mybrytography #TBT to this candid shot of @darrencriss & the gorgeous @sunsetstrippa on the pink sofa at the wedding of @emmahunton & @ryanduval. A day filled with cool people, positive vibes, and love all around. #hunton4thatd #iduval #darrencriss #miavonglitz #hedwigonbway #powercouplegoals #thepinksofasessions
Oh, absolutely. I’m very confident that Sansa will return to
Winterfell at one point. Her story trajectory has always been about her
finding her way back to her home and reclaiming her Stark identity and
connection. Sansa’s arc, from the point of Ned’s death, has had
Winterfell at its heart, that yearning for home that Sansa keeps
dreaming of; the comfort and safety of Winterfell that she prays for
continuously.
I pray for Robb’s victory and Joffrey’s death … and for home. For Winterfell.
That was such a sweet dream, Sansa thought drowsily. She had been back in Winterfell,
running through the godswood with her Lady. Her father had been there,
and her brothers, all of them warm and safe. If only dreaming could make
it so …
From the high battlements of the gatehouse, the whole world spread out
below them. Sansa could see the Great Sept of Baelor on Visenya’s hill,
where her father had died. At the other end of the Street of the Sisters
stood the fire-blackened ruins of the Dragonpit. To the west, the
swollen red sun was half-hidden behind the Gate of the Gods. The salt
sea was at her back, and to the south was the fish market and the docks
and the swirling torrent of the Blackwater Rush.And to the north …She turned that way, and saw only the city, streets and alleys and hills and bottoms and
more streets and more alleys and the stone of distant walls. Yet
she knew that beyond them was open country, farms and fields and
forests, and beyond that, north and north and north again, stood
Winterfell.
She awoke all at once, every nerve atingle. For a moment she did not
remember where she was. She had dreamt that she was little, still
sharing a bedchamber with her sister Arya. But it was her maid she heard
tossing in sleep, not her sister, and this was not Winterfell,
but the Eyrie. And I am Alayne Stone, a bastard girl. The room was cold
and black, though she was warm beneath the blankets. Dawn had not yet
come. Sometimes she dreamed of Ser Ilyn Payne and woke with her heart
thumping, but this dream had not been like that. Home. It was a dream of
home.
Even
after Ramsay sacks Winterfell, after the people of Sansa’s childhood
are either murdered or lost, after the castle burns down, all of which
Sansa knows – she still looks to return home, automatically associating Winterfell with safety.
“You look distraught. Did you think we were making for Winterfell, sweetling? Winterfell
has been taken, burned, and sacked. All those you knew and loved are
dead. What northmen who have not fallen to the ironmen are warring
amongst themselves. Even the Wall is under attack. Winterfell was
the home of your childhood, Sansa, but you are no longer a child.
You’re a woman grown, and you need to make your own home.“
Still. Despite Littlefinger’s best effort, Sana’s connection to
Winterfell (and to her father) only grows stronger in the Vale. Her arc
in the Eyrie is one of my favorites because despite how much
hand-wringing fandom tends to do over it and how much the fear of “Sansa
losing her identity” permeate fandom conversation, I don’t think that
Sansa has ever been as connected to her Stark identity as she is in the
Eyrie. She might be forced to hide under an assumed identity to survive
but her connections to the North saturate her chapters in the Vale.
She
is in her father’s childhood home, the closest she has been to Ned
since his execution. She has come in contact with people her father
would name friends, lords who, unbeknownst to her, have categorically
tried to get her aunt Lysa to fight for Robb – a change from her days in
King’s Landing where she was surrounded by enemies and people who only
thought to take advantage of her. She has already identified Bronze Yohn
Royce as a potential ally but her lack of knowledge about his attempts
to aid Robb stood in the way. She might not fully grasp it yet, but
Sansa Stark does have friends in the Vale that would help in the name of
her father.
To add, Sansa’s arc in the Eyrie witnesses her increasingly finding connections to Northern symbols like snow and the godswood.
Yet she stepped out all the same. Her boots tore
ankle-deep holes into the smooth white surface of the snow, yet made no
sound. Sansa drifted past frosted shrubs and thin dark trees, and
wondered if she were still dreaming. Drifting snowflakes brushed her
face as light as lover’s kisses, and melted on her cheeks. At the center
of the garden, beside the statue of the weeping woman that lay broken
and half-buried on the ground, she turned her face up to the sky and
closed her eyes. She could feel the snow on her lashes, taste it on her
lips. It was the taste of Winterfell. The taste of innocence. The taste of dreams.
