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reginarubie · 3 years

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Thanks for replying on Mirri. I think resurrection topic is interesting in asoiaf. As you have mentioned that Jon is defender of Starks, he also crave to be one of them. He tried to help them while in NW, but couldn't do it because of his vows. He only try to go on war with Ramsey because of pink letter. His not able to help his sister and threat on NW by Ramsey made him to broke his vows. He also connect his desire to be lord of WF with hunger. Do you think he will become lord of WF?

Hello again!

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to give more attention to a character who is actually so important while having had only a short appearance in the books and show, after all Mirri' actions have consequences for everyone Daenerys interacts with.

Jon is much more of a yet complex character to dissect especially because of all the circumstances around his birth and life and death. I am glad you think the resurrection topic is interesting, now to answer your question, yeah Jon is the stauncher Stark defender but also craves — in a way that shames him — to be recognised as a Stark and these two themes prominently intertwine in his journey in my opinion.

I think both are part of his identity, but in different ways. One is what Jon is and most probably will be forever, the other is what Jon wishes to be, what he craves to be since he has been old enough to understand the differences placed between him and his true born siblings. I do think the matter of choice is prominent in Jon's journey because he is, as all Stark children, the one who pays most dearly for it; whatever he does, he pays for. Always; not only because it happens — because it doesn't happen only to him, but to other characters as well — but because of the way he lives those mistakes and their consequences.

I think that it's important, to understand Jon's journey and maybe his ending that we look at Jon first appearance.

Both in show and book Jon is shown at first while instructing Bran, or better yet, guiding him while he takes his lessons. In the show he is shown with Robb as he encourages Bran when he is learning archery.

In the book instead, it gets trickier since immediately we are thrown in the scene of the execution of the NW's deserter. I think it holds a certain importance that the first to speak is Lord Eddard — Bran's father — basically executing the role of the Father of the Faith of the Seven (bring justice) and the second one is Jon Snow.

Lord Eddard Stark dismounted and his ward Theon Greyjoy brought forth the sword. “Ice,” that sword was called. It was as wide across as a man’s hand, and taller even than Robb. The blade was Valyrian steel, spell-forged and dark as smoke.

— Bran I, AGOT

We know that Theon, Robb and Jon were the oldest in Bran's eyes. Theon was true born, an hostage, a ward, and strangely he is introduced before the true born heir to Winterfell Robb. Theon manages to hold the ancestral Stark sword, Ice, to bring it to Lord Eddard (so he is shown holding the blade and passing it to its owner — maybe a foreshadowing for Theon having a role in a sort of the passing of the baton of the Stark's legacy from one to the other?, possible) while Robb, lord Eddard's heir and the future King in the North is introduced immediately after, and the subject of the sentence is not Robb himself but Ice, which represents the Stark's legacy, which is even taller than Robb (another hint for how the mantle the eldest true born Stark will don on a mantle too big for him — exactly like the crown on the King in the North being loose on his head and he having to keep adjusting it in his curls).

Bran’s bastard brother Jon Snow moved closer. “Keep the pony well in hand,” he whispered. “And don’t look away. Father will know if you do.”

This is the first introduction we have of Jon. And he is the first to actually speak (without having to recite ceremonial formulae, but actually saying something that tells us about him). This introduction tells us all we need to know about Jon:

he is bastard born

he has the attitude of the older brother, and guides Bran

«don't look away. Father will know if you do» — Jon is capable of feeling empathy, because he knows that what is about to happen could make Bran feel squeamish and he wants to ease him and help him through it, but he also knows that if one looks away they aren't ready to face the consequences of the actions that are happening and they take. This tell us very much of Jon, especially with coupled with the next bit:

Theon was a lean, dark youth of nineteen who found everything amusing. He laughed, put his boot on the head, and kicked it away.

“Ass,” Jon muttered, low enough so Greyjoy did not hear. He put a hand on Bran’s shoulder, and Bran looked over at his bastard brother. “You did well,” Jon told him solemnly. Jon was fourteen, an old hand at justice.

— Bran I, AGOT

This tells us that Jon knows he has to keep most of his opinions to himself (like he had to keep to himself when Joffrey and Robb were sparring because of his lesser birth), he is aware of the social status he occupies and acts based on that; he knows what Theon did was wrong, but also knows when and how he can express his opinion and in which ways. Also, he takes the time to praise his little brother because he has not looked away and has learned the lesson he had come to learn, which suggests that he is mature beyond his age.

“No,” Jon Snow said quietly. “It was not courage. This one was dead of fear. You could see it in his eyes, Stark.” Jon’s eyes were a grey so dark they seemed almost black, but there was little they did not see. He was of an age with Robb, but they did not look alike. Jon was slender where Robb was muscular, dark where Robb was fair, graceful and quick where his half brother was strong and fast.

This is another important bit. Jon Snow is observant, there is little he does not notice and is the exact opposite to Robb, as Bran points out.

“Done,” Jon said, kicking his horse forward. Robb cursed and followed, and they galloped off down the trail, Robb laughing and hooting, Jon silent and intent.

Clearly this first chapter seems intent on pointing out all the differences between Robb and Jon in their demeanour. Robb challenges Jon, but Jon moves forward before, tricking him, and while Robb laughs, Jon is silent and focused.

The one who finds the dead direwolf is Robb, yet it's Jon who first recognises her for what she is.

“A wolf,” Robb told him.

“A freak,” Greyjoy said. “Look at the size of it.”

Bran’s heart was thumping in his chest as he pushed through a waist-high drift to his brothers’ side.

Half-buried in bloodstained snow, a huge dark shape slumped in death. Ice had formed in its shaggy grey fur, and the faint smell of corruption clung to it like a woman’s perfume. Bran glimpsed blind eyes crawling with maggots, a wide mouth full of yellowed teeth. But it was the size of it that made him gasp. It was bigger than his pony, twice the size of the largest hound in his father’s kennel.

“It’s no freak,” Jon said calmly. “That’s a direwolf. They grow larger than the other kind.”

I would delve in the foreshadowing of Robb, Ned's son, finding a dead by little she-wolf and her pups, the way Ned found Lyanna as she died after the birth of Jon while Jon is the one recognising the she-wolf for what she is, but I won't digress on it now, though it is some food for thought.

“Lord Stark,” Jon said. It was strange to hear him call Father that, so formal. Bran looked at him with desperate hope. “There are five pups,” he told Father. “Three male, two female.”

“What of it, Jon?”

“You have five trueborn children,” Jon said. “Three sons, two daughters. The direwolf is the sigil of your House. Your children were meant to have these pups, my lord.”

Bran saw his father’s face change, saw the other men exchange glances. He loved Jon with all his heart at that moment. Even at seven, Bran understood what his brother had done. The count had come right only because Jon had omitted himself. He had included the girls, included even Rickon, the baby, but not the bastard who bore the surname Snow, the name that custom decreed be given to all those in the north unlucky enough to be born with no name of their own.

Their father understood as well. “You want no pup for yourself, Jon?” he asked softly.

“The direwolf graces the banners of House Stark,” Jon pointed out. “I am no Stark, Father.”

This. This is Jon at his purest form. He sees the tears in Bran' eyes, he knows his siblings would like to have this direwolf pups because he does want one for himself (he does not deny it) and he is ready to sacrifice himself metaphorically (and later also physically) for the happiness of his siblings, by omitting himself in the count to convince his lord father to let them keep the pups. Also, the fact that Bran changes from calling him his bastard brother to his brother the right moment Jon put his wishes away to get Bran and their siblings what they wish for.

He sees the direwolf, the sigil of House Stark of which Jon desperately craves to be part of for real, to have their name and be truly recognised as a Stark; he sees the tears in his brother's eyes and his first instinct is "Stark, must protect at all costs". And he is rewarded for it, by being recognised by the Gods as a Stark with the gift of Ghost.

Halfway across the bridge, Jon pulled up suddenly.

(...)

“Can’t you hear it?”

Bran could hear the wind in the trees, the clatter of their hooves on the ironwood planks, the whimpering of his hungry pup, but Jon was listening to something else.

“There,” Jon said. He swung his horse around and galloped back across the bridge. They watched him dismount where the direwolf lay dead in the snow, watched him kneel. A moment later he was riding back to them, smiling.

“He must have crawled away from the others,” Jon said.

“Or been driven away,” their father said, looking at the sixth pup. His fur was white, where the rest of the litter was grey. His eyes were as red as the blood of the ragged man who had died that morning. Bran thought it curious that this pup alone would have opened his eyes while the others were still blind.

“An albino,” Theon Greyjoy said with wry amusement. “This one will die even faster thanthe others.”

Jon Snow gave his father’s ward a long, chilling look. “I think not, Greyjoy,” he said “This one belongs to me.”

— Bran I, AGOT

Jon saves the direwolf pups, is rewarded with a direwolf of his own, which in his mind reminds him he still has the Stark blood in his veins even if he lacks the name — hence why the entire litter is one colour and Ghost another. Jon long and chilling look is perhaps another foreshadowing — he will live long and survive the chill, but I cannot be sure, it's just the vibe I get from it. It describes his personality perfectly, tho.

So, Jon is one of the first characters introduced and the first one who actually speaks.

But we also know that the only thing Jon desires and cannot have — to the point it draws him away from Winterfell — is being a Stark. Jon has done nothing shameful, yet he is considered to be the only shame on his father's otherwise clean honour simply because of his birth and that shame has made it so that his entire character revolves around his identity as the Stark's defender, his siblings' keeper, and a man who desperately wishes to become a Stark.

Jon loves all of his siblings, but he also is aware enough to know that his presence in Winterfell is starting to be suffocating, that he wants to carve a path for himself, something that may bring House Stark and himself honour and the place for that is the NW, where it wouldn't matter that he is a bastard, only his actions would matter.

The moment he leaves Winterfell behind he makes a choice, by joining the Watch, as far as he knows, he cannot pose as a threat for his siblings' birthright in any form — as lady Stark fears from him — and can manage to make a name for himself and bring honour to his father's name despite the shame his birth have brought forth. That's the tragedy: Jon, a boy who did not ask to be born, has bore since a young age the burnt of a choice his father supposedly made by laying with another woman and siring a son from her when he was already wed to Catelyn. Which is why his entire personality hinges on his protection towards his siblings and his — egoistical, in his mind, but humanly tragic and rightful — wish to be considered a Stark.

He is the only blemish on Eddard Stark's honour, so when Robb raises the banners to go South and demand Ned' release from Joffrey, Jon is ready to abandon the NW to follow his brother South and fight for House Stark — because he wishes to be considered a Stark — but he also knows that Ned has been accused of treason, that his honour is in question and that Jon leaving the Watch and possibly being executed because of that would only add to that. He comes back to the Watch to be the son Eddard Stark would be proud to have.

"We're not friends," Jon said. He put a hand on Sam's broad shoulder. "We're brothers."

And so they were, he thought to himself after Sam had taken his leave. Robb and Bran and Rickon were his father's sons, and he loved them still, yet Jon knew that he had never truly been one of them. Catelyn Stark had seen to that. The grey walls of Winterfell might still haunt his dreams, but Castle Black was his life now, and his brothers were Sam and Grenn and Halder and Pyp and the other cast-outs who wore the black of the Night's Watch.

— Jon IV, AGOT

But he had not left the Wall for that; he had left because he was after all his father's son, and Robb's brother. The gift of a sword, even a sword as fine as Longclaw, did not make him a Mormont. Nor was he Aemon Targaryen. Three times the old man had chosen, and three times he had chosen honor, but that was him. Even now, Jon could not decide whether the maester had stayed because he was weak and craven, or because he was strong and true. Yet heunderstood what the old man had meant, about the pain of choosing; he understood that all too well.

Tyrion Lannister had claimed that most men would rather deny a hard truth than face it, but Jon was done with denials. He was who he was; Jon Snow, bastard and oathbreaker, motherless, friendless, and damned. For the rest of his life—however long that might be—he would be condemned to be an outsider, the silent man standing in the shadows who dares not speak his true name. Wherever he might go throughout the Seven Kingdoms, he would need to live a lie, lest every man's hand be raised against him. But it made no matter, so long as he lived long enough to take his place by his brother's side and help avenge his father.

— Jon IX, AGOT

This is the start of a metamorphosis for Jon. From boy to man, and metamorphosis not yet done and completed. In this moment Jon is accepting of whom he is but the need to be his father's son in truth — protect his honour as Ned Stark would've, little does he knows he is exactly like his uncle, but I digress — is more powerful, so he turns back, also because, somewhere deep inside the knows Robb would have acted maybe like Ned would've, if he even managed to reach him without being captured and killed as a deserter he might still face punishment because of him being an oathbreaker.

He is clever and aware. He knows what will happen, how his family will be viewed because of it. He chooses to stay, to honour his father with conducting himself like he thinks Ned would've conducted himself if he was in his shoes.

Longclaw was not so long or heavy a sword as his father's Ice, but it was Valyrian steel all the same. He touched the edge of the blade to mark where the blow must fall, and Ygritte shivered. "That's cold," she said. "Go on, be quick about it."

He raised Longclaw over his head, both hands tight around the grip. One cut, with all my weight behind it. He could give her a quick clean death, at least. He was his father's son. Wasn't he? Wasn't he?

"Do it," she urged him after a moment. "Bastard. Do it. I can't stay brave forever." When the blow did not fall she turned her head to look at him

— Jon VI, ACOK

This is another pretty important moment.

Jon always struggled between what he thought Ned would've done, as Ned was his role model through all his life, and what he, himself, thought of doing. He is so desperate the be considered Ned Stark's son that that has been such a big part of his identity that as soon as he chooses the Watch over the Starks he ends up undercover between the wildlings (which will forge his own identity anew in a way — as in the show they tell us he has spent too much time with the Free Folk and he doesn't like to kneel either).

"I see what you are, Snow. Half a wolf and half a wildling, baseborn get of a traitor and a whore. You would deliver a highborn maid to the bed of some stinking savage. Did you sample her yourself first?" He laughed. "If you mean to kill me, do it and be damned for a kinslayer. Stark and Karstark are one blood."

"My name is Snow."

— Jon X, ADWD

While before Jon would say he was not a Stark, or say he was Ned Stark's natural son, now he states that his name is Snow — which is not who he is either (because otherwise he would say "I am a Snow") — to bring a point across to Cregan.

What do he says he is, I wonder?

He is often referred as the blood of Winterfell and he himself refers to himself as such:

He found himself back home once more, splashing in the hot pools beneath a huge white weirwood that had his father's face. Ygritte was with him, laughing at him, shedding her skins till she was naked as her name day, trying to kiss him, but he couldn't, not with his father watching. He was the blood of Winterfell, a man of the Night's Watch. I will not father a bastard, he told her. I will not. I will not. "You know nothing, Jon Snow,"

— Jon VI, ASOS

It's prominent in his mind that no matter the name he bears he is the blood of Winterfell, and even when Stannis offers to make him lord of Winterfell and free him of his oath to the NW, even if he is tempted — he would finally be who he always craved to be — he says no. He refuses.

Ygritte wanted me to be a wildling. Stannis wants me to be the Lord of Winterfell. But what do I want?

I would need to steal her if I wanted her love, but she might give me children. I might someday hold a son of my own blood in my arms. A son was something Jon Snow had never dared dream of, since he decided to live his life on the Wall. I could name him Robb. Val would want to keep her sister's son, but we could foster him at Winterfell, and Gilly's boy as well. Sam would never need to tell his lie. We'd find a place for Gilly too, and Sam could come visit her once a year or so. Mance's son and Craster's would grow up brothers, as I once did with Robb.

He wanted it, Jon knew then. He wanted it as much as he had ever wanted anything. I have always wanted it, he thought, guiltily. May the gods forgive me. It was a hunger inside him, sharp as a dragonglass blade. A hunger . . . he could feel it. It was food he needed, prey, a red deer that stank of fear or a great elk proud and defiant. He needed to kill and fill his belly with fresh meat and hot dark blood. His mouth began to water with the thought.

— Jon XII, ASOS

Yeah, Jon always wanted to be lord of Winterfell, to have a wife who'd give him children and have a domestic, nice life with her and their children, to act like lord and foster children see them grow. But he feels shame because of it. And he does so because he is aware of his position as a natural born son.

Every morning they had trained together, since they were big enough to walk; Snow and Stark, spinning and slashing about the wards of Winterfell, shouting and laughing, sometimes crying when there was no one else to see. They were not little boys when they fought, but knights and mighty heroes. "I'm Prince Aemon the Dragonknight," Jon would call out, and Robb would shout back, "Well, I'm Florian the Fool." Or Robb would say, "I'm the Young Dragon," and Jon would reply, "I'm Ser Ryam Redwyne."

That morning he called it first. "I'm Lord of Winterfell!" he cried, as he had a hundred times before. Only this time, this time, Robb had answered, "You can't be Lord of Winterfell, you're bastard-born. My lady mother says you can't ever be the Lord of Winterfell."

I thought I had forgotten that. Jon could taste blood in his mouth, from the blow he'd taken.

— Jon XII, ASOS

And he is aware because it has been such a big part of who he has always been that he has had to learn how to live with it.

