From Pawn to Player: Rethinking Sansa IV

[Kittykatknits]

This is really interesting :) As you noted, there's that sense of desiring freedom, wanting to be free from the troubles and restrictions around her, and this is connected to the nickname the Hound gives her (maybe she will warg a bird, or we could see her achieve true autonomy). I like the chronological outline you gave above, which illustrates quite succintly Sansa's development in the novels, and how she's now drawing on her own innate abilities to protect her. The peril still remains (crazy aunts like Lysa), but Sansa is playing an active part in handling her own crises now.

The first two examples are sucidial, desperate thoughts; the next ones relate to her relationship with the Hound, and her dependence on him during her captivity in KL. He's always there to catch her, even before she realises she might fall. In the scene with Dontos she finds the courage to make it down the ladder on her own, and makes a wise choice to send the drunken fool ahead of her. The final scene when she makes it across the ledge with SW is testament to Sansa's courage and strength of character. She's depending on no one here but herself (playing the damsel in distress, but only for the effect it produces in SW to be her champion), and indeed, the safety of a frightened little boy is in her hands.

(For the record, we have even more examples of Sandor catching her before she falls:

- the night of the Hand's dinner (when he scared her with his laughter)

- on the serpentine steps

- before she can be pulled off her horse in the riot)

I almost missed your small text at the bottom. It seems that Sansa isn't so much connected with heights or ledges alone, but with the potential for falling and escape. All of the incidents with the Hound, he's there to catch or save her in some way, reinforcing his role as her protector. As for the first two, they are suicidal thoughts but also indicative of her desire for freedom and escape. The Hound's nickname for her is not just about wanting to fly and be free, but also reflects how she can be kept in a cage, just as she was in KL and now finds herself in the Vale too.

Great point on how her each time also reflects her development as a character.

[brashcandy]

I almost missed your small text at the bottom. It seems that Sansa isn't so much connected with heights or ledges alone, but with the potential for falling and escape. All of the incidents with the Hound, he's there to catch or save her in some way, reinforcing his role as her protector. As for the first two, they are suicidal thoughts but also indicative of her desire for freedom and escape. The Hound's nickname for her is not just about wanting to fly and be free, but also reflects how she can be kept in a cage, just as she was in KL and now finds herself in the Vale too.

Great point on how her each time also reflects her development as a character.

Thanks Kitty. Yes you're right on the general connection to falling and escape. It highlights I think that Sansa is not only at risk throughout her times in KL and the Vale, but that she's also willing to take risks to secure her freedom/safety. She's moved from needing a protector to being a protector as well, and perhaps an appreciation for this responsibility will be the main reason why she protects SW from LF.

[Lady Lea]

Also, I'm not sure I'm understanding your twilight reference. Can you explain that a bit more?

Oh god, I feel like I'm destroying what teeny-tiny cred I might have here but I think I can answer that (my mom is a Twilight fan... she made me read Twilight so I made her read ASOIAF. She likes it!). It's probably because Bella, the protagonist, is a teen girl who in spite of being told several times that her bf Edward is a killer and dangerous and could hurt her without even trying (most of the times by Edward himself) she doesn't care because he's basically an Adonis with marble abs and great hair and skin that literally glitters in the sun. So it's like she's blinded by his good looks (I mean... that has to be it, because he has no personality to speak of and is in fact incredibly abusive).

[voodooqueen126]

Very poetic! I agree. The theme of songs is the strongest in Sansa's story. It's as if she is tying everything else that happens, even in other parts of the world, together with his theme. The name of the entire series is "A Song of Ice and Fire" after all.

Here is one other thing: actual Medieval girls, in Sansa's position (say the tsesarevnas*, or madam royals, infantas, princesses* etc) were given an education that consisted mostly of religious indoctrination (think about the joke about the portuguese princess whose nun companions could never sleep on a bed that had been occupied previously by a man) a music and etiquette, and Latin and French. In comparison to a Princess like Mary Tudor, Isabella of Castile, the daughters of Charlemagne and Alfred the Great, Matilda of Scotland and Matilda of England, Sansa is woefully under educated: her education seems to have consisted of nothing more than love stories, a smattering of Valyrian (inferred since Arya knows the language) and a little bit of courtesy. Sansa's education is, for instance, rather more shabby than that of Isabella of Castile, who was in many ways deliberately kept in the dark during her elder brother's time as king.

