#was going for something asoiaf inspired

[violet-moonstone]

The Wings of War

Summary:

Fifteen years have passed since the battle with Drago Bludvist. Since then, Berk and its allies have lived in relative peace, banding together to fend off whatever trouble finds its way to the Archipelago. But as The Gathering of the Chieftains arrives, rumours abound of an encroaching dragon-riding army, tinging the ceremonies with dread rather than joy. Hiccup and the other dragon riders will be faced once again with an old foe; their children will try to find their way in childhoods interrupted by violent conflict; and Toothless will rediscover parts of his past thought to be forever lost. In a tale of love, grief, and revenge, none can escape the shadow cast by the wings of war.

Read the first chapter on AO3

[jaehaeryshater]

Vaella with a pony!!!!!

art by my good friend @novembermorgon

Is this so cuteiful or what????? I’m so so happy with how this turned out, it’s adorable. I’ve been asking for Vaella with a pony for like six months and my friend åse delivered on it, I’m so excited!!!!!! I’ve always thought of Vaella being a pony girl, I feel like horses were probably a very common special interest for autistic girls (and boys) in a medieval or Tudor inspired society. There was simply less to do or hyperfixate on so while undoubtably there were special interests that were more abstract or “out there”, I would think that ponies would be very popular among little girls in particular. She loves her pony, its name is Baby because it is small and cute. She has other ponies too l, Daeron can’t stop buying them for her because it always puts a smile on her face, but Baby is her favorite. Vaella is super excited and not scared at all when it comes to ponies, but her father Daeron is way more nervous. He’s always worried that she’s going to fall (falling off a horse and breaking your neck is still dangerous to this day, and a surprisingly common cause of death throughout history), something that Vaella is not aware of. She just thinks it’s fun and she enjoys spending time with her father, even if he won’t let her ride her pony without him by her side holding her hand.

I love åse @novembermorgon so much and they are so so so so talented. This is so second commission from them and it’s been more than worth it. Everything they put out is beyond beautiful, I would encourage everyone to scroll their page for a while because there is some truly amazing stuff over there. I hope people have some kind words for them; I don’t think they truly understand how talented they are and what a gift they have. They’re definitely my favorite asoiaf artist out there and I’m loving that they’re branching out into other fandoms as well. I’m always excited to see what they put out. So a big thank you to åse, I appreciate them so much.

Bonus: these are two really cutesy options that we didn’t go with for the pony, but I intrigued by both of these as well, so I wanted people to see them.

[whumptober]

Anatomy of a Whumptober Prompt

We get a lot of questions about prompts, so I thought this might be a helpful post for how to break down a Whumptober prompt and get ideas.

Each day of Whumptober has 4 prompts: a theme trope, then three ideas. You can use any one, two, three, or all four in your work. Each day’s prompts loosely relate to each other but could also be taken individually. They can be interpreted as literally or figuratively as you want.

Let’s look at an example. I’m a writer, so I’m going to talk in terms of storywriting, but just remember that this challenge is open to all sorts of creative works, including art, gifsets, headcannons, crafts, or whatever else you can think of.

ICARUS

cage | “You'll say you'd never let me fall from hopes so high” | crash landing

(Fiona Apple, Never is a Promise)

So the theme is Icarus, with additional prompts of a place, a song lyric, and a situation. Taken together, you could write a story of Icarus, who was caged with his father Daedelus, flew too close to the sun on the hope of freedom, and crashed fatally to earth. But you could also look at each prompt in isolation for ideas.

Icarus:

themes of hubris

themes of freedom from captivity

winged characters

a child trying to prove themselves to a parent figure and failing

Cage:

being literally caged

feeling figuratively caged

breaking free of something (literal or figurative)

themes of imprisonment and freedom or false freedom

“You'll say you'd never let me fall from hopes so high”:

regret

promises made or broken

an accident and its aftermath

bitterness after betrayal

guilt after betrayal or accident

Crash landing:

literally falling from a height

being high (drugs, mania, medications, love, sugar) and crashing

plane/helicopter/airship/dragon/spaceship/winged creature crash

an angel falling to earth or hell

comet or meteor impact

This isn’t an exhaustive list, but just some brainstorming ideas I could come up with quickly. In a few of my fandoms, I could write about Bucky’s fall from the train and Steve’s guilt (MCU), Basch fon Ronsenburg’s fall from grace or languishing in a cage for treason (FFXII), Sephiroth summoning Meteor (FFVII), Chell being dragged back into Aperture after thinking she’s free (Portal), a dragonrider battle (ASOIAF/HoD), crashing into the Chionthar after victory (BG3), Geralt coming down after battle when the potions wear off (The Witcher). Any of these scenarios could be inspired by one or more of the four prompts for that day – my problem is always deciding which one I want to use!

“But Yenn,” you say, “what if I can’t think of anything for any parts of the prompt, or I don’t like the prompts, or they’re too much for me in some way?” No problem! We also have a list of 15 alternatives that can be substituted for any day (once per prompt). If you’re still stuck, you can always come on Discord and ask for brainstorming help. Everyone is super nice there, especially for a community of people that live to put blorbos in discomfort.

I hope this post helps give people ideas. We’re working hard to get everything together and should release the prompts in a couple of weeks! In the meantime, our 2024 playlist will be loading soon...

[amartworks]

Elia Martell, princess consort of Rhaegar Targaryen, and her children, Rhaenys and Aegon

I like how while Elia isn’t in the books, she haunts the narrative just as much as her husband – down to her daughter’s kitten literally haunting the Red Keep.

Artist notes below cut for freaks who like that

Oh god this took so long. Oh god why did I let it go this far. Here's the original sketch. Referenced from JookPubStock… I think. It's been so long.

This painting is quite blatantly inspired by Franz Xaver Winterhalter’s The Royal Family. It's decidedly rococo/neo-classical and wayyyy too late for ASOIAF but I don't care.

Elia Martell is described as flat chested and quite sickly. I see her being easily exhausted and therefore wearing dresses that do not weigh much, so as to not put pain on her shoulders and tire her out. I also gave her a strong nose because I am very fond of Pedro Pascal’s Oberyn, Elia’s brother.

Elia is wearing a simple ambigious renaissance dress with small sleeves and a light corset. Kind of cobbled together from looking at Hans Holbein the Younger’s works. The fabric the dress is cut from is however meant to be Dornish – I drew inspiration from this beautiful Ottomanian textile.

Her crown is completely made up. I searched “sun crown” and was greatly inspired by the works of jewelry maker SunFlames.

King Aerys refused to touch his granddaughter Rhaenys because she “smelled Dornish” which tells me Rhaenys probably favored her mother.

Rhaenys was difficult. I looked up what renaissance children wore, and the answer is they wore exact copies of what adults wore. I don’t know how, I feel like the moment you were done with a sleeve the child in question would’ve outgrown it. I decided to freestyle it a little.

Aegon is wearing a christening gown. As far as I can tell the Faith of the Seven doesn’t mention baptisms… but considering the catholic inspiration I think it makes sense. Also I think it's sweet.

They both have deep indigo eyes. My personal headcanon is that Targaryen eyes are purple in the same sense that Elizabeth Taylor’s eyes were purple. Moreover the definition of colors change over time. During the Middle Ages, there was no word for the color “orange” – instead you would say red or yellow. Similarly a lot of languages will use the same word for blue and green.

HOWEVER, this is something that has come with later generations – the first Valyrians had inhumanly violet eyes, which I will be doing concept art for… sometime.

Finally here’s what I know you're REALLY here for, and the part of the painting which I am the proudest of – the 3D model of the chair and table which I made in Blender because I couldn't find a good reference for a renaissance era chair from the angle I wanted.