So he refuses, he refuses because he desperately wants to cling to Ned Stark's son, who he thinks that man should be, and who he is. He is the keeper of his siblings. Thus his choice is not easy, but he makes the same choice he had in Bran I, AGOT

(...) Which would you have as Lord of Winterfell, Snow? The smiler or the slayer?"

Jon said, "Winterfell belongs to my sister Sansa."

— Jon IV, ADWD

Now, we know Robb legitimised Jon and made him his heir, disinheriting Sansa, but Jon doesn't know that. He knows only he won't steal his sibling's birthright. Never.

He is and remains and dies (after he gets the pink letter he just acts on it) the Stark's defender. He dies because he wants to take the Watch out of its place of neutrality by not only aiding Stannis but taking part of the matters of the Realm of Men he has forsaken to save Jeyne Poole who is posing as Arya Stark, his little sister.

So, back to your question. Do I believe Jon will end up lord of Winterfell?, he probably will — for a time — because that' who Jon always craved to be, hungered for, but Jon despite that hunger always choose his siblings over himself and that hunger. Thus, when the moment comes Jon will, I think, end up relinquishing his lordship over Winterfell either willingly or by act. He will always choose his siblings over himself and anyone else. Of course the truth about his parentage might probably play a part in this, but in the end, when Jon will be faced with the choice, especially after he returns from the death enhanced in his quality of Stark's defender, he will choose his siblings. He will choose to forsake his wishes for their safety, just like show canon Jon became a kinslayer to defend Sansa, Arya and Bran from Daenerys.

And you know what I think will be the most tragic and realistic thing? That that act (as all the others he took before it choosing his siblings over himself and his hunger for Winterfell) is exactly what will prove that he is a Stark — like it's hinted by the crypt's trailer of s8 where Jon' statue is in the crypts of Winterfell next to his sisters, rewarded with the same honour as all the Lords of Winterfell and Kings in the North before him.

He probably won't end up in the very end as Lord of Winterfell, as his story (if it goes by show canon) will bring him beyond the Wall still...or maybe he will go back and forth between Winterfell and the Wall, or his exile will be just a temporary thing («Ask me again in ten years» — Tyrion tells him in the show, and I hope this last one is the truth of it), but he will be remembered as a Stark, or as the Targaryen prince or bastard who chose the Starks. People will say that Ned Stark had raised four sons instead of three. And that is the core of who Jon wanted to be known as.

Though I hope he gets his wish: a family, in Winterfell and being recognised even in life as a Stark. I don't know if this wish of mine will happen in the books though I hold hope the Old Gods will reward his self-sacrifice as they did back in AGOT in Bran I, but I think, without any doubt that Jon Snow will got down in history and be remembered by his people as a Stark wether he ends up as lord of Winterfell or Lord Commander of the NW.

Even if my Jonsa coloured lenses want me to firmly believe that he and Sansa will end up rebuilding the North and Winterfell together as their dreams align and they are both heavily linked with Winterfell and the North; I can acknowledge that it's difficult Martin will give us such a clean cut, while it's more probable they will play a part together and I do believe Sansa' journey will end in Winterfell as she rebuilds the North after all the wars fought; while Jon's journey may take him beyond the Wall, again, and back again, after years home. Because to me that trailer of the crypts hints that Arya, Sansa and Jon will all be remembered as the Starks of Winterfell and maybe even return home before their stories are ended.

Sorry again for the length of the reply! I hope you enjoyed my take on this particular matter, though better meta-writer than me have written on this matter and have studied Jon as character better. What do you think about it?

Thank you for your question! I hope you have a very nice day!

#ask the hag #lord of Winterfell #will Jon Snow end up as Lord of Winterfell

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agentrouka-blog · 4 years

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ASOIAF - Food symbolism: apples and Jon “You have to choose.”

Inspired by this amazing post by @thoughtsandgrumbles I felt compelled to look at apples a little.

Apples are a deeply symbolic fruit on a good day, but I’m not going to go too deeply into the general use, because who has time for that? I’m looking at the text itself. This post will be all about apples in Jon’s chapters, once I get the preliminary rambles out of the way.

Warning: LONG. Many quotes.

Just a few things:

Popularly associated with temptation and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the garden of eden, the realization of being nekkid, the Expulsion of Adam and Eve from paradise as a result. (That would botanically not have been an apple, though.)

The apple “to the fairest” handed out by Eris, godess of discord, for Paris to choose among the three godesses Hera, Athena and Aphrodite, ultimately leading to the Trojan War, which GRRM heavily draws from.

Snow White and the poison apple

Sansa is the name of a variety of apple that was developed in the 1970s, an early ripening mix of Gala and Akane.

Just by the general use, we get a theme of choice and destruction. Also Sansa is an apple. But - spoiler alert - that is NOT very central in Jon’s chapters. YET.

Also, some boring numbers, because this is not as easy a fruit as the persimmon to parse for the sheer amount of them:

Apples in general have 155 mentions in all searchable publications, 135 in the novels directly, 22 in Jon chapters. Only 9 of all the novel-mentions concern House Fossoway, 11 in the other literature.

Top chapter uses:

AFFC, Prologue - 14: Oldtown, Quill and Tankard inn backyard. Alleras shoots them with bow and arrow while the acolyte nerd squad discusses Dany and her dragon rumors. "Where's Rosey? Our rightful queen deserves another round of cider, wouldn't you say?" The apples are withered and wormy, the cider is fearsomely strong. Pate agonizes over his betrayal and theft for his creepy, obsessive love. His choice is “love”. Then he is killed. Complex.

ADWD, Jon V - 11: Jon passes out food and asks the wildlings at Mole’s Town to choose if they want to fight for the NW or not. Apples and onions, you have to choose. The apples are withered.

ADWD, Davos II - 7: Getting information about Manderly from an apple seller in White Harbor. Bad apple, good information. Theme in WH: who are you truly loyal to? The apple is dry and mealy, “bad”. Apples and onions, again.

ASOS, Bran III - 5, and ASOS, Jon V - 3: (8 combined) Rotten apples carpet the ground near an abandoned Queenscrown inn. They provide the background for Jon’s break with the Wildling Undercover Operation and flight back to the Watch. Theme: the abandonment of the Gift, the decline of the Watch, the Dream of Spring and Jon really doesn’t even really pretend to want a future with Ygritte. He chooses. The apples are rotten.

POV uses: Jon 22, Arya 18, Prologue AFFC 14, Sansa 13, Davos 8, Jaime 8, Bran 8, Tyrion 8, Brienne 6, Catelyn 6, Dany 5, Eddard 5, Cersei 3, Theon 3, Samwell 2 JonCon 1, Asha 1, Quentyn 1, Arianne 1, Areo Hotah 1, Prologue ADWD: 1.

Jon is not only the single top POV character to feature the apple, he also has two of the top-use chapters that give the apple significance in setting the background. The apple is very closely tied to Jon.

A short note on the red apple Fossoways (Cider Hall) and the green apple Fossoways (New Barrel):

The branches split at the trial of seven at the Tourney at Ashford (of the Ashford Theory), where the red apple fought for the bad guys (Aerion Targaryen) and the green apple for Ser Duncan the Tall.

Both had the red apple of the Fossoways painted on their shields, but the younger man's was soon hacked and chipped to pieces. "Here's an apple that's not ripe yet," the older said as he slammed the other's helm. (…)

"Ser Raymun, if you please." He cantered up, a grim smile lighting his face beneath his plumed helm. "My pardons, ser. I needed to make a small change to my sigil, lest I be mistaken for my dishonorable cousin." He showed them all his shield. The polished golden field remained the same, and the Fossoway apple, but this apple was green instead of red. "I fear I am still not ripe . . . but better green than wormy, eh?"

(The Hedge Knight)

Again with the split of loyalty, with the following your moral code, with the choices.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So how do apples feature for Jon himself?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Apples are connected to Jon’s struggle of loyalty to the Night’s Watch, and with his inner struggle in general. Every time they show up, he is confronted with a choice of who to stay loyal to, what values to follow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First apple: AGOT, Jon IX.

Jon’s final chapter in the book. Big Drama!

Jon eats a brown, withered apple when he tries to flee the NW the first time. He is heading South because his father has been killed and he wants to join Robb. He is plagued by self-doubt and fear. Then he takes a break to eat.

In his saddlebag, he found a biscuit, a piece of cheese, and a small withered brown apple. (...) He kept the apple for last. It had gone a little soft, but the flesh was still tart and juicy. He was down to the core when he heard the sounds: horses, and from the north.

Straight after, he is caught and prodded back in an incredibly moving, nonviolent confrontation by his new Brothers reciting the NW vows.

"… and all the nights to come," finished Pyp. He reached over for Jon's reins. "So here are your choices. Kill me, or come back with me."

Jon lifted his sword … and lowered it, helpless. "Damn you," he said. "Damn you all."

In his mind, Jon is determined to try and escape again, but the next day, Mormont lets him know they knew what happened.

Jon’s throat was dry. “You know?” “Know,” the raven echoed from Mormont’s shoulder. “Know.” The Old Bear snorted. “Do you think they chose me Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch because I’m dumb as a stump, Snow? Aemon told me you’d go. I told him you’d be back. I know my men … and my boys too. Honor set you on the kingsroad … and honor brought you back.” “My friends brought me back,” Jon said. “Did I say it was your honor?” Mormont inspected his plate.

Jon thinks he’ll be executed. Instead, he will be taken along to the great ranging beyond the Wall.

“So I will have an answer from you, Lord Snow, and I will have it now. Are you a brother of the Night’s Watch … or only a bastard boy who wants to play at war?” Jon Snow straightened himself and took a long deep breath. Forgive me, Father. Robb, Arya, Bran … forgive me, I cannot help you. He has the truth of it. This is my place. “I am … yours, my lord. Your man. I swear it. I will not run again.” The Old Bear snorted. “Good. Now go put on your sword.”

Apple = choice. The choice is the Watch. Because the war against the Others is more important.

Apple Quality: Brown and whithered. But still tart and juicy.

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Second apple: ACOK, Jon I

A former green apple (the valiantly knightly Fossoway kind) is to be dispatched from the Wall to garner support from a Baratheon king...

"Renly is not like to heed a quaking fat boy. I'll send Ser Arnell. He's a deal steadier, and his mother was one of the green-apple Fossoways."

"If it please my lord, what would you have of King Renly?"

The conversation turns toward maester Aemon, his repeated refusal to become king and the incredibly foreshadowy information about the ending of the dragon line.

It made him feel odd. “My lord, why have you told me this, about Maester Aemon?” “Must I have a reason?” Mormont shifted in his seat, frowning. “Your brother Robb has been crowned King in the North. You and Aemon have that in common. A king for a brother.” “And this too,” said Jon. “A vow.” (…)

Jon drew himself up, taut as a bowstring. “And if it did trouble me, what might I do, bastard as I am?” “What will you do?” Mormont asked. “Bastard as you are?” “Be troubled,” said Jon, “and keep my vows.”

Apple = choice. The choice is the Watch. The bigger picture is more important.

Apple Quality: green and unripe. (But honorable.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Third apple: ACOK, Jon VII

Jon and the Qhorin Halfhand crew are on the losing side of a game of cat and mouse with the warg-powered wildlings. Squire Dalbridge is about to sacrifice his life by going to shoot the Wildlings that are stalking them.

The squire bowed his head. "Leave me as many arrows as you can spare, brothers." He stroked his longbow. "And see my garron has an apple when you're home. He's earned it, poor beastie."

He's staying to die, Jon realized.

And that’s almost right at the end of the chapter. This is the only apple chapter where Jon is NOT immediately confronted with a moral dilemma of loyalty or the making of choices. And Dalbridge’s self-sacrifice, his off-page death, all of that means it’s a more long-term projection of the dilemma.

The next, final chapter, Jon and Qhorin Halfhand are captured and he is compelled to kill Qhorin to prove himself a turncloak to the Wildlings, in order to start his Undercover Operation.

The flames were burning low by then, the warmth fading. “The fire will soon go out,” Qhorin said, “but if the Wall should ever fall, all the fires will go out.” There was nothing Jon could say to that. He nodded. “We may escape them yet,” the ranger said. “Or not.” “I’m not afraid to die.” It was only half a lie. “It may not be so easy as that, Jon.” He did not understand. “What do you mean?”

(…)

Rattleshirt’s bone armor clattered loudly as he laughed. “Then kill the Halfhand, bastard.” “As if he could,” said Qhorin. “Turn, Snow, and die.” And then Qhorin’s sword was coming at him and somehow Longclaw leapt upward to block. The force of impact almost knocked the bastard blade from Jon’s hand, and sent him staggering backward. You must not balk, whatever is asked of you.

(…)

He knew, he thought numbly. He knew what they would ask of me. He thought of Samwell Tarly then, of Grenn and Dolorous Edd, of Pyp and Toad back at Castle Black. Had he lost them all, as he had lost Bran and Rickon and Robb? Who was he now? What was he?

“Get him up.” Rough hands dragged him to his feet. Jon did not resist. “Do you have a name?” Ygritte answered for him. “His name is Jon Snow. He is Eddard Stark’s blood, of Winterfell.”

(ACOK, Jon VIII)

Ouch. From this point on, Jon will have to make his own choices, no longer guided by other people’s rules, other people’s honor. The choices will be harder, lonelier. They will be contradictory, they will involve even more tangible loss. They will involve dishonor. The reward is as distant as home. Sacrifice. Death.

But one day, the poor beastie will get an apple, he will have earned it.

Apple = choice. The choice is the Watch. The bigger picture.

Apple quality: unknown.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fourth apple: ASOS, Jon I

As inconspicuously as above, the apple features in a memory of home, featuring not-yet-deserter Mance Rayder at Winterfell, meeting Robb and Jon up to shennanigans:

“I remember,” said Jon with a startled laugh. A young black brother on the wallwalk, yes … “You swore not to tell.”

"And kept my vow. That one, at least."

"We dumped the snow on Fat Tom. He was Father's slowest guardsman." Tom had chased them around the yard afterward, until all three were red as autumn apples. "But you said you saw me twice. When was the other time?"

"When King Robert came to Winterfell to make your father Hand," the King-beyond-the-Wall said lightly. (ASOS, Jon I)

A neat connection between desertion, vow-keeping and the events that led Jon to take his own path to the Wall. Before Meeting Mance, Ygritte has been praising the values of being “free” like the good Little Wildling Propagandist that she is. But Jon isn’t biting yet.

The following conversation gives the backstory of Mance Rayder’s desertion from the Wall. It was over a cloak, mended by a Wildling woman who tended to him while he was injured.

“And she sewed up the rents in my cloak as well, with some scarlet silk from Asshai that her grandmother had pulled from the wreck of a cog washed up on the Frozen Shore. It was the greatest treasure she had, and her gift to me.” He swept the cloak back over his shoulders. “But at the Shadow Tower, I was given a new wool cloak from stores, black and black, and trimmed with black, to go with my black breeches and black boots, my black doublet and black mail. The new cloak had no frays nor rips nor tears … and most of all, no red. The men of the Night’s Watch dressed in black, Ser Denys Mallister reminded me sternly, as if I had forgotten. My old cloak was fit for burning now, he said. “I left the next morning … for a place where a kiss was not a crime, and a man could wear any cloak he chose.” He closed the clasp and sat back down again. “And you, Jon Snow?”

Jon uses Mance’s story of visiting Winterfell to spin his own lie:

“And did you see where I was seated, Mance?” He leaned forward. “Did you see where they put the bastard?” Mance Rayder looked at Jon’s face for a long moment. “I think we had best find you a new cloak,” the king said, holding out his hand.

What will the bastard do? Be troubled and keep his vows. So far, so true. But he did kill Qhorin Halfhand, he is pretending to be a deserter. Lines are a lot more blurry than they used to be.

Apple = choice. The choice is… the Night’s Watch. Shifting more and more toward simply the bigger picture.

Apple quality: red autumn apple.

Red silk patches. Conflicting values. Women. There is uncertainty on the horizon.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fifth apple. ASOS Jon V. BIG apple chapter.

His final confrontation as an Undercover Wildling.

This confrontation takes place at the abandoned tower and village of Queenscrown, which gets a closer description in the accompanying Bran chapter:

No one had lived in the village for long years, Bran could see. All the houses were falling down. Even the inn. It had never been much of an inn, to look at it, but now all that remained was a stone chimney and two cracked walls, set amongst a dozen apple trees. One was growing up through the common room, where a layer of wet brown leaves and rotting apples carpeted the floor. The air was thick with the smell of them, a cloying cidery scent that was almost overwhelming. Meera stabbed a few apples with her frog spear, trying to find some still good enough to eat, but they were all too brown and wormy.

(ASOS, Bran III)

The abandonment of Brandon’s Gift is a subject of conflict between Jon and Ygritte. A carpet of rotting apples. It opens the very next Jon chapter, as they are on the way to Queenscrown. Ygritte mocks the farmers who left the Gift as fools. Jon doesn’t take the bait yet. He briefly indulges in a fantasy of introducing Ygritte to Winterfell before being overcome with guilt and shame again. Ygritte is super great at reading his mood:

“Might be after we could come back here, and live in that tower,” she said. “Would you want that, Jon Snow? After?”

