For those who've read A Song of Ice and Fire

Discussion in 'Discussion of Published Works' started by Mocheo Timo, May 9, 2015.

  1. Jack Asher

    Jack Asher Banned Contributor

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    Yes, I imagined you would.
     
  2. animenagai

    animenagai Member

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    To me, it's enjoyable because it's disturbing. Fiction's ultimately about intrigue and conflict, Song of Ice and Fire does that very well (for most of the series anyway). If a story doesn't have conflict or intrigue, I just find it boring. What can be more intriguing than a little boy witnessing incest and being thrown off a roof? What about a wedding created for peace where everyone gets betrayed and dies? You're engrossed because Martin understands the bread and butter of fiction.

    By the way, how many stories do you know where there is no clear 'good guy'? Where any character can die at any time? Once again, that's conflict and intrigue. It all works as one cohesive whole.

    The only thing I don't' like about the series is its longwinded descriptions. It's fine when everything's fast paced, because you need some down time in between the action. When things have been slow for a few chapters? Not so much.
     
  3. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    Song of Ice and Fire is not the first story to kill its heroes. Homer's Illiad sees a lot of deaths. So does Romeo and Juliet. Also, Lost.

    I'll admit, I was first impressed by George RR Martin's format. Characters whose POV you were reading actually died, and often times it was completely random. This is an impressive, unique format, and it certainly has its merits. But I don't think its perfect. Literature (I know this going to sound like exactly the opposite of what I often argue here but bear with me) isn't about being realistic. If it was, dialogue would suck. A story is ultimately controlled by the author, and unlike the real world, a readers expects to be able to make sense of things. When a POV just up and dies, suddenly and often pointlessly, suddenly RR's world begins to feel a lot more like ours. Shit just happens. This isn't necessarily a BAD thing. But then, shit begins to happen nonstop, and when he starts resuscitating characters, like Catelyn Stark, whom I hated to begin with, and makes her some weird zombie shadow character who can't talk, the world starts to veer away from apparently senseless, to.... (•_•) (-•_•)⌐■-■ (⌐■_■) A SOIAF OPERA.
     
    Last edited: May 10, 2015
  4. Lemex

    Lemex That's Lord Lemex to you. Contributor

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    Really, though, aside from two things that would have been obvious to the Ancient Greeks, that it was a holy war for honour, what makes The Iliad different from A Song of Ice and Fire?

    One has dragons and zombies, one has gods - both have hot bits (kind of, much less in The Iliad) and some rather intelligent things are said by popular characters. Tyrion Lannister, or whatever he's called, the dwarf has his witticisms, Hector has his pathos. The only difference is that The Iliad never leaves Troy and two sides, ASoI&F has many locations and many factions.

    Fancy interpretations about the justice of war and the humanization of warriors are (I'm convinced) later interpretations, partly based on the fact that Virgil had to totally side with the Trojans because he was writing about Aeneas. I agree with the spirit of animenagai's post, but I don't agree with his words if that makes sense. :p
     
  5. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    You're kind of right. A Song of Ice and Fire isn't terrible. It too is about war. But I do maintain that song of Ice and Fire is about a lot more than its war than the Iliad is. Don't forget the scene where Daenaerys (I remember the name now) is getting jacked off by her handmaiden. Little things like that.

    I think the worst thing Song of Ice and Fire has going for it right now is that it is incomplete. It's hard to really say anything about the story yet, because we don't know where exactly it goes. Classics are largely considered done (correct me if I'm wrong), so they can be measured.

    I read the first four novels, waited for the fifth, waited for the fifth, gave up waiting for the fifth, watched the first season of GOT minus the season finale (that should show you how much I cared) and that was it. So a Song of Ice and Fire is in limbo for me. There's no closure.
     
  6. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    @Lemex, @ChickenFreak
    It's interesting that you both mentioned Tyrion. He is certainly one of the story's redeeming elements.
     
  7. Steerpike

    Steerpike Felis amatus Contributor

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    That's true of any ongoing TV show or book series, isn't it?
     
  8. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    That's one of the reasons I don't read book series. And you and I both know Martin is notorious for long waits. This is different than series with volumes that come out reliably. As for TV series, at least you know when the next season is going to come out. Granted, you're in limbo for as long as the show goes on. I also don't watch many TV series (minus comedies) and prefer movies. I think the greatest television drama I've seen is True Detective, which was set to end after nine (or was it eight) episodes. There was no limbo there.

    Lost was a blast, but as I get older, I'm not really willing to invest myself emotionally like that anymore. I want things to end so I can move on.
     
  9. Steerpike

    Steerpike Felis amatus Contributor

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    I tend to avoid series as well, though I'll read series with recurring characters from book to book, but where each book is a stand-alone story. I have never seen True Detective. I'll have to see if it is on Amazon or Netflix.
     
  10. Wreybies

    Wreybies Thrice Retired Supporter Contributor

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    But it is a soap opera. I don't think there's any animosity in pointing this out. Soap operas are wildly popular the world over, and for reasons that are difficult to pin down we have a love/hate relationship with them.