When
Sansa opened her eyes again, she was on her knees. She did not remember
falling. It seemed to her that the sky was a lighter shade of grey.
Dawn, she thought. Another day. Another new day. It was the old days she
hungered for. Prayed for. But who could she pray to? The garden had
been meant for a godswood once, she knew, but the soil was too thin and
stony for a weirwood to take root. A godswood without gods, as empty as
me.
She finds the absence of a weirwood tree disturbing. Sansa leans more towards the Seven in her worship but she has appreciation for the old gods. She routinely prayed for Ned in the godswood in King’s Landing, and it was the godswood that provided cover for her meeting with Ser Dontos, providing a refugee for Sansa and a way for her to plan her escape. Her connection to the godswood has been growing till she finds the lack of a proper godswood with a weirwood tree in the Eyrie’s garden disquieting, and compares the feeling of emptiness due to the absence of the old gods to her own feelings of emptiness due to the absence of her family.
In that same scene, the narrative links Sansa to the colors of House Stark
It was a place of whites and blacks and greys. White towers and white
snow and white statues, black shadows and black trees, the dark grey sky
above. A pure world, Sansa thought. I do not belong here.
Well, she doesn’t. But then she sets to building a place where she does belong: Winterfell.
She literally builds Winterfell with her hands, with all the possible foreshadowing here to her endgame.
The snow fell and the castle rose. Two walls ankle-high, the inner
taller than the outer. Towers and turrets, keeps and stairs, a round
kitchen, a square armory, the stables along the inside of the west wall.
It was only a castle when she began, but before very long Sansa knew it
was Winterfell. She found twigs and fallen branches beneath the
snow and broke off the ends to make the trees for the godswood. For the
gravestones in the lichyard she used bits of bark. Soon her gloves and
her boots were crusty white, her hands were tingling, and her feet were
soaked and cold, but she did not care. The castle was all that mattered.
Some things were hard to remember, but most came back to her easily, as
if she had been there only yesterday. The Library Tower, with the steep
stonework stair twisting about its exterior. The gatehouse, two huge
bulwarks, the arched gate between them, crenellations all along the top .
. .
A connection to the old gods. A connection to
House Stark’s colors. A connection to Winterfell. A connection to her
bastard brother, the Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch…..
She had not thought of Jon in ages. He was only her half brother, but still … with Robb and Bran and Rickon dead, Jon Snow
was the only brother that remained to her. I am a bastard too now, just
like him. Oh, it would be so sweet, to see him once again.
….with all that carries of implications, from
Jon being the only remaining connection to Ned, her family and her childhood in Winterfell, to
the Night’s Watch being an institution that is visibly linked to the
North, and to the Starks in particular. Sansa’s story in the Vale is filled with associations with all things Northern, all things Stark.
So while she has to take on the persona of Alayne Stone and gets immersed in it, Sansa is still holding onto her identity, defiantly, proudly and with an understanding that this is her source of strength.
I am not your daughter, she thought. I am Sansa Stark, Lord Eddard’s daughter and Lady Catelyn’s, the blood of Winterfell.
She wondered where this courage had come from, to speak to him so
frankly. From Winterfell, she thought. I am stronger within the walls of
Winterfell.
This is the girl who has had to filter her thoughts
through courtesy and censor herself now drawing strength from a
Winterfell to speak up. It’s not the first time Sansa draws strength
from her identity (thinking that she can be brave because she is a Stark
just before her wedding to Tyrion comes to mind) but this adds a
conscious understanding to that instinctive association. Sansa’s story
has been about her finding her way back to her Northern identity and to
the North itself, a journey she already started on because she has started
moving closer to the North – and she will continue
on to Winterfell. To the place that represents safety and comfort. To
her remaining family whose own journeys draw them back to Winterfell. To
the source of her strength within Winterfell’s walls. To the place where a
piece of her soul (or however else you want to describe it) is buried.
Ned did not send men with Lady’s bones all the way back to Winterfell
just to prevent Cersei from getting her skin, he did it because Lady is
of the North. She belongs in Winterfell, and so does Sansa.
