Re-reading Eddard

[bloodsteel bitterraven]

I am planning to re-read all 5 books from the perspective of only one character. For each book, I will pick the character with the most chapters. From book 1 I am only reading Eddard's POVs. For book 2, I will start counting from the last Eddard chapter and I will read Tyrion (including the last 2 Tyrion chapters from AGOT).

Eddard has 15 chapters which makes this a very short read! I have read the first 8 so far while trying to put myself in the position of someone who has never heard of ASOIAF before. What I found most interesting is that if you read only the Eddard chapters, at least the first 8, you get the impression that Ned and Cat only have 3 children. There is only one mention of Robb's name and no mention of Rickon. Both Arya and Sansa come off as really young and innocent girls and their rivalry seems like a cute game from Eddard's perspective.

It feels like reading a detective novella, with Ned meeting various shady characters (Littlefinger, Varys, Pycelle, Renly) while trying to discover how Jon died. Sansa supporting the Hound in the tourney doesn't make much sense without having seen her POV, but I guess it can be seen as her rooting for the underdog.

It's quite an interesting experiment, and I will report again once I am done.

While I know how it ends, I am trying to put myself in the position of someone not knowing the ending, and I find myself hoping that Ned can find a way to beat the very evil Lannisters! I got worried once Ned quit and Robert threatened to have his head on a spike, but then Littlefinger telling him about the brothel makes you think Ned might still discover what he's looking for.

[bloodsteel bitterraven]

Well I finished reading Eddard's chapters. It was quite an interesting experiment. It felt like the story of a good honest man, who went to the big city to discover what happened to his friend Jon Arryn and to help his other friend Robert, but fails miserably. We eventually learn that Ned has 5 children, and a bastard and there's something fishy about Jon and I guess it isn't that hard to connect the dots and realize Jon isn't Eddard's son.

The cliffhanger at the end didn't really bother me (not knowing what happened to Ned), because Varys wrapped the story up pretty well in his speech about the game of thrones high lords play, and how the innocent are the ones who always pay the price. Reading only Eddard's chapters leaves a lot of room for a sequel: we know that Arya escaped and that Robb is marching south.

If I had to give the book a title, I think "A game of thrones" is perfect.

Now I'm planning to read only the Tyrion chapters from ACOK (plus his last 2 chapters from AGOT, the ones after Eddard XV). Tyrion in AGOT: Tyrion appears momentarily at the beginning of the book (Eddard's first chapter) when the King arrives at Winterfell. That's the only time we see him. We later hear that he tried to kill Bran, and that Cat has captured him (under Eddard's orders). At the end of the book, Varys tells Eddard that the Imp has escaped. Reading Eddard's chapters makes us think Tyrion is 100% guilty of trying to kill Bran, so it will be quite interesting to read a book from his perspective only. I will report again once I am done!

[Lady-Nymeria]

Nice experiment! It's funny to reread and put yourself in the place of somebody who doesn't know the way the book ends. There are some things you will miss, but that's the interesting part: to know what the characters don't. For example, you have noticed that Ned underestimate his children and wasn't aware of their potential, not paying attention to the girl's quarrels (even when there is a dead kid in one of them), doesn't think about the children he left in Winterfell (except Bran because he was attacked) and says Robb "is just a boy" when Varys told him that he had called the baners and planned to march south. We also get to know that there is something that happened in the Tower of Joy that haunted him forever, because of his "promiss me, Ned" numerous flashbacks.

[Annara Snow]

That's an interesting experiment. I will try that someday, but not before I re-read the books the normal way. I have a feeling that one would need at least 2 re-reads to get all the details.

Ned is our main window into the 'game of thrones' in AGOT - but what's ironic now, after reading the later books, is how wrong he was about a lot of things. He figured it out that Jaime was the real father of Cersei's children, but he was completely wrong about the identity of Jon Arryn's murderer, the crime he originally set out to investigate. But then everyone would have been, based on the available evidence at the time.

Another thing that's funny is the difference between the image of the Lannister family we got from Ned's POV, and what they're really like. From Ned's POV, they seem to be this powerful family clan that sticks together and has its paws everywhere, cleverly orchestrating things to their benefit. While some of this is not far from the truth, when we get to know them better and see their relationships with each other, it becomes increasingly clear that they're a completely dysfunctional family and that they don't get along with each other at all - and it's eventually the cause of their downfall. Cersei comes off as a screwd, dangerous evil queen in Ned's POV, but when we see her later in Tyrion's chapters (and in her own), she looks pretty stupid and occasionally pitiable. (While in Jaime's POV, she goes from perfect woman to complete bitch.) Ned's impression of Jaime re: sitting on the throne, is particularly off, as we learn later.

