for that, I've borrowed a wodge of cash from z), either way unless he is enough of an idiot to have signed and sealed contrasts there would be nothing for an Alayne Stone to inherit - not that she could prove that she was Alayne Stone if it came to that.

I see Littlefinger more as a person who would be fine with signed contracts as long as they meant they were good for him. As in, I am sure he has written evidence that Lady Waynwood owes him money, and he waved Harry's marriage contract in Sansa's face. He kept books in Kings Landing over the Royal finances as well. Like you though, I am certain that his dodgier financial deals, or anything that could hurt him isn't written down. That however doesn't mean he doesn't sit on a lot of contracts, business deals, proof of ownership etc. but he probably uses it in conjunction with things like Randyll Tarly and his maids, or old Lord Hunter's murderous sons, etc etc.

Ah you know Lyanna how I like Randyll Tarly, that model man. ETA who truly all lesser men should adopt as a role model.

I think hope Randyll Tarly might be reborn as a sheikh in his next life... :leaving:

[Lummel]

With the Waynwoods and co wasn't he buying up their debts- so gaining control of other people's paperwork?

You being so lily white and all if you were using inflated invoicing from subsidiary companies then you could keep a set of books, probably better yet multiple sets but why? He owns brothels which produce cash after all. If you want to evade taxation and trouble you keep off paper or you work through other people as we see with him owning the debts of the Waynwoods. The kind of books that say "item: two boys at a groat a piece for Lyn Corbray" are only going to get him into trouble.

Now I'm wondering if ASOIAF will turn out to be the set of books were the mysteries are solved and the plot resolved through double entry bookkeeping...

ETA the candle guttered out just as Sansa finished her audit of the Littlefinger accounts. That discrepancy of three dragons could only mean one thing...the accountant who was promised, a prince among bookkeepers.

[jons nissa]

I won't even pretend to know what Dany could have done to avoid the problems in Slaver's Bay but I don't think elevating the status of women needs to be quite the societal upheaval that we saw in Dance. For the sake of argument, if Dany does get the IT, she could marry. If she does, and has a King Consort, that would sent a large precedent on its own. From heer, she could have women be eligible to become maesters as well as men. This would provide women with options beyond wife, septa, or silent sisters. Eventually, the law could change so that the rules of inheritance match those of Dorne. I'm sure there are several other changes that Dany could do and she doesn't have to do it all in the first six months either.

as much as i hate to compare asoiaf to real life, i can only look at modern woman's suffrage and it has been very much of an upheaval. in fact, it is still not what it should be. and to connect it to medieval times, the british royal family has just (a few months ago) given women the right to be in line to inherit the throne. (yes, i know women have held it in the past as well as in sweden and holland) so while it seems very easy for dany to just swoop in and make social changes i don't believe it is. i agree, the economies of a slave society are far more intricate though. i do believe that alleras/sarella will be responsible for some upheavals in the citadel which will hopefully allow women to study but again, if that follows real history, it will be extrememly difficult as well.

So you are referring to the fact that Littlefinger is acting as both her father and her suitor here as something that will traumatise Sansa or has already traumatised her to the degree that she doesn't know what she desires, or cannot know what she desires. Would that be a correct interpretation?

Do you have anywhere in the text where you think that it's actually supported that a healthy sexual appetite is something she cannot have, or that her emotional development and understanding of romance have in fact been corrupted, since I am getting the opposite vibe. She does not approve of of Littlefinger, she recognises immidiately that she's not attracted to Tyrion, she recognises the fact that Loras is physically attractive and she has thoughts indicating she is attracted to Sandor. Seems like she's not very confused at all here, although at the moment she has a lot of other things on her plate, meaning these type of feelings probably takes a back seat to other issues she has to face of a more urgent nature, like surviving and posing like Alayne.

i believe the text indeed supports that she has become confused about her emotions and feelings specifically because of how she has romanticized her encounters with sandor. i am not trying to create a war here but her last encounter in king's landing with sandor has been changed into her first kiss - at times she remembers it warmly and at times she is bitter about it. i do find it very troubling that she is basing her knowledge of romance and sex on that incident because i do not see it as a positive encounter (even if he did offer to take her out of king's landing). i understand where his head was at the time and i also appreciate that she was still able to show him compassion but that doesn't mean it was a nice time for her. i wonder if that is why she is recreating the scene in her mind? not sure and quite frankly, until we get more insight from the next books, all we can do is speculate about why she is doing this. usually when someone changes a traumatic situation in their mind, it's coping mechanism. i know that opinion is not shared here but that is my take of that scene after reading it several times.

