References and Homages

[Prof. Cecily]

I find Eddard XV in AGOT, especially the conversation with Lord Varys to be a distinct nod to the similar scene in Dune between Duke Leto I and dr Yueh.

[SeaWitch]

9 hours ago, Prof. Cecily said:

I find Eddard XV in AGOT, especially the conversation with Lord Varys to be a distinct nod to the similar scene in Dune between Duke Leto I and dr Yueh.

So much Herbert.

Facedancers. Teenage messiah figure tames massive critters. Acquiring of dodgy stereotype army of native peoples. (Two of them.)  Applied psychotropic substances for said teenage messiah figure. (Two of them) The Undying have a Navigator's Guild feel, the blue lips and general transhuman aura.  Not entirely sold on a Maester/mentat equivalency, but Syrio Forel had elements of Duncan Idaho.  The Iron Bank as CHOAM.

But then, Herbert was deliberately echoing all sorts of influences himself.

[Prof. Cecily]

33 minutes ago, SeaWitch said:

So much Herbert.

Facedancers. Teenage messiah figure tames massive critters. Acquiring of dodgy stereotype army of native peoples. (Two of them.)  Applied psychotropic substances for said teenage messiah figure. (Two of them) The Undying have a Navigator's Guild feel, the blue lips and general transhuman aura.  Not entirely sold on a Maester/mentat equivalency, but Syrio Forel had elements of Duncan Idaho.  The Iron Bank as CHOAM.

But then, Herbert was deliberately echoing all sorts of influences himself.

Maesters= BG+Suk doctors+Mentats?

The idea that the Maesters are bound to a House first set off the idea of the influence of Dune on ASOIAF.

And of course , all your analogies are spot on. 

How do you feel about the odd parallel between Lysa's coded message to Cat and Lady Fenring's coded message to Jessica.

Obviously, Lysa is not BG trained, poor darling, but even so.

And the shadout Mapes as a Meera type?

[SeaWitch]

Just now, Prof. Cecily said:

Maesters= BG+Suk doctors+Mentats?

The idea that the Maesters are bound to a House first set off the idea of the influence of Dune on ASOIAF.

And of course , all your analogies are spot on. 

How do you feel about the odd parallel between Lysa's coded message to Cat and Lady Fenring's coded message to Jessica.

Obviously, Lysa is not BG trained, poor darling, but even so.

And the shadout Mapes as a Meera type?

The Fenring parallel, yes.  That's also a nice Tudor touch, the secret codes for messages in a world without real privacy.  Also, the red haired Tully girls. Very Jessica.

Paul's role is split between Bran and Dany, generally, but the fifteen year old Robb becoming a leader with Cat's oversight was familiar, too.

Mapes - Mirri Maz Duur as a twisted version? 

[Prof. Cecily]

Nice one with the Mapes MMD imagery. Much better than Meera.

How about Lord Tywin as the Padishah Emperor? The conversation of these two characters is strangely similar, at least to my eye.

And Arya. St Alia of the Knife?

The parallel of the hidden lineage of the teen messiah figures? With its attendant negative aspects?

[SeaWitch]

6 minutes ago, Prof. Cecily said:

Nice one with the Mapes MMD imagery. Much better than Meera.

How about Lord Tywin as the Padishah Emperor? The conversation of these two characters is strangely similar, at least to my eye.

And Arya. St Alia of the Knife?

The parallel of the hidden lineage of the teen messiah figures? With its attendant negative aspects?

Tywin is very much a historical Kingmaker figure to me, I never saw a parallel there.  But the Alia/Arya thing had half-occurred to me.

Yeah, the shady GB breeding programme... 'The Prince that was Promised' is very KH.

A Leto/Ghanima 'marriage' is a possible get-out on the J/D front. I cannot get behind the jolly enthusiasm for incest, myself. (It annoys the crap out of me in Heinlein, too.)

 

[Prof. Cecily]

20 minutes ago, SeaWitch said:

Tywin is very much a historical Kingmaker figure to me, I never saw a parallel there.  But the Alia/Arya thing had half-occurred to me.