    They are thought of as trashy and trivial... yet they are wildly popular.
    The writing is terrible and the acting is worse... yet they are wildly popular.
    The stories go on forever and make little sense... yet they are wildly popular.
    They tend to the lurid, base, and crass... yet they are wildly popular.

    So, I see no problem with accepting ASoIaF as what it is, a soap-opera. The problem lies in the social lie we tell ourselves that soap-operas are to be eschewed and denigrated at all costs... even though... we have to leave now... because our favorite soap-opera is starting in just ten minutes and we have to find out of Julia is really the mother of Nicole or if Nicole was the lab experiment between two fathers that was made reference last season. Bye!
     
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  11. Lemex

    Lemex That's Lord Lemex to you. Contributor

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    Yeah, you are right. On both accounts, about the incompleteness, and the fact that most of the Classics we can talk about as poetry are complete. Kinds kind of funny with Virgil, but it can be considered complete - and most of the stuff that we know are incomplete from the Classical age we have only in tatters and quotations. Sappho I think has only one poem we actually know is the full, original thing.
     
  12. Kingtype

    Kingtype Banned Contributor

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    I actually rather like series.

    Not all the time but they can be pretty awesome.

    Though I normally seek out a series that is already complete as opposed to one that's midway through. It can be rather annoying plowing through a series only to discover that its not finished yet and thus begins the waiting.....and the waiting......and the waiting.

    Still waiting.....

    Of course we can only write so fast but STILL that is a downside to series. But eh I still like them, just depends on the story the author is going for and wouldn't mind writing a series someday day myself.
     
    Last edited: May 10, 2015
  13. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    Yep, exactly. What Martin achieved is brilliant. The book series manages to pull in readers who I presume would normally be against reading a soap, by dressing it up with swords and spells, and the TV series managers to pull in readers, who I presume would normally be against watching swords and spells, by presenting it in the form of a soap. Hence, mass appeal.
     
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  14. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    OK, here's the thing about series. I'm not going to say anything positive about them. I don't think I need to. It's obviously an extremely successful format.

    David Lynch is a good example of the problem with series. So is Lost. Twin peaks, I believe, was meant to go on longer than it did, and when it didn't, the second season didn't end incredibly gracefully. Muholland Drive was meant to be a television series, and while the movie (which is what it was reduced to) was still great, I've been semi convinced that this was not really the Muholland Drive we were meant to see.

    In the last episode of season 1 of True Detective, I was sad to know we would no longer be seeing Woody Harrelson and Matthew Mchougony. This was the end of the Louisiana hell. But it was better that way. Matthew Mchoughony gets to remain the pessimistic sonofabitch we know and love. We never have to see him become a mockery of himself, like we did with Agent Mulder in X-files (also, Californication).

    The thing about stand alone novels, duologies, trilogies, poems, and short stories (and basically any non series based work) is that its beauty is in its sense of finality. When something becomes finite, it achieves permanence. It's unchanging. Time will go by, and those things will simply have "been." This, I believe, is the beauty of mortality (and no I'm not going to quote Brad Pitt again from Troy, based on the Iliad [do you see how things go full circle around here?]). My most favorite pieces of literature and songs, are absolute, in that they capture one thing, and that's it.

    This is in opposition too many series (not ALL series), because many series do not have destinies. They go on for as long as they can, they bend over backwards to stay relevant, and almost always ends disgracefully. Technically, all series are finite, too, but in my mind, not in the literary sense. Robert Jordan died, and then Brandon Sanderson finished A Wheel of Time. It's technically a finite series. But it wasn't all conceived by Robert Jordan. It's not really cohesive. Perhaps the greatest example of a pandering series was Lost. It snared its viewers with its mysteries, and it grew, and it grew, but there was no intelligent design (at least none that I'm aware of). The ending was shit, something they pasted on at the end. It's not a beautifully constructed story. It's a SERIES. Obviously some series achieve closure, and not all standalone works do, but I maintain that series, by their very definition, are at greater risk of leaving you ultimately unsatisfied.
     
    Last edited: May 10, 2015
  15. Wreybies

    Wreybies Thrice Retired Supporter Contributor

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    Yes. This. Also, and not to be agist, but there's a whole generation of adult watchers and readers who missed the heyday of primetime soaps like Dallas and Knots Landing, Dynasty and Falcon Crest in the 80's, who relegate the idea of "soap opera" to only daytime TV. The Soap Opera has stretched into other territories in the past and is happily doing so again, because, though they are loathe to admit, people like them.
     
  16. Steerpike

    Steerpike Felis amatus Contributor

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    I believe the Wheel of Time series was finished by Brandon Sanderson, after Jordan died.
     
  17. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    You're right. Fixed.
     
  18. Kingtype

    Kingtype Banned Contributor

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    I agree completely.

    Its easier to get finality from a one shot and of course one shots are less likely to suffer from seasonal rot but still I dig the format XD. There a lot of series that I really just love over the wide spectrum of media (books, comics, tv, games etc). I'm into series.