[hbheavensent]

Andrealphus/Striker

Oh boy oh boy my boys- As you can see, somewhat like Loona, Striker for sure isn't fully Imp. I also wanted to explore his relationship with the Goetia in general. As for Andy here I wanted to. Make him less stupid. By a lot. So let's get right on into it here-

Andrealphus, at least in demonology, has not a god damn thing to do with ice so I have no idea where Viv got that from. In fact he has a lot more to do with space and astrology! I figured so did Stolas technically so I leaned into his OTHER thing, lyinggggg like a liar lmao. I wanted to take some inspiration from The Spiral/Distortion (TMA) and lean into his thing being mirrors and illusions. I also don't really know what I was going for with his outfit, I just know I wanted him to stand out so I pulled from Babidi and general Demon Realm stuff from Dragon Ball for that sort of look. I don't think that within the larger Goetia that his outfits are trend setting but they're def new amongst the main cast.

So in terms of his relationship with Stella and Octavia, I wanted to lean into that emotional incest side of things. Make his weird and gross comments have a purpose besides it just being… gross and uncomfortable with no service to the plot. So I leaned into him making Stella feel stupid and small, poking at her insecurities and validating all of those toxic feelings she feels. (Admittedly I'm ALSO stealing a touch from Petyr Baelish and Jamie Lannister from ASOIAF) I also thought it'd be interesting that after he gets Stolas out of the picture that he no really longer has a use for Stella, so he moves on to Octavia. Being a "kind" ear and exceptionally "understanding" of her. Really sanctioning and endorsing her anger against both of her parents, though once you become that ear for someone it's harder and harder to dissociate yourself from them. Get stuck playing the character that cares despite not really in the first place. Sure, in the end Andy will always choose himself and his power first- but that doesn't mean he doesn't have to have some complex feelings about his niece.

"I thought you were the one person in this family who cared about me!"

"Well that’s not your fault really! I’m very good at my job, and you’re… I shouldn't say, that would be cruel! Ha!"

Something along those lines is probably how it turns out.

Sooo for Striker, I wanted to focus on WHY he would hate Stolas/Blitzo, hate Goetia but still work under them. Alongside this I felt it was important to use Striker as a prime example, like Loona, of how classes in Hell effect the residents. Even beyond Imps being the lowest of the low, you can go lower within that structure. All Imps were originated from Wrath, made by Satan, there's no small amount of racism from "Pure Imps" to "Crossbreeds" in Wrath. This is something we could demonstrate with Striker, who presents himself as "Satan's perfect creation" but in reality knows who is Goetic parent is- and knows how they left his father and him out to dry. He hates royalty for being selfish and not sticking to their own, but he also can't fully fit in with Imps of any kind. It's why he covers his unique markings and rarely if ever uses his inherited Beast Taming powers. Strikers whole things is that if he can do it himself he will, but there's also the fact that he's as poor as any other Imp out there.

So, when Striker is propositioned by Andy (who is prized for his information gathering and gossip) to help him get Stolas out of the picture, he takes the angelic weapon and runs. Fully goes off the rails of just inconveniencing Stolas and being on Andy's leash the second he learns this Prince is trying to get with some Imp. Originally he tries to convince Blitzo that he's being used, just like his father was, before realizing he can't convince him- settling to just kill the fuckers instead before they ruin more lives. So much of Striker is projecting and anger towards a system that he's a victim of, but unlike Loona he's also been put out. Knowing he will outlive everyone he loves because he's looked 20 for 15 more years than he should, and to him, killing Stolas is good enough as revenge for a life he will have to live.

Stiker notably has shame about his blood, and I tried to show that in both his expression and how he tries to cover up every inch of his markings. If people know he has an unfair advantage then nothing he's done will have been worth it, he will never be poor enough, never be down trodden enough, none of what he does will put him as low as he feels he needs to be to be worth the anger.

Anyway, they both make me sick and there's more to say for sure but this is GETTING LONG and frankly I don't wanna even re-read everything so. Off it goes.

[belladonnafeli]

The Romanticism of ASOIAF

The idea that ASOIAF is "nihilistic" and that the message should be that nothing matters and the world is terrible, therefore caring and being kind is pointless is a fundamental misunderstanding of the story. George himself says that his favorite characters are the heroes “My own heroes are the dreamers, those men and women who tried to make the world a better place than when they found it, whether in small ways or great ones. Some succeeded, some failed, most had mixed results… but it is the effort that’s heroic, as I see it. ” The romance of the story. Chivalry, courtesy, courage, being good in spite of evil. Being good because of evil. These are the fundamentals of A Song of Ice and Fire. “We’re here for a short time and we should be conscious of our own mortality, but the important thing is that love, compassion and empathy with other human beings is still possible! Even laughter in the face of death…The struggle to make the world a better place…We have things like war, murder, rape…Horrible things that still exist, but we dont have to accept them, we can fight the good fight.”GRRM, Ideas At The House

Some examples of this are exemplified by characters such as Brienne. Briennes’ belief in doing good regardless of whether or not she benefits from it is inspiring. No chance, No choice is obviously extremely heroic. “Willow stepped out into the rain, a crossbow in her hands. The girl was shouting at the riders, but a clap of thunder rolled across the yard, drowning out her words. As it faded, Brienne heard the man in the Hound's helm say, "Loose a quarrel at me and I'll shove that crossbow up your cunt and fuck you with it. Then I'll pop your fucking eyes out and make you eat them." The fury in the man's voice drove Willow back a step, trembling. Seven, Brienne thought again, despairing. She had no chance against seven, she knew. No chance, and no choice. She stepped out into the rain, Oathkeeper in hand. "Leave her be. If you want to rape someone, try me." AFFC Chapter 37 This is exactly the kind of chivalry George is in love with. Her chivalry, courtesy and courage inspire someone like Jaime, a man who has lost his way due to his family, his own carelessness and his mental health. Now this isn't to make it seem like Jaime is a man with zero faults. As evidenced by him pushing Bran out of a window. But focusing only on Jamies worst moment does a disservice to his greatest act, the one act he is reviled for. Killing mad king Aerys. He is the one who hears Rhaellas cries. The cries that continue to haunt him, well past her death.

Now personally I want to talk about the moments that provide Compassion, Empathy, and Courage. Courage- Theon, specifically Theon in regards to Jeyne Poole. Theon has done terrible things and I am not trying to absolve him of any of those things. If I did he would be a significantly less interesting character and his next act which I'm about to bring up wouldn't be as powerful. There is something to be said about the Theon/Jeyne plotline that really touches me. Everyone in the North wants to save “Ned’s girl”. Everyone wants to save Arya Stark. But part of why they want to save her is because of who she is attached to in terms of her father and what Arya's status is in society as a highborn lady. Theon is the only person who knows that “Arya” isn’t actually Arya, but Jeyne Poole. And I feel as though there's something to be said here. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of women and girls who go through what Jeyne is going through, but how many of them are going to actually be saved? How many of them will be remembered? How many of them will be forgotten? To me there is something very heartwarming that the one person who knows who Jeyne really is, is the person saving her.

He’s not saving her because she’s Ned Stark's daughter, or because she’s some high lord's daughter. He’s saving her because even though he's been traumatized beyond belief and he’s terrified, he knows that it is the right thing to do. And with what he’s been through, when it comes to Ramsey, what he does is so very courageous. And it inspires that hope and heroism that George RR Martin is writing about.