And
if those connections in Sansa’s story are not enough, keep in mind that
there are two people who want to get her there: Littlefinger who wants
to bring Sansa to the North with the Knights of the Vale at her back to
reclaim Winterfell from the Boltons, and Brienne who wants to bring
Sansa to safety, but where is safety for Sansa if not Winterfell?
Sansa’s arc points straight to Winterfell, narratively and thematically.
Her story has always been about her finding her way back to her
Northern identity, and Winterfell is the epitome of that.
As for
how her endgame goes, I’m really invested in the idea of Sansa being the Stark in Winterfell during the War for the Dawn. All the
Starklings’ arcs have them picking up some skill set that will help them
during the war with the Others, but while Jon, Arya and Bran will be
directly involved in the fighting, Jon and Arya on the ground and Bran
on the astral place, a Stark is needed in Winterfell to hold.
Wars are not only built on fighters, others are vital to carry the war
effort by helping in places where the fighters can’t. The North can not
be mobilized in its entirety to fight. There will be those who can’t
fight: the sick and disabled, the women and children, the injured, etc;
these vulnerable people need a place that protects them from the harsh
winter and the threat of the Others, and that’s what Winterfell will be with its long history of offering protection.
The castle of Winterfell was specifically designed to be the second
line of defense after the Wall with its hot springs that run through the
walls keeping the castle warm and its glass gardens that provide food
in the dead of winter, which makes it a perfect place for these people
to gather for protection. But as the Wall either gets breached or falls,
and the harshest winter there is slams Westeros, those inside
Winterfell will desperately need a leader to calm them down, organize
food rations, raise morale, prepare a defense for the castle itself when
needed and organize a steady flow of supplies to those fighting. This
is where Sansa comes in – the girl who would have given bread if she’d had it, who expressed a desire to be a good
ruler and look after her people and whose temperament and compassion,
previous actions during battle (i.e: comforting the women during the
Battle of the Blackwater and assisting an injured Lancel) and current
responsibilities in the Vale prepare her for the responsibility of
organizing the logistics of defending a castle and looking after its
occupants. Sansa is the perfect person for this job, and the only one
for it as well as Jon and Arya will be engaged on the battlefield as
Bran acts as overhead general. Someone needs to hold Winterfell and its
people, and Sansa’s skill set makes her the best candidate. Remember
that Ned quote “the winters are hard but the Starks will endure”? Sansa
will endure and help her people endure and survive which is just as
vital to the war as engaging in direct combat with the enemy.
Sansa will hold.
She will be the one taking on the historical role of the Starks to look after their people in winter not only by protecting but by providing.
“The wolves took us in and nourished us” will be Sansa’s role in the
model of hundreds of Starks before her. What could be a more perfect
closure to her arc than her taking on a mantle steeped in Northern
history as the Stark in Winterfell, a role and a responsibility her ancestors have
espoused for thousands of years? Or than her being a part of rebuilding
the North and Westeros after the war, putting her skills to rebuilding
Winterfell and the North as she once did with a castle made of snow?
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Someone asked me why I am supporting/ignoring the racism
of Dany. I normally don’t respond, but, today is the 70th
anniversary of when we got rid of the white people who fucked up my country. So, I
really could not ignore accusations of racism today.
TIME FOR A HISTORY LESSON, BITCHES!!
A Difficult Situation and a Moral Conundrum:
Let’s talk about Daenerys’s racism shall we?
Firstly, imagine you are in a land where slavery is very widespread.
People are suffering daily. You have three dragons. Fortunately or
unfortunately, the dragons are linked to you by blood and will listen only
to your commands. You are a teenager, you have no fighting skills or army yet.
Let me ask you this – what will you do in this situation?
You can sit by and see
millions suffering and dying. You can try and be politically correct by not doing
anything and just fucking off to Westeros? All in the name of an absurd effort
to protect their “culture”?
Or you could take (an
admittedly controversial and problematic) decision, but impact the lives of
millions of disenfranchised and oppressed people.
Both choices are problematic, but which one seems better to
you, huh?
In fact many of the least empowered people (the slaves) tend to side with Daenerys on her abolishment of slavery. Now, there are many
who say that she is not racist in the traditional sense (after all she fights
against slavery), but she is a colonialist. I vehemently disagree. Is she a “white
saviour”? Sure. Is she a colonialist? No.