He doesn’t think about it, doesn’t answer for a while, it rather reminds him of Ned’s Dream of Spring, the plan to resettle the Gift. The Starks and the Watch.

If winter had come and gone more quickly and spring had followed in its turn, I might have been chosen to hold one of these towers in my father’s name. Lord Eddard was dead, however, his brother Benjen lost; the shield they dreamt together would never be forged. “This land belongs to the Watch,” Jon said. Her nostrils flared. “No one lives here.”

Jon isn’t even tempted. Like, no, Jon, Bambi, you did not love this person, no matter what your telling yourself later. He doesn’t even really contemplate it.

Instead of bonding them closer together, Ygritte’s invitation to make long-term plans has the opposite effect. It fans the flames of what divides them. They argue about raiding and rape. Ygritte spouts nonsense.

“You know nothing, Jon Snow. Daughters are taken, not wives. You’re the ones who steal. You took the whole world, and built the Wall t’ keep the free folk out.”

Ygritte, no, that is not why the Wall was built. You think they built a gargantuan magic ice structure to keep out Styr, Magnar of Thenn, or what? Really? Jon is also sceptical of this version of history:

“Did we?” Sometimes Jon forgot how wild she was, and then she would remind him. “How did that happen?”

"The gods made the earth for all men t' share. Only when the kings come with their crowns and steel swords, they claimed it was all theirs. My trees, they said, you can't eat them apples. My stream, you can't fish here. My wood, you're not t' hunt. My earth, my water, my castle, my daughter, keep your hands away or I'll chop 'em off, but maybe if you kneel t' me I'll let you have a sniff. You call us thieves, but at least a thief has t' be brave and clever and quick. A kneeler only has t' kneel."

Ygritte is basically a bland political extremist. I could sympathize with her criticism of feudal culture if it didn’t come hand in hand with her passionate defense of violent theft and rape culture. Like, you paragon of intelligence, not everyone resides at the fair top of the food chain like you do in your peak fitness status within your warrior culture. But of course, rape is fun! Just bring a knife!

"Harma and the Bag of Bones don't come raiding for fish and apples. They steal swords and axes. Spices, silks, and furs. They grab every coin and ring and jeweled cup they can find, casks of wine in summer and casks of beef in winter, and they take women in any season and carry them off beyond the Wall."

Apples in a breath with women. People should not be “stolen”. But Ygritte thinks men who successfully abduct and rape women are sexy. She’s like Dany that way. There are some cultural divides that cannot be pretended away, and their entire conversation circles around it. Jon is plagued by terrible guilt, he tries to warn Ygritte that their plan is doomed, she (rightfully) suspects his loyalty to the Wildlings and Jon believes himself in love but he never wavers in his actual allegiance to the NW.

She grinned at that, showing Jon the crooked teeth that he had somehow come to love. Wildling to the bone, he thought again, with a sick sad feeling in the pit of his stomach. He flexed the fingers of his sword hand, and wondered what Ygritte would do if she knew his heart. Would she betray him if he sat her down and told her that he was still Ned Stark’s son and a man of the Night’s Watch? He hoped not, but he dare not take that risk.

GRRM is going out of his way to undermine the supposed romance by constantly referring to the conflict between them and the apples-of-choice are just all over.

Anyway, Jon is thoroughly eaten by guilt over having to betray these human beings who are a vicious and brutal threat to the place and people he loves and swore to protect. His true identity is hinted at:

Jon wondered where Ghost was now. Had he gone to Castle Black, or was he was running with some wolfpack in the woods? He had no sense of the direwolf, not even in his dreams. It made him feel as if part of himself had been cut off. Even with Ygritte sleeping beside him, he felt alone. He did not want to die alone.

Ghost. Not Ygritte. Not the wildlings. Not the Watch, even. Ghost. Wolf.

They arrive at the Queenscrown inn and an old man is captured.

Jon walked away. A rotten apple squished beneath his heel. Styr will kill him. The Magnar had said as much at Greyguard; any kneelers they met were to be put to death at once, to make certain they could not raise the alarm. Ride with them, eat with them, fight with them. Did that mean he must stand mute and helpless while they slit an old man's throat?

The apples are rotten. Jon spends one last moment with Ygritte contemplating Queenscrown and then the “kill the old man” business starts. He struggles but ultimately refuses. Bran’s wolf Summer disrupts the tension with a bloody attack and Jon doesn’t hesitate to Escape. Like when they met, Jon didn’t slit Ygritte’s throat, but she slit the old man’s. He will not shoot arrows at her, but she did at him. Love.

Thunder rumbled softly in the distance, but above him the clouds were breaking up. Jon searched the sky until he found the Ice Dragon, then turned the mare north for the Wall and Castle Black. The throb of pain in his thigh muscle made him wince as he put his heels into the old man’s horse. I am going home, he told himself. But if that was true, why did he feel so hollow?

Apple = choice. The choice is… NOT Ygritte. NOT the Wildlings. Time and again. But it also isn’t the Watch. Not as it had been before. Jon followed his instincts, his inner values, but it had a cost, it is hard. Jon is lost.

Apple Quality: rotten.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sixth apple: ASOS, Jon VII

The Battle at Castle Black They await the attack, Jon and Satin share a meal. And they get a nod to Renly’s peach quote:

"Eat," Jon told him. "There's no knowing when you'll have another chance." He took two buns himself. The nuts were pine nuts, and besides the raisins there were bits of dried apple. (ASOS, Jon VII)

Compare to Renly, which also took place before a nightly sneak attack.

"A man should never refuse to taste a peach," Renly said as he tossed the stone away. "He may never get the chance again. Life is short, Stannis. Remember what the Starks say. Winter is coming." He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. (ACOK, Catelyn III)

Peaches have an air of incest and hedonism about them, nostalgia and summer, Baratheons and Arya and Asha. The apple is different. It’s about choice, about conflicted loyalty and personal values, about identity and the bigger picture. (And again and again, they connect to women.)

Jon commands part of the fight, it’s grim. He recognizes some of the wildlings as they pepper them with arrows but cannot shoot at who he thinks is Ygritte. Wildlings die, his brothers die. The battle is brutal, Jon’s POV is distant. Satin remains by his side all throughout, grounding him. Jon remembers advice from Theon, from Ned. They eventually beat the wildling attackers with a horrifying fire trap on the stairs, they win. Immediately after, Jon goes looking for Ygritte, Satin still by his side.

The ice crystals had settled over her face, and in the moonlight it looked as though she wore a glittering silver mask. The arrow was black, Jon saw, but it was fletched with white duck feathers. Not mine, he told himself, not one of mine. But he felt as if it were.

We get a Dany-Val nod…

The light of the half-moon turned Val's honey-blond hair a pale silver and left her cheeks as white as snow. She took a deep breath. "The air tastes sweet."

"My tongue is too numb to tell. All I can taste is cold." (ADWD, Jon VIII)

...and a lovely double-layered “not mine, not one of mine”. Not his arrows, but he feels guilty. She is not his pack, but he feels guilty.

She just smiled at that. “D’you remember that cave? We should have stayed in that cave. I told you so.” “We’ll go back to the cave,” he said. “You’re not going to die, Ygritte. You’re not.” “Oh.” Ygritte cupped his cheek with her hand. “You know nothing, Jon Snow,” she sighed, dying.

Jon struggles to let go of the fantasy. He is loyal to the cause of the Watch, if not the letter of the vows, but he knows now that his souls want more. He indulges Ygritte’s fantasy of returning because it’s the only thing he has, the only thing he can offer.

Apple = choice. The choice is… the Watch. But painfully. Numbly. No passion. Duty.

Apple quality: dried.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Seventh apple: ASOS, Jon X

Tormund’s daughter Munda.

After vicious attacking Janos Slynt for insulting Ned Stark during a hiostile interrogation in the previous chapter, Jon is sent to kill Mance Rayder under the pretense of parley to prove his loyalty. He is resigned and shame-filled, contemplating his future, where he will be remembered in honorless infamy. Much bitterness, plenty of woe. His reception by Tormund is surprisingly jovial. They drink mead to honor their fallen Donal Noye and Ygritte, with surprisingly little bitterness. It helps Jon return some of his cheer.

"You bloody crows." Tormund's tone was gruff, yet strangely gentle. "That Longspear stole me daughter. Munda, me little autumn apple. Took her right out o' my tent with all four o' her brothers about.” Toregg slept through it, the great lout, and Torwynd … well, Torwynd the Tame, that says all that needs saying, don’t it? The young ones gave the lad a fight, though.”

“And Munda?” asked Jon. “She’s my own blood,” said Tormund proudly. “She broke his lip for him and bit one ear half off, and I hear he’s got so many scratches on his back he can’t wear a cloak. She likes him well enough, though. And why not? He don’t fight with no spear, you know. Never has. So where do you think he got that name? Har!” Jon had to laugh. Even now, even here.

Autumn apple. Stolen women. Cloak.

Stealing women was a hot topic with Ygritte and Jon is immediately concerned, but is reassured. The tenor of the conversation is conciliatory, while he is revealed to be loyal to the Watch, there is mutual respect. In Jon’s thoughts, Ygritte becomes a mentor voice, drifting away from the romantic woe of before.

Easy for you to say, he thought back. You died brave in battle, storming the castle of a foe. I’m going to die a turncloak and a killer. Nor would his death be quick, unless it came on the end of Mance’s sword.

Similarly to Dany later, Jon is arguing with dead beloved abusers in his head, like she will do in ADWD with Viserys. Ygritte is less obviously horrific, but the “voices in my head” aspect and the sheer idealising that both of them engage in feels disconcerting. Never the less, we see Jon’s current identity status on Facebook is “turncloak”. Not Night’s Watch.

The rest of Mance’s “court” is less welcoming, but Mance draws him in for a private conference. The Horn of Winter is revealed, the mutual cause of the Wildlings and the Night’s Watch is identified.

“If I sound the Horn of Winter, the Wall will fall. Or so the songs would have me believe. There are those among my people who want nothing more …” “But once the Wall is fallen,” Dalla said, “what will stop the Others?”

(Dalla has the brains that Ygritte lacked. Why can SHE not be Jon’s mentor?)

Mance offers to hand over the Horn of Joramun if they let the Wildlings pass through the Wall, or he will destroy the Wall in three days. Jon hesitates because he fears they will ransack the place, but he also has no negotiating credit with Thorne and Slynt. He contemplates just smashing the Horn, when suddenly Stannis attacks. The Wildlings are smashed, a helpless Jon enters the tent with Val to attend Dalla.

He is just... disillusioned.

Apple = choice. The choice is… the bigger picture. The Watch is headed by irrational scum, the Wildlings are no less dangerous to the North than they were before and Jon has no hope of saving his ruined reputation either way. He was about to murder Mance, then about to smash his bargaining chip, yet he has no ill will toward them. Only a depressed, numb resignation to preventing the worst of all outcomes.

Apple Quality: autumn apple.

Again with the autumn apple. There are only 3 “autumn apples” in the books, all in ASOS. Jon I (above with Mance), Samwell II, and Jon X here.

In Jon I it connected Mance’s disloyalty to the Watch to the red-and-black cloak given to him by a woman. Also Bael the Bard, deception and stealing. Jon consults his inner values, and chooses pragmatism. His break with “blind” honor will leave him flailing a bit.

In Jon X it specifically refers to a young woman being stolen. Jon consults his inner values, he chooses the bigger picture, but he’s frayed and his choice is interrupted. Stannis will offer him Winterfell. Ghost will remind him of who he is. Ultimately, he will become Lord Commander and his struggle with loyalty will cease for a long time.

What’s Sam’s autumn apple about? They are listed with many foodstuffs that the angry NW brother’s at Craster’s after the fight at the Fist of the First Men expect to receive. Mormont just remembered the true purpose of the Watch. Gilly has just given birth to her son. Sam offers to take the boy, Craster gets mad. they bury a dead brother and the mood is mutinous.

“Apples,” said Garth of Greenaway. “Barrels and barrels of crisp autumn apples. There are apple trees out there, I saw ’em.”

A confrontation breaks out and they kill Craster and stab Mormont. Sam’s friends flee, the others raid and rape, Sam cradles a dying Mormont. Some wives approach and order Sam to take Gilly to safety.

Gilly was crying. “Me and the babe. Please. I’ll be your wife, like I was Craster’s. Please, ser crow. He’s a boy, just like Nella said he’d be. If you don’t take him, they will.” “They?” said Sam, and the raven cocked its black head and echoed, “They. They. They.” “The boy’s brothers,” said the old woman on the left. “Craster’s sons. The white cold’s rising out there, crow. I can feel it in my bones. These poor old bones don’t lie. They’ll be here soon, the sons.”

The massive abundance of apples suggests a link to the abundance of women, to the connection to inner values over formal loyalty, to the “stealing” of Gilly to save her. To the massive bigger picture. With Jon it translates to his trademark quick-thinking pragmatism, with Sam it translates to compassion and identifying valuable information.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

8th and final apple: ADWD, Jon V - The Grand Appling.

ADWD Jon V is another big apple chapter: you have to choose!

Much time has passed since the last apples were mentioned. Jon is Lord Commander and has sent away Sam, Gilly and maester Aemon. The Wildlings are south of the Wall. Food is a constant worry. Bowen Marsh is upset with Jon, Jon is super-diplomatic. Not. It’s time to bring provisions to the Wildlings at Mole’s Town. A Mirror to Dany in ADWD, Daenerys VI, bringing food to the Astapori refugees. The Wildlings are grumpy. Jon struggles to balance the culture clash between free folk, Stannis’ men and Wildlings.

Pig ignorance, Jon thought. The free folk were no different than the men of the Night’s Watch; some were clean, some dirty, but most were clean at times and dirty at other times.

Jon is much removed from his earlier woeful struggles or idealism. A weary pragmatism guides his every action. Grey.

Apples ensue:

"You can have an onion or an apple," Jon heard Hairy Hal tell one woman, "but not both. You got to pick."

The woman did not seem to understand. "I need two of each. One o' each for me, t'others for my boy. He's sick, but an apple will set him right."

Hal shook his head. "He has to come get his own apple. Or his onion. Not both. Same as you. Now, is it an apple or an onion? Be quick about it, now, there's more behind you."

"An apple," she said, and he gave her one, an old dried thing, small and withered.

"Move along, woman," shouted a man three places back. "It's cold out here."

The woman paid the shout no mind. "Another apple," she said to Hairy Hal. "For my son. Please. This one is so little."

Hal looked to Jon. Jon shook his head. They would be out of apples soon enough. If they started giving two to everyone who wanted two, the latecomers would get none.

"Out of the way," a girl behind the woman said. Then she shoved her in the back. The woman staggered, lost her apple, and fell. The other foodstuffs in her arms went flying. Beans scattered, a turnip rolled into a mud puddle, a sack of flour split and spilled its precious contents in the snow.

Apples are once again almost aggressively connected to choices. Apples or onions. Not both. You have to pick.

Barring another meta, I can’t really say what the onion is supposed to represent. Some things that echoe Jon’s apple themes:

His sons were good fighters and better sailors, but they did not know how to talk to lords. They were lowborn, even as I was, but they do not like to recall that. When they look at our banner, all they see is a tall black ship flying on the wind. They close their eyes to the onion. (ACOK, Davos I)

Denial.

Dany nibbled at an onion and reflected ruefully on the faithlessness of men. (ACOK, Daenerys III)

Faithlessness.

The feast was a meager enough thing, a succession of fish stews, black bread, and spiceless goat. The tastiest thing Theon found to eat was an onion pie. Ale and wine continued to flow well after the last of the courses had been cleared away. (ACOK, Theon II)

Theon about to be ordered to attack Winterfell. Betrayal.

The last time it was life I brought to Storm's End, shaped to look like onions. This time it is death, in the shape of Melisandre of Asshai. (ACOK, Davos II)

Life and death brought by the same person.

Melisandre’s manichean world view vs. Davos’ more encompassing one:

"What if I am? It seems to me that most men are grey."

"If half of an onion is black with rot, it is a rotten onion. A man is good, or he is evil." (ACOK, Davos II)

Bless you Sam.

Hungry as he was, Sam knew he would retch if he so much as tried a bite. How could they eat the poor faithful garrons who had carried them so far? When Craster's wives brought onions, he seized one eagerly. One side was black with rot, but he cut that part off with his dagger and ate the good half raw. (ASOS, Samwell II)

Considering apples represent the choice you make to serve an ethical bigger picture (not necessarily loyalty to an order), onions seem to show a contrasting duality of bad and good, a refusal to position oneself honestly, dirty compromises, the darkness in human beings.

Davos’ entire arc circles around being a very decent human being who none the less supports a whole lot of questionable crap. Our resident kraken Theon is torn inside unable to choose between Greyjoy and Stark identity and becomes monstrous.

Melisandre downright denies the existence of grey. The presence of bad cancels out all good. Samwell, on the other hand, embraces the good while disregarding the bad.