Next a moment that is extremely popular and also iconic is when Daenerys decides to free the slaves of Astapor. Something that isn't brought up very often I feel is that when Daenerys does this she’s nervous. Her heart is pounding. And it takes me back to the beginning of the story with Ned and Bran. When Bran asks if someone who is afraid can be brave? And Ned says the iconic response that we all know. “That is the only time a man can be brave” There are a plethora of moments of chivalry, honor and courage. When Brienne follows Lady Catelyn because she has “woman's kind of courage” it hit me because a lot of stories, especially ones where a mother is a character in a medieval setting, tend to fall into one of two categories. Pure, saintly, and all good or evil, terrible nasty stepmother trope. Essentially the madonna/whore complex, but Brienne recognizes the courage and strength in a woman like Catelyn in this society which doesn't value the strength of women. In a story where Brienne says “Women die in childbirth and no one sings songs about them.” She sees Catelyns strength and I think that’s beautiful.

sorry for the ranting 😭

[elbiotipo]

Going back in time to introduce pastoralism and horses to ancient America. Imagine what the alternate Pampas and Great Plains would look like

I feel horrible because I really should have more sources than this, but in one of Bret Devereaux's articles about the historical inspirations for the Dothraki in ASOIAF (which prove not to be based in anything historical) he remarks on how incredibly fast North American natives adapted to life in horseback.

I'm quoting the relevant here:

A skilled Native American hunter on a horse, armed with a bow, could hunt bison wildly more effectively than on foot. They could be found more rapidly, followed at speed and shot in relative safety. It is striking that while pedestrian bison hunting was clearly a team effort, a hunter on a horse could potentially hunt effectively alone or in much smaller groups. In turn, that massively increased effectiveness in hunting allowed the Native Americans of the region, once they got enough horses, to go ‘full nomad’ and build a subsistence system focused entirely on hunting bison, supplemented by trading the hides and other products of the bison with the (increasingly sedentary and agrarian) peoples around the edges of the Plains. Many of the common visual markers of Plains Native Americans – the tipi, the travois, the short bow for use from horseback – had existed before among the hunter-gathering peoples, but now spread wore widely as tribes took to horse nomadism and hunting bison full time. At the same time, Isenberg (op. cit. 50-52) has some fascinating paragraphs on all sorts of little material culture changes in terms of clothing, home-wares, tools and so on that changed to accommodate this new lifestyle. The speed of the shift is quite frankly stunning.

And to me something that is more interesting; the fact that this was a very, very new lifestyle for them (based on hunting rather than herding), and historically we didn't see its full development because of colonization:

At the same time, as Isenberg (op. cit. 70ff) makes clear that this pure-hunting nomadism still existed in a narrow edge of subsistence. From his description, it is hard not to conclude that the margin or survival was quite a bit narrower than the Eurasian Steppe subsistence system and it is also clear that group-size and population density were quite a bit lower. It’s also not clear that this system was fully sustainable in the long run; Pekka Hämäläinen argues in The Comanche Empire (2008) that Comanche bison hunting was potentially already unsustainable in the very long term by the 1830s. It worked well enough in wet years, but an extended drought (which the Plains are subjected to every so often) could cause catastrophic decline in bison numbers, as seems to have happened the 1840s and 1850s. A sequence of such events might have created a receding wave phenomenon among bison numbers – recovering after each dry spell, but a little less each time. Isenberg (op. cit., 83ff) also hints at this, pointing out that once one factors for things like natural predators, illness and so on, estimates of Native American bison hunting look to come dangerously close to tipping over sustainability, although Isenberg does not offer an opinion as to if they did tip over that line. Remember: complete reliance on bison hunting was new, not a centuries tested form of subsistence – if there was an equilibrium to be reached, it had not yet been reached. In any event, the arrival of commercial bison hunting along with increasing markets for bison goods drove the entire system into a tailspin much faster than the Plains population would have alone. Bison numbers begin to collapse in the 1860s, wrecking the entire system about a century and a half after it had started. I find myself wondering if, given a longer time frame to experiment and adapt the new horses to the Great Plains if Native American society on the plains would have increasingly resembled the pastoral societies of the Eurasian Steppe, perhaps even domesticating and herding bison (as is now sometimes done!) or other animals. In any event, the westward expansion of the United States did not leave time for that system to emerge.

And the citation itself is here: A.C. Isenberg, The Destruction of the Bison: An Environmental History, 1750-1920 (2020). Though I believe that Deveraux here underestimate the effect of bison hunting by settlers; then again, I am no expert.

I WISH I HAD THE SAME FOR THE PAMPAS, AND ALSO FOR THE GREAT CHACO, those two places are the other ones where this kind of nomadic culture arose incredibly quickly after the adoption of the horse and the introduction of European cattle. Needless to say the culture that arose in the Pampas is completely unique, and you can get a sense of this by reading contemporary literature like Don Segundo Sombra, it is a whole life at horseback that the Mongols would be probably be proud of.

I hope I can do a better post to do this justice with regards to South America, but here's ACOUP's take on nomadic Native (North) Americans and Steppe peoples. The premise might be to debunk the worldbuilding (or lack of it) of ASOIAF, but don't be fooled, the historical information here about the nomadic way of life is amazing:

[mask131]

This is about Neil Gaiman's work - this is NOT about the rape accusations, but it is about the aftermath of them. I wanted to make a post for some times now about works you could read that were similar to Gaiman's works if you wanted to go see something akin to his fictional world without directly supporting him. Which would have been a VERY easy post since Gaiman kept listing everywhere the works that influenced directly or indirectly his own novels and creations. But I realized other people were already doing this, so I just thought "Heh, let's not bother with this".

And then I randomly stumbled upon this post which is trending on Tumblr. And this post got me a little mad. Because while I do agree that several of the facts in there should be more well-known and more talked about... I also think this post is quite unfair in its depiction of how Gaiman acted towards his inspirations.

People are currently screaming that Neil Gaiman plagiarized stuff by "taking huge inspiration from things and not crediting people". Except... he did credit people. It's just that his fans never bothered to go look for what inspired him. I was there back in the old days - so I saw exactly how it went. Don't start telling me Neil Gaiman purposefully stayed "silent" about the works that inspired him - I clearly saw how people were just apathetic. Myself when I compiled lists and made posts about all the works that preceeded Neil Gaiman or that he explained were his inspirations for things, people didn't bother and had no interest... but when I made a list of Gaiman's work suddenly everybody reblogged. Whether Gaiman plagiarized or not is not the thing I want to talk about today - but I want to HEAVILY criticize the way people are saying "Neil Gaiman never said he took X from X" when in fact, he did, and people were just too lazy to do their research. (Or, if you take the "Gaiman is a villain " angle, Gaiman counted on the fact people would not bother to read the original books and he won his bet!)

I am deeply sorry for this rant but it is a little trigger for me, since I have been studying and exploring the "chain" of inspirations and rewritings throughout literature and the fantasy genre (half for university work, half for personal hobby), and I have seen people literaly ignore all the bibliographies given to them under titles like "If you want to read more of the sort". [For example the original post talks about how Martin was very honest about how he took inspiration from Druon's book series. Fair. But nobody is talking about how he indeed kind of "plagiarized" Memory, Sorrow and Thorn. A lot of people don't know about this series, despite said series having literaly almost all of ASoIaF's supernatural - in fact, the reason Martin seems to be under-using his own supernatural creations, like the White Walkers, is precisely because they don't come from his mind and they are just a copy of Williams' Norns and he seems to not really know what to do with them. But that's a talk for another day.]

EDIT: I realized the post got very long, so all my personal objections and my argumentative points against the post I linked above will be under a cut. And if you want a conclusion to my long rant below the cut, it is this one: You can shit all you want about Gaiman, but at least get your facts right. It is not because someone turns out to be a bad person that you must feel the need to blast cultural misinformation. Heck, I will directly compare it to how the entire Internet wished and wanted Rowling to have "plagiarized" Gaiman's Books of Magic, because of their similarities, only for Gaiman himself to point out, no, it was not plagiarism, it was just a set of similarities and coincidences due to both works coming from a same British culture with a specific background in children literature and fantasy works. It just happened that people didn't know anything outside of Harry Potter and Gaiman's works and so assumed it was the only two pieces of a much vaster puzzle...

