SPOILER thread for A Game of Thrones Read

[brentodd]

... Interesting omen considering I wouldn't say it's House Baratheon
that ends up being responsible for the fall of House Stark. Unless you count
Cersei as a Baratheon I guess, but that's a bit of a stretch I think ...

I was trying to figure out what starts the whole downfall off... in a way, I blame Ser Duncan the Tall... standing up for a puppeteer, getting Baelor killed, paving the way for Mad King Aerys, and Robert's rebellion.

But really... I've gotta lay the real blame on that idiot Sansa. Sure, they wouldn't be in King's Landing at all if it weren't for Robert insisting Ned be the Hand, but Sansa carries much of the blame in my book.

[lakesidey]

I was trying to figure out what starts the whole downfall off... in a way, I blame Ser Duncan the Tall... standing up for a puppeteer, getting Baelor killed, paving the way for Mad King Aerys, and Robert's rebellion.

I am not sure, really....Baelor would have been long dead by this point (almost certainly without adding to his tally of sons)....and his kids the rest of the family died of various causes (which they could have done, anyway) and so sooner or later Aegon (and thus Aerys the Mad) would have got the throne, ceteris paribus. Though of course, with the Chaos Butterfly in action, we don't know what might have changed over a hundred years if Dunk had done differently.

If you must blame someone, blame Rhaegar - if he hadn't stolen Lyanna, much of this would not have happened.


~lakesidey

[HArai]

Hello HArai,

And, you're right, I do think the inability to discuss the "foreshadowing of major events" ,and how "so and so contributes to some action in the future" ,or how a couple of "people are related or share history", makes for a dull thread. I just feel like Malazan as a REread could have so much more depth! I feel like the reread will need a reread to get into the meat of it all. SE discusses so much philosophy....maybe we should get into that?

Unfortunately, I'm moving for the next 2-4 weeks and it is chaos in my life, and reading is not really happening, so I'm not much of a contributor at this time. I can't even remember where I put my coffee down in this mess. ;-)

I think the Malazan re-read will pick up once we get more into MoI. It's hard to have a good discussion of SE's "echo" patterns when he's mostly been introducing characters and themes for the first time. In my opinion anyway.

[HArai]

I was trying to figure out what starts the whole downfall off... in a way, I blame Ser Duncan the Tall... standing up for a puppeteer, getting Baelor killed, paving the way for Mad King Aerys, and Robert's rebellion.

But really... I've gotta lay the real blame on that idiot Sansa. Sure, they wouldn't be in King's Landing at all if it weren't for Robert insisting Ned be the Hand, but Sansa carries much of the blame in my book.

Someone in the post comments was expressing dismay at Ned taking his young sons to the execution. Maybe if he'd taken Sansa things would have turned out differently.

[RobMRobM]

Harai said "Guess this "read" is coming at a good time: I'd forgotten the direwolf was killed by an antler wound. Interesting omen considering I wouldn't say it's House Baratheon
that ends up being responsible for the fall of House Stark. Unless you count
Cersei as a Baratheon I guess, but that's a bit of a stretch I think.

My response (and damn that I couldn't get the usual quote boxes to work) is that the guy responsible for the execution is Joffrey Baratheon and he did the deed until an Antler sigil. That counts in my book.

[RobMRobM]

LOL for blaming Ser Duncan the Tall. Well played. Rob

[RobMRobM]

Harai and others - the role of commenters is to highlight insights of significance in the present text without relying on info in future chapters. Tough challenge but I believe we're up to it. Rob

[HArai]

My response (and damn that I couldn't get the usual quote boxes to work) is that the guy responsible for the execution is Joffrey Baratheon and he did the deed until an Antler sigil. That counts in my book.

Well, maybe I'll change my mind as we go back through it, but I never really formed much respect for Joffrey as an entity independent of his Lannister family. He just does what he's told.

[JonathanLevy]

Well, maybe I'll change my mind as we go back through it, but I never really formed much respect for Joffrey as an entity independent of his Lannister family. He just does what he's told.

Well, specifically in the execution of Lord Stark, he did precisely the opposite of what he was told, no?

[JonathanLevy]

Someone in the post comments was expressing dismay at Ned taking his young sons to the execution. Maybe if he'd taken Sansa things would have turned out differently.

She lost her wolf.

Sansa's spinelessness is foreshadowed by the execution of her direwolf, Lady. Perhaps it was even caused by the loss of her wolf? In that case, blame Joffrey and Cersei...