Ygritte smelled of onion. Dany eats wild onion on her dragon grassland chapter, Jorah eats onion. Brienne has onion soup on her way to Lady Stoneheart. Jon offers the Wildlings onion soup after they burn their god’s for Melisandre in echange for safety. Dark compromises.

So the choice between apples and onions is the choice to MAKE a choice. Stop hedging your bets or practicing denial, position yourself, one way or the other.

The woman who refuses to choose, loses her apple, loses the fruit that will set her sick son right, loses her cance at following her inner moral compass and doing the right thing.

There is a tussle, Jon tries to rally them with a speech. They are in a Mutiny at Craster’s Keep kind of mood.

“You want more food?” asked Jon. “The food’s for fighters. Help us hold the Wall, and you’ll eat as well as any crow.” Or as poorly, when the food runs short. (…)

“Fight for you?” This voice was thickly accented. Sigorn, the young Magnar of Thenn, spoke the Common Tongue haltingly at best. “Not fight for you. Kill you better. Kill all you.” The raven flapped its wings. “Kill, kill.” Sigorn’s father, the old Magnar, had been crushed beneath the falling stair during his attack on Castle Black. I would feel the same if someone asked me to make common cause with the Lannisters, Jon told himself. “Your father tried to kill us all,” he reminded Sigorn. “The Magnar was a brave man, yet he failed. And if he had succeeded … who would hold the Wall?”

Jon believes in the greyness of men, but he also believes in choices. You don’t have to be perfect to do the right thing. But you have to do the right thing. Or a thing, anyway. You have to choose.

There is more commotion. Jon decides to make it simpler.

"Hal, what was it that you told this woman?"

Hal looked confused. "About the food, you mean? An apple or an onion? That's all I said. They got to pick."

"You have to pick," Jon Snow repeated. "All of you. No one is asking you to take our vows, and I do not care what gods you worship. My own gods are the old gods, the gods of the North, but you can keep the red god, or the Seven, or any other god who hears your prayers. It's spears we need. Bows. Eyes along the Wall. (…)

He recruits, actively.

“The choice is yours,” Jon Snow told them. “Those who want to help us hold the Wall, return to Castle Black with me and I’ll see you armed and fed. The rest of you, get your turnips and your onions and crawl back inside your holes.”

Apples yay, onions nay. Dany killed the slavers of Astapor, and left alive only children under the age of 12. Jon recruit ages 12 and up for the Watch, girls and boys. Dany killed 163 random slavers. Jon recruits 63 Wildlings.

By the time the last withered apple had been handed out, the wagons were crowded with wildlings, and they were sixty-three stronger than when the column had set out from Castle Black that morning.

The apples win out. No more mention of onions in this chapter.

The chapter ends on a grey note, uncertain but hopeful.

Marsh was unconvinced. “You’ve added sixty-three more mouths, my lord … but how many are fighters, and whose side will they fight on? If it’s the Others at the gates, most like they’ll stand with us, I grant you … but if it’s Tormund Giantsbane or the Weeping Man come calling with ten thousand howling killers, what then?” “Then we’ll know. So let us hope it never comes to that.”

Hilariously, it is not the treachery of the apple-choosing wildlings Jon will have to worry about.

The abundance of onions and apples in this chapter sets up the struggle Jon faces in later ADWD chapters. The bigger picture v. Arya. Apples are done, for now, the onions stalk him. He tries to strikes a balance. He hesitates, he sends Mance, he struggles. In the end, the Pink Letter sends him over the edge.

Apples v. onions. Jon has chosen.

Apples = choice. The choices is… NOT the Watch. Arya. The North. The bigger picture. House Stark.

Apple Quality: withered. Like the very first apple.

Jon stood tall. He told himself that he would die well; that much he could do, at the least. “I know the penalty for desertion, my lord. I’m not afraid to die.” “Die!” the raven cried. “Nor live, I hope,” Mormont said, cutting his ham with a dagger and feeding a bite to the bird. (AGOT, Jon IX)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In conclusion:

Apples signal the necessity for Jon make a moral choice according to his own personal values.

Jon always has his eyes on the bigger picture.

His choices becomes increasingly divorced from the concept of loyalty to the Watch.

There is a pronounced conflict between apple and onion, between moral choice and refusal to choose. Jon tries to walk the line between the letter of his vows and his values. He ends up choosing his values. It goes badly.

The quality of the apples has a relationship with the ease of choosing.

whithered apples are fairly clean choices,

rotten apples are traumatic choices,

autumn apples relate to choices influenced by the wisdom of women, the stealing of women.

There is a future apple promised to “the beastie” as a reward.

If we want to draw a connection to the show, Jon will clearly face another apples v. onions conflict and the need to choose will feature heavily. It will go badly. But there is the promise of home and reward.

#asoiaf #fruit symbolism #apples #jon snow #you have to choose #my posts

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jackoshadows · 5 years

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From where do people get the notion that book Jon Snow does not know how to negotiate? I just came across a post on my dash with thousands of notes about how Robb Stark would have done fantastically negotiating with Dany as opposed to Jon Snow. First of all, I doubt D&D would have bestowed Robb with good storytelling in season 7 had he survived that long and secondly, I don’t recall any examples of Robb Stark being a good negotiator in the books?

I will also say that however fantastic the negotiation would have been by whichever Stark, the North would have to bend the knee for Dany’s help. That’s just how it is in Westeros. Recall that Catelyn had to pledge both KITN Robb and Arya in marriage to the Freys for just the use of a bridge! Jon was asking that Dany halt her war and use all her resources to help the North at great loss to her. The least the North can do in return for her saving all their lives is be a part of her 7 kingdoms and assist her against their common enemy Cersei Lannister.

Recall that in the books, Stannis is at the wall to help Jon face the threat from beyond the wall - but the condition is still that Stannis will be king with the North as part of the 7K. And Jon is giving Stannis all the help to fight the Boltons, win the North and become king of the 7K. Jon is allying with and helping a king who likes to burn people to death to please his red priestess and the Lord of Light.

Now coming to Jon Snow and his diplomatic skills, let’s look at the different types of people with whom 15/16 year old Jon Snow has successfully negotiated with:

Tycho Nestoris of the Iron Bank – We have seen how it’s no easy task getting a loan from the Iron Bank and yet Jon is able to secure a loan to buy food for the Night’s watch – and he does this while Tycho is there to actually meet with Stannis. Rulers are vying for a loan from the Iron Bank and here Jon is getting one despite the Wall not being a good place to invest in for a Braavosi banker.

The mountain clans of the North – The chiefs are invited to the wedding of Alys Karstark and the Magnar of the Thenns where Jon speaks to them and convinces them in the worthiness of his plans including letting the Wildlings in past the wall. The Grand Northern Conspiracy also theorizes that the clan chiefs know about Robb’s will and are there to assess Jon’s leadership capabilities and leave convinced that he would be a good leader.

The Freefolk/Tormund - In return for letting them in, Jon has taken child hostages to ensure good behavior, obtained soldiers to man the wall, people to cook, clean and sew and even took their belongings to purchase food! He in effect has command over the freefolk so much so that they are ready to march with him south of the wall to attack the Boltons.

Stannis Baratheon: Jon Snow negotiates so well with Stannis for control of the castles/Freefolk at the wall that he actually wins praise from him – something so rare to get from Stannis. As Stannis tells Jon – “You haggle like a crone with a codfish, Lord Snow” – high praise indeed! And remember that Stannis is a southern king.

The viewpoint that Jon at the wall does not know anything about politics and the south is simply not true. Jon Snow learnt the same as Robb Stark and from the same teachers. The classist thinking that the bastard is less knowledgeable than the rest of the Starks is false. Ned educated all the boys the same – and that includes Jon and Theon. And this is reflected in Jon Snow often thinking of Ned’s teachings.

These are Jon’s teachers and mentors throughout the series at various stages – Ned Stark, Maester Luwin, Rodrik Cassel, Jeor Mormont, Donal Noye, Maester Aemon, Mance Raydar and even Stannis himself. He has learned from maesters, warriors and kings. He has learned from NW brothers like the Halfhand and from Ygritte. Which of the younger characters in the books has had better teachers than Jon Snow at this point? The fact that he acknowledges that he still has much to learn ( ‘I know that I know nothing’ - Socrates) makes him one of the wisest characters in the books.

What negotiation has Robb Stark successfully done? Robb was a young prodigy, a genius battle commander but negotiator? His intelligent, strong willed, politically aware mother took care of that. Catelyn negotiated with Renly and Walder Frey for Robb. What negotiation has Sansa successfully done in 5 books? Getting SweetRobin to eat his dinner is not the same as conducting a financial transaction with the Iron Bank.

So this idea that Robb and Sansa were/are seasoned politicians and negotiators as opposed to ‘out of touch’ and ‘know nothing’ Jon snow has no basis in the books. In actuality, GRRM is involving Jon more and more in the politics of the realm as of the last book. And if Robb’s will does come into the picture, it looks as if Jon Snow as leader of the North will be doing a lot of negotiating – even with southern rulers that perhaps include Daenerys Targaryen who has arrived in KL.

Show Jon Snow has nothing in common with the book version and they are two entirely different characters with different personalities, characterization, plots, narrative themes and relationships. Not sure why we are taking cues from the show on Jon’s negotiating skills and knowledge. Book Jon Snow’s journey in the next book is going to be different from what we got in the show. For one, he is going to be spending considerable time in a wolf!

Book Jon Snow is an intelligent and well versed diplomat who is capable of going toe to toe with Dany or Tyrion or whomever he would be negotiating with in the future. Hell, Tyrion was impressed by 14 year old Jon Snow. He’s going to be even more impressed when they meet up again in the books.

#Jon Snow #asoiaf #anti-GOt #anti-D&D

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gondorosi · 5 years

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The gradual separation of show!Jon from book!Jon - Part I

I loved the character of Jon Snow the moment he claimed Ghost as his own.

"This one will die even faster than the others." Jon Snow gave his father's ward a long, chilling look. "I think not, Greyjoy," he said. "This one belongs to me."

The chilling look. The brazen claim. All of this despite him bringing up his lower status not a moment ago, just so that Bran would get his direwolf pup.

This dichotomy between the sacrificial big brother and the confident claimant was what made me a fan. The fact that show culled this whole scene to keep the 'I am not a Stark' part but have Theon TELL Jon that Ghost the runt belonged to him, defeated the entire gravitas of this scene.

The show version of Jon (who I still love dearly, despite) has always been subtly different from the book version but the deviations became more stark (heh) S6 onwards.

Ambition and Leadership

There's this assumption among show-watchers alone that Jon has never wanted a position of responsibility. Which is just - wrong.

To me, the above quote shapes Jon's character, motivations and growth in the NW. Jon WANTS to be in a position of power. He wanted to be LC - just that he received the position earlier than he expected. Doesn't make him unwilling. He's had dreams of being Lord of Winterfell. The fact that he would never act on those dreams is a separate matter.

But entirely removing Jon's ambition and desire for glory removes an essential part of Jon's character. His nobility and quality lies in the fact that he is able to overcome his natural ego in a short enough time period to realise he's got much to learn. His mentors are all leaders - Jeor, Mance and even Stannis. Most Kings/Lords have never learnt how to follow since they were born into those positions. That's the fundamental difference between Robb and Jon (and the subject of another post). Humility is a personal quality which makes leaders popular, but it has to be kept in check once you're in a leadership position. There will always be a degree of separation between the leader and the others, which book!Jon LC was well aware of. Case in point: The controversial Gilly and Mance baby decision. That was Sam's lament was it not? That Jon took the decision without considering his friend's feelings. But it was the Lord Commander who took the best (and only) decision he saw fit to save both children. Not Sam's friend Jon.

Val, the Mountain Clans, Melisandre - and the attack on the Boltons

I don't like Sansa. I skipped her chapters in the books and I actively hate her on the show. Which is why it's infuriating that she becomes the fulcrum for Jon mustering forces to take back Winterfell. It suggests that Jon himself has no motivation to take back the North from the Boltons, even in the absence of the Jeyne!Arya storyline.

The show massively downplays the importance of the Free Folk following and fighting alongside Jon. Mance took years and years and it needed force and the common fear of the Others as well as hatred against the NW. And for Jon to gain their respect and acceptance despite being a Crow and infiltrator is huge. The only Freefolk represented in Jon's story in the show is Tormund - and while he's undoubtedly the main cheerleader, the absence of Val and others like Borroq from the narrative relegate the Freefolk to 'bunch of savages who fight for Jon'.

Val is important to Jon's story both as a man and as a leader. She's the closest thing to a Wildling 'princess' and she trusts him.

"You have my thanks, Lord Snow. For the half-blind horse, the salt cod, the free air. For hope."

We don't know where the books will take Jon and Val's relationship. But for the Freefolk to follow Jon into a war which doesn't affect them requires more than simply Tormund's support or Mance's regard. Acceptance of one of the 'enemy' as your Commander is a complicated process and Val should have been a part of it.

Similarly, we have no mention of the mountain clans. Show!Jon struggles to find support among the Northern houses for the attack on Winterfell. Book!Jon steers Stannis away from attacking the Dreadfort to gain support of the mountain clans whi are fiercely loyal to the memory of Ned. The absence of the mountain clans impacts show!Jon's knowledge and awareness of the North, painting him as a lone fighter with no knowledge of political strategy. (All to give it completely unearned to Sansa which is a rant for another time).

As for Melisandre, I wanted much more of their interaction beyond her trying to seduce him. There HAS to be a reason she's fixated on him, since in the book she's still convinced Stannis is Azor Ahai, despite her visions telling her something else.

I pray for a glimpse of Azor Ahai, and R'hllor shows me only Snow.

There's more than enough material for them to have built up an unwilling Mage/King relationship. Her bringing him back to life should have created an unwilling bond of gratitude - and made it clear to Jon he needs to keep her around, despite Davos' feelings. Show!Jon put Davos over the need to have her power around - not sure Book!Jon would have done the same.

Recklessness

Jon and Dany's military experiences are fundamentally different yet thematically similar. One of these is their roles in the battles they've fought. Dany's always been the aggressor, the conqueror (I'm only talking about roles here, not the intent). Jon's always been the defender, the protector (with the exception of BoB). Additionally, Jon's always been on the ill-equipped side. Smaller army, no supernatural weapons to fight a supernatural threat. Jon is reckless both in the show and in the books but again the nature of the recklessness veers sharply from S6. Book!Jon takes crazy risks only when his back is against the wall, stemming from desperation. Show!Jon post S6 seems to take crazy suicidal risks out of emotion. I'm in the camp that believes that coming back from the dead will do a spectacular number on your mental stability but I would have expected Book!Jon to be more 'bare knuckle pounding Ramsay's face into pulp' than 'Let me face down a rampaging cavalry on my own, on the ground'.

Of course, it's not that book!Jon hasn't done stupid things out of emotion, his thwarted desertion being primary among them. But that was at the beginning of his journey, even before he had fully emotionally committed to the Watch, and out of an understandably burning desire to be at Robb's side in the war. Every decision he's taken after that, be it for himself or for the Watch, has been carefully considered and decided.

#jon snow #book!jon #show!jon #i love them both #freefolk #jon/val #asoiaf #jeor mormont #mance rayder #jon DOES want it #he always has #tormund giantsbane #asoiaf val

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jonryatrash · 5 years

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ADWD + Jon’s Heart

What do you know of my heart, priestess? What do you know of my sister?

I know among Jonrya shippers that this line from Jon VI in ADWD is iconic and further evidence that the good ship Jonrya is sailing strong in ASOIAF (as GRRM originally intended). I also know that there’s been some, err, tumblr discourse about the use of this line for other ships, and this is not a response to that in anyway; I’ve honestly missed 95% of that particular skirmish.

As I was working on another meta tonight, I ran across a very curious line much later in ADWD that parallels Jon VI beautifully, so I thought I would put these two scenes together and discuss how they build upon one another.

Jon VI is the chapter in which Jon finds out about Ramsay’s marriage to fArya, and it marks an important turning point for Jon for the remainder of the book (and arguably the series itself). The quote that follows occurs after Jon reads Ramsay’s letter and has presumably been reflecting on it all day. We find him talking to Mormont’s raven and listening to Melisandre’s worship from inside his chambers.

Jon felt as stiff as a man of sixty years. Dark dreams, he thought, and guilt. His thoughts kept returning to Arya. There is no way I can help her. I put all kin aside when I said my words. If one of my men told me his sister was in peril, I would tell him that was no concern of his. Once a man had said the words his blood was black. Black as a bastard’s heart. -Jon VI, ADWD

This particular line feels important since it’s the first time that Jon thinks about his heart in the chapter. Earlier, his heart stops for a moment when he discovers that Ramsay is to wed fArya, but that’s not quite the same thing as I’m trying to get at here. This line shows that Jon is a sworn brother of the NW--his blood has turned black and black is the color of the NW. However, his heart has remained uncolored by his oath to the NW’s. His heart remains black because it’s always been marked dark/bad/base due to his bastardy. I think the blood vs. heart here is worthwhile of our attention because we know that Jon ultimately decides effectively to betray the NW for the sake of his sister; his bastard’s heart proves too much for him to overcome. We’ll also see the phrase “bastard’s heart” appear later on, so keep that in mind.