Do you know how I know? I was born and live in a country
that was colonised and studied colonialist history for a minimum of 7 years.
So, I’ll take an analogy from my country to drive the point home.
Colonisers and Emperors:
1) Colonialists conquer and control other
countries to further their trade interests and improve the economy of their
home nation. They generally do not consider the colonised nation to be “their
people”, but rather as savages or resources who could be used.
HISTORICAL EXAMPLE:
British
invaded India, mainly in order to expand the market for their produced goods,
and also to use up the resources of our country (India was considered one
of the few sources of mining gold & diamonds before discovering them in
South Africa.) This is one of the reasons why we consider the British as a coloniser, from whom we needed to demand freedom. The British did not learn our
language, instead tried to thrust ‘English’ upon us. So that they could
easily communicate with the English-learned Indians who could be administrators
of their colonial enterprise. They made sure that if there was any cultural
mixing, it would be one-sided. That is, they exported their culture – spreading English
language, encouraging missionaries etc. However, they did not import our
culture – even the British who stayed in India rarely learned the local
language. They made specialised areas and built estates and bungalows where
they could live, away from the savage Indians. Contrast this with the Mughals.
The Mughals were also from an external country/area – they had
Turkish/Persian/Mongol roots. They had a completely different culture &
religion from the those who were then inhabiting Indian subcontinent. Mughals
were mostly Muslim (Islamic) as opposed to the Hindu-Buddhist people of India.
When Mughals came, they integrated their culture to the existing one in India
– this is evident in architecture, poetry, history, art, laws, politics etc.
However, they are not considered colonialists but rather an empire. Mughals are
deemed an empire, just like the Guptas or Mauryas. Do you know why? Because
when they came and settled in India – they actually ruled us. They considered India as their home country,
the people as “their people”, not savages.They learned the language and contributed to building of a nation.
WHAT DOES DAENERYS DO?
Now,
Daenerys shows more similarity to whom – the British or the Mughals?
Daenerys frees slaves in Essos. She is fundamentally different to them –
different religion, race, different culture etc. However, she learns their
language (Dany knows bastard Valyrian, High Valyrian, Common Tongue, Dothraki
and Ghiscari). She considered all the freed people and even the Dothraki “her
people” and explicitly asked her brother
“not to call them savages, as they are my people now”. She gets her army of
Unsullied and then she frees them. Both in the books and show, it has been
repeatedly asserted that the Unsullied follow her out of free will, as free
men. They would have followed her to Westeros then and there and she could’ve
had a decent chance at getting the Iron Throne. In the books, Jorah advises her
to do so. It would be easy for her. Book!Jorah advises her to go back to
Illyrio Mopatis with her Unsullied army and abandon the freed slaves of Astapor
(who are not fighters/soldiers and hence serve no purpose). A
coloniser would do this exactly – get the resources (a good army), ditch the
liability (the welfare of the freed slaves who are not soldiers) and leave of
to their home country. In the show, we get Tyrion tell Jon snow that “she
could’ve sailed for Westeros earlier, but stayed to protect a lot of people
from very bad things.”
Instead of doing this, like an empress, (like the Mughals), she stays – to benefit
the people, the slaves, of these cities. She respects and follows the culture
of people she rules, only thing is: she doesn’t support slavery. She has her subjects (whom she does not
consider to be savages/ or as just resources to use) in her council meetings. (Indians had to fight and fight to get the
British to give us limited franchise.) She listens to their advice. She starts
projects to help the freed slaves and improve their lives and tries to do political and social reforms.
She is even offered ships in exchange for leaving Mereen (which will help her
sail to Westeros), howvere, she knows the freedmen will be enslaves again, and
decides to stay back. She is literally, postponing her life-long goal of
sailing to Westeros and conquering it, because she is worried about the welfare
of the people. She tries to rule these lands while the lords and slavers
(the ones who are doing the oppressing) try to overthrow her. So, forgive me, if I compare her to the
Mughals (Emperors and Rulers) instead of the British (Colonisers against whom
we fought against for freedom). Does she take questionable actions? Sure,
she does. So did the Mughals – Akbar, the greatest Mughal emperor, (Akbar is an
epithet which literally means “the great”), used to trample his enemies under
elephants.