Now in my opinion the purpose of this religious indoctrination was to prevent the princess from straying from her husband when she was eventually married off (since the whole monarchial system depended on female loyalty), but also, on a sort of metaphorical level, teach someone that most joy in life was in the next world, but that life on earth was full of sufferig.

I think cracked does a rather funny article on it actually.

In contrast the romance stories and songs that Sansa loves (and women of the lesser nobility also loved) are about people achieving happiness in this world. Although it is through adultery and it does end in tragedy. Yet all the same, it shows that it is possible to be happy in this lifetime, if one is willing to go out and seek love.

*given the size of the North)

[romantic]

Yeah Marillion is a shithead, but I wonder...did Littlefinger actually cut off his fingers? Sansa is doubtful and so am I, but what on earth would LF use Marillion for?

Maybe LF is using Marillion to try and make Sweetrobin crazy - doesn't SR still hear singing after Marillion is supposed to be dead?

[Caro99]

Here is one other thing: actual Medieval girls, in Sansa's position (say the tsesarevnas*, or madam royals, infantas, princesses* etc) were given an education that consisted mostly of religious indoctrination (think about the joke about the portuguese princess whose nun companions could never sleep on a bed that had been occupied previously by a man) a music and etiquette, and Latin and French. In comparison to a Princess like Mary Tudor, Isabella of Castile, the daughters of Charlemagne and Alfred the Great, Matilda of Scotland and Matilda of England, Sansa is woefully under educated: her education seems to have consisted of nothing more than love stories, a smattering of Valyrian (inferred since Arya knows the language) and a little bit of courtesy. Sansa's education is, for instance, rather more shabby than that of Isabella of Castile, who was in many ways deliberately kept in the dark during her elder brother's time as king.

Now in my opinion the purpose of this religious indoctrination was to prevent the princess from straying from her husband when she was eventually married off (since the whole monarchial system depended on female loyalty), but also, on a sort of metaphorical level, teach someone that most joy in life was in the next world, but that life on earth was full of sufferig.

your post made me wonder about sansa's education and what her parents thought would be good for her in the long-run. i don't know if cersei whom i think always expected and was expected to end up as queen one day,due to her aunt encouraging her about rhaegar's visit to casterly rock, but i'm sure tywin would have wanted his daughter to be prepared for the life at court she would lead and her involvment in the game... (of course they could have thought about it) but maybe neither ned or cat expected sansa to be a queen, therefore no need to teach her anything beyond the things you stated (high valyrian, songs, keeping accounts i think, how to keep a household, courtesy, i'm sure i could be forgetting something else). i think ned said to arya that one day she would marry a great lord and rule his castle, so before jon arryn's death this could've been sansa's case as well... of course they had no way of seeing the future, but this sort of "lack of attention" to the girl's education we know brought a little trouble down the road, since sansa has had to learn in the hardest way some lessons by her own...

[voodooqueen126]

your post made me wonder about sansa's education and what her parents thought would be good for her in the long-run. i don't know if cersei whom i think always expected and was expected to end up as queen one day,due to her aunt encouraging her about rhaegar's visit to casterly rock, but i'm sure tywin would have wanted his daughter to be prepared for the life at court she would lead and her involvment in the game... (of course they could have thought about it) but maybe neither ned or cat expected sansa to be a queen, therefore no need to teach her anything beyond the things you stated (high valyrian, songs, keeping accounts i think, how to keep a household, courtesy, i'm sure i could be forgetting something else). i think ned said to arya that one day she would marry a great lord and rule his castle, so before jon arryn's death this could've been sansa's case as well... of course they had no way of seeing the future, but this sort of "lack of attention" to the girl's education we know brought a little trouble down the road, since sansa has had to learn in the hardest way some lessons by her own...

Learning High Valyrian would be pretty important: if it's role is anything like that played by Latin in the Middle Ages, then the equivalents of Cicero, Seneca, Pliny, Julius Ceasar, Suetonius, Livy, Sallust, Varro, Virgil, Horace, Tacitus, Cato the Younger and Vitruvius.

Heck Christian authors like St Augustine, St Jerome, St Ambrose, Prudentius and Boethius wrote in Latin...

To know Latin was to have access to at least some of these writers (not their complete works by any means, but a litlte bit).

In particular the authors I have bolded, wrote about politics, in terms both idealistic and cynical, a few were influenced by Thucydides, who is widely considered the father of political realism.

