GoT

[kmusser]

I linked it on facebook, I ought to link it here too. Ragnarök - The Song of Ice & Fire. Full of spoilers of course (book and show). Non-spoiler version, idea that the final conflict to the series is not going to be ice (zombies) vs fire (dragons), but humankind vs ice & fire, aka Ragnarok.

Possibly also of interest notes on some of the shows historical inspirations (show spoilers only). Not mentioned there, but the historical inspiration for the Red Wedding.

Comments

[andrewducker]

Am I safe to read it if I'm up to date with the TV series? Or are the spoilers beyond that?

[kmusser]

The Ragnarok thing is based on the books, so yes, there are spoilers beyond that - you could read the first page, which presents the idea without anything especially spoilerific, but stop before they get into specific character correspondence details.

[winterbadger]

I have to say, I don't think much of some of the speculation in the Washington Monthly article--the correspondences and "connections" are many of them not actually connections or correspondences at all.

Yes, even Martin (IIRC) has remarked that the WOTR were a *partial* *inspiration* for the civil war in the Seven Kingdoms. But the author of the article, despite repeatedly saying that she understands there isn't a one-to-one correspondence, doesn't seem to grasp the concept of "inspiration"; instead, she's glommed onto the idea that there are parallels and assumed that Martin has just taken history and rewritten it with different names.

I give Martin credit for a little more imagination than that...


ETA: I've seen a couple of suggestions that the Black Dinner is likely to be the inspiration for the Red Wedding. But what does it say about Scotland that both of the events cited are from there? :-)


(Not much, really--just that most of us don't know enough German, or French, or Italian, or Balkan history to find parallels there, which I'm sure there are.)