Yes, Neil Gaiman is very derivative. Yes he is very imitative. But he never hid it? He always said he was, he always pointed out the works that influenced him, he always listed the stuff that he based his own works upon - down to sometimes helping these works come out of obscurity when they were too forgotten (like the Lud-in-mist novel?). People are doing a "surprised Pikachu face" today but... he never hid his derivatiness. In fact it was a certain part of the "charm" people found in his work back in the days. He never hid anything, it's just that a lot of people didn't want to see it or didn't care about it...

Gaiman posted an entire page on his blog for American Gods (back in the early days of Internet, he had a blog to follow his writing process for American Gods, weeks after week, you can still find it somewhere) listing the three dozen of books that inspired him/that he took elements from/that he learned stuff from. People can accuse him of having plagiarized Zelazny's work in American Gods because of one scene - Wednesday having Shadow drive into the "Backstage", which is a rewrite of the "driving to Amber" scene from The Nine Princes of Amber. But the accusation of "plagiarism" becomes a bit muddled when you know that A) Gaiman has been screaming for years about how the main source of inspiration for American Gods were all of Zelazny's mythological works and B) He literaly dedicated American Gods to Zelazny, first page you open.

When does an homage becomes too much? When is plagiarism allowed? Is taking after public domain a bad thing? What are the moral consequences of your work overshadowing your source of inspiration? These are questions I am not wanting to answer today and this post isn't about them - plus things are even more complex when you remember Gaiman was one of the most fervent defensers and advocates of fanfiction, reacting positively to it and encouraging people to do it a lot ; as well as one of the main celebrities on Tumblr to warn people to NOT send him fanfics so that it wouldn't cause legal troubles of potential plagiarism.

Anyway, my actual angry rant is below.

I/ Tanith Lee and Sandman

The post that got me angry starts with Tanith Lee. I do agree that it is a shame Tanith Lee is not more talked about and didn't receive as much fame as she deserved. I do agree that Neil Gaiman's work was heavily inspired by Tanith Lee's writing. I do agree Gaiman's work overshadowed Lee's own (for a long time I didn't know she was the first one to do a vampiric Snow-White twist, before Gaiman's own). However I have to recuse the idea that Sandman is a rip-off of Tales from Flat-Earth.

It doesn't help that the person who made this original claim clearly doesn't know very much about either Lee's Flat-Earth or Gaiman's Sandman (with easy to debunk claims like how "Delusion" is one of Gaiman's Endless - no, the character does not exist). For example the poster rightfully compares how the top-dogs of the supernatural pantheon of Lee's Flat-Earth are the Masters of Night, Death and Delirium, wth the Master of Night's physical appearance echoing Dream of the Endless' appearance... However the comparison stops there, unlike what the poster tries to claim, because the Master of Night is a demon who rules over hatred, fear, curses and malevolence first and foremost - and is this world's equivalent of Satan/Iblis - and is not a personification of dreams, imaginations and sleep like Morpheus. Also, unlike what the OP claims, the Demon Princes are not like the Endless, "eternal entities beyond gods" - on the contrary, it is shown by book one the Demon Princes CAN be killed, and that there are gods who are a distinct species far above the Demons.

It is also incomplete to try to claim that having Dream and Death be siblings is a "proof" of Tanith Lee plagiarism... Because Gaiman is very explicit in his narrative of how Dream and Death are transpositions of the Thanatos & Hypnos/Thanatos & Morpheus twinship present in Greco-Roman mythology (Ovid's "Gates of Horn and Ivory" are literaly there in the first issues). Plus, since we do have the original manuscripts and the proposition draft Gaiman sent to DC (it is in the bonus of collected editions and in companion books), we know Gaiman originally had just three Endless in mind, Death, Dream (who was a reshape of DC's Sandman super-hero), and Destiny (who pre-existed in DC's universe), Delirium only coming far later.

That being said, I am feeling very sad for Tanith Lee through the testimony of her friend - how, again, she had trouble becoming a recognized author despite her work being very influential and frequently talked about for the fantasy genre (all the fantasy manuals and guides and encyclopedias of France list her among the authors to be read), and I do feel her distate for Neil Gaiman's work vampirizing hers is very justified. But to jump into saying Sandman is a copy-paste or a full on rip-off of Flat-Earth is unfair and very limiting. Flat-Earth was one of the inspirations of Sandman, but it doesn't own "everything" to it.

Plus, the OP also gets very angry at how Gaiman "never" talked about Tanith Lee and ... you know how I got to learn about Tanith Lee, and how I got encouraged to read her? Through Gaiman's Tumblr blog, where he regularly listed her as part of the authors that inspired him/the fantasy authors he enjoyed/the authors he encouraged others to read. I saw her appear like five different times on his Tumblr, and without him I probably wouldn't have started getting curous about her. So he did talk about her and he did present her as one of his inspirations and favorite authors... At least on Tumblr, and for several years.

II/ Coraline and Thief of Always

The comments mention Coraline and the Thief of Always as possibly being another "plagiarism" of Gaiman... I remember when Neil Gaiman was asked on his Tumblr about how similar Thief of Always and Coraline were, and he simply answered with the fact he and Barker had a similar thought process and came up with akin works though very different in the results.

You could say it is a form of copy or plagiarism (though Gaiman at least did an effort to make Coraline the almost opposite of Thief of Always in several ways). But I will have to point out that that Neil Gaiman and Clive Barker know each other, and that it has been reported, talked about and evoked a lot of times how they hanged in the same circles, with the same people, and exchanged thoughts, and talked about their mutual creations. We know Gaiman talked of the early Sandman issues when they were created with Alan Moore and Clive Barker, while Moore talked of his creation of From Hell. We also know that a part of the Sandman's universe was indirectly created by Barker - as Gaiman explained the idea for naming Desire's domain "The Threshold" came from a story Clive Barker had planned but never wrote, exploring the puns "threshold" could offer.

To my knowledge Clive Barker never claimed that Gaiman plagiarized him or stole from him with Coraline? But I might be wrong.

III/Other details

The comment about the "Lovecraft and Doyle" comparison is clearly taken out of context, because it was literaly about a story which WAS a literal Sherlock Holmes meets Cthulhu fanfiction, "A Study in Emerald". The commenter seems to think this comment applied to Gaiman's entire work? No it does not.

I don't know anything about the Lenny Henry situation, I will have to look for this.

[goodqueenaly]

Do you think we'll ever get to see the widow's law impact succession related plots in asoiaf? Potentially with the freys? I've always been disappointed it was not included in the dance, as a way to lend strength to rhaenyra's faction and show her or her allies as skilled politicians to play up her claim via a popular law championed by a popular queen.

I certainly think it’s possible. I’ve talked before about the Widow’s Law, and I agree that it seems like a creative addition that should have come up in the Dance - say, Lord Beesbury mentioning it in defense of Rhaenyra during that late-night meeting of the green council upon Viserys I’s death, or Grand Maester Orwyle explaining to Rhaenyra why the law should support Aegon II’s accession. GRRM certainly doesn’t have to reintroduce it in the future, but I would not at all be surprised if he does; I will certainly be curious how much of F&B is translated to the main novels (beyond, of course, broad character and narrative parallels).