Yeah, the shady GB breeding programme... 'The Prince that was Promised' is very KH.

A Leto/Ghanima 'marriage' is a possible get-out on the J/D front. I cannot get behind the jolly enthusiasm for incest, myself. (It annoys the crap out of me in Heinlein, too.)

 

The Tywin/ Padishah Emperor is based solely on their language and speech patterns. And, yes, their descriptions.

Of course. Kingmaker. Tyrion as a nod to Clarence?

Could Sansa end up being an Irulan?

I must say I like the Leto/Ghanima 'marriage' very much. 

Ghanima's projected marriage to prince Farad'n, for example, would be a neat little parallel treatment. 

And the Baron Harkonnen?

Ser Barristan Selmy, Thufir Hawat?

 

Incest.

We had a rather odd news item recently (a case of accidental incest) and as a result I've read a bit on the subject.

Granted, neither The Independant nor the Guardian are my sources of choice, ranking with that peculiar Thomas More document, but anyway

Quote

In 2003, the Post-Adoption Centre, which offers information and counselling to people undertaking adoptee reunions, and which at the time was seeing 3,000 clients a year, estimated that up to half of reunions were accompanied by anything from temporary attraction to obsessive sexual obsession, according to the Guardian. A study by University College London found similar results.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/genetic-sexual-attraction-husband-and-wife-discover-they-are-brother-and-sister-9653274.html

 

And then, of course, Craster.

To tell the truth, I find teacher/student sexual goings on, or therapist/client, more distasteful than incest.

Anyway, back to Planetos.

The only Heinlein I've read was the story about 'grokking'. Yes. Stranger in a Strange Land.

Which of his books do you find are reflected in ASOIAF?

[SeaWitch]

Can't say anything Heinlein jumps out at me. Except maybe an echo in Varys' speech about young Aegon's education. There's a flavour of the 'specialisation is for insects' about it. (Also, it parallels Arya's experiences-as-education. She's in the mound of his YA hero(ine) type.)

Craster is every creepy backwoods cult leader, with a dash of Sawney Bean.

[Prof. Cecily]

On 5/20/2017 at 1:14 PM, SeaWitch said:

with a dash of Sawney Bean

Yes!

[Crowfood's Daughter]

I would like to add in "The Wierwoods" by Thomas Burnett Swann?  It is about the Etruscans who have a centuries long pact with the people of a wooded place called the Weirwoods. The people of these woods are called the Weir ones and there are some who are much like the CotF with slitted gold cat eyes and also webbed feet that make a squish sound when they walk. Anyway there is a father who breaks this pact and steals a weir-one for his daughter as a slave.

[Lost Melnibonean]

6 hours ago, Crowfood's Daughter said:

I would like to add in "The Wierwoods" by Thomas Burnett Swann?  It is about the Etruscans who have a centuries long pact with the people of a wooded place called the Weirwoods. The people of these woods are called the Weir ones and there are some who are much like the CotF with slitted gold cat eyes and also webbed feet that make a squish sound when they walk. Anyway there is a father who breaks this pact and steals a weir-one for his daughter as a slave.

[Lord Wraith]

On 5/19/2017 at 6:18 PM, Prof. Cecily said:

I find Eddard XV in AGOT, especially the conversation with Lord Varys to be a distinct nod to the similar scene in Dune between Duke Leto I and dr Yueh.

 

On 5/20/2017 at 4:32 AM, SeaWitch said:

So much Herbert.

Facedancers. Teenage messiah figure tames massive critters. Acquiring of dodgy stereotype army of native peoples. (Two of them.)  Applied psychotropic substances for said teenage messiah figure. (Two of them) The Undying have a Navigator's Guild feel, the blue lips and general transhuman aura.  Not entirely sold on a Maester/mentat equivalency, but Syrio Forel had elements of Duncan Idaho.  The Iron Bank as CHOAM.

But then, Herbert was deliberately echoing all sorts of influences himself.

Glad to see other fans of Dune.

Faceless Men are so close to Facedancers it hurts.