[Lyanna Stark]

i believe the text indeed supports that she has become confused about her emotions and feelings specifically because of how she has romanticized her encounters with sandor. i am not trying to create a war here but her last encounter in king's landing with sandor has been changed into her first kiss - at times she remembers it warmly and at times she is bitter about it. i do find it very troubling that she is basing her knowledge of romance and sex on that incident because i do not see it as a positive encounter (even if he did offer to take her out of king's landing). i understand where his head was at the time and i also appreciate that she was still able to show him compassion but that doesn't mean it was a nice time for her. i wonder if that is why she is recreating the scene in her mind? not sure and quite frankly, until we get more insight from the next books, all we can do is speculate about why she is doing this. usually when someone changes a traumatic situation in their mind, it's coping mechanism. i know that opinion is not shared here but that is my take of that scene after reading it several times.

So if understand you correctly, you think that the UnKiss false memory is proof that she is confused about her emotions and that this is having an strongly negative impact on how she views romance and sex?

In the text itself, apart from the UnKiss memory, we have her thoughts on marriage in general, at Littlefinger's and Lysa's wedding and here, despite having a rather terrible experience in Kings Landing, she reflects that the bedding wouldn't be so bad surrounded by friends and family and people she likes and trusts. Later on, we have her telling Littelfinger he should kiss Lysa instead. Then she reflects on Lothor Brune being a good match for Mya Stone, and has a, to my eyes at least, totally normal talk about romance/love/sex with Myranda Royce. Overall this points to her being able to shake off the bad experiences and keep on trucking, as it were. She doesn't strike me as someone deeply traumatised or somehow impaired.

I'm struggling to pick up on this level of confusion that other people seem to find in Sansa's thoughts, unless the sole evidence of her having a stunted sexual growth and a somehow "wrong" view of romance and love solely hinges on the false UnKiss memory, whereby she is romanticising a man who is not easily romanticised? Or is it because she doesn't as of yet seem completely sure on how she feels for Sandor (which isn't really strange, since he hardly fits any of her preconceived notions of what a suitor should be, and he also fails to tick a lot of boxes in order to become conventionally desirable)?

[brashcandy]

I don't see Littlefinger's economic activites as being something that can be taken over by another person. It's not like a lordship or a property that has independant legal form and status, it appears to be borrowing, lending and investing with bits of blackmail and manipulation involved too.

Yes, the same blackmailing and manipulative techniques that LF is teaching Sansa:

- lies and arbor gold - telling a man what he what he wants to believe/hear

- boys and gold - giving a man what he wants/understanding people's hidden desires

- keeping clean hands - never letting your misdeeds be traced back to you/importance of subtlety

- trusting no one - make sure a guard is guarding the guard

As Lyanna intimated upthread, LF himself is initiating Sansa into his secret society of how to play the game of thrones/the game of power, and whilst it's true that his own investments are probably tangled within a web of inscrutable activities, it doesn't mean that Sansa couldn't find one single thread that could unravel the whole thing, or at least enable her to take over a significant enterprise and become wealthy/powerful from such.

The key thing that remains for me is that she's learning from LF the basic guidelines of how he's managed to be successful. This power of this knowledge cannot be underestimated since he's so far used it to trump other considerable "players" like the Lannisters, the Tyrells and the Lord Declarants in the Vale.

As for managing his accounts etc, I would expect that Sansa would appoint - if she found herself lacking in that area - a competent advisor who could assist her. It would be sweet irony IMHO if Littlefinger ends up sowing the seeds of his own destruction, not simply via his obsession with Sansa (as we all expect will happen), but through his most narcissistic act up to this point: the creation of an ideal daughter, Alayne Stone.

ETA there is of course the economic powerhouse that is the mighty sheep shit estate on the fringes of the fingers. Littlefinger shows no flash. Mind you that tower house would be enough if somebody wanted to live modestly and didn't mind a diet of seaweed and mutton.

Don't discount the Fingers yet :) I have a crackplot theory or two that says that place is more important/valuable than it looks.

