Perhaps, comparing Martin’s A Game of Thrones to J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings epic is inappropriate, but nostalgia (as well as
good reviews and curiosity) encouraged me to pick up the first installment of
Martin’s epic A Song of Ice and Fire.
There are many differences between the two series. For one, the Lord of the Rings follows the noble
quest of a band of hobbits, men, a wizard, a dwarf, and an elf: a fellowship
sent to eradicate evil from its world. A
Game of Thrones features no such fellowship. In A Game of Thrones, fractured perspectives dictate the way the story
is told; readers are privy to the perspectives of sworn enemies, men and women
who have taken up the sword against each other, and their families. Identifying
purely evil or purely good characters is nearly impossible in Martin’s work.
Readers can readily identify some factions whose cause can be said to be nobler
than others, and they can loosely define protagonists within the book’s pages,
as well as identify some pure villains, but many of the characters straddle
moral virtue and vice.
The
other major difference between the two epics is the prevalence of magic and
fantastical creatures in Tolkien’s work. Tolkien introduces readers to a
fantasy world, where elves, dwarves, hobbits, men, wizards, goblins, and orcs
clash and interact. Tolkien’s world is one where trees walk and speak, and
ghosts rise to fulfill the oaths they had broken. Martin’s world is no less
fantastical than Tolkien’s, but fantasy peeks around the edges of realism. The
book opens with an attack, in a snow-swept forest, where men are set upon by
the Others, the blue-eyed ghost-men of beyond the great Wall, creatures said to
have vanished thousands of years before the novel’s beginning, creatures of
myth and legend. Dragons, too, have since been vanquished from the realm of
men, but their relics dot the kingdom, leaving no doubt that they had once been
as real as the dodo was in our own world.
Westeros
is a continental realm held together by a feudal monarchy. The current dynasty
is young, the throne is still held by its first king, Robert Baratheon, who won
his place after a brutal and bloody civil war brought about the death of most
of the Targaryen dynasty, the lords who had united the continents seven
kingdoms only three-hundred years earlier. Tensions still flair beneath the
surface of this feudal realm. Living lords and ladies remember who killed whom
in the war that still runs fresh in their minds. Family honor and pride are at
stake as the great families jostle for high favor at court, and swords are
never far from noble hands and noble throats.
Winter
is coming to the realm. In the north, beyond the great ice Wall, an army of
Wildlings is forming, and other creatures lurk in the frozen landscape north of
the Wall. To the east, across the sea in Essos, the grandson of the late
Targaryen king plots revenge against the man he calls the Usurper, the king who
sits the throne in Westeros. Darker forces and blacker magics threaten from the
edges of the book’s pages, and run between the lines of its sentences.
In the
midst of turmoil and tension, Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of
the North, struggles to honor his family name, protect his king and friend, and
preserve his family and realm, tasks that become more difficult with each
passing day.
The
novel’s multiple perspectives lend to its brilliance. Slowly, the history of
Westeros, both recent and distant, is revealed to readers as younger characters
are told bedtimes tales, and as older characters reminisce with old friends.
Events unfold in an interconnected story, as the character with the best
perspective for a given event lends his eye to that portion of the tale. As the
narrative unfolds, it becomes clear that no one, not even that handful of men
and women that Martin uses to tell his tale, is safe from death. When lords and
ladies converge on the Iron Throne of Westeros, the only possible outcome is
war and death.
Martin
tells a compelling tale, one that draws a reader into court intrigues and
bloody confrontations. His tale turns readers who would rather dream of the
future into wanting historians, desirous only of one more scrap of myth or
fable that will bring the events of the past into a clearer light. Martin is
careful to never give away all the details of a story, he is careful not to
allow his narrators to become unhinged from the world they occupy, he is
careful not to break down the fourth wall and privilege readers with the
details and facets of history that they crave to learn, but have yet to earn.
He requires that his readers turn the pages, and invest themselves more deeply
in his work. A Song of Ice and Fire
cannot be contained within the pages of a single epic novel. Those who start
the song are prompted to follow it to its end, even if that requires reading
seven epic novels.
JCM
21 March 2013
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