Brienne is in love with Jaime.

[Theon'sSong]

i for one think that Jaime will sacrifice himself for her, but not before impregnating her with a son who will take the Tarth name.

I think Brienne dies first because Jaime still has a significant part to play in the story to come, i think his story is linked to Jon's lineage and i think his redemption plays out on grander stages so I don't see him dying to LS right now but I do see Brienne dying in that episode.

[Roddy the Ruin]

I think Jaime has a huge role to play. Your right but that doesn't mean there can't be any fun ;)

Maybe, but I'm still on the Kingmaker theory kick, I don't see Jaime sacrificing himself anytime soon, he has a job to do

You mean the Kingslayer Slays the Kingslayer to Become the Kingmaker theory

[Bunners]

You mean the Kingslayer Slays the Kingslayer to Become the Kingmaker theory

Not directly from that thread but yeah. That's what sparked my interest. I do think based on the historical significance of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick is very much parallel to our knight of lannister. Along with the Criston Cole references and I jus got a hold of the Princess and the Queen and now I'm even more convinced.

I think Brienne, Jaime's muse (and possible love) will die, spiraling his depression, until he learns the truth somehow...

[The Mad Wolf]

I'm sure Brienne will put that stump to good use. :ack:

Omg hahahahahahaha

[Bunners]

Also as support for proof that Jaime's feelings are mutual is in the last part of his Chapter in ADWDs

It was near midnight when two came riding back with a woman they had taken captive.

"She rode up bold as you please, m'lord, demanding words with you."

Jaime SCRAMBLED to his feet. "My lady. I had not thought to see you again so soon."

'Gods be good, she looks ten years older than when I saw her last. And what happened to her face?'

"That bandage...you've been wounded..."

I just want to analyze Jaime real quick. The first thing I notice is when the guards return with Brienne is that he "scrambled" to his feet.

Basically it means to do something quickly, using ones hands, unceremoniously. To move with urgency or panic.

Think about when your interest or crush walks into a room, you automatically sit up a little straighter, and you are a bit more alert to what they are doing, completely disregarding what you were doing. I have this mental image of him looking at a map or something or laying down and as soon as she enters him tossing everything aside. Hastily running his fingers through his hair.

Notice how he greets her.

"My lady"

There is much formality, much respect and surprise and awe. There's no wench, no woman, none of that. She has his complete full attention.

Just by looking at this it obvious he is ecstatic. He's very happy to see her though trying to keep his guy cool, and he says as much.

"I had not thought to see you again so soon."

AKA

"I've missed you."

He then starts to take her in. Looking at every bit of her. He's analyzing her face, noticing any changes he wasn't present for. He notices that she looks much older, and he notices the bandage. I can almost see the crinkle between his eyebrows and hear the frown in his voice.

"That bandage...you've been wounded..."

This needs no explanation, he's very clearly concerned. As I said before I can almost hear all his emotions in his voice. Mind you Brienne has yet to say a single word. This is all Jaime expressing how he feels. Surprise/happiness, longing, concern and lastly excitement.

When Brienne starts to explain about finding Sansa (which I didn't include). I can almost picture Jaime sitting down on the floor of the tent to put his shoes while asking Brienne questions. His excitement is almost palpable, he can't wait to go off on some adventure with his muse who he is having budding feelings for.

But that's my analysis. I don't think this bout with the BwB will end well for our Beauty and the Beast though :/

[Modesty Lannister]

Jaime and Brienne are knights. Actually, Jaime is supposed to be a knight, but it takes his journey with Brienne to teach him true knight valors. His journey towards a true knighthood ends with him saving Brienne. What they feel for each other is, first and foremost, mutual admiration for their respective fighting skills that both of them find to be one of the most important traits. However, since they are both knights, their affection, which is obviously both physical and spiritual on both ends, is not likely to be consumated. Their relationship is taken straight from Medieval poetry. Platonic, deep and true.

[Lord Jennings]

I think Brienne loves Jaime because he is every thing she is not and Jaime loves Brienne because she is every thing he is not.

[Bunners]

Jaime and Brienne are knights. Actually, Jaime is supposed to be a knight, but it takes his journey with Brienne to teach him true knight valors. His journey towards a true knighthood ends with him saving Brienne. What they feel for each other is, first and foremost, mutual admiration for their respective fighting skills that both of them find to be one of the most important traits. However, since they are both knights, their affection, which is obviously both physical and spiritual on both ends, is not likely to be consumated. Their relationship is taken straight from Medieval poetry. Platonic, deep and true.

Everything but platonic, I would say. Those feelings, respect, admiration, affection are all second to Jaime's true emotion toward Brienne. He's attracted to her. Point blank. As I would say goes for Brienne, who is actually feeling something real for Jaime, more than she did for Renly. But for Jaime it's her personality that makes her so beautiful to him and it's so against what he usually goes for.