Just after this mini-scene in his chambers, Jon leaves and eventually runs into Melisandre. At first he mistakes her for Ygritte (and idk what to make of that) and then notices that her hands are uncovered. Jon tells her that her fingers will freeze off, and this iconic exchange follows:

“If that is the will of R’hllor. Night’s powers cannot touch one whose heart is bathed in god’s holy fire.” “You heart does not concern me. Just your hands.” “The heart is all that matters. Do not despair, Lord Snow. Despair is a weapon of the enemy, whose name may not be spoken. Your sister is not lost to you.” “I have no sister.” The words were knives. What do you know of my heart, priestess? What do you know of my sister? Melisandre seemed amused. “What is her name, this little sister that you do not have?” “Arya.” His voice was hoarse. “My half-sister, truly …” “… for you are bastard born. I had not forgotten. I have seen your sister in my fires, fleeing from this marriage they have made for her. Coming here, to you. A girl in grey on a dying horse, I have seen it plain as day. It has not happened yet, but it will.” -Jon VI, ADWD

First, I appreciate how Melisandre can see right through Jon’s pitiful attempt at pretending he doesn’t care and doesn’t have a sister. He tries to distance himself from Arya, yet it’s a struggle to even say her name with his voice “hoarse” and his thoughts totally occupied with her all day.

Second, I’d like to linger on the parallel structure of the “what do you know” lines. As someone who has taught her fair share of composition and public speaking classes, I can assure you that parallel structure plays an important function in writing/speaking. The purpose of parallel structure is to elevate ideas to a higher level of importance and to demonstrate equal importance between the two parallel statements. It also functions to make statements clearer and easier to remember. Long story short, Martin is waving a giant red flag to tell the reader that these two things (Jon’s heart and his sister Arya) are incredibly important. Also, because the sentences are worded exactly the same in terms of subject and verb, “heart” and “sister” are interchangeable; you can switch their locations and the meaning of the sentences stay exactly the same. I offer this up as evidence of the claim that Arya is without a doubt Jon’s heart.

Having explained that, the line that comes before it--“The heart is all that matters”--takes on another meaning. Arya is all that matters to Jon, particularly because Arya is the only one who could ever love this bastard brother. Arya knew that being a bastard was not a good thing to be (hence the mention of Arya fearing she was a bastard because she looked just like Jon), but she still loved Jon despite him being insert the long list of beliefs about bastards here. And it’s ultimately his heart makes Jon break from the NW in his final ADWD chapter, both his bastard heart’s traitorous ways (according to Westerosi society, that is) and his incredibly strong love for Arya, who is also his heart.

Jon XIII is Jon’s final chapter in ADWD, and I was surprised when I reread it just how much content is packed into this chapter. There’s also many thematic parallels to Jon VI, which against serves to mark those themes as important in a variety of ways.

In Jon VI, we first hear about the letter from Ramsay. In Jon XIII, we finally get to read the whole thing. A lot of Jonrya fans rightly comment on the importance of “I want my bride back” from the letter and how Jon echoes it in his own quest to get Arya back. When he echoes Ramsay’s sentiments (hello, parallels!), it becomes I (Jon) want my bride (Arya) back (from you, Ramsay), and offers a strong explanation for why Jon throws everything away to save Arya. Well, that coupled with GRRM’s Waterstones Letter, at least.

At the end of the letter, Ramsay writes:

I want my bride back. I want the false king’s queen. I want his daughter and his red witch. I want his wildling princess.

I want his little prince, the wildling babe. And I want my Reek. Send them to me, bastard, and I will not trouble you or your black crows. Keep them from me, and I will cut out your bastard’s heart and eat it. - Jon XIII, ADWD

In these lines, we once again see black + bastard + heart appear together. GRRM emphasizes again that Jon’s allegiance is to the NW, but also that he has a bastard’s heart that marks him as deceitful/traitorous/lustful/etc. I think all of this is to prime the readers for what comes at the end of this chapter.

(Also, as a side note, I’m inclined to read the consuming of Jon’s heart aka Arya very sexually, which makes sense with the whole echoing of I want my bride back. Coincidentally, that echo occurs with a page of his quote).

In the next scene (again, paralleling the shift from the letter right to Melisandre and the heart quote), Jon enters the Shieldhall and announces that he’s going to make plans to save Hardhome. These plans happen to not involve him. When he’s called out, Jon explains:

“No. I ride south.” Then Jon read them the letter Ramsay Snow had written. The Shieldhall went mad. Every man began to shout at once. They leapt to their feet, shaking fists. So much for the calming power of comfortable benches. Swords were brandished, axes smashed against shields. Jon Snow looked to Tormund. The Giantsbane sounded his horn once more, twice as long and twice as loud as the first time. “The Night’s Watch takes no part in the wars of the Seven Kingdoms,” Jon reminded them when some semblance of quiet had returned. “It is not for us to oppose the Bastard of Bolton, to avenge Stannis Baratheon, to defend his widow and his daughter. This creature who makes cloaks from the skins of women has sworn to cut my heart out, and I mean to make him answer for those words … but I will not ask my brothers to forswear their vows. “The Night’s Watch will make for Hardhome. I ride to Winterfell alone, unless …” Jon paused. “… is there any man here who will come stand with me?” -Jon XIII, ADWD

Again, the letter is read. Then Jon explicitly states that what’s about to happen is not about Stannis and the politics of Westeros. This is a really weak out for Jon, but a nice work around based in a technicality. But, Jon explicitly says what it is about: Ramsay swore to cut out his heart. And we know from Jon VI that GRRM invites us to understand Jon’s heart to be the same thing as Arya. Therefore, Jon is riding to Winterfell because Ramsay swore he would keep Arya away from him forever--forcibly and gruesomely removing her from his life--and Jon isn’t having any of that.

I don’t think that it’s a radical claim that Jon went to war for Arya. Even non-shippers can see that much, I’d say. But Jon isn’t just riding to save his sister, he’s riding to save a vital, life-giving part of him, Arya. He has never spoken about any of his family in such a way, except for Arya. I’d argue that based on his commitment to throw it all away (the past several years of his life and his honor) for a girl who is his heart (again, a strange comparison for siblings who aren’t Jaime and Cersei), GRRM is still planning on moving forward with his original plan for Jon and Arya. I also think Jon 2.0 is going to make Ramsay pay to a degree we haven’t yet seen.

#jonrya #suppleassin #asoiaf meta #arya stark #jon snow #my asoiaf meta #meta worth reading

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aegon · 6 years

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Do you think that there’s a connection between Jamie and Cersei being twins and having a relationship and Arya and Jon being the only ones to look alike in their family and being super close? I ship Jonerys but I feel like in the books Jon and Arya are way too close for it not to mean or add up to anything?? Martins original idea was for them to end up together too

Anon, you’re after my own heart.

Jon x Arya parallels with Jaime x Cersei both on a relationship and an individual character level is one of my favourites to discuss and is so underappreciated.

And I’m always here to rant about what I think Jon and Arya are all about! I have so many, many thoughts about how important their relationship is to their respective narratives.

Buckle in, mate, I’m about to rant to hell. All my bottled up emotions over my faves, here we fucking go:

To start off with, I 1000% think there’s an important connection between both relationships. Jaime and Jon have incredibly specific parallels, as do Arya and Cersei. Like a century ago, I talked about the idea of balance in the series and that for every action, there’s a kind of reaction, so to speak. For me, the counterbalance to Jaime x Cersei is Jon x Arya.

Jon and Jaime parallels (keeping this short as it’s been discussed by others):

Swore vows to organisations created to protect with their lives and remain celibate.

Lord Commanders of their respective organisations.

Where Jaime was the youngest Kingsguard in history, Jon became one of the youngest Lord Commanders.

Break their vows twice each (one being celibacy).

Mother died in childbirth.

Mained/disfigured sword hands. Jon’s hand is burnt while Jaime’s is completely removed.

Nicknames designed to mock, re: Lord Snow / Kingslayer.

Jon refuses Winterfell while Jaime refuses Casterly Rock.

King foreshadowing in both their chapters.

Arya and Cersei parallels:

As children, both dressed in breeches and showed interest in training with swords.

Resent the patriarchal standards set on women and vocally refuse to follow what’s expected of them.

Identify and draw strength from the sigil of their respective houses.

Hold to their grudges. They never forget the ones that hurt their house or their family.

Have had their heads shaved by/for religious organisations, but where Cersei had hers forcibly removed and lost her agency, Arya gained hers by doing it willingly.

Both their ambitions are rooted in gaining a position of influence not often afforded to their gender. Arya asks if she can be a king’s conciliator, build castles and be a High Septon. While Cersei did become Queen, it was taking control over the small council and ruling in her own right that she really wanted, instead of being dictated around by men or the pretty wife birthing children.

Daddy’s little girls that look up to their fathers and attempt to emulate them after their deaths.

Difficulty with one sibling while being incredibly close to another.

Both are told they will marry a king, but misleadingly, not the ones in power at the time. Maggy tells Cersei she will wed the king, but this was long before Robert’s Rebellion and Aerys was in power while Rhaegar was still a prince, so the witch wouldn’t have made sense at the time. Ned tells Arya she’ll marry a king, but it’s Sansa that’s betrothed to the crown prince, so again, it shouldn’t make sense. In both cases, the choice of words is particular but telling.

Another fascinating anti-parallel is their opposite developments in temperament. Arya and Cersei as children are incredibly similar: willful, ambitious, quick to anger. But as the series progresses, through the FM, Arya learns to be humble, to control her emotions, to be patient and listen. Cersei, however, dissolves into anger, impatience, and pride.

These are mostly off the top of my head, but moving on to specific relationship parallels:

Jon x Arya / Jaime x Cersei:

Jaime and Cersei are twins, with classic Lannister features. Arya and Jon are the only children that look like Starks, and look like one another.

Obviously, they’re incredibly close and neither ever stops thinking of the other.

Jon and Jaime have both broken their vows for their sisters. Jaime breaks his for Cersei when he beds her and fathers her children, and Jon breaks his for Arya when he tries riding to Winterfell to save her (!!!)

This is more of an anti-parallel. Jon and Jaime both receive letters about their sister’s needing their help. Jon gets the Pink Letter of Ramsay demanding fArya’s return, and Jaime receives one from Cersei begging him to rescue her. The letter is the catalyst that drives Jon to break his vows, whereas Jaime burns the letter Cersei sends as he grows apart from her. Poetry.

Jon and Jaime compare the women they’re attracted to with their sisters. Jon sees Arya in Ygritte and Jaime thinks of Cersei with Brienne. Oh, and Arya thinks of Jon with Gendry, oof.

Another anti-parallel that’s less obvious: Arya thinks of Jon as being the only one that would want her after her traumatising experiences escaping King’s Landing and wouldn’t care about who she’d become now. Jaime barely makes it back to King’s Landing, back to Cersei, and she finds his disfigurement and the changes to his personality after his own traumatic experiences unappealing and starts keeping her distance.

There might be more but admittedly, it’s been a while since I’ve read Jaime and Cersei’s chapters but there we have it.

To answer the first part of your ask - yes, there’s clearly a connection between these two relationships. I like to think of them as two sides of the same coin - but where Jaime and Cersei have all the toxicity you’ll never find with Jon and Arya. Essentially, they’re anti-parallels of each other, evidenced by Jaime and Cersei growing apart where Jon and Arya still very much love and miss each other. So where Jaime and Cersei are doomed to end tragically and aggressively, Jon and Arya’s bond is strong enough to stand the test of time and circumstance.

Jaime x Cersei is not the relationship to aspire to, but to demonstrate what happens when the individuals and the nature of the relationship is twisted to something corrupt. Cersei and Jaime essentially see one another as an extension of themselves, whereas Jon and Arya are one another’s source of support, but still very much their own people. Healthy af, yo.

So what does this mean for Jon and Arya?

From a writer’s perspective, having a character constantly bring up another and how much they love them and miss them and would do anything to be with them seems to be a pretty big red flag that they will, in fact, do anything for them.

It’s why I never understand those that say Arya and Jon’s relationship can be substituted with other characters.

In my opinion, there’s definitely something happening in the future that needs the reader to understand how much these two mean to each other. It’ll culminate in a climax that’s basically going to drive them from that point onwards and be a turning point in their narratives.

In Jon’s situation, we’ve seen the start of such a climax. His constant mentioning of Arya and agonising over her in ADWD comes to a head when he’s stabbed for trying to to save her. Such a moment wouldn’t have had the same impact for anyone else but Arya, because their relationship is the only one convincing enough. In the midst of knowing an army of the dead is coming and the drama with Stannis and the freefolk, Jon can’t stop thinking about Arya. We’ve literally had it hammered into our skulls that he’d do anything for her.

Surprise, surprise - he does.

And in that moment, as we’ve seen from the show, Jon Snow stops being Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch and starts his journey towards becoming the King in the North. Because of how much he loves Arya.

I very much believe the Battle of the Bastards will happen, but differently than in the show. The North is currently rallying behind Arya’s name and when Jon’s brought back to life, he’s still going to be out of his mind with worry for her. And he won’t have any vows holding him back from bringing her home (home being by his side because Jon calls himself Arya’s home and I just want to remind everyone of that, thanks). Fuck me, I’m excited. He’s 10000% gonna go to war for her and I am HERE FOR IT.

In this case, Arya being Jon’s favourite person and GRRM making sure she’s brought up in almost all of his POV chapters pays off.

For Arya, we’ve yet to see it happen, but I’m predicting that it’s the news of Jon’s death that’s going to force her to leave Braavos. We know that she gets news from the Wall from Eastwatch, and she’s struggling to truly become No One as the FM want because of how deep her connection to her family and identity runs. Jon is never far from her thoughts and plays a very important role in who Arya Stark really is.

When disguised as Blind Beth or any of her other identities, she still thinks about Jon. When she finds a deserter of the Night’s Watch, despite the fact that she’s not supposed to be Arya anymore, she still doles out justice for breaking his vows.

So, even though she’s a thousand miles away, Jon and the Night’s Watch are still very present in her narrative.

And we know how much Arya loves Jon. Damn, do we know.

I do believe the news of Jon’s murder is going to spread. And when it reaches Braavos, and finally Arya, it’s going to absolutely shatter her. Arya, like Cersei, does not forgive and forget easily. She’ll never be able to return to her training after hearing about her favourite person’s death, and she’ll be on the first boat out. Probably to go enact some justice.

The foreshadowing is present in this little nugget in AFFC, when Arya is listening to the NW deserter sing:

He is a man of the Night's Watch, she thought, as he sang about some stupid lady throwing herself off some stupid tower because her stupid prince was dead. The lady should go kill the ones who killed her prince.

Which I think is exactly what Arya is going to try and do. She won’t, of course, lots of shit still has to happen before they reunite, but she’s definitely going to try. Fucking p o e t r y.

But the point is, it’ll be her love for Jon that draws Arya back to her true self and sets her on course to reclaiming her identity and returning home. To make it convincing, it makes complete sense to have Arya think of Jon as the only one that ever accepted her for who she was, that loved her unconditionally, that would want her despite all the horrific acts she was forced to commit to survive. He’s the one she’ll willingly and without doubt break her vows to the FM for.

Love is the death of duty.

Jon and Arya’s love for each other could very well be the death of their respective duties to their organisation and vows, and be the catalyst they each need to propel their narratives towards the climax of the story, re: the War of the Dawn, and beyond.

This is why I never understand those that think they’re interchangeable with other characters. They simply aren’t? Everything I’ve mentioned can only ever be applied to Jon and Arya. No other relationship has been so deeply developed, nor as intrinsically integrated into their POVs. Literally everything I’ve said is only applicable because they never shut up about each other.

I don’t think this contradicts Jonerys tbh, but I think it’s an important reminder that Jon and Arya’s relationship is very much as vital to the story as Jon and Dany’s. There’s a reason I ship them as an OT3, and I’m in love with Arya and Dany’s parallels as well. Arya and Daenerys are and will always be the two most important women in Jon Snow’s life, and in turn, he’s just as important in theirs.

I tried answering this as objectively as I could, and I hope this was what you were looking for!

Thank you so much for a brilliant ask!!

#I have a lot of feelings #jon snow #arya stark #jaime lannister #cersei lannister #jon x arya #jonrya #meta #this was waaay longer than I thought it would be #but I have fucking missed writing theories about my darlings #I love them so much #anon thank you so much for the ask!!#anonymous #answered

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laboratorioautoral · 5 years

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Jon Snow’s journey through the Major Arcana

Since I wrote a previous analysis of Arya’s journey through the Major Arcana of the Marseilles Tarot, I decided to write one for Jon as well. A shout out to @ourmrsreynolds for helping me with her great insights on the interpretation of the cards and the character!

The Devil: I can already see your shocked faces through the screen. This card tends to bring with it a lot of misconceptions because of the idea that we have of the devil. This card represents the conflict between what we should do and what we want to do. It represents attachment, addictions, restrictions (self-imposed or not) and sexuality. On the other hand, it can also represent breaking free from these restrictions, breaking rules or indulging dark thoughts.

