#arya thoughts

[a-chaotic-dumbass]

favorite thing in asoiaf is that the stark family tree is just filled with haters in every generation. theon stark brandon snow alaric stark cregan stark even ned's brother brandon and lyanna too. even the current kids jon snow robb sansa and arya all have some kendrick lamar level of beef w at least one person. brandon the builder spawned an entire genre of haters

[myastoned]

we always talk about lyanna/arya parallels but what about the lyanna/sansa parallels. What about the girl who believed in true knights so much she needed to become one. What about the girl who ran away for true love only for it to cause the death and destruction of everyone around her. What about lying destroyed at the feet of prophecy and songs and stories. What about having your girlhood taken away because you were a stupid little girl who didn’t know any better.

[ladystoneboobs]

the younger starklings about robb (robb the strong and brave big brother, the perfect heir, the fierce and unbeatable young wolf):

arya

bran

sansa

meanwhile, actual robb (robb the lord and then robb the kitn):

before arya ever promised to be strong by using robb as her benchmark, the definition of stark strength, ned had to remind robb to be strong as the ruling stark in winterfell. (strong for bran and rickon, the brothers he thought he failed by sending their would-be killer away, leading to his great moment of weakness in jeyne westerling's bed.) as his siblings' faith in his ultimate triumph held strong, even after the loss of the north, robb himself was struggling with despair.

as grenn once told sam, maybe everyone is just pretending to be brave, maybe that's how people become brave. robb was faking it to make it too, imitating his father's lordly attitude as bran later tried to imitate robb's. as his younger siblings remembered him as their shining example, robb was trying to live up to his father's example. not the ned who'd been in his circumstances, a teenager unexpectedly turned into a lord and fighting a war to save his family. no, ofc, he never knew that young ned. the ned he knew as his father, the standard to measure himself against, was an adult man in his mid-30s who'd ruled the north for ~15 years. but was that standard for a 15/16yo any more fair and valid an expectation than 8/9yo bran believing he was almost a man grown and holding himself to the standard of 15/16yo robb as robb's heir?

and the only person left close enough to see robb as the boy he still was died with him.

[whppxdit4chi]

EDIT TO ADD:

Just to be clear if anyone cares and because this post kinda blew up and people started dragging me and I’m pretty sure they assumed that I was suggesting anything I said was in some way representative of my beliefs/theories:

I was totally just spitballing shit off the top of my head.

I never intended my word salad to trigger such a heated debate, I genuinely was just hoping for a civilised discussion about what’s right/wrong, what’s most/least likely. I want to understand all this deep stuff and engage with the fandom and hear people’s thoughts. I don’t have the mental capacity to weave intricate theories that tie all strings together like some of this fandom does. This post was incredibly fucking low effort drivel that I tossed out into the universe in the hopes of exploring different possibilities and engaging in conversation about exploring the significance of the differing appearances of the Stark children. Nowhere was it supposed to say I *want* the characters mentioned to fail/succeed. Nowhere was it supposed to imply that I know the significance of it. I just picked up something that was sitting with me and thought aloud about what it could mean and just came up with a random idea of what it might mean without much thought. At least some part of the thought was shaped by the end of Robb’s story and because he failed due to what I interpreted as getting too close to Southern politics and perhaps forgetting the core values he was fighting for along the way. I don’t know. I feel like I shouldn’t say anything else now cause anything I could say feels like it will just fuel the fire.

I’ve confessed multiple times now that what I said was shortsighted, wrong and didn’t consider intricacies that refute what I was saying entirely. Now if people could chill and take the post for what it is, that would be great.

ORIGINAL POST:

Do any of y’all asoiaf homies think there could be some significance to the Stark kids’ appearance?

My brain does not currently have the capacity to explain what I mean exactly but I’m talking in the sense that the majority of the kids look like Tullys not Starks, notably it’s said that Arya and Jon look most like Starks and it just made me wonder whether that somehow foreshadows their failures- in the sense that the rest cannot truly uphold Stark values and therefore ultimately fail? Idk if I’m just pulling shit from thin air and this may not make much sense but I just think that fact might somehow imply that they’ll be the ones to uphold Stark values in the send and ultimately succeed in their endeavours.

Ofc I understand I’m ultimately damning Sansa, Bran and Rickon in this but I wouldn’t put it past GRRM to plan that far ahead and use some kind of magical heritage-related symbolism like that… and ofc nobody is safe in asoiaf so there’s that too.