Cersei's chapter speaks of that.

When told that Jaime disappeared off with some woman she is immediately alarmed. But when described She thinks of the way Brienne looks, and acts and dresses and thinks automatically that Jaime hadn't received her letter, and that he would never desert her for such a creature. But infact he has. Jaime had a choice, when Brienne needed him he jumped at the opportunity to help her, but when Cersei needed him he's shunk away, burning her letter.

Anything but platonic

[sapphire_lion]

However, since they are both knights, their affection, which is obviously both physical and spiritual on both ends, is not likely to be consumated. Their relationship is taken straight from Medieval poetry. Platonic, deep and true.

And why would GRRM ever conform to the norms of medieval poetry and courtly love, when his purpose so far has been to subvert worn-out literary tropes, archetypes, and clichés? He's more likely to take medieval poetry and turn it on its head.

He can consummate this relationship, and keep it deep and true. That would be groundbreaking. Nothing of the sort has really been done before. Why not write something unique, something so far removed from what is acceptable and known that it’s actually interesting and has meaning? I honestly hope he goes there. Anything less would feel like a cop out.

[Errant Bard]

And why would GRRM ever conform to the norms of medieval poetry and courtly love, when his purpose so far has been to subvert worn-out literary tropes, archetypes, and clichés?

Same reason Brienne did not end up with a laser gun but with a magical sword?

The argument that Martin is all about subverting everything is asinine: he may put a realistic twist to Fantasy clichés (which would make them closer to history) and focus on areas of the Fantasy story usually neglected by other writers (the fall of the kid heroes family, for example), but he's essentially following the stereotypical formula and keeping the setting classic.

This being said:

He can consummate this relationship, and keep it deep and true.

While that's true, I don't think that would be groundbreaking. A lot, if not all, of Fantasy have secondary characters have sex and a healthy relationship, it's only in the extreme grimdark (let's say, Bakker, Abercrombie) that it fails to be "deep and true" or the YA (say, Eddings) where sex is not a point (and even then...) meanwhile you take the Jordan, Lynch, Abraham, Brust, Kay, heck even Erikson, whatever, and you have those relationships.

This being said, while Brienne definitely has feelings for Jaime, and Jaime is attracted to her, I'm not sure their story arc goes toward them becoming a couple. If anything, I think it was about the friction between love and duty: Brienne needed to be in love for it to work, but I think she ultimately chose duty over love, contrary to what Jaime did back then, and will lead him to his doom, despite her feelings.

As an aside, a funny thing to consider here is the ages of those involved: Brienne is 19 and Jaime 35 (or something like that.) It makes sense for Brienne's feelings to be a bit more intense and crush-y than those of Jaime.

[sapphire_lion]

Same reason Brienne did not end up with a laser gun but with a magical sword?

You’re going to have to help me out. How is this reply relevant to anything I’ve said? Please explain.

The argument that Martin is all about subverting everything is asinine: he may put a realistic twist to Fantasy clichés (which would make them closer to history) and focus on areas of the Fantasy story usually neglected by other writers (the fall of the kid heroes family, for example), but he's essentially following the stereotypical formula and keeping the setting classic

GRRM uses the stereotypical formula and is keeping the classic setting but with a twist in order to make valuable commentary about various issues such as gender, classism, oppression, inequality, discrimination, etc. He takes fantasy tropes and manipulates them in a way that is quite subversive and novel. Case in point, telling “Robb’s story” (sarcasm) through Catelyn’s eyes. This goes against the conventions of the fantasy genre. He gave a voice to a figure who is typically ignored within fantasy.

Here's an interesting quote:

[One of the strongest female characters is Catelyn Stark, in my point of view.]

Well, I wanted to make a strong mother character. The portrayal women in epic fantasy have been problematical for a long time. These books are largely written by men but women also read them in great, great numbers. And the women in fantasy tend to be very atypical women… They tend to be the woman warrior or the spunky princess who wouldn’t accept what her father lays down, and I have those archetypes in my books as well. However, with Catelyn there is something reset for the Eleanor of Aquitaine, the figure of the woman who accepted her role and functions with a narrow society and, nonetheless, achieves considerable influence and power and authority despite accepting the risks and limitations of this society. She is also a mother… Then, a tendency you can see in a lot of other fantasies is to kill the mother or to get her off the stage. She’s usually dead before the story opens… Nobody wants to hear about King Arthur’s mother and what she thought or what she was doing, so they get her off the stage and I wanted it too. And that’s Catelyn –GRRM.

It’s not asinine to say GRRM is subverting problematic areas in fantasy writing especially when it comes to women, because he has made this intent known publicly.