This is card is a perfect summary of Jon’s entire arc. Jon lives a divided life between what he wants to be and what people expect him to be. The bastard status brings with it a very negative expectation and prejudices about his character in society. People expect him to be deceitful, greedy, evil in some way, or - the worst thing for anyone raised by Ned Stark – dishonorable. Jon lives to prove all of these to be wrong and to frustrate others’ expectations on his character. “Let them say that Eddard Stark sired four sons”. This sentence represents the moral compass that guided Jon through all of his narrative.

Jon doesn’t allow himself to be ambitious, so it won’t be seen as a threat to his legitimate siblings. In order to craft a position for himself and at the same time annul the threat he represents to his sibling, Jon goes to the Night’s Watch. He gives up his name, his family, his ambitions in the political scenario and even sexuality in order to become what “he wants to be”; an honorable man like Ned Stark.

Is it really what Jon wants to be though? The answer is no. Jon has ambitions or had at some point in his life. He wanted Winterfell, even though he knew it would be passed to Robb one day. He wanted to take Ned’s place in the future and be the Lord of Winterfell, with a family of his own. This became explicit when Stannis offered him the title.

Jon holds to all these restrictions tightly until he is confronted with the fact that life can’t be live in black and white. At the first contact with the wildlings, Jon starts to question several of his values and he experiences a level of freedom he had never allowed himself to have. At some point, holding up to these old values no longer makes sense. Between what he wants to be and what people expect him to be is where Jon’s true self if. “He was who he was; Jon Snow, bastard and oathbreaker, motherless, friendless, and damned.”

The Hierophant or The High Priest: this card represents conformity, tradition, institutions and religious beliefs. It can also represent personal belief, freedom and breaking the status quo. The High Priest, unlike the High Priestess, has disciples around him. He is a man in a position of power and influence.

This card represents Jon in the Night’s Watch, both as a steward and as Lord Commander. Jon is a natural leader. People tend to follow him and his presence demands respect. As I said before, he also holds to a number of strict values and to some extent he likes structure and stability, here represented as the Night’s Watch as an institution.

Jon also has personal beliefs and they are not always aligned with those of the structure/institution he represents. He breaks free from several previous concepts and throws status quo through the window at the moment he decides to help the wildling, becoming a leading figure to both the NW and the free folk in some ways.

The Moon: intuition, creativity, imagination and the shadow-self. Just like Arya, the moon is often present in Jon’s narrative and it represents yet another aspect of Jon’s personality that is kept hidden. Jon is a warg and Ghost is somewhat an extension of Jon’s identity.

Temperance: where Arya is Justice, Jon is Temperance. This card represents balance, moderation, patience, and purpose. In the negative aspect, it represents imbalance, excess, realignment and self-healing.

As Lord Commander, Jon has a political role to perform and being political is precisely the effort of balance several conflicting interests both inside, and outside the Night’s Watch. Jon serves as a bridge between the institution he represents, the wildlings, Stannis and his actions have an impact on the whole North. At the moment Jon decides to march to Winterfell and fight Bolton, this balance is broken and chaos follows.

The Lovers: love, trust and unity in a relationship. This card has both romantic aspects and also a pragmatic ones. It represents love in an ideal concept, but it also represents a choice between two options that are mutually exclusive. In the negative aspect, this card represents the internal conflict that affects one’s relationships (in a broad aspect, not only romantic ones).

Just like Arya refuses to let go of Needle and her own identity; Jon breaks the one rule he should never break. He forsakes his vows of neutrality and the promise of letting go of all his former familial bonds in order to save a girl he believes to be Arya. He can’t be a member of the Night’s Watch and save her at the same time.

This card also represents his relationship with Arya. The mutual trust, loyalty, and unity in a relationship that is selfless. You can see it as a platonic, familial or even romantic sort of love, but there’s no way to deny the fact that Jon and Arya love each other deeply and are fiercely loyal to each other as well. To deny it is to ignore Jon’s entire arc and the fact that Arya is the main feminine reference that he has, and also the first experience he has with love coming from a woman/girl. Arya takes the place of the loving female figure that should have been occupied by a mother. Jon has no maternal love reference in Catelyn, at least not directed to him. He observed the difference in the treatment she gave to her sons and to himself. Although he has witnessed Cat being a good mother, we can’t say that he experienced it himself. This first reference to feminine love came from Arya, who seems to be Lyanna 2.0.

The Judgment: judgment, inner calling, absolution, rebirth. It can also represent the act of ignoring a call, self-doubt and inner critic. Every action must have a consequence. In some ways this card represents karma.

Every unpopular decision Jon made along his journey leads to the moment he is attacked by his black brothers. Jon’s death isn’t something that happened by accident. This result could be foreseen all along and at every step he gave in the opposite direction of the Night’s Watch’s rules were a step closer to his death. It’s interesting that this card also represents rebirth, isn’t it?

The Emperor: authority, establishment, structure, a father figure. In the negative aspect is the domination, excess of control, lack of flexibility and discipline.

The card in the first moment represents all the male figures that represented an example to be followed in Jon’s life. Ned, the Old Bear, Half-Hand, Benjen, and Mance are represented in this card. They are all parts of the man Jon wants to be and also everything he can’t be because Jon is his own person with all his virtues and flaws that are not the same as these men’s.

It’s also the father he never knew but is somehow dictating his future. Rhaegar was born to be a king but died before the right time. This legacy is passed to his son.

#jon snow #jon and arya #jon x arya #jon/arya #jonarya #meta #tarot #tarot symbolism

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asknightqueendany · 6 years

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The Big Five (Bran, Arya, Jon, Dany, Tyrion) who will survive is only something that George R. R. Martin wrote in a letter about the upcoming series in 199-fucking-3. It was supposed to be a trilogy. There was supposed to be a love triangle between Tyrion, Arya and Jon. Also dany wasn’t supposed to have dragons in that outline so STOP using the big 5 to justify that Sansa isn’t an important character! It’s getting old and transparent.

I’m cracking up. Have you people even READ the original outline? No? I highly suggest you check it out before sending me asks on it again. You can see the original photos and transcribed texts HERE.

But let’s go through it because it’s a glorious Friday afternoon and I feel like taking some people down a notch.

The things I seem most about GRRM’s original outline as reasons why it shouldn’t be taken seriously are: 1) it was supposed to be a trilogy and 2) there was supposed to be a love triangle between Jon, Arya, and Tyrion. I don’t know where you got the whole, “Dany wasn’t supposed to have dragons” thing anon because according to the outline, there be dragons:

But let’s take a look at the letter. George states, “There are three major conflicts set in motion in the chapters enclosed. These will form the major plot threads of the trilogy, intertwining each other in what should be a complex but exciting (I hope) narrative tapestry. Each of the conflicts presents a major threat to the peace of my imaginary realm, the Seven Kingdoms, and to the lives of my principal characters.”

The first threat, George says, is the Lannister/Stark conflict.

The second threat is the Dothraki invasion, led by Daenerys in what George thought would be his second novel - A Dance With Dragons.

And the Third and final threat to Westeros would be the Others in his presumed last novel - The Winds of Winter.

Now, right off the bat, George has already used all the book titles, with TWOW in progress. On the show, we’ve already seen the play out and conclusion of the Lannister/Stark war. Daenerys/Dothraki invasion of Westeros has happened in the show. And the Others had begun invading the Seven Kingdoms at the end of Season 7.

So all of what George first said has come to pass, just eight seasons and seven books, not a trilogy.

In AGOT, things George said would happen was that Ned and Cat were doomed (✓), things for the Starks would get worse before they got better (✓), Ned would find out what happened to Jon Arryn (✓), Robert would have an accident and the throne would pass to Joffrey (✓), Ned would be accused of treason (✓), and Ned would help Arya and Catelyn escape to Winterfell (did not happen). HOWEVER - Cat never needed escaping from King’s Landing AND Arya did escape King’s Landing after Ned’s beheading - she just didn’t receive help from him.

George says of Sansa: she will wed Joffrey (no) and bear him a son (no), “and when the crunch comes she will choose her husband and child over her parents and siblings, a choice she will later bitterly rue” (✓ - Sansa DOES choose Joffrey over her family in the Riverlands and then again in King’s Landing by going behind Ned’s back to tell Cersei of his plan to send them back to Winterfell and willingly volunteers to write the letter to Robb so that she can still marry Joffrey (not because Cersei made her write it, she did it for Joffrey). Tyrion befriends Sansa (✓) and Arya (no) and becomes disillusioned with his own family (✓).

I’m just going to quote the whole letter from now on because I’m too lazy to type…

“Young Bran will come out of his coma (✓), after a strange prophetic dream (✓), only to discover that he will never walk again (✓). He will turn to magic, at first in the hope of restoring his legs, but later for its own sake (✓). When his father Eddard Stark is executed, Bran will see the shape of doom descending on all of them, but nothing he can say will stop his brother Robb from calling the banners in rebellion (✓) . All the north will be inflamed by war (✓). Robb will win several splendid victories (✓), and maim Joffrey Baratheon on the battlefield (no), but in the end he will not be able to stand against Jaime and Tyrion Lannister and their allies. Robb Stark will die in battle (no), and Tyrion Lannister will besiege and burn Winterfell (no - kinda).” - Winterfell does get besieged and burned, only not by Tyrion, by Theon and Ramsay. And of course, Robb will die during his war against the Lannisters, just not in battle.

“Jon Snow, the bastard, will remain in the far north (✓). He will mature into a ranger of great daring (✓ - kinda), and ultimately will succeed his uncle as the commander of the Night’s Watch(✓ - kinda). When Winterfell burns, Catelyn Stark will be forced to flee north with her son Bran and her daughter Arya (no - kinda). Wounded by Lannister riders, they will seek refuge at the Wall, but the men of the Night’s Watch give up their families when they take the black, and Jon and Benjen will not be able to help, to Jon’s anguish (no). It will lead to a bitter estrangement between Jon and Bran (no). Arya will be more forgiving … until she realizes, with terror, that she has fallen in love with Jon, who is not only her half-brother but a man of the Night’s Watch, sworn to celibacy (no - kinda). Their passion will continue to torment Jon and Arya throughout the trilogy, until the secret of Jon’s true parentage is finally revealed in the last book (no - kinda).” - though Jon isn’t a ranger, he goes on a ranging and is pretty daring. He does become LC but not succeeding Benjen, succeeding Mormont. Bran does flee to the Wall, but to go beyond it. Arya tries to flee North/to the Wall but doesn’t make it. Jon is tormented by a love because of his NW vows of celibacy - Ygritte - and does develop feelings for his kin - Daenerys.

“Abandoned by the Night’s Watch, Catelyn and her children will find their only hope of safety lies even further north, beyond the Wall (no - kinda), where they fall into the hands of Mance Rayder, the King-beyond-the-Wall, and get a dreadful glimpse of the inhuman others as they attack the wildling encampment (no - kinda). Bran’s magic, Arya’s sword Needle, and the savagery of their direwolves will help them survive, but their mother Catelyn will die at the hands of the others (no - kinda).” - as stated, Bran does go beyond the Wall, Jon is the one who falls into the hands of Mance Rayder, Jon does get a glimpse of an Other attack on a wildling encampment (Hardhome), and Bran’s magic and direwolf do save him from the Others (The Door - Hodor).

“Over across the narrow sea, Daenerys Targaryen will discover that her new husband, the Dothraki Khal Drogo, has little interest in invading the Seven Kingdoms, much to her brother’s frustration(✓). When Viserys presses his claims past the point of tact or wisdom, Khal Drogo will finally grow annoyed and kill him out of hand, eliminating the Targaryen pretender and leaving Daenerys as the last of her line (✓). Danerys [sic] will bide her time, but she will not forget (✓). When the moment is right, she will kill her husband (✓) to avenge her brother (no), and then flee with a trusted friend into the wilderness beyond Vaes Dothrak (✓ - kinda). There, hunted by Dothraki bloodriders (✓) [unclear] of her life, she stumbles on a cach***e of dragon’***s eggs (✓ - kinda) [unclear] of a young dragon will give Daenerys the power to bend the Dothraki to her will (✓). Then she begins to plan for her invasion of the Seven Kingdoms (✓). - Daenerys does wander the wilderness beyond Vaes Dothrak (after she hatches her dragons) with her Khalasar in the Red Waste. She does get dragons eggs, just given to her at her wedding instead of stumbling upon them (really, that’s just better storytelling on George’s part. If she had just randomly found them, it would feel too coincidental). Dany did kill Drogo but not to avenge Viserys; it was to put him out of his misery. Dany does use her powers to bend the Dothraki to her will (burning the Khals to become TSWMTW).

“Tyrion Lannister will continue to travel, to plot, and to play the game of thrones (✓), finally removing his nephew Joffrey in disgust at the boy king’s brutality (no - kinda). Jaime Lannister will follow Joffrey on the throne of the Seven Kingdoms (no - kinda), by the simple expedient of killing everyone ahead of him in the line of succession and blaming his brother Tyrion for the murders (no - kinda). Exiled (✓), Tyrion will change sides (✓), making common cause with the surviving Starks to bring his brother down (✓ - kinda), and falling helplessly in love with Arya Stark (✓ - kinda) while he’s at it. His passion is, alas, unreciprocated (✓ - kinda), but no less intense for that, and it will lead to a deadly rivalry between Tyrion and Jon Snow (yet to be seen).” - Joffrey is killed and Tyrion is accused though he wasn’t guilty. Cersei follows her son to the throne after Tommen’s death (which was her fault so she essentially killed him), Tyrion joins Daenerys to bring down Cersei, he falls in love with Dany (according to all of Peter’s interviews about his feelings for Daenerys), as Dany is in love with Jon, it seems Tyrion’s affections are reciprocated, and we don’t yet know if Tyrion and Jon will fight to the death. It’s possible.

So anon, I’d say so far as George’s predictions go for the entire series, he’s gotten it closer to his original outline than not. So please, for the last goddamn time, leave me alone with this bullshit that the Original outline doesn’t mean anything so far as Sansa’s character and I should stop referring to it. Almost everything George predicted he’d write, has come to pass. Perhaps not how he originally thought…but largely, it’s all happened.

Wanna know why Sansa’s a “major character” in the show? Look:

And it’s because of Turner’s strength, Benioff continued, that it made sense to give Sansa a dramatic storyline this season and to use Ramsay’s engagement for that very purpose. In fact, the showrunners first thought about putting Sansa and Ramsay together back when they were writing season 2. “We really wanted Sansa to play a major part this season,” Benioff said. “If we were going to stay absolutely faithful to the book, it was going to be very hard to do that.

D&D wanted it. It’s not George’s story or George’s plan. Dan and Dave like Sophie’s acting and wanted her to play a more major role. So they gave her that. It has absolutely nothing to do with the series as a whole or the endgame. Sansa is not a main character and she will matter very little to the endgame.

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julibf · 6 years

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Jaime Lannister as the Hand of the King.

On season one we were literally told by Tyrion Lannister on episode 1, that Jaime was the handsome brother and that Tyrion was the smart one. That of course, its not a lie, but I do think it was a way for books and show to deceives us, to overestimate Tyrion’s intelligence and underestimate Jaime’s capability as a leader and as a judge of human character. Jaime was the one who told to Jory on S1 E4 how dangerous Theon seemed to be for House Stark and what a risk his was for the family, while Tyrion could only mock the way Theon talked about his masters. Jaime proved to be the one right since later Theon would betray House Stark and take Winterfell.

Saving the lives of innocent people and spare blood shed seems to be a constant on Jaime’s live. He saved the life of millions of people in KL and instead of being made a hero, he became a disgraced man, and oathbreaker, a man without honor because only few knew the reason why he did what he did.

Yet, Jaime still kept on trying to save lives during his life, in fact, it got my attention in my re watch that he did offer himself to fight Robb Stark in a man to man combat, in order to avoid the war between Starks and Lannisters. Thats exactly what Jon Snow did in season 6, but of course at the time we all thought he was a jackass to make such offer, because we knew it he was a great swordfighter and would of course beat Robb Stark, but he was trying to save the lives of thousands because that’s one of the constants in Jaime’s life. He is always trying to avoid more blood shed.

When he was sent to Riverland to take back the Tully’s castle he tried every way he could to avoid more deaths and more conflicts. First he tried to use diplomacy but when that didn’t work he lied to Edmure Tully and told him he would kill his son, it was a drastic way, but it did avoid even more destruction and deaths in the Riverlands.

When he went to Dorne, he was able to solve the conflict between House Martell and House Lannister without bloodshell and was bringing Myrcella home without another war.

I think a ruler or a person of power that tries to solve the conflicts with diplomacy and negotiation its one of the most important points of the books. A leader, a king, a ruler should always try to save their people and try other methods before war. George RRM is a anti war man, but he does believes that some war are necessary and unavoidable, BUT if there is chance for peace, it should be explored.

So, I believe George RRM has big plans for Jaime in the end of this story and will award him with a hppy ending for caring so much for the lives of the people in Westeros.