Of course, it me, so I tend to think (as I mentioned in that original post) that the Widow’s Law was inspired by Maurice Druon’s depiction of the Salic law in The Accursed Kings, specifically The Royal Succession. In that novel, Druon has the soon-to-be King Philip V essentially invent a rule that would support him becoming king over his late elder brother’s daughter, Jeanne. Consequently, I would not be surprised if GRRM brought up the Widow’s Law again at the accession of Viserys II - another capable, intelligent younger brother who, upon the death (in which he may have had a hand) of his late elder brother’s son, crafts a quasi-legal or pseudo-legal argument in favor of his accession over that of his dead elder brother’s daughter. In this case, of course, Viserys II and his supporters might have taken the position not of the character of Philip V and his (paid) scholars but of the slightly mocking author himself: just as Maurice Druon remarked that the basis of the Salic law “contained nothing concerning the transmission of the royal powers” and only briefly mentioned “that the inheritance of land must be by equal division among the male heirs”, so I imagine the soon-to-be King Viserys would argue that the Widow’s Law (should anyone have used it to support the rights of eldest daughter Daena) did not speak to the transmission of royal powers, only the inheritance of “lands, seat, or property”.

Perhaps a more straightforward argument over the Widow’s Law will come in “The She-Wolves of Winterfell” (or whatever its final title may be). Cregan Stark obviously married three times, with a child or children from each marriage, and given the succession disputes among his descendants (which are obviously going to be at the heart of this story), I could see someone bringing up the Widow’s Law to support the rights of one or multiple candidates. Would, say, Serena Stark’s descendants say that Beron Stark had had no right to be lord in the first place, because Serena should have inherited the right of her father Rickon (as the child of the first marriage) to Winterfell? Would, say, Cregan’s daughters by Alysanne Blackwood (to the extent they had children) argue that their claims to Winterfell should also come before those of Cregan’s younger sons and their descendants, since those daughters were born of Cregan’s second marriage? I could very much see that happening.

It’s possible that this law comes up with the Freys as well, although I’m not sure how much we may focus on this. I tend to think we’re going to see a vast number of Freys die - at a second Red Wedding or otherwise - so the point may be something of a moot one. Considering Big Walder is well aware of the order of succession within House Frey (and very ambitious in his own right), perhaps he or someone around him will bring it up with respect to his right of succession; alternately, perhaps it will be the role of the postgame ruler of the Riverlands (whether Edmure or someone else) to sort through such legalities regarding whatever Frey descendants may remain (assuming the Twins themselves still stand).

[nitewrighter]

Is it just me or does the poster guy for Elden Ring's DLC have kind of an Elric vibe to his design? Or at least the high fantasy artwork of Elric with exposed arms and thighs.

I mean, Elric is the guy who brought the sickly antihero look into at least something adjacent to the mainstream of fiction (if you can call 1960's/1970's Pulp science fiction and fantasy adjacent to mainstream fiction, which I'd argue was more of a subculture that eventually became mainstream). Miura, the creator of Berserk, which was a major visual inspiration for all the Soulsborne games, has cited Elric of Melnibone as a major inspiration for Berserk--so it stands to reason that that would carry over from Elric, to Berserk, to Soulsborne games including Elden Ring. Also absolutely worth noting: Elden Ring also got a lot of its worldbuilding from George R. R. Martin of ASOIAF/Game of Thrones fame, and one of his biggest inspirations has always been, you guessed it, Elric of Melnibone.

Wait hold up I have to update something.

There we go.

[jon-sedai]

I could say that ASOIAF is a very medieval lit story at heart and you’d be like, “well no shit Sherlock, tell me something I don’t know 🙄”.

And I’d say: “Ok bet. ASOIAF’s medieval core is best exemplified through Jon Snow and Bran Stark, two distinct yet mirrored iterations of one hero-knight whose origins can be traced to Percival and his magical quest. Both are Percival (and both are potentially the grail king) but one is as close a 1:1 copy as we can get (Jon) and the other is the Percival archetype completely flipped over its head before it even begins (Bran). Jon, by the author’s own admission, is the fantasy hero in the most traditional sense. He’s Percival who was inspired by the knights and left his mother’s castle to chase after chivalric glory (Jon III AGoT), only to find out that he has a massive misunderstanding of the knight’s purpose and honor (ACOK/ASOS arcs). No one told him of the ethical dilemmas involved with being a knight. No one told him that he could meet the fair maiden and either be completely incapable of helping her (Gilly) or help her, leave her, and be burdened by her death (Ygritte). No one told him how hard it would be to have his entire world view upended and upon going back to his fellow knights and saying ‘hey friends maybe we should all re-evaluate the system in which we operate and how it might be causing us to betray the vows we swore’ he’d be met with disdain. No one told him that, like Percival, he might look back to his mother’s home and see what has become of it (and his sister whom he left) and upon making the decision to go back to it he dies before he can even get his foot out of the gate. Percival made it back home and Jon might too, but where Percival still had his mother’s shirt to remind him of his boyhood Jon had to kill the boy because the fate of the world depended on it. Jon stumbles and rises, only to stumble again. But nonetheless, he gets to be a knight. But on the other hand, there’s poor Bran! He doesn’t even get to fail at being a knight in the first place because that storyline was fucking taken from him before he could realize his dream of leaving his mother’s home. Jon at least got his call to action. Bran’s dazzling dream of knighthood doesn’t even get off the ground (quite literally). He climbs, falls immediately, and once his eyes are awakened he realizes that he is now incapable of being Percival as he’d wish to be. There’s no battling evil knights. There’s no saving fair maidens. But then he’s visited by a wizened old man who’s like ‘hey Percival, you can never be a knight but I’ll teach you how to be a mighty wizard!’ And that would be cool and all….BUT BRAN WANTS TO BE A KNIGHT GODDAMNIT! When he auditioned for the medieval lit play, he picked up the Percival/Arthur script. Yet that’s not what he ultimately got when the cast list finally got out. Because who the fuck switched it out his hero-knight script for the Merlin one??! So now he has to try and figure out how to be a knight who’s actually a wizard, and it fucking sucks y’all.”

[wpmorse]

One of my side projects is a ASOIAF/Discworld crossover. The main premise is, due to the events of A Thief of Time and Night's Watch, Ankh-Morpork and the surrounding  is transported to Westeros roughly replacing Saltpans, approximately when Robert and the court are heading north to Winterfell. Due to their location, Ankh Morpork is forced to become part of the war of Five Kings out of self defense. Due to Ankh Morpork having a different flavor of narativium, a 300+ year technological edge and... wizards, I expected things to be interesting.

For the most part this hasn't gone anywhere beyond me throwing ideas at the wall when I'm inspired. One of the bits I enjoyed the most was a scene with Arya and Rincewind after Rincewind accidentally saves her from the Brotherhood Without Banners and the Hound. It appeals to me for two reasons. The first is because so many fans go on about all of Arya's cool teachers, it appealed to me that she get one with a notably different philosophy than the others. The second is, as any Discworld fan can tell you, sticking Rincewind with someone gung-ho and heroic is comedy gold.

I'm afraid I rushed this scene too much, but it could be worse. Recently I've started to base my vision of Rincewind on Neil from the Young Ones mainly because Nigel Planer uses the voice for him in the audiobooks.

Anyway, here's the scene.

* * *

They had been walking through the forest for the entire day. They’d kept away from trails and didn’t see anyone. Still, Arya wasn’t sure if they were getting anywhere at all. All of the moss on the trees faced north, but she was sure she had seen several of the trees they had passed before, and then before that.

“Are we there yet?“ She asked again.

Her companion stopped and gave a loud exasperated sigh. He turned slowly and stared down at her. Arya stared back until he looked away. "Calm as still water," she thought to herself, smugly.

He was a tall skinny man with a thin, scraggly, beard. When she first met him, two days ago, she thought she had run into another red priest, like Thoros, in his faded red robe. But Thoros didn’t wear a strange pointed, wide-brimmed hat which looked even more threadbare than his robes, with the word “ WIZZARD” sewn in large faded letters. It made him look more like a mummer. Or at least a mummer who had been lost in the woods for many years.