[1234567]

Don't discount the Fingers yet :) I have a crackplot theory or two that says that place is more important/valuable than it looks.

Do tell!

[brashcandy]

Nothing extraordinary, Rapsie my sweet. :) Just musings on certain features of the island - the cave, the rock which marks where the Andals landed to wrest the Vale from the first men, the smallfolk who don't really know their landlord all that well, etc etc. I also have great respect for that dismal piece of rock as a suitable hiding spot for those needing brief respite from the world.

[bloodymime]

That's the rock with the star carved into it?

[brashcandy]

That's the rock with the star carved into it?

Yes it is.

[bloodymime]

Thank you, I'd forgotten about that, don't want to go offtopic but that's pretty interesting. There's not really a lot of signs of the seven in the days of old when the belief would be strong that I can remember if anybody like me thinks eventually they're going to start getting stronger manifistations of their faith like the others.

[brashcandy]

Valkyrja:

So, are there any signs pointing to Sansa remaining Alayne Stone (other than the So Spake Martin quote)? I could be going crazy, but I think I remember somewhere that in the tv series, they've made a conscious decision regarding Sansa's wardrobe (I think they said it was a 'hint'?) to have her dresses decorated with dragonflies (she also wears a dragonfly necklace iirc). What the heck would dragonflies have to do with Sansa's storyline??? I thought to myself. At first, I thought perhaps it was a hint that Sansa would becoming involved with/married to a Targaryen. But then I remembered......dragonflies are *not* dragons.....

When in the Fingers LF tells her: "The Fingers are a lovely place, if you happen to be a Stone."

Given that Sansa herself is now a Stone, might this be foreshadowing of her eventual return there? It's tenuous at best, but something to keep in mind. Also, she draws strength from this bastard identity, and has a positive role model in Mya Stone.

I really enjoyed your post btw, on the whole contrast between dragonflies and dragons. If we extend the comparison further, dragons in the series are associated with fire and blood, death and destruction, qualities and pursuits that really do not define Sansa's character or personality. Dragons inspire fear, she talks of ruling through love. I know a lot of posters believe that Sansa not reclaiming her noble status would be an awful outcome, but if there's anyone who's experienced the nasty underbelly of nobility and would be predisposed to shunning it forever, it would be Sansa.

And just to support the Fingers as a place where Sansa might return, and which connects to your whole theory on the dragonflies:

Dragonflies are valuable predators that eat mosquitoes, and other small insects like flies, bees, ants, wasps, and very rarely butterflies. They are usually found around marshes, lakes, ponds, streams, and wetlands because their larvae, known as "nymphs", are aquatic. Some 5680 different species of dragonflies are known in the world today.^[2]

[jons nissa]

So if understand you correctly, you think that the UnKiss false memory is proof that she is confused about her emotions and that this is having an strongly negative impact on how she views romance and sex?

...and has a, to my eyes at least, totally normal talk about romance/love/sex with Myranda Royce. Overall this points to her being able to shake off the bad experiences and keep on trucking, as it were. She doesn't strike me as someone deeply traumatised or somehow impaired.

i can't say for sure if this will result in a negative impact on her view of romance and sex in general, but i do find her changing events in her thoughts as an indication that she was more traumatized than was originally thought.

to go from this:

He yanked her closer, and for a moment she thought he meant to kiss her. He was too strong to fight. She closed her eyes, wanting it to be over, but nothing happened. “Still can’t bear to look, can you?” she heard him say. He gave her arm a hard wrench, pulling her around and shoving her down onto the bed. “I’ll have that song. Florian and Jonquil, you said.” His dagger was out, poised at her throat. “Sing, little bird. Sing for your little life.”

Her throat was dry and tight with fear, and every song she had ever known had fled from her mind.

Please don’t kill me

, she wanted to scream,

please don’t.

She could feel him twisting the point, pushing it into her throat, and she almost closed her eyes again, but then she remembered. It was not the song of Florian and Jonquil, but it was a song. Her voice sounded small and thin and tremulous in her ears.

Gentle Mother, font of mercy,

save our sons from war, we pray, stay the swords and stay the arrows,

let them know a better day.

Gentle Mother, strength of women,

help our daughters through this fray,

soothe the wrath and tame the fury, teach us all a kinder way

.