I wonder if Weirwood paste or Shade of the Evening has an properties of spice. Other than seemingly granting or improving ones powers.

[The Bard of Banefort]

This probably came up a long time ago, but does fAegon acting as the Westerosi Perkin Warbeck count as homage?

Right before I started watching GoT and reading ASOIAF, I read Philippa Gregory's "The White Princess." Now, I realize that Gregory doesn't exactly have the best reputation when it comes to historical accuracy, but what I found interesting is how similar her portrayal of Elizabeth of York was to Sansa in ACOK. Both of them "played dumb" in order to avoid saying the wrong thing and ending up on the chopping block. I don't support the theory that the War of the Roses can predict how ASOIAF will end, but I definitely see the parallels between Sansa and Elizabeth of York, more so than between her and Queen Elizabeth I. 

Edited December 23, 2020 by The Bard of Banefort

[Prof. Cecily]

4 hours ago, Lord Wraith said:

 

Glad to see other fans of Dune.

Faceless Men are so close to Facedancers it hurts.

I wonder if Weirwood paste or Shade of the Evening has an properties of spice. Other than seemingly granting or improving ones powers.

Oh, yes, indeed.

Also, Cat has some features of Lady Jessica.

[Bluetiger]

Quote

From Behind the Name:

NERYS

GENDER: Feminine

USAGE: Welsh

 

 

Meaning and history:

 

Perhaps an elaboration of Welsh ner "lord", with the intended meaning of "lady".

 

dân = fire

Therefore, Dan + nerys = Daenerys, The Lady of Fire

This explains Queen Naerys' name as well.

Fits too well to be a coincidence, especially when we know that GRRM often uses Welsh as source of inspiration (Tyrion, Gwen from Dying of the Light etc.)

 

Edited June 28, 2017 by Blue Tiger

[Jiriki]

In Tad Williams' new novel, The Witchwood Crown, he references "the Small Council", a nice nod in GRRM's direction, and a back-and-forth conversation ever since George's homages to Tad's MS&T (Marya, the Hound, the bearded star, the white walkers/foxes, the wolf companions, the children of the dawn/forest, witchwood/weirwood, etc).

[Lord Varys]

On 1.7.2017 at 6:45 AM, Jiriki said:

In Tad Williams' new novel, The Witchwood Crown, he references "the Small Council", a nice nod in GRRM's direction, and a back-and-forth conversation ever since George's homages to Tad's MS&T (Marya, the Hound, the bearded star, the white walkers/foxes, the wolf companions, the children of the dawn/forest, witchwood/weirwood, etc).

Isn't that 'the Inner Council'. There is talk of a Great Council that we never see, though. One must say that Tad is a lot better with royal offices and titles than George.

As conscious nods I saw the phrase 'much and much' ('much and more' most likely would have been, well, too much) once and the talk about 'words being air'.

The character of Unver is also somewhat reminiscent of Daenerys and what she is not-so-unlikely to do in future novels.

[Jiriki]

6 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

Isn't that 'the Inner Council'. There is talk of a Great Council that we never see, though. One must say that Tad is a lot better with royal offices and titles than George.

As conscious nods I saw the phrase 'much and much' ('much and more' most likely would have been, well, too much) once and the talk about 'words being air'.

The character of Unver is also somewhat reminiscent of Daenerys and what she is not-so-unlikely to do in future novels.

True, it is 'Inner Council' in the published version.

We shall see about Unver. I have my doubts that it is so straightforward.

[Lord Varys]

6 hours ago, Jiriki said:

True, it is 'Inner Council' in the published version.

We shall see about Unver. I have my doubts that it is so straightforward.

Well, he also gets the 'fire and blood' reference in the end. We can say he is going to be a guy uniting some guys who aren't uniting right now and then doing something big.

There are also Silver Stags in the book (a group of royal guardsmen, not a type of coins).

Shouldn't it then also have been 'the Outer Council' in the published version? I'd have preferred that.

[Gomagoti]

how did i not see the Dune similarities before...once pointed out, so obvious!