He frowned. "How the gods should I know?" He asked.

Arya could not believe what she heard. “We're lost, aren’t we?” she said.

“ We are not!” He shouted.

“Then where are we going?” Arya demanded.

The man shrugged and started walking. “I don’t know about this ‘we’ business, but I’m going away from here,” he said pointing at the ground.

“That’s stupid!“ she shouted.

“No, it’s not. It’s away from danger!” He shouted back.

“And what if we just end up in more danger?” Arya asked.

The man turned again looking down at her with an infuriatingly knowing smile.”When we find it, we can run away from it too" he explained.

Aria wanted to punch him but she stopped herself as an idea struck her. “If we’re not going anywhere, can we go to Riverrun?” She asked.

"What’s in Riverrun?“ He asked.

“My…“ Arya paused. She wasn’t sure if she should tell him about her mother and Robb. She hadn’t told him her name yet and had gone back to calling herself Weasel, for fear of giving herself away once again. She didn’t think he would try to hold her for ransom, as the Brotherhood had planned, but she didn’t want to take any chances.

“The Warden of the Riverlands and the king in the North,“ she said

The man gave her a crooked look. "So… There’s an army there?“ He asked

"Oh yes, lots,“ she said, excited.

The man shrugged. "Well then,“ he said, "Let's keep away from there. You don't want to mess with armies. Too much of a chance they'll try to kill you.“

Arya couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You're craven!" She shouted.

"I am not! Craving only leads to more trouble! I don’t crave anything'.  He paused, remembering something. “Well, except for boredom, that is, and," he sighed wistfully, “ potatoes."

“What’s a potato?“ Arya asked.

The man gave her a pained look. He turned and looked up at the sky and said something under his breath. Arya couldn’t quite make it out, but it sounded like whimpering. “ Look, no one's asking you to follow me, “ he said, changing the subject. “ If you don’ t like where we’ re going, you can leave anytime you want."

Arya said nothing. She didn’t know why she was following the man, ever since she had run straight into him escaping from the Brotherhood, but he had got her past the Brotherhood's outer guard and, she shuddered, the Hound, and so far they avoided any other people out to get her. She was safe around him, even if she found his whining annoying.

She hadn’t asked him his name yet. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to get close to anyone, after losing Gendry, Hot Pie, Syro and... her father. Still, she should try to learn as much as she could about him. “Is a wizzard anything like a hedge wizard?” She asked.

He looked at her surprised. “You’re the first person who’s known how to read since I’ve arrived in this gods forsaken mud hole,” he said.

Arya gulped realizing she’d given away an advantage. "Well, is it?“ She asked. The wizard drew himself to his full lanky height. “Oh no, we wizards are something much better. We look into the higher magics.”

“Can you show me some?“ Arya asked.

The wizard coughed. “Not right now.“ He said. “My powers can’t be wasted on simple parlor tricks, especially when we might need them for something serious later. "

Arya said nothing. Let him keep his stupid secrets she didn’t need him.

[polysucks]

hey! what are some of your favourite asoiaf fanfics that you've read (if you feel ok sharing)?

Say less. I came prepared. All of these links are on Ao3 and almost all are rated Explicit because I think spicy things are fun. It’s not all sexy tho. Sometimes it’s rated E for Emotions. Or E for. Like. Life things.

Well. As you all know by now, I am Sansan trash. So most of these are sansan unless otherwise declared. Oh and everyone is of consenting adult age.

A Gift by 3rdstarksistr is my fucking goat. This fic? This fic. Right here. After 15 years of browsing ao3 anonymously, this is the fic that forced me to make an ao3 account. AFTER FIFTEEN YEARS. And it’s being actively updated. This makes me lose my mind, bro. LOSE MY MIND.

Essentially AU where Sandor doesn’t leave at BoTBB and Sandor bargains with Sansa for her body to take her across the narrow sea to safety. I can’t do the story justice. It sounds bad when I describe it. But Sansa is so so soooooo sweet and eager and Sandor is like. It’s hard to describe bc he could totally be triggering to some, but it’s very evident that he cares so deeply for her health, her safety, her happiness, but on the surface? Fuckin asshole. A real Sweet and Smol girl with HUGE SCARY DOG PRIVILEGES dynamic. With some excellent plot, too, that feels very-in-world.

There’s some big loss of virginity, dubcon, and some kiiiinky ass shit here (respectfully) but genuinely love love love this depiction of Sandor. He’s so loving, but also so rough, and he cares so much. I’m trash I know I’m sorry I’m sorry.

The author truly takes my breath away. The writing is so immersive, so catered for the reader, so vivid. It reads so naturally, like the author is painting a picture for you. Also madly in love with Pate, Sandor’s squire. What a cutie patootie. I’ll buy 4, thanks.

For Rent by Gendervny of course I got rep the fucking homie! My beloved @theeironprice wrote this fuckin thramsay masterpiece (it’s ongoing). I wouldn’t recommend it if I didn’t genuinely love it. Now, a fair warning, it is not for everyone. Definitely pay attention to the tags, because this author does not fuck around. The dove’s not dead but. It ain’t sleeping. Ifykyk. (It’s a compliment I promise)

This fuckin gem is so near and dear to my heart. It is a 2004 au with some amazing pop culture references sprinkled in as a little treat for the reader. It’s like the author leaves M&Ms on each page for u to go “OOH CANDY” And it gives u a little shot of dopamine every time I promise you. It’s actually what inspired this doodle of Sansa and Arya I did that you dorks seem to love so much and it makes me microwave all of these characters on fucking repeat in the year 2004. As a 2000s kid, like, this hits so hard. So close to home in the best way possible. And once you read about Theon listening to the Smiths, it just becomes canon to you. Of fucking course Theon listens to The Smiths. What a fucking loser.

A harmless addiction by rummy_cat is just stupid fun. Point blank. Yeah, it’s a sansan modern au. Look, I’m not a modern au person. I truly am not. So if I’m recommending it, it’s worth a read. Sansa is a 20-something who purchased a piece of shit house and is way over her head with her HGTV dreams. Sandor is a poor-bedside-manner, 3-stars-out-of-five on Angie’s list handy man—who also does in-story-equivalent of Onlyfans on the side. Now imma be real with you. I’m a sucker for a romcom cliche. If there’s a meet-cute, or a situation where they’re forced to share one bed, or anything else you can picture happening in a stupid straight to dvd Katherine heigl movie? Say less im already there.

So this is one of those fics that you genuinely don’t even need to know wtf is happening in the asoiaf world like at all. It would be a lovely standalone romcom book. It helps if you know who the main players are like Sansa, Sandor, Podrick, Bronn and Arya, but everyone is kind of a loose caricature. Usually I can’t stand this shit. But they’re so endearing, and written with so much heart and humanity and it genuinely feels like a HBO style romcom sitcom thing with a lot of situational humor. Also like??? Sandor is so endearing. Handyman Sandor and sweet little shut in with a secret potty mouth and a (very mild) porn addiction Sansa is to die for. And the first sex scene? Hysterical. But also hot. And bronn IS SO CUTE AS COMEDIC RELIEF. also gotta rep my man Tony the Italian who literally only shows up for like 3 paragraphs as situational humor narrative fodder and I would genuinely lay my life on the line to protect that man. I actually haven’t finished this one so I have no idea how it ends but genuinely you will be hanging on every chapter. The author is so engaging.