[jonsnowunemploymentera]

I feel so dumb for never having realized this before but I was thinking about the bookend in AGoT between the Others, the dragons, and two heroes: Waymar Royce and Daenerys Targaryen.

While squaring off against the Others, Waymar Royce asks for a dance.

Ser Waymar met him bravely. “Dance with me then.” He lifted his sword high over his head, defiant. His hands trembled from the weight of it, or perhaps from the cold. Yet in that moment, Will thought, he was a boy no longer, but a man of the Night’s Watch.

It’s notable that this scene is eerily silent save for the bits of dialogue. And when Waymar’s dance finally begins, there’s a notable lack of music.

The pale sword came shivering through the air. Ser Waymar met it with steel. When the blades met, there was no ring of metal on metal; only a high, thin sound at the edge of hearing, like an animal screaming in pain. Royce checked a second blow, and a third, then fell back a step. Another flurry of blows, and he fell back again.

I’ve always asserted that Ser Waymar is a failed last hero if we judge his success based off Old Nan’s blueprint.

So as cold and death filled the earth, the last hero determined to seek out the children, in the hopes that their ancient magics could win back what the armies of men had lost. He set out into the dead lands with a sword, a horse, a dog, and a dozen companions. For years he searched, until he despaired of ever finding the children of the forest in their secret cities. One by one his friends died, and his horse, and finally even his dog, and his sword froze so hard the blade snapped when he tried to use it. And the Others smelled the hot blood in him, and came silent on his trail, stalking him with packs of pale white spiders big as hounds—”

Both Ser Waymar and the last hero lost their companions and both had their swords shatter to the cold. Yet Waymar failed to complete one important step: find the children of the forest. The children are also known as “the singers”. So it’s notable that Ser Waymar attempts to dance without any music(ians) to accompany him. And because he does so, his dance ends in failure.

But then we have Daenerys Targaryen in the Dothraki Sea.

As Daenerys Targaryen rose to her feet, her black hissed, pale smoke venting from its mouth and nostrils. The other two pulled away from her breasts and added their voices to the call, translucent wings unfolding and stirring the air, and for the first time in hundreds of years, the night came alive with the music of dragons.

Dany performs a miracle in bringing dragons to life, the first person to do so in centuries. And these dragons sing a song that proclaims her, an exiled young princess and a widow, Azor Ahai reborn - the champion of fire, and warrior of light.

This bookend between the first and last chapters is so poignant. It’s not just that fire has returned to combat Ice. It’s that Dany brought back the music necessary to complete this dance. We start the book with a failed hero and end it with the rise of a true one; also interesting that Waymar’s end comes while he’s down on his knees whereas Dany rises to her feet reborn.

This makes Dany’s identity as the promised prince(ss) all the more impressive.

“He has a song,” the man replied. “He is the prince that was promised, and his is the song of ice and fire.” He looked up when he said it and his eyes met Dany’s, and it seemed as if he saw her standing there beyond the door.

Waymar failed because he didn’t have a song to accompany him. Yet Dany has a song to dance to. A song of fire.

I think this raises some interesting questions regarding the nature of this great conflict. There not only has to be a song to dance to, but it seems that there is a key distinction between the singer and the dancer. Rhaegar Targaryen failed to fulfill the prophecy because he was the singer and not the dancer. His role was to provide the hero’s musical accompaniment. In a way, it’s almost like he as the bard is the herald. And the herald is rarely, if ever, the main character. So notice how Rhaegar heralds the hero, the king, while looking at Dany.

But! - there’s different kinds of songs. Dany has one, made by her dragons. But it’s not be the only one. The children of the forest are heavily associated with the last hero and while Waymar Royce is dead, there lives another: Bran Stark.

Bran found the children, the singers, and is a step closer to completing the last hero’s journey.

Now Bran is an interesting case.

“Go,” Bran whispered to his own horse. He touched her neck lightly, and the small chestnut filly started forward. Bran had named her Dancer. She was two years old, and Joseth said she was smarter than any horse had a right to be.

He has a dancing horse but at some point has to leave her behind. So does that mean that he has to learn to do the dancing in his own way?

And I find it interesting that Bran has a female dancer horse because this creates a neat parallel with Dany, a dancer who may also be the stallion that mounts the world; if it’s not her, then it has to be her mount, Drogon. This is important if we consider that the last hero, Azor Ahai/the promised prince, the Stallion That Mounts the World, etc. are all different yet complimentary manifestations of one heroic legend.