Yet at the same time I wouldn't expect an 11 year old to have read them, though Julius Ceasar's "Commentaries on the Gallic War" was traditionally the first authentic text assigned to students of Latin in a classical education. Yet neither Sansa, Cersei, or even Robb or Tyrion mention reading any Valyrian work that approaches "Valyrians invade the Rhoynar" or some such.*

Anyway that's pretty small fry, but none of the Stark children, and of Lannister's only Tyrion, have received an education that deals with Westerosi history. Since it's pretty clear that Tyrion sought out his historical knowledge, we can not attribute that to Tywin's choices. Actually remember that Jon Snow in ADWD was sufficiently knowledgeable to know that pissing off the Iron Bank=Bad, which Cersei didn't know :eek: . Now we could attribute this to a difference in personality: people with Cersei's sort of personality disorder tend not to take instruction very well, whilst Jon might have been desperate for approval and love and thus sought out learning. But I think it is more to do with Tywin: for a man who expected his daughter to be queen, he certainly didn't give her a Queen's education. Since at 35 or so her education seems little better than Sansa's... I must question Tywin' wisdom here: did he not realise that Kings fight in out of the way locations (in Essos or the Step Stones) or more importantly die prematurely leaving their wives regent?

Which is precisely what happens, and low and behold, Cersei is unable to govern.

*Of course this could be because all Valyrian texts sunk into the sea with the fall of Valyria, making this yet another example of Martinworld being far worse than the real world in late Middle Ages.

[bloodymime]

Without looking to be sure I'm pretty sure Tryion thinks of how there are Valyrian scrolls in the library of Winterfell as well as other texts he had never seen before so they had a pretty well stocked center of learning as well as proof there were Valyrian documents.

"Be gentle with the Valyrian scrolls, the parchment is very dry. Ayrmidon’s Engines of War is quite rare, and yours is the only complete copy I’ve ever seen.”

It might have not been this topic but somebody said something about how Arya was indulged more than Sansa citing as an example how she wouldn't get a music instructor the way Arya got her dance master but in fact both most likely were taught music with Sansa being better.

"Sansa could sew and dance and sing. She wrote poetry. She knew how to dress. She played the high harp and the bells."

[Lummel]

...of course they had no way of seeing the future, but this sort of "lack of attention" to the girl's education we know brought a little trouble down the road, since sansa has had to learn in the hardest way some lessons by her own...

The children are with the exception of Robb and Jon are still fairly young to be attending The Ned's councils. Besides the brief mention of a few subjects studied by Arya and Sansa I wouldn't say that there is anything to suggest that it was a particularly good or a deficient education. I'd say that possibly Cersei's education was worse seeing as all she recalls is gossip (Maynard Plumm) and drawing pictures of her and Rhaegar flying on a dragon together :love: . While Catelyn's education seems to have more practical seeing as she spent some time riding round visiting the Riverlands Lords with her father.

[Kittykatknits]

Without looking to be sure I'm pretty sure Tryion thinks of how there are Valyrian scrolls in the library of Winterfell as well as other texts he had never seen before so they had a pretty well stocked center of learning as well as proof there were Valyrian documents.

"Be gentle with the Valyrian scrolls, the parchment is very dry. Ayrmidon’s Engines of War is quite rare, and yours is the only complete copy I’ve ever seen.”

It might have not been this topic but somebody said something about how Arya was indulged more than Sansa citing as an example how she wouldn't get a music instructor the way Arya got her dance master but in fact both most likely were taught music with Sansa being better.

"Sansa could sew and dance and sing. She wrote poetry. She knew how to dress. She played the high harp and the bells."

The children are with the exception of Robb and Jon are still fairly young to be attending The Ned's councils. Besides the brief mention of a few subjects studied by Arya and Sansa I wouldn't say that there is anything to suggest that it was a particularly good or a deficient education. I'd say that possibly Cersei's education was worse seeing as all she recalls is gossip (Maynard Plumm) and drawing pictures of her and Rhaegar flying on a dragon together :love: . While Catelyn's education seems to have more practical seeing as she spent some time riding round visiting the Riverlands Lords with her father.

We know Sansa was a reader. But, based upon her age, I think it would be more accurate to say her education was cut off than deficient in anyway. From what we know, she was good at her studies. Then, for much of her time in KL, for obvious reasons, her education got cute short. From what we see in the Eeyrie, she enjoys solving puzzles as evidenced by her pride in figuring out Lyn Corbray.

If she had stated in WF, I wonder if she would have had some of the same exposure as Cat did with her father? I would hope so but I don't recall any textual evidence that tells us this would be the case.