Quenched by Rambo holy fuck dude. Holy fuck dude. This? This shit right here? Holy fuck dude. Cw for dubcon bc well they’re both drunk and there’s some very tasteful feet stuff (if you know me, I am NOT a feet-stuff person. Periodt.) a lovely quick little horny read where Sandor pushes Sansa’s boundaries (consensually) and they are just so sexually compatible with one another. It’s very sweet. Some really lovely horny visuals surrounding period-accurate attire (I am a SUCKER for period accurate attire)

What I love the most about it is that it’s not framed like “character A does things to character B” nah. While Sandor may be doing the bulk of the “work” 👀 the reader gets to see an equal amount of Sandor’s enjoyment as Sansa’s. I love a dynamic where partners get off to their partner enjoying themselves bc it just feels so realistic. Like have you ever been with someone you care for deeply? That their enjoyment fuels your enjoyment, sexual or platonic. That shit is REAL. this author is a PAINTER.

Nine nights by Sarah C this. Was. Soooooo. Much. FUN. It’s a “oops we’re snowed in at an inn and we have to share a room with one bed what r we gonna dooooooo????” trope that is a huge romp and a half. I loved how realistic this was. I love how the author included real life details that are period accurate. Gross little details that aren’t “gross,” but every day real life things! For example, there is a scene where Sandor falls asleep before Sansa and she’s staring at him and just kinda disappointed bc she’s romanticized everything around her and Sandor is just so real. She’s staring at him and unable to sleep and he is snoring and he rolls over and farts in his sleep and she SCOWLS AND SCOFFS and I locked my phone and kicked my feet because it was just so cute and well written and REAL!!!! SO REAL!!!!! And Sansa gets to girl talk with a side character who is also a teenage girl and she deserves that. She sooooo deserves that. We miss Jeyne in this house. also there’s a spicy public fingering scene that is just— I’m blushing like a slut rn 10/10 amazing.

A Tough hide and a tender heart is a lovely little samsa quick read that is rated G and only 800+ words. It was the fic that was attributed to my samsa doodle. I don’t really ship it, but it was so so sooooo cute to think about. This fic is essentially Samwell Tarly being just so fucking sweet as usual. Just a complete gentleman. To Sansa at the Wall. Nothing even truly happens. It’s just Sam being a perfect fucking gentleman and admiring on Sansa. Honestly will give even most hardened assholes sweet little butterflies in their belly. Like I say, not even my ship, but it’s just genuinely so cute.

And I CANNNNNNNN NOT for the fuckin life of me find this fic that tells the “real story” of how the Vale was won. It’s a total “Yeah, Visenya fucked MILF GOAT Sharra Arryn and that’s how Visenya got the Vale to surrender” fic that was. P E A K. but for whatever reason, it’s wiped from my browser history.

I hope you find some of these fun :,) I know I did. Sorry it’s so much sansan I read other things too I promise!

[humanpurposes]

There isn't any point to this, I'm just ranting.

Lately, posting fanfiction feels like screaming into the void.

This isn't to say I'm not grateful for those who do interact with my posts. Since I've started posting fanfiction I've gone through phases of having a lot of motivation, having little motivation. Phases of comparing how many notes I get compared to someone else, then reminding myself why I started writing fics in the first place, because I can do exactly what I want with something I write. And I so appreciate all the comments, likes, kudos and reblogs I get on my fics.

There can be a whole load of different reasons why engagement in fandom lately has been not great. Season 2 being a mess, toxicity and petty drama within the fandom, dwindling attention spans, general disinterest in HotD and ASOIAF. I get it. I haven't felt particularity inspired by the latest season, I'm not very 'Tumblr sociable' and tend to stick to a few mutuals, I also haven't been interested in reading as much fanfiction for a few months.

And if someone doesn't want to interact with me or my content, for whatever reason, that's their business and it's completely valid. I don't write to hit a certain number of notes or followers. I write because I enjoy it. I started posting because I thought there might be a few people out there on the internet who might like what I was doing. In a way I have found that, and I know I wouldn't have stuck with writing this long if I hadn't started posting. But I won't lie and say it isn't disheartening when you get nothing or very little back after putting a lot of time and thought into a chapter.

And on top of that, some comments are just... the worst. What goes through someone's head that they feel the need to read a fic they don't like, comment all the reasons why they didn't like it, AND insult a writer who has posted this FOR FREE. We're all doing this as a hobby. The fact that fanfiction is public is not an open invitation to criticise, all you're doing is discouraging people from sharing their works or writing altogether, which damages our community. Fanfiction is not content simply there for you to consume. It's a pure form of creativity (in my opinion), because it doesn't come from necessity or obligation. If you don't like what you're reading, stop reading it. Find something else, or go write a hateful review of an actual book on Goodreads because at least that author got paid.

Or even just people being so stubborn about their dislike of certain characters. I can't tell you how sick I am of people taking the existence of Alys Rivers so personally in fics. Or wishing death upon characters that are clearly central to the plot or main relationship in a fic (why are you reading an Aemond fic if you hate Aemond)??? This fandom can only operate in extremes, apparently. There's no room for nuance or emotional complexity and it's frustrating when someone projects that on a fic.

I don't really have a point to this. Read what you want. Read the tags first. Reblog posts to keep them alive. Ask writers about their fics and OCs. Be nice to people.

[melrosing]

a while back you mentioned bran being a fisher king type of figure if he becomes king. i am so intrigued by that concept. can you tell us more?

so full disclosure, I don't have a great deal of familiarity with Arthurian legend or British/Welsh mythology, which is what the Fisher King really draws upon, so I don't think I can say anything of real substance on this subject! i keep meaning to just sit down and swot up on this stuff but it's. not really something you can do in one sitting lol

HOWEVER i think even to a wiki peruser it's patently clear that GRRM is drawing on the Fisher King concept with Bran (as in, once you know he's doing that, you realise he isn't even trying to hide it). and I do tend to think that GRRM is more likely to stick with the top line of a myth or historical event he means to parallel rather than get lost in the minutiae - e.g. Matilda v Stephen succession crisis inspiring Rhaenyra v Aegon, the Black Dinner of 1440 inspiring the Red Wedding, this is GRRM taking the substance of an event but not the details of how it came to pass.

I'm going to guess that rather than getting into the finer details of the Fisher King mythos, GRRM is going to utilise it much like he's used Shakespeare's Richard III for Tyrion, which is another inspiration that seems painfully obvious from the moment you spot it, but is hardly lifted beat for beat, and I seriously doubt that Tyrion's story ends up anywhere like the end of RIII. but you can see GRRM taking the bits and pieces of RIII he finds interesting and twisting them for Tyrion in ASOIAF.

so with that in mind, I'm just going to quickly list the key points I can personally gather from the Fisher King myth that seem to gesture to Bran, and why I think these are probs interesting to GRRM as a writer (but as I say there are people who know lots about arthurian legend and british/welsh mythology who would probs have a lot more to say here):

the Fisher King is usually depicted as being wounded in the groin/legs/thigh - this is considered synonymous with his inability to have children and so propagate his line. immediately obvious parallel to Bran, and I think through both ASOIAF and F&B, GRRM is trying to show that ruling through dynasties where everything hinges on how the next guy's son turns out, is not a viable way to run a country. Bran will not be succeeded by children of his own blood, but I think much in the way that he himself has succeeded Bloodraven

the Fisher King is one with his land as such: his welfare is the welfare of the land, and when he takes a wound (and becomes infertile), the land too becomes barren. the Fisher King awaits a hero who will heal and restore him and so the land (but I can only imagine GRRM would subvert this - it's clear through GRRM's writing of disability that he doesn't see value in just 'curing' his characters. he wants to actually write them as disabled people). and I think there's a lot in Bran's story about man learning to respect the land he lives upon - the children and the first men's peace pact was agreed upon the grounds that the first men would essentially preserve Westeros and its weirwoods etc, and so I think it's generally agreed ASOIAF could end with a similar kind of pact to end the Long Night (or after the end of TLN)? so again, think this point is about Bran representing a renewed relationship between the lands of Westeros and its peoples - the welfare of all is tied together through him

the Fisher King is guarding the Holy Grail. im way out of my depth on this point, someone with more knowledge re. the Holy Grail needs to weigh in here lol, but I would guessssss that maybe this has something to do with Bran ending the story on the Isle of Faces, protecting the peace from there or SOMETHING idk

then the most obvious point: the Fisher King as he appears in Arthurian legend is thought to draw on the figure of Brân the Blessed, a character of Welsh mythology - which immediately recalls Bran the Broken (something Bran literally calls himself several times). the name 'Bran' also translates to crow or raven in Welsh, so, duh. and Brân the Blessed's story ends with his requesting that his head be buried on the White Hill of London - and as long as it remained there, Britain would be safe from invasion. more about Bran being tied directly to the welfare of the land and its peoples

