#rasoiaf

[mightyisobel]

Wearing the floppy ears -- A 1910 antecedent to the Meereenese Knot (repost from 2018 r/asoiaf)

Daenerys Targaryen in Meereen is not the first ruler of a fantasy realm to chafe under the burden of ruling rabbits while wearing unsuitable headgear.

You may know that that the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz was an adaptation of Book 1 of a 14-book series by author, playwright, and filmmaker L. Frank Baum. The series was extremely popular and their author became famous from writing them.

Book 6 of the Oz series, The Emerald City of Oz (1910), is a great read. It follows two converging point-of-view narratives with Dorothy on a cutesie-pie walkabout through the realm while the Nome King, Roquat the Red, prepares a subterranean invasion of Oz. The invasion story is wholesome fun, but I want to focus on one of Dorothy's encounters, during her visit to Bunnybury.

Here's her description of the place:

Dorothy now found herself in a city so strange and beautiful that she gave a gasp of surprise. The high marble wall extended all around the place and shut out all the rest of the world. And here were marble houses of curious forms, most of them resembling overturned kettles but with delicate slender spires and minarets running far up into the sky....

But the rabbit people were, after all, the most amazing things Dorothy saw. The streets were full of them, and their costumes were so splendid.... Silks and satins of delicate hues seemed always used for material, and nearly every costume sparkled with exquisite gems.

Yes, Dorothy goes to the land of the rabbits, and lunches with their King (Chapter 20).

And check out what he says to her:

"I've often thought," said Dorothy, who was busily eating, "that it would be fun to be a rabbit."

"It is fun—when you're the genuine article," agreed his Majesty. "But look at me now! I live in a marble palace instead of a hole in the ground. I have all I want to eat, without the joy of hunting for it. Every day I must dress in fine clothes and wear that horrible crown till it makes my head ache. Rabbits come to me with all sorts of troubles, when my own troubles are the only ones I care about. When I walk out I can't hop and run; I must strut on my rear legs and wear an ermine robe! And the soldiers salute me and the band plays and the other rabbits laugh and clap their paws and cry out: 'Hail to the King!' Now let me ask you, as a friend and a young lady of good judgment: isn't all this pomp and foolishness enough to make a decent rabbit miserable?"

So many elements of Dany's desolation in Meereen are laid out right here. The complaint about uncomfortable showy clothes and of feeling confined in splendor befitting a ruler. Also the fatigue with ceremony and attention, all "pomp and foolishness" making the monarch "miserable".

By the way, after luncheon, the king presents an acrobatic dance show for his guest (Chapter 21):

"It is our royal duty, as well as our royal pleasure," he said, "to provide fitting entertainment for our distinguished guest. We will now present the Royal Band of Whiskered Friskers."

As he spoke the musicians, who had arranged themselves in a corner, struck up a dance melody while into the room pranced the Whiskered Friskers. They were eight pretty rabbits dressed only in gauzy purple skirts fastened around their waists with diamond bands. Their whiskers were colored a rich purple, but otherwise they were pure white.

After bowing before the King and Dorothy the Friskers began their pranks, and these were so comical that Dorothy laughed with real enjoyment. They not only danced together, whirling and gyrating around the room, but they leaped over one another, stood upon their heads and hopped and skipped here and there so nimbly that it was hard work to keep track of them. Finally they all made double somersaults and turned handsprings out of the room.

Compare their frisking with this moment from ADWD Dany III:

As the drums reached a crescendo, three of the girls leapt above the flames, spinning in the air. The male dancers caught them about the waists and slid them down...

On second thought, best not. L. Frank Baum was definitely not thinking of topless dancing bunny pornography here and neither should you.

Look, I'm not saying that GRRM was explicitly or intentionally referencing this scene or that we can know for sure he ever read it, without Word of GRRM one way or the other. But I do think the books can be read as a delicious gumbo of all kinds of cultural influences beyond his deconstruction of Tolkien-inspired epic fantasy like Tad Williams's Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn tetralogy. Reminders of ASOIAF scena are everywhere; some of my personal favorites are: The Godfather, The Court Jester, I, Claudius (short version), I, Claudius (long version), and Gone With the Wind.

GRRM has an uncanny ability to remix motifs from across multiple genres, formats, and cultural eras into something that feels both familiar and startlingly original, something with the capacity to constantly reinvent itself anew. It's an ability that he happens to share with the original Wizard himself, an entertainer and storyteller writing over 100 years ago about strangers in strange lands and the magic and wonder that they find there.

What do you think? Have you noticed other elements borrowed or referenced from the original American fantasy realm, the marvelous Land of Oz? Or other cultural references that seem underappreciated?

originally posted at https://www.reddit.com/r/asoiaf/comments/8laanv/spoilers_adwd_wearing_the_floppy_ears_a_1910/

[daenystheedreamer]

peeks into the cesspool of rasoiaf are haunting...