He’s doing the same with Brienne and her story. She’s a warrior woman, except with a fully developed personality. It's rare to find one who's not an emotionless machine lacking personal desires and internal struggles. Plus, she’s not a beautiful waif with breastplate armor molded around her boobs who can inexplicably kill 100 men in the blink of an eye. With her character alone, he is subverting a host of clichés and stereotypes.

While that's true, I don't think that would be groundbreaking. A lot, if not all, of Fantasy have secondary characters have sex and a healthy relationship, it's only in the extreme grimdark (let's say, Bakker, Abercrombie) that it fails to be "deep and true" or the YA (say, Eddings) where sex is not a point (and even then...) meanwhile you take the Jordan, Lynch, Abraham, Brust, Kay, heck even Erikson, whatever, and you have those relationships.

That’s your opinion. Obviously, I strongly disagree.

In my view, it would be absolutely groundbreaking to have a story that ACTUALLY transcends the physical and not just pretends to.

[David Selig]

You’re going to have to help me out. How is this reply relevant to anything I’ve said? Please explain.

GRRM uses the stereotypical formula and is keeping the classic setting but with a twist in order to make valuable commentary about various issues such as gender, classism, oppression, inequality, discrimination, etc. He takes fantasy tropes and manipulates them in a way that is quite subversive and novel. Case in point, telling “Robb’s story” (sarcasm) through Catelyn’s eyes. This goes against the conventions of the fantasy genre. He gave a voice to a figure who is typically ignored within fantasy.

Here's an interesting quote:

It’s not asinine to say GRRM is subverting problematic areas in fantasy writing especially when it comes to women, because he has made this intent known publicly.

Given that Martin also killed off the mothers of all 3 of his main characters before the story even started (they all died giving birth to them too, the ultimate fridging), and even killed Catelyn off before the middle of the series was reached, he really shouldn't pat himself on the back that much about how he is so much progressive in his treatment of adult female characters and mothers especially.

After the RW there is exactly one mother who is a PoV character and she has become an embarrassing fairy Evil Queen who even has her own Snow White type prophecy motivating most of her actions.

[Errant Bard]

It’s not asinine to say GRRM is subverting problematic areas in fantasy writing especially when it comes to women, because he has made this intent known publicly.

I agree with what you say in the rest of your post, and it makes it all the more obvious that you are moving goalposts here. Your original objection was, I quote:

And why would GRRM ever conform to the norms of medieval poetry and courtly love, when his purpose so far has been to subvert worn-out literary tropes, archetypes, and clichés? He's more likely to take medieval poetry and turn it on its head.

That is you arguing that GRRM is not out to subvert "problematic areas in Fantasy writing", but more than that: you are saying he's out to subvert the setting itself, that he cannot conform to some historical more but rather... do something else, and that is where laser guns enter into play.

Your objection is asinine because, objectively, Martin is far from subverting everything, and in fact does incorporate many many clichés in his story, including women (people) following what popular culture believes was the culture of middle ages. Cersei's walk of shame was such a subversion, heh? What about Sansa being married off? Daenerys sold? The role of Jeyne in Robb's fall? What about the knightly ideal held unironically by about all the popular knights, and Jaime? The "honour" so dear to Ned or Stannis or Jon? Yeah, such subversions here, the same than you could bring up about magical swords, animals, gifts, blood, or destiny.

Your GRRM quote goes counter to your original objection too: you surely noted that GRRM rails firstly against the fact that fantasy only shows atypical women, which sounds weird as an argument against showing a typical historical romance (though atypical for the Fantasy genre), and secondly that he is only talking about narration (and visibility), because Catelyn does die, if you had not noticed.

That’s your opinion. Obviously, I strongly disagree.

In my view, it would be absolutely groundbreaking to have a story that ACTUALLY transcends the physical and not just pretends to.

You are sole judge of what is, subjectively, actually "transcending the physical" and what just pretends to, I suppose, but maybe you should consider not presenting it as an objective fact when anyone can look in his library and find examples of couples meeting all the criteria you give. You are blatantly using a form of the "no true Scotsman" fallacy here ("Nothing of the sort has really been done before."... "But those authors did do it"... "No, they did not actually do it, they only pretended",) stop it.

Given that Martin also killed off the mothers of all 3 of his main characters before the story even started (they all died giving birth to them too, the ultimate fridging), and even killed Catelyn off before the middle of the series was reached, he really shouldn't pat himself on the back that much about how he is so much progressive in his treatment of adult female characters and mothers especially.

I don't think he is patting himself on the back here, but saying that he is trying to show a part of the Fantasy Story that is commonly left offscreen. He's not saying that he is totally not sticking to the formula, but you got to admit, when you read the Belgariad, Belgarion's family fall is not shown for three books (it works for virtually any main hero family, too: Rand's family in WoT, anyone in Abercrombie or Erikson, and heck, even Otah and Mati in the First Price don't have mothers onscreen)

After the RW there is exactly one mother who is a PoV character and she has become an embarrassing fairy Evil Queen who even has her own Snow White type prophecy motivating most of her actions.