But the issue of songs doesn’t end there because there still exists one Jon Snow, another version of the last hero and promised prince. Jon isn’t a bard but he has been positioned as being adjacent to dancers. I won’t harp on about Jon’s parallels with Waymar Royce because they’ve been done to death. But it seems that Jon, like Bran and Dany, will succeed where Ser Waymar failed.

Because not only does Jon have music to herald him:

That night he dreamt of wildlings howling from the woods, advancing to the moan of warhorns and the roll of drums. Boom DOOM boom DOOM boom DOOM came the sound, a thousand hearts with a single beat.

But he is also positioned as a last man standing among many dead heroes:

“Stand fast,” Jon Snow called. “Throw them back.” He stood atop the Wall, alone. “Flame,” he cried, “feed them flame,” but there was no one to pay heed. They are all gone. They have abandoned me.

And he has a sword that will not shatter against the cold:

“Snow,” an eagle cried, as foemen scuttled up the ice like spiders. Jon was armored in black ice, but his blade burned red in his fist.

It’s noteworthy that Jon is the son of a singer, Rhaegar Targaryen. The very singer who sang the song of ice and fire; and notice how Jon is clad in both. Plus he has been mentored by another, Mance Rayder, whom he eventually succeeds.

At a quick glance, it’s very interesting to me that Jon is constantly listening to songs beyond the Wall. There’s the song of the blue winter rose (which in a way heralds his own birth), the song of Joramun and the Horn of Winter, and many others.

It’s also noteworthy just how often giants are mentioned as the subject of songs in Jon’s POV chapters. I bring this up because of the Last of the Giants:

Ooooooh, I am the last of the giants, my people are gone from the earth. The last of the great mountain giants, who ruled all the world at my birth.

I think there is a parallel here between the dragons, the giants, and the children of the forest. These are all dying species, yet they linger on for the song of ice and fire still needs to be brought to completion.

And let’s consider where our heroes fit in all this. Dany commands the dragons, Bran learns from the children, while Jon begins to befriend the giants. All these creatures make musical accompaniments for our heroes to dance to.

Lastly, I’m inclined to think of the Stark girls though I’m not entirely sure where they would fit in all of this. Arya, at some point, trains to be a dancer:

On the way back to his chambers, he came upon his daughter Arya on the winding steps of the Tower of the Hand, windmilling her arms as she struggled to balance on one leg. The rough stone had scuffed her bare feet. Ned stopped and looked at her. “Arya, what are you doing?” “Syrio says a water dancer can stand on one toe for hours.” Her hands flailed at the air to steady herself. Ned had to smile. “Which toe?” he teased. “Any toe,” Arya said, exasperated with the question. She hopped from her right leg to her left, swaying dangerously before she regained her balance. “Must you do your standing here?” he asked. “It’s a long hard fall down these steps.” “Syrio says a water dancer never falls.” She lowered her leg to stand on two feet. “Father, will Bran come and live with us now?”

Now Arya is no singer, but her wolf is.

In another place, his little sister lifted her head to sing to the moon, and a hundred small grey cousins broke off their hunt to sing with her.

On the other hand, Sansa is no dancer but she is known for her ability to sing. And boy does she sing beautifully.

Her throat was dry and tight with fear, and every song she had ever known had fled from her mind. Please don't kill me, she wanted to scream, please don't. She could feel him twisting the point, pushing it into her throat, and she almost closed her eyes again, but then she remembered. It was not the song of Florian and Jonquil, but it was a song. Her voice sounded small and thin and tremulous in her ears. Gentle Mother, font of mercy, Save our sons from war, we pray,

In fact, a lot of Sansa’s songs are prayers for those who dance to the music of swords. Her songs are soothing, calming. And see this during Stannis’ assault on Kings Landing when she is able to calm Sandor and the noble women through the power of song. Hers is not a song to dance to, it’s a different kind though I’m not entirely sure what it entails. I do want to say, though, that Sansa is often paralleled with creates that take flight; various birds and bats. So she is a singer, much like the dragons.

I may have neglected other characters here, but I just thought it was intriguing that our main heroes (Jon, Bran, Dany, maybe Arya) are all positioned as dancers for the song of ice and fire.