Thus, what I’m saying is that she is not Perfect and Pure™, but she is trying to do right in a
world where wrong & right isn’t always clear.
2) Colonisers generally tend to side with the
nobility of a land, rather than the common people. They do not perform social
reforms unless pressurised into doing so. They try to take away power from the
oppressed and disenfranchised, and grant more power to the nobility.
HISTORICAL EXAMPLE:
There seems to be a
common misconception that colonialists helped develop the colonised nations. The
truth is, colonialists tend not to do social reforms. I’ll give you the example of Abolishment
of Sati in India. If you’re on the wrong side of history, you probably learned
that this is one of the great accomplishment of British in India – they (supposedly) helped abolish the
practice of Sati. (For those who don’t know, Sati is the ritualistic
practice of burning widows in their husband’s pyre. In those days since very
old Brahmins married child wives, many young women were burned alive in their
husband’s funeral pyre. This is a shitty enough situation to be compared to
slavery.) In fact, Indian social reformers had to fight and fight to get the
British listen to us to abolish Sati by law. Because the British
did not want to displease the Othodox Brahminical Lords who wanted
the practice to continue. The British even tried to argue that ‘we cannot interfere
in your culture’. It was the Indian social reformers like Raja Ram
Mohan Roy who had to fight for the oppressed (the women) against the Othodox
Brahmins (upper caste, similar to nobility). He wrote articles upon articles to change mindsets,
he founded the Brahmo Samaj, he petitioned the British again and again. It
was only when social pressure, by the newly enlightened intelligentsia, was
unbearable that the British abolished the practice of Sati, by law. Thus,
colonialists tend to retain existing power structures, give more power to
nobility, avoid social reforms and avoid giving power to the oppressed.
WHAT DOES DAENERYS DO?
Daenerys do not side with the nobility (the
slavers) of the cities she invaded. Despite the fact, that it would be
better for her and her ambitions if she sides with the nobility. Despite multiple assassination attempts,
despite making very powerful enemies, despite her own personal ambition to go
to Westeros, she doesn’t side with the slavers (who are the nobility). Many
of them offer her ships to go to Westeros, she still declines, because she
wants to make sure the freed men do not slide back into chains. It is
because of this fact that she has so much trouble maintain peace and stability
in Mereen. Later she does make alliances and marriage with Hizdahr Loraq and
others, but never compromising on her insistence that the freed slaves will be
free. Instead of behaving like a
colonialist– side with the nobility and crush the oppressed – she is basically
doing what the social reformers had done: help the oppressed gain more rights, even if it incurs the wrath of powerful and nobility.
I get why people say she is racist – a white
person is ruling brown/black/racially different people. But, generally, the
people who say that are just repeating some rudimentary idea of what racism is,
without bothering to learn the lived reality of colonisation. You need some
reason to disparage Dany and SJW cause seems to be popular these days. However,
if you bothered to look beyond skin and see racism and see what a colonialist does, you would quickly switch sides.
Judge her by her actions, not your preconceived notions of what a colonizer looks like.
Daenerys
Stormborn has invaded another country or continent – but she has NOT colonised
it. She behaves as a good ruler would, not as a colonialist would.
She is
a queen and perhaps an empress, she is no colonialist.
(2) which is why i feel like so many fans of color have an issue with Dany’s storyline – she thinks she is doing the right thing by “saving” the people of slaver’s bay but in the end she is still a white woman conquering these eastern cities and enforcing her idea of right and wrong onto a civilization that she sees as barbaric, which ultimately costs the lives and livelihood of many innocent people. i think (or at least hope) that’s what they were trying to get at in the podcast.
This colonialist narrative of “we want to save the godless heathens!” has always been moral posturing and little more. Even the Ancient Romans pulled this shit, except instead of doing it with the intention of spreading Christianity, they did it in order to acquire more land and slaves.
“Saving the godless heathens” sure as hell don’t look like kicking them out of their homes, enslaving them or stealing their natural resources. The concept of colonialism Because God Would Want Them To was just their piss poor justification for wreaking havoc on indigenous cultures and stealing their wealth.