(again there's doubtless a lot more that could be added here by someone who understands the Fisher King myth better than I do, but these seemed like the most obvious points that anyone could draw on)

anyway I absolutely take it as a given that Bran will be King at this point, and whilst it's really hard to imagine what that looks like, I do think it resonates. GRRM likes writing about dynasties but I don't think he believes in them. I'm sure he feels much the same way about feudalism, but I doubt that will be gone by the end of ASOIAF, too, so this is how I picture it??

KL: destroyed. red keep: fucked. some level of politics may continue here post-series, but I think it will no longer be the heart of westeros. the fact that it is in AGOT is I think GRRM trying to show the corruption at the heart of this country - KL is constantly described as a cesspit where the rich play their games and live and eat luxuriously directly atop the shoulders of the poor and downtrodden, divorced from what's happening in the rest of the 7K.

the new heart of Westeros will be the Isle of Faces. this is where I think Bran will end up. we don't know much about it, bc noone is able to sail there, but this was where the pact between the COF and the First Men was created, and it's one of the last places in the south where weirwoods still grow (here, in abundance). and apparently there was once a Green King of the Gods Eye?? if the Green King, of the Rivermen, is in any way the role Bran will soon be occupying, maybe this is where his Tully heritage is somehow relevant. and also like 'god's eye', Bran's whole thing is about learning to see all, so. likely place for him to be. ultimately, I don't think Bran will remain in Winterfell; the story is supposed to be about unity I think, and not northern exceptionalism, so a remaining Stark sibling will take up that seat and as I said before, I tend to think that will be Sansa.

and I guess the most I can imagine beyond this point is Bran living alongside the COF (perhaps in the company of Meera idk?), functioning less as a political entity and more as a figurehead, perhaps an oracle, who lives for the welfare of his people. there will still be politicians to run the country, but they will be guided by Bran in some way, and like Bloodraven, Bran will choose his own successor. what the intricacies of any of this look like i have no idea, but this really does sound to me like the start of GRRM's answer to all his concerns re. dynasties and corruption etc etc

sorry this was all garbled as hell but this is basically what the Fisher King endgame means to me for now. in short, not a whole lot that I can make sense of but I like the feel of it, I think it's consistent with the themes of the text and suggests the start of real change at the end of the story, rather than the start of yet another dynasty.

[alinaastarkov]

I kind of fell down the jonrya rabbit hole and would like to hear more opinions. I'm not convinced that George gave up on JonArya. No one has proof of this or can pinpoint exactly where he was abandoned. No character has replaced Arya's importance to Jon and vice versa, and I don't think that will ever happen. Their relationship is the strongest in asoaif and is treated as a driving force and something separate from the rest, and I ask myself why. What is the reason for so much emphasis? ADWD is the book with the most clues, since Jon spends a lot of time agonizing over her. He dies for her in the end, and she is his last thought. Not to mention that famous line about the heart, which is very romantic coded. The foreshadowing didn't vanish with the first books, and I truly wonder w h y. Does anyone have any interesting theories about them or speculation?

When I re-read an AMA from George, I was quite surprised by this response.

Has there been a character that you have given a reprieve to, or maybe deviated from the path you originally were going to send them on? If so, whom?

No, not really.

In some cases the chronologies have diverged from what I originally intended, but the overall character arcs remain the same.

This was years after the 1993 outline. And in 2016, he stated that he would continue with the endings he had in mind since 1991.

Also, this is from SSM:

Question: How different is the plot from what he originally envisioned?

GRRM: Not different - just more of it. It has grown in complexity but he likes it that way because it feels real to him. - SSM 2010

Some more quotes.

"But the size is different, and I've introduced some other elements to the books, but it's still the same characters, the '91 characters."

"Some major characters — yes, I always had plans, what Tyrion's arc was gonna be through this, what Arya's arc was gonna be through this, what Jon Snow's arc is gonna be. "

"Who is the most major character you've changed you mind about your plans for?

I don't want to reveal what I've planned for some of these characters, but I'm pretty well on track with most of the major characters. It's minor characters like Bronn that assume greater importance."

After a re-reading, I started to wonder… Why did they give up on being together if they did everything to be by each other's side? They are their true selves with each other, so why shouldn't they be together? Or share their lives together? I've seen some people claim that their relationship will never be the same. And yes, that's true. But isn't that applicable to any relationship in asoiaf? They are deliberately written as something too deep and an intense transcendental bond that no one else has; if they have no chance of thriving, no one does. And as much as George is accused of doing things for shock value, he cares about consistency. He definitely doesn't treat this relationship as trivial to be shattered. Jon is Arya's first priority. He is her home. They love each other unconditionally, and there’s no one Jon loves as much as he does Arya, no doubt on that. My impression is that George may have created an infrastructure for them to end up together somehow. Not necessarily in the way he initially envisioned it, but as soulmates who find refuge in each other and are saved by their unique bond that inspires them to live. Resurrected Jon will probably take the FitzChivalry Farseer route. I doubt he'll come back super damaged because he needs to be reasonably okay for some plot lines. And George always intended for all 5 main characters to survive so.

I would be more inclined to think that everything was scrapped if Jon's arc in ADWD was vastly different. George not only deepened their connection and recycled an old plot line, but also introduced powerful new themes. They are each other's hearts and homes. This approach is very rare in this universe. And no other relationship is treated with this same importance. Why should we pay so much attention to them? What is George's point in this? Like, a lot of time passed between 1993 and 2011. He had more than enough time to rewrite Jon's arc and remove Arya's influence. But he continues to keep these characters intensely and emotionally connected throughout all the books. If he accidentally wrote them as soulmates, wouldn't it be easier to remove it after the first book? I have some vague ideas of what he's going to do with them. But I genuinely don't think it's out of the question as so many fans confidently claim

sorry for taking so long to answer this anon! it was mostly because i agree with everything you said and couldn't think of what to add. i agree there seems to be consensus that george initially planned for them but changed his mind, probably after the first/second book. however, as you say, it then makes no sense that jon's adwd arc is the way it is. for me, it's the most explicitly romantic we get, with many of jon's thoughts (i want my bride back, imagining arya in ramsay's bed, winter's lady etc.) being things a brother cannot innocently think about his sister (despite what some people say and i worry about their relationship with their sibling tbh). if it was scrapped, i wonder how they explain adwd? (they mostly don't, explain it away as platonic, or pretend these thoughts are just about his 'family'). there's also the fact that george's affc outline (before affc and adwd were split) had jon going to and probably dying in hardhome, removing his rescue of arya and betrayal because of that entirely. george explicitly altered his adwd plot to include more arya. i frankly would be amazed at the ga's lack of awareness of the books they claim to love if j*nsas didn't exist