* S1E1 in his first scene with Cersei she tells him that he should be the Hand and Jaime remarks that its a honor that he could live without and makes a joke telling her that its a job that requires long days. Remember Jaime always uses jokes to deflect insecurance or frustration. I actually think he likes the idea.

* S1E1 When they are preparing for the feast in the evening Jaime goes after Tyrion who is in a brothel with some whores. Jaime shows up and tells him to get ready for the party. "The Starks are feasting on this evening, please dont leave me alone with those people"

That already got my attention. I expect the Jon and the Starks to rule the kingdom in the end and a new time, a time for wolves to start in Westeros by the end of this story, and I think Jaime will be the last Lannister left to restore his House.

* S1E2 Later we see Jaime going to Jon Snow to thank him for joining the NW, he offers his right hand and makes a joke about Jon's decision. They even make sure to focus on the hand shake.

* When Ned Stark arrives in Kings Landing Jaime is in the Throne room to receive him. He makes a joke about Ned being the hand of the King "how do they say it? the King shits and the Hand cleans it?

Again, he is making another joke and mocking Ned Stark, but I think he is a bit jealous, he wanted the job, but people dont think he is serious enough for such position. Nobody taks him seriously, no even his family.

* S1E5 - in the Robert and Cersei scene where they discuss their marriage, once again there is the idea of Jaime being the hand of the King. Robert says that he will make Jaime his hand, but Cersei knows tells him that Jaime is not serious enough for the job.

* S1E5 Robert goes see Ned and orders him to put back the badge of hand of the King or he will put the badge on JAIME LANNISTER and make him the Hand of the King!!!

How many times now did they mention Jaime and the Hand of the King job? how did I miss this in my first views of the show? I was actually shocked.

* S1E7 - Tywin is introduced in that awesome scene with the dead stag and in that scene he asks Jaime to become the man he was supposed to be. Jaime now in season 7 is finally taking back his life and becoming the hero we all expect him to be. Jaime completely outsmarted Tyrion in season 7 using the mistakes he made in the past as a lesson. Jaime and Jon were literally the two leaders on season 7 trying to save their people from unecessary deaths. He went to Cersei to tells her that they couldnt win against Dragons, he wanted her to surrender to Dany to save the lives of his armies and his people; he decided to abandon her to go fight North and save the realm. He is finally becoming the man he is supposed to be.

And that quote from Jon in season 7 also made me think of him and Jaime "my father used to say, we find our true friends in the battlefield". I think Jon and Jaime will forge a nice relationship in season 8 and Jon will need someone with experience in Kings Landing. Jaime lived his whole life in the capital and watched his father and Jon Arryn being hands of the king for decades. He will help Jon to be a better king.

There is also foreshadowed in the books about this ending game possibility. Our brilliant fedonciadale pointed out that:

And I would like to add that in the books it is not a pin, but a chain of hands that signifies the office of the hand.And the mummers make a rope and hang Jaime’s hand around his neck like a chain.

Bolton’s silence was a hundred times more threatening than Vargo Hoat’s slobbering malevolence. Pale as morning mist, his eyes concealed more than they told. Jaime misliked those eyes. They reminded him of the day at King’s Landing when Ned Stark had found him seated on the Iron Throne. The Lord of the Dreadfort finally pursed his lips and said, “You have lost a hand.” "No,“ said Jaime, “I have it here, hanging round my neck.” (ASOS, Jaime IV)

And even before Jaime lost his hand, the books were already focusing on his right hand, as jonbonsnowvi pointed out:

Ned, he should have kissed the hand that slew Aerys, but he preferred to scorn the arse he found sitting on Robert’s throne –– ACOK - Catelyn VII

How cool is that? That would be a surprise ending for Jaime Lannister. Make it happen!!!!

#game of thrones #got #jaime lannister #aegon targaryen #jon snow

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rogers-senpai · 7 years

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“Jonerys has no foreshadows, no parallels, nothing other than them being Targaryens”

Yes, that’s an actual thing Jonsa shipper said to me, talking about all their Oh sO CoNviNcing metas and “foreshadows”. So HERE WE GO, ALL THE ONES I AM AWARE OF AND I HAVE SOME NEW ONES THAT I HAVEN’T SEEN BROUGHT UP SO STAY WITH ME TILL THE END.

1. Both bring their sigil animals, believed to be extinct, back to the game. Jon is the one to convince Ned to save the pups, and he found Ghost himself. Dany literally brought dragons back.

2. Both start as secondary characters, underastimated and both gradually came to being leaders and one of the most iconic characters in both the show and TV as a whole.

3. Both are the underestimated sibling. Jon as a bastard, Dany as a female. Both looked down upon by their family members.

4. Despite being the undestimated one, Jon is said to have more of North in him than any of his siblings. Tyrion was the one who said that to him, I believe. And Dany ends up being the dragon, so more of a Targaryen or a Valyrian in a way than Viserys.

5. Their first loves died in their arms.

6. What’s also interesting about that ^ is that Drogo dies because of the witch and Dany in books is sure that was the first betrayal she had the vision about, and Ygritte is killed by Olly, who later betrays Jon. Ygritte in books isn’t killed by Olly, but still by men who end up betraying him. And again, both Ygritte and Drogo were savages, both killed by people who the savages have hurt

7. Both are believed to be The Prince Who Was Promised. They are the two main theories, for sure. And both kinda fit, but not entirely. But when you think about them as whole…They fit much more.

“I believe you have a role to play as does another. The King in The North - Jon Snow.“

8. Both taken hostage by savages, who they end up leading. Both are attached to those savages, and are accepted by them, despite being outsiders.

“You were the first one to bring Dothraki to Westeros, he was the first to make allies of Wildlings and Northmen.”

9. Both start their journey in the first book, Dany with Dothraki, Jon with the Night’s Watch, which both have a bad reputation, as rapers and thiefs and such. And they both end up as their leaders, both trying to stop the flaws of their packs. Jon trying to help the Wildlings, Dany not allowing them to rape, or steal from in example Qarth, before the shit there goes down, that didn’t go down in the books if i remember correctly.

“She protects people from monsters, just as you do.”

Both face many setbacks and become increasingly frustrated with their roles as leaders.

11. Both feel so lonely and sad at first. Jon after seeing what NW really was, and Dany does not need to be even explained I think.

10. Both, at some point are given the chance to literally make their dreams come true. Jon being proposed by Stannis to be legitimized as a Stark, and Dany being offered all the ships and money she needed to go to Westeros. And both decline because of morals. Jon keeps his vows, Dany stays to free the slaves.

11. “One to bed, one to dread, one to love.” Jon is Dany’s third love interest, Daario was more of a bed partner (”to bed”) and Drogo was someone Dany was at first sooo scared of (”one to dread”).

12. “ A blue flower grew from a chink in a wall of ice, and filled the air with sweetness… . mother of dragons, bride of fire … “ Blue flowers obvioulsy symbolizes Jon, that’s certain. And who is at the Wall???

13. Ok so Dany being called “Moon of my live”, moon is strongly associated with her bc of that, "Dragons come from the moon" thing, like think about a moon in GoT and tell me you don’t think of Dany, and being the only female with silver hair, that being her most iconic trait. ( “ The old woman washed her long, silver-pale hair and gently combed out the snags, all in silence. The girl scrubbed her back and her feet and told her how lucky she was.”) and this: “The light of the half-moon turned Vals honey-blond hair a pale silver and left her cheeks as white as snow. She took a deep breath. The air tastes sweet.”

MOON TURNED HER HAIR SILVER.

So three things that can be considered to be about Dany in two sentences. And the thing about Jon not smelling the sweetness, which some antis point out, is obvious. He is the sweetness.

14. “Sometimes she would close her eyes and dream of him, but it was never Jorah Mormont she dreamed of; her lover was always younger and more comely, though his face remained a shifting shadow.” - Dany, ASOS

Targaryens are prone to having prophetic dreams, Dany has them as well.

“For the rest of his life –however long that might be– he would be condemned to be an outsider, the silent man standing in the shadows who dares not speak his true name.” - Jon, AGOT

“The flames crackled softly, and in their crackling she heard the whispered name Jon Snow. His long face floated before her, limned in tongues of red and orange, appearing and disappearing again, a shadow half-seen behind a fluttering curtain.” - Melisandre, ADWD

15. “Jon fell to his knees. He found the dagger’s hilt and wrenched it free. In the cold night air the wound was smoking. “Ghost,” he whispered. Pain washed over him. Stick them with the pointy end. When the third dagger took him between the shoulder blades, he gave a grunt and fell face-first into the snow. He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold … “ - ADWD

“Off in the distance, a wolf howled. The sound made her feel sad and lonely, but no less hungry. As the moon rose above the grasslands, Dany slipped at last into a restless sleep.“ - ADWD

Are wolves in Essos a common sight????

16. “… but the Usurper’s dogs had murdered her brother’s son when he was still a babe at the breast. If he had lived, I might have married him. “ - ADWD

“The best way to make alliances is with marriage.“

“If he does rule the North, he’d make a valuable ally.“

17. “He might as well wish for another thousand men, and maybe a dragon or three.”

GRRM clearly making us think about Dany, like come on, possibly helping Jon.

18. Both were sneaked away in order to keep them save from those who would harm them - baby Targaryens (Jon from South to North and Dany West to East)

19. “ Even with Ygritte sleeping beside him, he felt alone. “ “Her captain slept beside her, yet she was alone. “

Find me another example of someone in GoT feeling alone while sleeping next to their lover, for reasons. Also both mentioned during times when they had to choose. Jon between duty and Ygritte, Dany between duty (marrying Hizdahr) and the man she wanted - Daario.

20. Both have Mormonts as mentors, Jon has Jeor and Dany has Jorah. Also, Jon wields the Mormont family sword Longclaw which once belonged to Jorah. That’s less powerful, but the only Mormonts we really know until Lyanna are with them, helping them, showing them the way.

21. “A Targeryen alone in the world is a terrible thing” guess what two Targaryens met and made an alliance and found love oops

22. Both were seperated from their animal for a long time, until they came back and helped to kill some bitches.

23. Both are seen as somewhat godly, Jon coming back from the dead, Dany being the Unburnt which gave us this visual parallel:

24. Both share some moral rules, Dany being more a dragon ofc, but still like:

the last one didn’t go unnoticed by Jon either, like WORD TO WORD

25. These two iconic scenes, that even Kit mentioned being weirdly reflective of each other

26. “Well, of course, the two outlying ones — the things going on north of the Wall, and then there is Targaryen on the other continent with her dragons — are of course the ice and fire of the title, “A Song of Ice and Fire.” ‘ - George RR Martin.

27. “If destiny has brought Daenerys Targaryen back to our shores, it has also made Jon Snow King in The North.”

28. “These are two people in love…” Kit Harington

29. “She didn’t feel she was missing anything [in her love life]. It took someone coming and forcing her mind to be changed,” - Emilia Clarke

30. “He walks into the room and doesn’t expect to see such a beautiful young woman of similar age to him,” - Kit again. It was important enough then to make that point.

32. “[Martin] did sort of say things that made it clear that the meeting and the convergence of Jon and Dany were sort of the point of the series.” - Alex Taylor in an interview with Deadline

33. “However, as she meets and becomes more familiar with Jon Snow (Kit Harington), Dany’s outfits appear lined with fur, a staple of Northern attire that feels symbolic of her growing affection for the King in the North. “There is obviously some chemistry at work!” Clapton said about the relationship between Dany and Jon”

34. “I think when she sees him return on the back of Coldhand’s horse, that’s a big moment for her in terms of the way she feels about him.”

“It’s kind of hard for her at this point for, I think, not to look at this guy and not realize that this is not like the other boys”

- D.B Weiss, Game of Thrones: Season 7 Episode 6: Inside the Episode

35. “I don’t think either one of them really knew exactly how powerful their feeling were towards each other until these moments. Just the notion of falling for someone, that involves weakness. That’s not something a queen does, but she feels that happening and he feels it happening for her. I think both of them are on kinda unfamiliar ground and especially because it’s with an equal,”

- David Benioff, Game of Thrones: Season 7 Episode 6: Inside the Episode

36. Wars of the Roses were an inspiration for ASOIAF, Aand that war ended with Henry VII and Elizabeth of York joining the roses. Henry was an heir in staright line, that had lived his entire life in exile, Yorks were inspiration for Starks. So yup Dany and Jon work p e r f e c t l y. The war they will end might be The Great War, or the War for the Iron Throne.

Henry - the red rose Elizabeth - the white rose

37. And if the book version of HofU visions does not convince you how about the show version, where Dany almost touches the Iron Throne, but turns to go beyond the Wall instead, where she finds her lover and a child . SOUNDS FAMILIAR? Plus, just before she touches the Iron Throne , doesn’t she hear a dragon cry that makes her turn?

ADD ALL THE OTHER VISUAL PARALLELS THAT I DO NOT HAVE THE GIFS OF, SORRY AND HOW THE SHOW CREW NAMED THEIR SCENES “A DATE WITH DESTINY” AND “UNION OF ICE AND FIRE"

Yeah, why do we even ship that.

credits to @midqueenally for all the parallel gifs

#jonerys #jon x daenerys #jon x dany #jonerys parallels #game of thrones #jon snow #daenerys targaryen

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thelawyerthatwaspromised · 7 years

Text

What Makes Jon Snow Different Part 2

Part 1 found here.

This is part 2 of a 2 part-post regarding Jon Snow’s compassion and kindness leading to his support from strangers and former adversaries. His entire political foundation is built on his loyal friends and the positive relationships he’s fostered since leaving Winterfell. Part 1 covered his leaving Winterfell up until he returned from Hardhome with the Wildlings he helped save.

Jon’s Assassination and the Aftermath

Jon is murdered by Thorne and company because of his decision to let the Wildlings pass through the Wall. At any other time, Jon would never have considered this and he probably would have agreed that it was treasonous. However, extenuating circumstances require that Jon re-evaluate the relations between the Free Folk and the rest of Westeros.

For his foresight and compassion; Jon is murdered. A cursory glance might make the viewer believe the lesson is that kindness and compassion is foolish. The results of Jon’s actions actually point the exact opposite direction. Jon continues to reap the benefits of his good deeds and is able to survive and navigate a situation in which any other person likely would have made poor decisions, died, or both.

Jon is dead. King Crow is stabbed through the heart. But what saves him? Dumb luck? The will of the gods? I suppose to a certain extent you can say that but my answer is different; Jon is saved because of how many people are willing to die for him which is directly related to the person Jon has become.

We have Davos and some select brothers, including Edd, barricading themselves to protect Jon’s body and willing to die fighting to defend it. Jon is dead at this point. Dead. They are willing to die essentially for Jon’s honor. Davos, the man who previously served a man who burned people for some godly rewards. The man who saw Jon defy his king by way of an arrow through Mance’s heart. Edd, the man who Jon showed faith in...the man who rewarded Jon’s faith by performing admirably at the battle and also at Hardhome.

It gets deeper.

The Free Folk are willing to literally break down the gates to Castle Black to defend Jon. The Free Folk that Jon fought against are the same people that Jon spoke for among the Night’s Watch and gave his life to try to save.

Leading this charge?

Edd and Tormund now marching side by side. Edd, who opposed Jon’s mission to Hardhome in the first place. Edd saw the Night King’s army. He knows the mission now. He’s also become one of Jon Snow’s close friends. Edd rallies the Free Folk to punish the mutineers. Yet this is also the Jon Snow effect....the Free Folk enter Castle Black and don’t just kill everyone that would oppose them.

When else in history is a scene like this even possible?

The Red Woman. So cold and detached from the inhumane deeds she’s performed to this point, is shown so weak and vulnerable and desperate to save Jon Snow. She’s moved far closer to Jon’s point of view than the other way around. She regrets burning Shireen (she still must pay for that) - she feels broken - and her attempt to save Jon conveys a humility that was completely non-existent before.

“Please.”

Jon’s back to life. He still feels utterly broken. The family he thought he gained (NW) betrayed him for doing the right thing. He’s resigned to head south and live a quiet life while watching the world end. What else is there left to fight for if his family is gone and the men he thought existed to protect the world from monsters would murder him for saving innocent people?

In walks Sansa Stark.

“Where will we go?” Jon pledges to protect Sansa. He pledges to try to make the world safe for her. He pledges that where he goes, she too, will go. Sansa has done nothing but been betrayed over and over and over again through the series and here is someone that finally, FINALLY, will put her before himself.

She inspires him to fight again. They decide that they must take back Winterfell. Jon is thrust into world politics for the first time. He’s flailing in front of Lady Mormont....

Davos speaks for Jon. Yet again, Jon doesn’t have the oratory skills to do this by himself. He needs help and he receives help from people who have seen him put his life on the line to do the right thing.

Jon also goes back to the Free Folk to ask for aid. He knows that’s not the deal he made with them previously. He doesn’t try to play words games or deny what’s happened. He owns the situation but tells them that they have to see the bigger picture. Again, there’s a part where Jon struggles to find the right words and someone comes to his aid.

Tormund. Again. Sticking his neck out for Jon because Jon stuck his neck out for him and also because ultimately, Jon is right.

Jon hates being praised. A consistent character trait that contrasts him strongly with almost every other political leader on the show.