You’re right that Dany does follow this line of thinking, to an extent, particularly with the Dothraki whose culture she tries to reform by disallowing rape and senseless violence. The Dothraki’s “barbarism” is driven home by the fact that there’s no goddamn word for “thank you”. That’s one example of the white savior trope at play in her story.
It also has some shreds of it in her Slaver’s Bay campaign, in that she wants to free the slaves and create economic equality. So yes, she is “enforcing her idea of right and wrong” but like, slavery is wrong, y’all. She is doing the exact opposite of what most historic colonialists are doing, she’s not even taking their wealth or resources for herself or exploiting them. The white savior trope comes into play here that she’s the Mighty Whitey Savior and that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
My point re: the podcast is that they used the lie of Saving the Heathens as proof that colonialism has been historically “well-intentioned”. It has never, ever been genuinely well-intentioned. Dany’s campaign in Slaver’s Bay is genuinely well-intentioned, though. She actually, legitimately wanted to help the slaves and not herself. The only problem is that it’s not that easy, and it caused them a lot of grief in the process.
I do not think he regretted his promise or that he kept it, but rather the cost of keeping it.
That the promise to Lyanna chaffed at Ned is indisputable
but that struggle was about the
price it exacted from him and forced him to exact from his loved ones, rather than the promise itself.
“I
will,“ Ned had promised her. That was his curse. Robert would swear
undying love and forget them before evenfall, but Ned Stark kept his
vows. He thought of the promises he’d made Lyanna as she lay dying, and the price he’d paid to keep them.
Through
his attempt to keep Jon safe, Ned lied through his teeth to people he cared deeply about. He hurt Catelyn tremendously and created
a chasm in their marriage that would not otherwise be there. He hurt Jon
tremendously by keeping the identity of his mother a secret and giving
him absolutely nothing about her which led Jon to internalize the
thought that Ned was ashamed of his mother and of Jon himself by
extension. That’s a heavy load of guilt to carry day in and day out,
the realization that you’re hurting the people you love the most by your
actions but being unable to do anything about it. Ned knew he was
hurting both Catelyn and Jon, he knew he put them in a position where they were hurting each other (inadvertently in Jon’s case because he couldn’t exactly help existing),
but he could not see an alternative route since anything that made Jon’s situation better would have come at Catelyn’s expense, and anything aimed to ease Catelyn’s issues with Jon would have come at Jon’s expense. So that left Ned with a situation that was inherently imperfect, and a perpetual predicament of being caught between Jon and Catelyn, something that only brought pain to all parties.
What adds a layer of complication to Ned’s thoughts about his promise to Lyanna (something that haunts him throughout his PoV) is what it symbolized: the fact that Ned’s foster brother would sanction the murder of his kin so that Ned was then forced to lie to protect his little nephew. In addition to that, that
promise was linked to a great deal of trauma for Ned.
For better or for worse, Ned’s promise to Lyanna is tied to the trauma
he experienced at the tower of joy from losing friends to the three standing Kingsguard to having his much beloved little sister die in his arms but not before entrusting him with a last piece of her, a little life that was in danger from Ned’s own foster family. That is not something that’s easily dealt with,
especially alone and in silence because he could not share it with
anyone in fear of Jon’s life being endangered. Keeping the secret of
Jon’s paternity was incredibly isolating to Ned in its necessity of
keeping a certain distance between him and his foster family, and its creation
of a distance between him and Catelyn, and him and Jon. That only
compounded Ned’s previous trauma and left him to deal with it all on his
own, all while that trauma was kept alive and on the forefront of Ned’s
mind, what with the threat of Robert’s wrath held over his and Jon’s
heads, and Jon being a walking reminder of the reality of why he
had to keep that secret and the trauma tied to it. That’s a very lonely
position to be in, not at all made better by how Ned’s response to
trauma tends to be inherently isolating.