[phantomqa]

Hot take:

Okay so, I don't really understand the Sansa slander, especially in the first few seasons. Beauces my girl is a child, can you blame a child for being scared of the queen and the king. Can you blame a child for having a crush and wanting said crush to like them back? I don't think so. The whole Arya is better,oh Sansa is so bad thing ,I don't understand. Both of these characters are great in my opinion and you can't really compare them.

Arya just likes swords and stuff like that, and Sansa likes embroidery and stuff. And I think they have a relatively normal sibling dynamic, cause I remember I was like that with my older sister.

Since it was five years ago for me when I watched the show and I now finished the first book, I can't really understand the dislike for Sansa.

Like she went through shit , in the show. Like watching her father die, getting humiliated as a child, getting married as a humiliation, getting married to a psycho and abused from him.

And one thing I once read in a comment section was "well we don't like her because she didn't trust Daenerys." Well why should she trust someone she doesn't know from the beginning.

I get people disliking characters, but Sansa is just a character I don't really understand why.

Can someone explain to me, because every explanation has been I've seen especially on tiktok, kinda sexist and biased, no offense.

[fromtheseventhhell]

Arya learned the Braavosi language and culture well enough to pass as someone "born and bred" there while interacting with actual native Braavosi, but I'm supposed to think she's going to have difficulty navigating Westerosi noble life...as someone who was actually raised as a Westerosi noble? The way you can tell that people don't think before they "theorize" about Arya will always crack me up

[arte072]

Op was talking about the Stark girls but the problem with this take is that Sansa calls Arya ugly AND would also never die for her lol. In fact, she actively risked Arya’s life/safety multiple times be it the Trident incident, telling the entire court that Arya has traitor’s blood while she herself was a “good girl”, telling Cersei about Ned’s plan, etc etc. and never reflects upon it. She still blames Arya for Lady’s death in A Clash of Kings 😭

I’m sorry but Sansa’s dislike of Arya runs deep. Far deeper than any negativity that might be felt in reverse lbr. And it may not be as bad as say, Cersei and Tyrion, but it also doesn’t have to be for it to still be considered negative.

I’m just so baffled by the insistence that this fundamental aspect of their relationship be denied.

Name one moment of Sansa being selfless for Arya or standing up for her in any way. Name top three moments of Sansa saying or thinking anything positive specifically about Arya! (Vaguely remembering her existence in her idealized memories of Winterfell doesn’t count btw) They both care about each other as family, sure. But where’s the actual love y’all keep talking about?

I think the biggest evidence of the sheer dearth of positivity between these girls is the fact that Arya and Sansa are both POV characters with some of the highest chapter counts in the series, they’ve interacted with each other both in their own chapters and in other’s, and have thought about each other multiple times even after they’ve gone their separate ways. Yet the most ““positive”” quote this fandom has of them is Ned’s “sun and moon” comment. (And for context, this quote was said by Ned after Arya was angry at Sansa for victim-blaming Mycah for his own murder so…..lol)

In the combined 50 something chapters these girls have, the fact that the “Stark sisters LOVE each other!!!! 🤬” crowd has just that one quote spoken by their dad who was basically giving his daughter a lecture and nothing from the girls themselves is just…. sad tbh. Imagine if we were constantly told of the strength and love between Jon Snow and Arya’s relationship and the only evidence was Theon’s “Lord Stark’s sullen bastard has always been fond of his half-sister Arya”.

Sad.

There used to be this trite, overused comeback made by Sansa/Stark Sisters fans that went:

“Umm if Arya knew you were saying anything bad about Sansa she would fucking HATE you!!!!!”

and maybe so! Arya’s very empathetic and has been shown to defend Sansa and get upset on her sister’s behalf multiple times! But would the reverse be true?

Would Sansa hate me if I said negative things about Arya? And if so, where are the textual evidence for this? Because Ned’s “sun and moon; you share dna” is not cutting it I’m afraid 😔

[gendrie]

"You need to rid yourself of all this," he said of her treasures. Arya felt stricken. "They're mine." "And who are you?" "No one." He picked up her silver fork. "This belongs to Arya of House Stark. All these things belong to her. There is no place for them here. There is no place for her. Hers is too proud a name, and we have no room for pride. We are servants here." "I serve," she said, wounded. She liked the silver fork. "You play at being a servant, but in your heart you are a lord's daughter. You have taken other names, but you wore them as lightly as you might wear a gown. Under them was always Arya."