And which member of the Free Folk “pledges” for Jon first? Probably one that’s seen why Jon is someone worth following:

Wum Wum, another former enemy combatant and the last of the fucking giants, was willing to fight and die because he believed in Jon.

This is the crew Jon brings to the Battle of the Bastards. His sister-cousin-wife (the entire reason for his attempting to retake Winterfell in the first place), a former enemy combatant whom he freed and turned into a close ally, and the former Hand of a King that Jon had openly defied.

Jon has a sparring match with Ramsay. There was a clear difference in the type of person Jon is compared to Ramsay and major players were there to watch it.

Lady Mormont, who trusted in Jon to win and restore order to the North, got a personal chance to see Jon win the battle, yes, but also to see how he conducts himself. Jon turned her into a true believer.

And so when Lady Mormont sees Jon again struggling to control the meeting of the Northern lords following the battle, she identifies that he needs her help and he’s more than earned her help.

Jon is also given a fork in the road when he speaks with Lord Glover. Lord Glover broke faith with House Stark and refused to aid them at the BotB. It’s certainly an option for Jon to consider Lord Glover, and any other lord the refused the call, as traitors.

Instead, Jon chooses a different and compassionate path.

Echoing a line spoken by Ned Stark in season 1, “there’s nothing to forgive.” You see, Jon could rule authoritatively. He could act entitled. He could demand allegiance while alternatively threatening death for anyone that doesn’t obey him. But that’s not Jon. This is how he builds his supports. It’s how he’s done it since the beginning of his ascent.

The result?

If the way in which Jon accumulated his power is the mark of a good man, his refusal to change who he is as a result makes him a great man. He’s rewarded those he trusts the most with responsibility and never was this more evident than with Sansa Stark after he had decided he must go to Dragonstone.

Sansa has needed validation like this for the entirety of the series. Jon shows the absolute ultimate faith in her by giving her the North before he departs. How many other characters on this show could we ever have expected to do something like this whose last name isn’t “Stark”?

Sansa immediately recognizes what Jon is doing for her. While just seconds previous she pleaded for Jon to remain, she knows that Jon is trusting her with this mission and she wants to do her best for him.

This is why it all will matter:

Jon has proven to every person that he deserves the benefit of the doubt. He’s won friendships and loyalties of people who were previously his enemies. Those same former enemies are willing to die for him. Not because of tricks or speeches or pageantry, but because he’s earned it.

Not long after, when the lords become frustrated with Jon’s decision to leave, it is Sansa who affirms Jon’s position and it’s Sansa who continues to work tirelessly to provide Jon with the armies and supplies he needs to defend the North and the realm.

His grandest gesture in giving the North to Sansa will be instrumental in his surviving the fallout when R+L=J goes public.

His original compassion to Sam builds to Sam working with Bran and helping Jon save Westeros.

His conviction to do the right thing in saving Tormund and the Free Folk won him loyal and fierce friends.

So why is Jon Snow different?

He is the People’s King.

#jon snow #jonsa #jonsa is endgame #westeros politics #king in the north #the prince who was promised #the white wolf #the people's king

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cmc-alumni · 6 years

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19TH STREET, Manhattan

In mid-September 2008 I embarked on my first Forgotten mission after a brief, but horrendous battle with a stomach flu of some kind that struck on September 11th, of all dates, a couple of hours after a meal of baked chicken and boiled frozen vegetables. (Even now, in mid-October, your webmaster hasn’t returned to frozen corn, beans or peas, but I know I have to eventually for the sake of health; I have been depending on salads for vegetative intake). So, I opted for a relatively brief hike on 19th Street, which I had found interesting some monhs back and filed a mental note to revisit. Not only did I find interesting architectural elements, but also some oblique references to my own life, as we’ll see…

The Joyce Theatre, at 8th Avenue and 19th, is a 472-seat dance performace venue opened in 1982 in the renovated and remodeled Elgin Theatre, opened in 1942, that had come on hard times in the 1970s as a porno palace — the renovation was suprvised by architect Hugh Hardy, whose Radio City Music Hall tour I attended — he revived RCMH as well — as part of Open House NY in 2008.

Your webmaster is not a ballet or modern dance fan, but I note the theatre because it is named for one of the founders of one of my workplaces. Joyce Mertz-Gilmore along with her parents, Harold and LuEsther Mertz, founded Publishers Clearing House, the premier direct marketing company in the country, in their basement in Sands Point, NY, in 1953. photo: wikipedia

The Joyce Theatre exists in great part due to the philanthropic efforts of LuEsther Mertz.

Directly across the Joyce, on 8th Avenue and 19th, was a Blimpie where I would get lunch once a week while employed at an international-language typesetter, ANY Phototype, on West 29th. In June 1990 I acquired one of my worst-ever stomach flus (until this year) at that Blimpie. Look, it made me remember the place. It was decorated unusually: it was filled with house plants.

I’ve only been in the Peter McManus Cafe, at 7th Avenue and W. 19th, once — in 1993, I had just gotten out of class at the School of Visual Arts, went in and called a friend to meet me there, whence we went to see The Fugitive, the Harrison Ford version. (I had a splitting headache that day.)

McManus looks as if it has been here forever, but it isn’t nearly as old as, say, the Old Town Bar or the granddaddy, McSorley’s Ale House. It has been owned and operated by the McManus family since it opened in 1936.

Looking south on 7th Avenue toward the old Barney’s. Several new residential towers have appeared on this stretch in the last few years (not at the fever pitch of 6th Avenue in the West 20s, though). Dominating the landscape is the new Coke bottle-green-glass-clad Yves Chelsea tower at West 18th. The penthouse will go for $10M, at least it was going to before all the Wall Street hotshots, bankers, and ill-advised real estate buyers tanked the economy.

Speaking of the economy, the last time your webmaster was out of work, all my unemployment check arrangements were handled electronically and there was less of a need to cut up paperwork before throwing it away. Nevertheless there will always be a neeed for scissors and shears, and that’s where Griffon came in. According to faded ad historian Walter Grutchfield, the Griffon Cutlery Works was founded by Albert Silberstein in 1888 and was located here on West 19th between 1920 and 1968. As you can see from the link the ad was in much better shape in 1986, and time is gradually taking a toll.

Note the palimpsest at the bottom. The company changed from “Works” to “Corporation” in the 1940s and painted over Works with Corp. Both are showing up now.

This sign is also an “example” of unnecessary quotation “marks.” They’re all over the place.

Pinking shears, by the way, are shears with jagged edges, used to cut thick cloth.

2008, meet 1908 along the south side of West 19th just east of 7th Avenue.

The Henry Siegel-Frank Cooper Dry Goods store, built in 1895 and in business until 1914, is the largest of the 6th Avenue Ladies’ Mile emporia, containing 15.5 acres of floor space. It used to have a clock tower as well as a large fountain, since removed and placed in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Los Angeles. A ramp from the old Sixth Avenue El (razed in 1938) allowed passengers to walk directly into the store from the platform on the 18th Street side. This is Beaux Arts at its most Beaux.

The store pioneered the use of free samples, female salespersons, and air conditioning as customer inducements, and one of its mottoes was “Everything Under The Sun.” Industrialist/barbed-wire king John Warne Gates once made a bet with financier J. P. Morgan that the boast was just rhetorical. Gates asked a floorwalker if the store sold elephants, whereupon he was directed to the toy department; Gates responded that he meant a real elephant. The representative asked him what color, Gates responded “white” and the answer was “we’ll let you know the delivery date.” A few weeks later Gates received a telegram informing him his order would be arriving the next day at the docks: an albino elephant shipped from Ceylon. Gates paid Morgan the bet and donated the pachyderm to the Central Park Zoo.

I see something new every time I pass or enter the Siegel-Cooper building. For example, here is one of the intertwined S/C’s that flank the arched entrance.

All 4 corners of West 19th and 6th are held down bu beautiful buildings of varying beauty and fame. On the NW corner (above right) is the Simpson-Crawford Building, constructed in 1900 and home to the titular store until 1915. The store popularized the phrase, “if you have to ask the price, you can’t afford it” and indeed the store eschewed the use of sales tags.

A Greek Revival building on the NE corner (above right) is home to a Sports Authority. Paragon, on Broadway between East 17th and 18th Streets since 1908, is the big sports dog in the area.

At the SW corner (left) we see the first Benjamin Altman Building from 1876-1906, whereupon the store moved to a massive building that filled an entire block between 5th, Madison, East 34th and East 35th Streets, where it was in business for the following 83 years. Altman opened his first store at 3rd Avenue and east 10th Street in 1865.

At a time when real estate has gotten so prohibitively expensive that even big retailers like Barnes and Noble are forced out by high rents (as they were from their 6th Avenue and West 22nd Street location in 2008) it’s comforting to know that Apex Tech is still holding down the corner plot on West 19th. The school offers training in automotive, refrigeration, electrical, plumbing, carpentry, welding and auto repair since 1961.

Throughout the 1980s, when local channels 5, 9 and 11 were independently owned and showed mostly reruns and movies, the Apex tech commercials featuring the mustachioed Apex Tech Guy were a staple. His catchphrase was “Now, I can’t call you…”

Naturally, he doesn’t utter the famous phrase in this vintage Apex tech spot, but you get the idea…

A couple of midblock views between 5th and 6th Avenues. 35 West 19th, on the right, now home to Sala, a Spanish restaurant, is notable for being the longtime home of The Magickal Childe, ostensibly an occult bookstore but also featuring hexerei of the weird such as voodoo dolls, herbs used in potions, tarot cards and wicca (not witchcraft to devotees) paraphernalia. The Charmed girls would have fit right in.

The Cluett Building at 22-28 West 19th runs right through the block to 19-23 West 18th. The name of the building stirred a memory. Walter Grutchfield: The building was constructed in 1901/02 as the New York headquarters of Cluett, Peabody & Co. of Troy, NY. They were collar manufacturers and created the Arrow brand of detachable shirt collars. According to the Free Dictionary, “About 1905 the company began an advertising campaign that featured an idyllic young man wearing an Arrow shirt with the detached collar… Hundreds of printed advertisements were produced from 1907 to 1930 featuring the Arrow Collar Man. The fictional Arrow collar man became an icon and by 1920 received more than 17 thousand fan letters a day.”

I had to reach deep in the ForgottenArchives for this: Cluett, Peabody was a name I heard frequently in youth; both my grandmother and my mother (who I indicated, at left, in the photo of a company gathering that I’d estimate was from the early 1950s) worked at the Troy, NY company in the 1940s and 1950s.

Free Dictionary again: In the early 1920′s Cluett, Peabody & Co. began manufacturing their shirts with attached collars in response to consumer demand and became the most successful company in the U.S. at that time. Their sales increased to 4 million collars a week and arrow shirts with attached collars were being exported to foreign ports such as Jakarta, Indonesia, Java and the Belgian Congo. The Arrow Collar Man campaign ended in 1930 having been one of the most successful advertising campaigns in history.

My mother, of course, is the most attractive woman in the picture.

The Flatiron Lounge at 37 West 19th takes its name, of course, from the famed Fuller (Flatiron) Building at 5th Avenue, Broadway and 23rd Street.

I’m rarely in Sam Flax but only because I fear that when I’m in here, I’ll spend too much. Flax is second only to Pearl Paint in providing art supplies and everything necessary for putting pen or brush to paper. I hope its locale between 19th and 20th Streets west of 5th Avenue isn’t closing.

LEFT: Idlewild Books, a new travel book store, has become one of my new favorites (especially since the ForgottenBook is displayed prominently within). “Idlewild” was the old name for John F. Kennedy International Airport. Good luck, though, in the shadow of the Barnes and Noble flagship at 5th and East 18th.

At the SE corner of 5th Avenue and West 19th is the Arnold, Constable Building, yet another former department store.

Jim Naureckas, NY Songlines: Nine West, Victoria’s Secret are in former department store (1869-1914) that took up the entire block from 5th to 6th avenues; founded by Aaron Arnold and son-in-law James Constable, it offered “Everything From Cradle to Grave.” Mary Todd Lincoln was a frequent customer, as well as Carnegies, Rockefellers and Morgans.

Another Constable building can be found on Canal Street.

Briton Arthur Arnold opened a dry goods store in 1825 and took on James Constable as a partner in 1842. After the firm thrived for over a century, the last Arnold Constable store, at 5th Avenue and 40th Street, closed in 1975. (The comma, like the New York Times period, has disappeared along the way, so latterday customers thought an Arnold Constable was the original shopkeeper.)

Two narrow 1900-era towers flank West 19th Street at 5th Avenue. The building on the right was the longtime home of Weiss & Mahoney Army & Navy store and the former locale of the 5th Avenue Presbyterian Church (1852-1875). Your webmaster’s first job out of school was in 150 5th Avenue, a block away on 20th.

A pair of great escapes on East 19th between 5th Avenue and Broadway.

ABOVE: ABC Carpet, SE corner Broadway and East 19th, formerly W&J Sloane Furniture. RIGHT: contrast 35 and the Modernist 37 East 19th. 35 was the residence of Horace Greeley, editor, abolitionist and politician, from 1850-1853.

LEFT: NW corner Park Avenue South and East 19th, new tower tries for a Starrett-Lehigh vibe but doesn’t quite get there; I prefer the Doric-columned neo Renaissance apartment building at 105.

The American Woolen Building actually is entered on 221-227 Park Avenue South (marked with a ram’s head), while this, at 102-104 East 19th, is the freight entrance.

I’ve always loved the corner apartment building at 81 Irving Place and 123 East 19th — it’s festooned with dozens of terra cotta gnomes. And more gnomes.

For this 14-story apartment house, architect George Pelham, one of New York’s most active apartment-house designers, exploited the requirements of the zoning law to create an exuberant design [in 1929-1930] with dramatic setbacks and a striking rooftop pavilion surrounding the water tower. The building, planned with 107 small apartments, is faced with brick, often laid in intricate patterns to add excitement to the facades. The building is ornamented wth beige terra-cotta detail of a very high quality. Terra-cotta features include columns, balconies, and gargoyles embellished with animal heads, monsters, and other fanciful detail. NYC Architecture

The figure below right seems to be influenced by cartoonist R.F. Outcault’s 1890s creation, the Yellow Kid.

East 19th changes character, rather abruptly, for the block between Irving Place and 3rd Avenue and transforms itself into a tree-lined, suburban-style stretch dotted with small brick buildings, carriage houses and cottages. The tone is set by the ivy-covered NE corner building. Pete’s Tavern is one block south of here at East 18th.

In the early 20th Century the creative community had a great presence on this block, which was home to actresses Theda Bara, Dorothy and Lillian Gish, Ethel Barrymore and Helen Hayes; playwrights, authors and activists F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Reed, Emma Goldman and Eugene O’Neill were visitors.

There’s some riotous terra cotta tilework on the north side of the block; much of it is the work of architect Frederick Sterner and artist Richard Winthrop Chandler.

146 East 19th was home to painter George Bellows from 1910-1925, a man who lived the high life. “I went there in the evening a young girl and came away in the morning an old woman,” as Ethel Barrymore once said. Bellows, along with Edward Hopper, studied under Robert Henri at the NY School of Art and became a luminary in the modernistic Ashcan School. Possibly Bellows’ most famous painting was his depiction of Luis Firpo (“The Wild Bull of the Pampas”) knocking Jack Dempsey through the ropes in the first round in a 1923 fight. Dempsey recovered to KO Firpo in the second round. Artist Eric Joyner does a takeoff on Bellows’ vision in The Final Blow.

At 226 3rd Avenue on the NW corner is a terrific painted sign for the Piccolo restaurant.

The block of East 19th between 3rd and 2nd Avenues is dominated by the rather forbidding Mother Cabrini Medical Center, originally Columbus Hospital. Andy Warhol was treated here when he was shot by Valerie Solanas in 1968.

Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini (1850-1917), the first US Citizen to be canonized as a saint by the Roman Catholic Church, founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart and established 67 orphanages throughout the USA , South America and Europe. Since 1931 her preserved remains have been displayed at Mother Cabrini Shrine in Fort Washington in upper Manhattan on a street named in her honor, Cabrini Boulevard.

Some bits of an increasingly retreating Little Old New York in the easternmost segment of East 19th, between 2nd and 1st Avenues.

We’ve already seen an item on 19th Street that reminded me of my mother. Here’s one that reminds me of the old man, who worked at Stuyvesant Town from 1955-1988 as a custodian. The apartment complex was constructed in the 1947 by Metropolitan Life Insurance Company; Peg Leg Pete, the Director-General of New Amsterdam, lived in this site on his farm in the late 1600s. It was championed by Robert Moses as part of his slum-clearance program in mid-century. When first opened, the complex would not rent to African-Americans, and the discrimination was held up in court. “Stuy Town” reversed the policy several years later. For many years, though the project didn’t have the necessary wiring for air conditioning, the waiting list for an apartment was quite long. The list was abolished when Met Life set about converting and upgrading the apartments to market rents beginning in 2006. Your webmaster foolishly never asked to get on “the list”, though Stuy Town would no doubt be trying to get my rent stabilized self out if I lived there now!

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