She had forgotten the other verses. When her voice trailed off, she feared he might kill her, but after a moment the Hound took the blade from her throat, never speaking.

to these thoughts:

As the boy’s lips touched her own she found herself thinking of another kiss. She could still remember how it felt, when his cruel mouth pressed down on her own. He had come to Sansa in the darkness as green fire filled the sky.

He took a song and a kiss, and left me nothing but a bloody cloak.

and finally:

You do know what goes on in a marriage bed, I hope?”

She thought of Tyrion, and of the Hound and how he’d kissed her, and gave a nod.

to have such an extreme change of thought/memory in only a few months time is not a normal progression in my mind. she is dripping with fear in the real scene and even though she gives him a compassionate gesture of touching his cheek, it just doesn't flow logically to go from that to remembering a cruel kiss that she thinks of when she thinks of sex and the marriage bed.

I'm struggling to pick up on this level of confusion that other people seem to find in Sansa's thoughts, unless the sole evidence of her having a stunted sexual growth and a somehow "wrong" view of romance and love solely hinges on the false UnKiss memory, whereby she is romanticising a man who is not easily romanticised? Or is it because she doesn't as of yet seem completely sure on how she feels for Sandor (which isn't really strange, since he hardly fits any of her preconceived notions of what a suitor should be, and he also fails to tick a lot of boxes in order to become conventionally desirable)?

i don't think it is stunted (too soon to say) but we cannot deny that she has twisted reality. it isn't that i find the hound hard to romanticize (i'm not really going there) but i find it troubling that sansa seems to have whitewashed sandor's threats and his holding her at knifepoint. he was clearly out of control in that scene and it has now become connected with the marriage bed. yes, she manages to diffuse it with her song but i cannot pretend it hasn't happened the way sansa has.

as for her preconceived notions of what a suitor should be, i can tell what he should not be: someone that uses weapons, anger and fear to get a desired response from you. all and all, i really don't think sandor means to harm her but i do believe he wasn't always able to manage his actions. i also think that the quiet isle may help with that but i really don't know how sandor will be in the next book(s).

[brashcandy]

@jon's nissa

I think Sansa's description of the kiss as "cruel" is very telling. Yes, she may have romanticised the night, but she hasn't completely whitewashed it in the sense of imagining Sandor as some gentle, gallant hero. Also, not focusing on how the scene ends - with her touching his face and feeling those tears - is I think, a mistake. As frightened as she was, and as dangerous as the Hound appeared to be, they do not part on a note of violence or fear at all. Forget the unkiss for a moment and think about what she does after he leaves: gets up and huddles under his cloak for warmth and comfort. That to me is even more powerful evidence that she is definitely not traumatised, at least not by Sandor.

[voodooqueen126]

I won't even pretend to know what Dany could have done to avoid the problems in Slaver's Bay but I don't think elevating the status of women needs to be quite the societal upheaval that we saw in Dance. For the sake of argument, if Dany does get the IT, she could marry. If she does, and has a King Consort, that would sent a large precedent on its own. From heer, she could have women be eligible to become maesters as well as men. This would provide women with options beyond wife, septa, or silent sisters. Eventually, the law could change so that the rules of inheritance match those of Dorne. I'm sure there are several other changes that Dany could do and she doesn't have to do it all in the first six months either.

I hate to be frank, but I think as long you have a warrior based society (and your weapons of war are knives, swords and great physical strength, rather than AK47's, fighter planes, and nukes) your society will be patriarchal.

I think the situation of Alys Karstark-where she was forced to run for her life from her own uncles- is the most likely result of widespread male death, since for a woman in a feudal society, being left without male relatives doesn't result in "uncontested rights to property" but rather being kidnapped or imprisoned and forced to marry some douche.

The only reason WW1 (widespread male death) was able to improve women's lives, is that by the time WW1 came around, society had shifted from feudalism to industrilisation.

I would also say the Dornish situation is incredibly unrealistic: firstly I can't imagine why men would be so fiercely independent and brave if they had the possibility of their older sister, or son-in-law, rather than themselves or their sons, inheriting. In fact Spain, had equal inheritance of property (for non nobles, and I think the nobility took the mother's surname, except the King of course) and it didn't result in Spain becoming some feminist utopia, it resulted in men forcing their sisters into convents whenever possible, so that they wouldn't have to share their inheritance.