The biased POV is especially obvious with the portrayal of Robert, who is presented in a sympathetic light because he's Ned's best friend, but it becomes increasingly obvious that he's an asshole. Ned is uncomfortable with a lot of things about Robert, but even when he openly criticizes him, he still sees Robert as a basically good person and keeps finding excuses for him. I have to wonder if Robert would have ever even seemed likeable if he wasn't seen from the POV of someone who loves him and is predisposed to show him in positive light.

Ned came off indeed as a naive, idealistic and good man, unsuited for the game of thrones, but does anyone else think that the popular view of him as driven exclusively by "honor" is an exaggeration? While reading AGOT, it seemed that he was often acting from compassion/mercy - as when he warned Cersei so she and children would be safe (he even genuinely told her he felt sorry for her regarding her marriage to Robert!) or love; his final act was to put love above honor, "confessing" his "treason" and calling Joffrey the rightful heir, in order to save Sansa.

It's also often said, even by people in-universe (like Sansa), that Ned always told the truth - but that's not exactly true, either. Ned could certainly lie to protect those he loved - he lied that Catelyn was acting on his orders when she apprehended Tyrion, he lied when he "confessed the treason", and one of his big mistakes was that he kept the truth about Joffrey's, Myrcella's and Tommen's parentage from Robert when Robert was on his deathbed - because he didn't want to break Robert's heart. He also deceived Robert about what he actually wrote down in the testament - although that little deception didn't end up helping him much. And if R+L=J is true, and I'm 100% convinced it is, then Ned had spent 15 years hiding the truth from Robert and everyone in order to protect Jon.

Well I finished reading Eddard's chapters. It was quite an interesting experiment. It felt like the story of a good honest man, who went to the big city to discover what happened to his friend Jon Arryn and to help his other friend Robert, but fails miserably. We eventually learn that Ned has 5 children, and a bastard and there's something fishy about Jon and I guess it isn't that hard to connect the dots and realize Jon isn't Eddard's son.

I was really interested in the identity of Jon's mother from the start, but I didn't have any suspicions that he wasn't his son until Ned's last chapter, which had me convinced of R+L=J. I facepalmed and wondered how it hadn't crossed my mind before. The many memories of Robert's Rebellion were perhaps my favorite part of Ned's chapters. It is obvious throughout the book that his sister Lyanna was incredibly important to him, that he loved her very much, and that she had a big impact on his life, and that he made some incredibly important promise to her. This promise and the fight at the Tower of Joy seemed to be the things he obsessively went back in his mind, things that have defined him, the way that Tyrion's defining experience was Tysha, and Jaime's defining experience was killing the Mad King. Ned's last chapter hints at R/L with the first mention of the Tournament at Harenthal, and when I went back and re-read the Lyanna references, I realized that there were lots of hints that the "kidnapping and rape" wasn't that at all.

Now I'm planning to read only the Tyrion chapters from ACOK (plus his last 2 chapters from AGOT, the ones after Eddard XV). Tyrion in AGOT: Tyrion appears momentarily at the beginning of the book (Eddard's first chapter) when the King arrives at Winterfell. That's the only time we see him. We later hear that he tried to kill Bran, and that Cat has captured him (under Eddard's orders). At the end of the book, Varys tells Eddard that the Imp has escaped. Reading Eddard's chapters makes us think Tyrion is 100% guilty of trying to kill Bran, so it will be quite interesting to read a book from his perspective only. I will report again once I am done!

Can someone remind me - did Catelyn ever tell Ned what Littlefinger told her about the dagger, that Tyrion won if from him when he bet on Loras beating Jaime? There is a hint very early on, during the Hand's tourney and in Ned's chapter, that LF lied. (When Renly bet on the Hound beating Jaime and won the wager from LF, he said that he wished Tyrion was there - because he would have won even more. That was a subtle hint that Tyrion always bet on Jaime - as he later says himself.) But it was before the conversation between Cat and LF, so it's something you only notice on re-read (or watching that scene in the show).

[bloodsteel bitterraven]

Yes, Catelyn repeated to Ned everything LF told her. LF was there too.

[Annara Snow]

Yes, Catelyn repeated to Ned everything LF told her. LF was there too.

Too bad Ned didn't remember the remark from the tournament, but one can't blame him, it was easy to miss when you didn't know it had any importance. I didn't even notice it on my first read.

It's a kind of thing that a super-detective would notice, but not an ordinary person who is not an expert in solving crimes and mysteries. You mentioned that his chapters in AGOT read like a detective story, but in a classic detective story, the hero is exceptionally good at reading clues and is often one step ahead of the readers.