That this promise haunted Ned so and that he was weighed down by all the lies and secrets is perfectly understandable under these circumstances, but it’s not indicative of Ned regretting giving that promise. Ned was always going to keep Jon safe because Jon was his blood and the son of his beloved sister, and because that’s just who Ned was (honestly, this is the guy who was prepared to let Cersei escape punishment for her crimes to save Joffrey. Joffrey.Ned’s compassion and empathy is a vital part of his character, especially when it comes to children.) That he gave his word to Lyanna to ease her mind as she died, well, that is the mark of a loving brother. But what forced him into a situation where he had to lie and hurt those he loved was not Jon, but rather Robert and his immoral vengeful wish to see every Targaryen dead. Ned was already in a fight with Robert over the murder of Princess Elia and Rhaenys and Aegon; that he then had to conceal his baby nephew to spare him the same fate only served to underline how Robert was responsible for the predicament Ned found himself in. The burden Ned bore was Robert’s doing, not Jon’s. That Robert’s condoning of the murder of children was always on the forefront of Ned’s mind was only made clear by his reaction to Robert’s order to kill Daenerys (compounded for Ned by the direct link to Jon, another teenage Targaryen that Robert would obliterate if he found out his existence) and by his attempt to get Cersei to leave with her children to spare them a similar fate. People always say that it’s easy to see Lyanna and Jon hovering behind Ned’s actions and I agree, but it’s also easy to see the ruined bodies of Rhaenys and Aegon, wrapped in crimson red and haunting Ned just as much. Rhaenys and Aegon were the motivator for Ned to lie and shoulder his burdens so he could spare Jon their fate.
As for how that reflected on his view of Jon…..
I’m firmly in the camp that believes that Ned loved Jon as his own. Jon was Lyanna’s but he was also Ned’s. An essential thing to note in
any discussion of Ned’s relationship with Jon is that this entire relationship existed by Ned’s choice.
Ned chose Jon as his son, and I don’t mean that only in the sense that he claimed him as his child but that he chose to be
a father to Jon instead of just giving the boy his name and foisting
him on a vassal to foster, as is the standard practice for noble
bastards in Westeros. Jon’s life in Winterfell was a choice on Ned’s
part, a choice to give Jon a loving relationship with a parent and
siblings and the best education he could get him, a choice to give Jon
all the advantages he could get away with giving to him and to instruct him as one
would a trueborn son. Ned chose to be Jon’s parent, full stop. He
claimed him as his own as an infant and prayed to the old gods that he
grows up with Robb as brothers. He gave him the name Jon in honor of the
man who wasn’t his father by blood but who Ned considered his second
father all the same, with what that symbolizes of Jon not being his son
by blood but being his son all the same. He upended his life and caused
strife in his marriage so he could take personal responsibility for
raising Jon. That goes beyond dutiful acquiescence to the wishes of a
dying sister, that’s love and not just for Lyanna but also for Jon. That Catelyn, the person who knew Ned best, remarked on his fierce protectiveness of Jon and noted his anguish when she informed him that Jon could not stay in Winterfell can only be a testament to that, as is Ned’s shame and sorrow in his final chapter over where he’d failed Jon. Ned’s love for Jon is visible in the text, if entangled with a lot of pain and trauma and mourning.
Yeah this is one of the cases where maybe there is an interesting layer to their relationship, but I am not sure if it is just very subtle or I am creating it in my head. Quentyn was sent away, but Mellario didn’t leave until several years after, after Trystane was born. So I think Quentyn was a huge part of it, but obviously it wasn’t the last straw.
Like many things about the Martells and Dorne, I always just read it paralleling Catelyn and the Starks. Catelyn struggles a lot in her chapters about feeling like an outsider, about not being Northern enough (and then finally culminating with her “on my honor as a Tully, on my honor as a Stark”) even though she has Northern children and a husband who she grows to love. Yet Ned prioritized Jon (and by extension his sister Lyanna) over Cat’s happiness and wishes. I always just imagined a similar experience for Mellario, but in reverse. She starts with a man she loves in a foreign place, but over time Doran prioritizes his identity as Dorne over his identity as her husband. So eventually, Mellario’s wishes are consistently being disregarded essentially for Doran’s love and duty to his siblings and his country. And Mellario could never be Dornish, so she would always be second to Oberyn and Elia’s shade. Doran proves that he both loves his family dearly, but he is not above manipulating them anyways. He lies to Arianne all those years, and never expects her to harbor resentment towards him. That is how he treated Mellario as well. Unlike Arianne, she could never be Dornish, never be a true Martell, so she was never treated as a partner or equal, the way we know Doran treated Oberyn, or the way he eventually treated Arianne. I think Doran’s love for Mellario is the epitome of loving someone but not respecting them. There is a Dornish pride, but a Martell pride as well. And Mellario was never either.