So frankly a medieval ruler who genuinely wanted to improve the lives of women wouldn't go about giving women the ability to become Maesters (since I think the Maesters would react pretty badly to that-sort of similar to the situation of Little Rock Arkansas, only those in favour of the segregation could probably beat the new students to death, and their would be no media coverage), it would be

a) reforming the legal system so that Westeros has better law and order

b]reforming the economy so that wealth shifts from the nobility to the merchant class.

the benefits of this are fairly obvious: this would deprive the capital of people like Tywin Lannister to start massively stupid wars whilst shifting it to people who will neither have the power nor the motivation to start wars, not mention that making jobs that women can compete in more available would do a lot to improving the lives of most women. Most significantly this will shift the economic focus from warfare (where women have little hope of competing) to commerce (where women can compete). From my reading of the Middle Ages, one of the motivations behind the crusades, was a way to get Medieval knights (with Gregor like personalities) away from Europe (where they killed Christians) to the Middle East (where they could kill Muslims). The reason this was considered necessary, was because warfare was the raison d'etre of the feudal class, knights basically started wars and feuds to provide continued justification for their existence.

So I suppose starting a Septade against followers of R'hllor (or the Dothraki) in Essos, would be a great way to deplete the number of knights, and eliminate people like Gregor from the gene pool, whilst those returning knights could bring back Essosi manufacturing techniques, which would help develop the Westerosi economy even more, so a Septade would bring numerous benefits to women.

This leads me to

C] reform the Warriors Sons and Poor Fellows from Teutonic Knights/Templars/ Knights of St John to something more like the Dominicans and Franciscans. In fact I would expand and encourage the role of the Sept generally. This might seem counterintuitive to people living today, but if the Sept is anything like Medieval catholicism, then, let it be known that the Medieval church, would usually take the side of women in annulment and forced marriage cases, mad as this might seem to us today, but the Church was far less patriarchal then the feudal lords. Another significant factor is that the Church (and well all religions really) are in favour of moral absolutes. I think moral absolutes are actually pretty useful when standing up against authoritarian regime (see the Critias dialogue, and that terrible scene in 1984, and a large part of 'overturning many a tyranny") and standing up to corrupt laws. All of that can only benefit women. We must also remember that much medieval philosophy was created by churchmen, whilst much medieval mysticism was created by nuns. This in turn had enormous influence on society, some of it rather positive. Also the Church funded much Medieval art, and I would say that religious art of late Middle Ages, whilst it takes, as a theme either Jesus or Mary and occasionally a saint, is much more interesting and innovative than the commissions from the nobles.

Another extremely important service that Church provided (especially in the late Middle Ages and coinciding with the expansion of the merchant Class) was social welfare: I think that whilst Mediaval lords donated money to orders like the Carthusians in exchange for prayers, and Cistercians in exchange for the Cistercians clearing out and farming swamp land and prayers, and to contemplative orders of nuns in exchange for prayers, the merchant classes expected much more than prayer: possibly because they didn't murder people for a living (though weirdly the Church considered charging interest and getting rich a sin though that attitude changed in the late Middle Ages), but also I think because merchants earned their money, they expected monks and nuns to do the same. Thus we see the preaching friars, charitable institutions for the poor* and hospitals. Later we see the emergence of teaching orders (though Nuns had to teach whilst being fully enclosed). I would say that widespread, basic female literacy would do far more to benefit women, than allowing a small elite minority to become Maesters. So I would tell Daenerys to reform the Sparrows into something like the Franciscans and Dominicans, and patronise orders that feed, heal and educate the poor

Which leads me to D

D]remove the disincentives to becoming a Maester, namely remove the celibacy/loss of surname lose clauses, as well as giving Maester the freedom to either serve particular castles and earn wages or inherit property (leading to a better class of feudal lord). Also provide scholarships for any male who can pass an entrance test. This would encourage a lot more men to become Maesters, thus encouraging the sciences, which would encourage the economy further. Not mention encouraging clever men to have families would lead to a greater number of men available for hypergamous marriages. Which would enable poorer women to climb the social ladder. Whilst there might be some protest, there would be far less protest than if you allowed women to become Maesters.

A lot of improving the lives of women is actually about improving the lives of human beings generally.

*Question: if you had to pick between a Magdalene Laundry and syphilis-and giving your clients wives syphilis-what would you pick?