    Never read Wheel of Time though, which is funny as I'd get consider myself a fantasy fan but I don't really want to invest the time on something that according to everyone suffers from seasonal rot.

    Haven't watched Lost either.

    Twin Peaks and True Detective.....now those are some awesome shows.

    And the waiting game is on for True Detective season 2. (High expectations). I also dig the anthology format, I think that serves True Detective well.
     
  19. Wreybies

    Wreybies Thrice Retired Supporter Contributor

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    Totally off topic...

    One thing that always has bugged me about the series is the very long timeline of which the present players are aware as regards their history. More than 8000 years. They have a more or less continuous historical lineage of more than 8000 years but they're living in 16th to 17th century technological surroundings? That seems pretty off to me. Yes, yes, they've had wars and The Others and all that shite, but we've had world wars and dark ages and all that shite and I'm still talking to everyone via a computer or my wee nifty cellphone. Just seems like not a lot of progress for such a long span of time.
     
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  20. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    It makes a lot of sense. You see I believe -in some form or another - in a profound connection between the noumenal and physical world (mind/body). Our world, the real world, is limited by the most intelligent mind, and thus, in fiction, any world based on our own world is experiences the same limitations. Thus I could write about a novel set in modern day USA about smart phones, and you'd believe me , even though I may not be smart enough myself to have conceived of the idea myself. If I write a futuristic novel about flying cars, you mighy buy it, because even though no one smart enough has yet invented a flying car, it is conceivable that one day someone smart enough will. This is called science fiction. In a fantasy world devoid from our own, that physical reality is limited not by the intelligence of the smartest person in our world, but by the intelligence of that fantasy world's creator, in this case, George RR Martin. So yes, it makes perfect sense that his creations could go on for tens of thousands of years and never evolve beyond swords and horses (I think at this point we can agree Martin is not really attempting historical fiction) , because that is all that can be naturally derived from Martin's mind, without borrowing from our present and stripping it of its "fantasy" genre title. Martin is simply not smart enough to conceive of a world that can evolve as much as our own has, without actually copying our world. And this is my problem with >99% of fantasy novels. It most cases, it's not creation. It's reduction .

    I am by no means criticizing Martin as a fantasy writer, by the way. I would say he is still one of the best.

    Counter examples to Martin include Gene Wolfe, Neil Stephenson, and, of course, Mervyn Peake.
     
  21. Kingtype

    Kingtype Banned Contributor

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    Hmmm

    Game of Thrones in a modern setting......

    Like this?

    [​IMG]

    Gamers should get that reference

    If any of us have played GTA XD

    But still the image comes to mind if a Song of Ice and Fire was put in a modern setting.
     
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  22. Jack Asher

    Jack Asher Banned Contributor

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    It's really no different than Tolkien's elves. Live for-fucking-ever, never develop beyond bows and arrows.
     
  23. StCecil

    StCecil New Member

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    “Why is such a disturbing book so good?”

    This is easy in my opinion. GRRM reminds people, he is striving to write a story that is realistic had it taken place in a medieval society. Terrible things happened to people in those societies with no punishment for the criminals or wrong doers. Tales of this kind can be intriguing.

    “Anyone who've read Martin's writings would say that his writing style is fenomenal.
    But he deals with pretty hectic issues, and his messages are too dark.
    When reading the books, I was horrified in multiple parts;
    I'm not talking only about the sex, there are scenes which are simply revolting to morality (if I may say that),
    for example: children being forced to use daggers to kill.
    As far as I understand books are made to give leisure to the reader, to make him experience things which make him excited, hopeful, interested; so why make him feel disturbed?”


    “I really have to say, this is an attempt to capture the actual times. Children were viewed different in medieval societies and put to work at very young ages and made to do things in our time that are unimaginable.”

    “As disturbed as I was, I was deeply engrossed as I read the books.
    And I know lots of people who loved them just as I did.
    So, how did Martin do it?”


    You were probably engrossed because of how real the writing felt, due to the fact GRRM did not hold back and sugar coat anything. There is no denying that sex, violence and horrific things happen in reality today, and for as long as we have been human beings. Omitting things like violence, sex and horrific acts may make the reading easier to handle for a portion of the readers, but it also makes it seem more fake.

    Don’t think as sex or violence as being good, bad or disturbing or anything other than a fact of life that the body of work contains. After all that’s what these things are, facts of life.
     
  24. 123456789

    123456789 Contributor Contributor

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    I'm pretty sure most people think sex is good :meh:
     
  25. Selbbin

    Selbbin The Moderating Cat Staff Contributor Contest Winner 2023

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    Almost everything terrible in those books has happened for real at some point in human history. Why is it still so shocking? It's not like he made up the idea of skinning people alive.
     
  26. Shadowfax

    Shadowfax Contributor Contributor

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    And here we are, only a millennium after the Anglo-Saxons were forced to yield to the Normans, and we have 4 historical sources for the period between 500 AD & 1000 AD. So how did GoT manage its written (and I don't mean printed) history?

    Also, it's fascinating how clear their history is. None of the revisionary interpretations that we're accustomed to.
     

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