(Juliet, John William Waterhouse / The Novice, James Sant)

[myimaginationplain]

I like to imagine that despite its dark color, Arya's hair is the same thick texture as Catelyn, Robb & Sansa's, which is part of why it tangles so easily & so often. Bran's hair is stick straight just like Ned & Jon's despite him getting the red Tully color. Rickon is the only one whose hair really & truly curls naturally, & he absolutely hates having it brushed.

[witchqueenvisenya]

no no no the arya is ackshually ugly and everyone should accept it argument is WILD because really that girl is for one not fully grown up she's not been around WOMEN who could understand her (except her mom because even catelyn was a bit of an outdoors child but she's a married highborn ladymom now who is happy that one of her daughters will have absolutely zero problems securing a quality marriage, like it's just easier it's simpler to have a highborn female child like sansa than arya) she's not had the experience of female acceptance AT ALL when she was growing up in winterfell and for another the people that constantly put her down and bully her are somehow taken as more honest at their word than the people in text that are unbiased and who have no stakes in this stupid argument, because it is a stupid argument for all anyone knows twow may never be released and we may never know arya's grown-up self EXCEPT WE DO KNOW because arya is constantly compared to lyanna who was famously called a 'child-woman of surpassing l o v e l i n e s s' by ned and who had a 'wild beauty' according to kevan lannister and if you just keep wanting to put george's explicit description of brienne and subtextual AND textual description of arya in the same category that's on you. that's you wanting to extract something from the text in favour of your preferred character in place of what's actually there.

[amaltheas-garden]

nothing will ever convince me sansan shippers actually like Sansa, and I get especially peeved when people act like its already canon and that Jonsas are the problem for wanting her to be with a guy who is nice. The bar is in hell.

"And the little bird, your pretty sister, I stood there in my white cloak and let them beat her. I took the bloody song, she never gave it. I meant to take her too. I should have. I should have fucked her bloody and ripped her heart out before leaving her for that dwarf." -Arya XIII, ASoS

"If I could show her Winterfell . . . give her a flower from the glass gardens, feast her in the Great Hall, and show her the stone kings on their thrones. We could bathe in the hot pools, and love beneath the heart tree while the old gods watched over us." -Jon V, ASoS

[visenyaism]

Coming into the fandom late, absolutely loving Sansa, and seeing the general fandom consensus on her was so jarring

this random middle school girl is just a lightning rod for every nasty thought people have ever had about girly girls being ontologically cruel and stupid. which is also what people do to her in the text it’s almost like the author was trying to Say Something? no. glitter eyeshadow just makes you evil

[sabiartrin]

Sansa. A Golden Child.

It simply breaks my heart that Catelyn creates such a rift between her children. And I'm not even talking about Jon right now. I'm talking about Sansa and Arya.

Sansa has always been Catelyn's golden child, the future queen and mother of rulers of all of Westeros. She admires her daughter, and in the later chapters, when Sansa is married off to Tyrion, it's as if Catelyn feels like she's losing her. She speaks of her in her thoughts in a similar way to how she talks about Bran and Rickon, whom she believed were dead.

Also, remember how Ned protested when Catelyn mentioned that Sansa could become queen. "Sansa is only eleven, and Joffrey..." Yes, Sansa is still a child who needs family, love, and care, and certainly not Joffrey. But Catelyn is only concerned about the fact that Joffrey is the heir to the throne, and her daughter could become queen. Sansa is hardly a child to her, just an extension of herself; she is captivated by the idea that her grandchildren will rule the Kingdoms.

Catelyn's initial thoughts about Arya are simply that the girl needs to learn some manners, and that's it. Right after Catelyn's chapter comes Arya's, which is filled with resentment and jealousy towards her sister. Yes, I think Arya was jealous of Sansa. She didn't give up trying to connect with Sansa, engaging her in conversation, inviting her to ride horses. But the Septa did everything to turn Sansa into a proper lady, and complained to Catelyn, fully aware of the scolding Arya would later receive for it. "Nymeria loved her, even if no one else did." Come on, would a child loved by her mother indulge in such thoughts?

Catelyn wanted the best for her children, but as a mother of daughters, she seriously messed up, let's be honest.

[hipsternumbertwo]

um, excuse me???

[blupengu]

David and Ritu reading the script for S4 really be like

I love the Umbrella Academy cast, I’m so sorry y’all’s characters were treated like this