When she had gone, Lady Nym said, “I know she loved our father well, but it is plain she never understood him.”
The prince gave her a curious look. “She understood more than you ever will, Nymeria. And she made your father happy. In the end a gentle heart may be worth more than pride or valor. Be that as it may, there are things Ellaria does not know and should not know.”
Doran is talking about Oberyn and Ellaria, yet I feel it is very telling of him and Mellario as well. Oberyn loved Ellaria, but there are things she did not know because she should not know, because Doran and Oberyn decided as much. I am sure Mellario was treated the same way. She was not given the opportunity to be a partner in crime, so the only way she could get her husband to listen to her was essentially appealing to the fact that although Doran is secretive and manipulative, he has a gentle heart. The only time in canon (that I can think of) that Mellario gets him to do anything is by threatening to hurt herself. I can imagine the heartbreak of realizing the man you fell in love with only listens to you when you threaten yourself. In summary, just as Cat started as feeling second to Jon (and his mother, not knowing it’s Lyanna) and an outsider with no place, eventually love grows and she managed to make the North her home, Mellario started with a loving husband, but slowly she realizes she will always be an outsider and second to Elia. I imagine that eventually the relationship was absolutely unbearable for Mellario, and that eventually even being with her children was not enough.
I love this analysis as it does add more depth to their relationship than just “Doran and Mellario argued a lot and Mellario didn’t like sending her children away, so she left him and her children”. I know I simplified the whole deal in my response to the anon, but there were clearly a lot of issues in their marriage, almost all of them stemming back to Doran controlling their children’s lives. But I agree that Mellario likely felt like an outsider in Dorne, and even more so when her children were not with her. Because I remember that another problem she had was with Arianne being sent away to someone to be their cupbearer. I also totally forgot about this incident:
The only time in canon (that I can think of) that Mellario gets him to do anything is by threatening to hurt herself.
Which is definitely a huge deal. The parallels between Houses Martell and Stark are always so interesting and I never thought to see Cat and Mellario as inverse yet also parallel to each other. Though I imagine Mellario had an even harder time because she was not only an “outsider” to Dorne, but to Westeros as a whole. This also seems spot on to me:
Doran wanted to foster Quentyn with House Yronwood. Mellario didn’t like the custom of fostering children away from home and insisted that he stay. Doran sent Quentyn away anyways, so Mellario chose to leave him and return to Norvos.
This is one of these things where I feel like GRRM was just trying to get the mother out of the picture by any means possible. It never made sense to me that Mellario wouldn’t want to leave her child with other people but then she chooses to leave Westeros and her children behind? It makes less sense bc it’s noted that Mellario was upset to have to leave her children behind. It really just doesn’t make sense unless Doran forced her to leave, which he didn’t.
I think Doran’s love for Mellario is the epitome of loving someone but not respecting them.
As their marriage seemed to be a series of Doran not respecting Mellario’s wishes and deciding their children’s fates without her help. We know that Mellario wanted to take her children with her to Norvos, but also knew she couldn’t stay. This is one tidbit that GRRM dropped and I feel he didn’t follow through on; I wanted to hear more about Mellario from the children she so loved, but we’re without any evidence that she keeps frequent contact with them. Once in Arianne’s story and once in Quentyn’s we see them both considering reaching out to their mother right before deciding against it.
This has all made me very sad for Mellario, and honestly for Doran too. I don’t think he realizes how much he inadvertently hurts people he loves in this quest for justice and vengeance. He tries to unite people through alliances and politics and seems to always fall short, even in his own personal relationships.
If you want more sadness just think about how Quentyn tells himself “I am Dorne.” It’s similar to Robb’s “the honor of the North is in my hands now,” but it is so much more…patriotic? That sentiment must be shared by the Martells. A lot of Doran’s story is this conflict for what he personally wants (justice) and what he thinks is best for his people (peace) (are we going to not pretend that is a major theme in Cat’s story as well? more parallels? anyways…) I mean, his name is freakin’ Doran of Dorne. His struggle is differentiating the two, Doran or Dorne. So to think of yourself as “I am Dorne” and then have the woman you love hate Dorne…I’m sure that hurt Doran as much as it hurt Mellario to find she had not just married Doran, but Dorne as well.
Sam speaks 