The Maggi prophecy revelation is truly an horrible choice, for which Martin lost some respect from me. Her PoV hardly mentions her children now too. It is the one thing that makes me doubt ASOIAF will not end up having all sort of contrived events happening as we rush (amble leisurely, rather) toward the end. Well, this, the Lord Commander election, and the way Dany got her unsullied, of course.

[sapphire_lion]

Given that Martin also killed off the mothers of all 3 of his main characters before the story even started (they all died giving birth to them too, the ultimate fridging), and even killed Catelyn off before the middle of the series was reached, he really shouldn't pat himself on the back that much about how he is so much progressive in his treatment of adult female characters and mothers especially.

After the RW there is exactly one mother who is a PoV character and she has become an embarrassing fairy Evil Queen who even has her own Snow White type prophecy motivating most of her actions.

Yeah, because he is using clichés and stereotypes and turning them on their heads as I’ve already said. He’s followed the theme that mothers must be dead and out of the way, except that from the beginning he has one mother figure whose presence is huge. Plus, he has her come back from the dead. As is typical in fantasy writing, Catelyn (the mother figure) should have been irrelevant and deceased from the start. However, she's always been part of the story. Even now that she's dead, she's still relevant.

Also, did you ever think that he might be using the Evil Queen archetype to make a point? I'm still waiting to see how Cersei's story concludes.

I agree with what you say in the rest of your post, and it makes it all the more obvious that you are moving goalposts here. Your original objection was, I quote:

That is you arguing that GRRM is not out to subvert "problematic areas in Fantasy writing", but more than that: you are saying he's out to subvert the setting itself, that he cannot conform to some historical more but rather... do something else, and that is where laser guns enter into play.

I don’t believe you understood my posts at all.

I said that GRRM’s aim was to subvert literary clichés. Then I supplied a quote where GRRM explains his intention to subvert literary clichés related to women in fantasy. It’s not about changing the goal post. It’s about demonstrating that this is a goal of his (to subvert such clichés). In addition, it is all the more relevant that he wants to subvert clichés related to woman in fantasy as this will have significant implications on the rest of Brienne’s story.

My original point was that GRRM is using medieval themes, settings, clichés, etc. but he is not obligated to conclude his story in a way that would be in accordance with the norms of courtly love. His story does not have to follow the same trajectory or have the expected outcome. Moreover, seeing as he often wishes to subvert the clichés found in such stories, it is unlikely that he would choose to conclude his work in the same manner as the very thing he is attempting to subvert.

Your objection is asinine because, objectively, Martin is far from subverting everything, and in fact does incorporate many many clichés in his story, including women (people) following what popular culture believes was the culture of middle ages.

GRRM must have characters who follow the popular cultural believes of the Middle Ages and he can include as many clichés as he likes. This does not prevent him from subverting such beliefs and clichés through the narrative.

Cersei's walk of shame was such a subversion, heh? What about Sansa being married off? Daenerys sold? The role of Jeyne in Robb's fall? What about the knightly ideal held unironically by about all the popular knights, and Jaime? The "honour" so dear to Ned or Stannis or Jon? Yeah, such subversions here, the same than you could bring up about magical swords, animals, gifts, blood, or destiny.

There is subversion in most if not all these instances. You just didn’t understand it.

Your GRRM quote goes counter to your original objection too: you surely noted that GRRM rails firstly against the fact that fantasy only shows atypical women, which sounds weird as an argument against showing a typical historical romance (though atypical for the Fantasy genre), and secondly that he is only talking about narration, because Catelyn does die, if you had not noticed.

No. My point was that GRRM does not have to follow the rules and traditions of medieval poetry or fantasy writing. He can incorporate every cliché found in these genres yet have an original conclusion. That’s what would make it subversive.

Jaime and Brienne’s relationship would not be a typical romance of any kind. It would be something completely new and different.

Also, yes Catelyn dies. Any character can die. But first, she did exist in the story, she had an active role, she did matter, and she still does.

Edit: fixed typos

[Arctan]

I think if you look at the way that Catelyn died, which was in itself pretty badass, is much more groundbreaking than most female character's deaths where they just cry and cower. At least Catelyn had some fight in her and a much more honorable death than Tywin did.

Although I can see where people say that Catelyn was a typical female character because she acted stupid letting Jaime go for Sansa, which was purely emotional and had no logic to it.

Also I definitely think that Jaime and Brienne have feelings for one another, at least lots of respect and trust but could also be love, but if nobody noticed they are about to get murdered by Lady Stoneheart so I don't think any romance is in the cards for them.