What The Frell?

So here I am eagerly awaiting the debut of Legends on TNT in a few weeks when Sean Bean has to go and make Game of Thrones news. Now some of you know I HATE the whole Song of Ice and Fire series and I only read it because I'm writing fantasy and you know, it sells millions so you have to know what to do to be successful. As for HBO's TV series, I watch (when it's on free) and I have no complaints about how it's done. But now SB, who won't let Ned Stark stay mercifully dead, has gone and given credence to the R + L = J theory and I'm back into the source material to see what I can find. 

 

Most of the evidence for this theory comes from the TV show, and it's the kind of twist Martin is known for. And it would be one hell of a twist. But the source material is lengthy and it's been a few years and it's definitely not a book I would willingly read twice. (Irony, shut up.) So it may take me a few days before I declare Sean Bean bat-shit crazy on my blog. And I can call Sean Bean bat-shit crazy for two reasons, one NOBODY bothers to read this thing and two I'm pretty sure, seeing as how we've never met, he doesn't care. On the other, one does not take the calling of a man who has been blessed by Aragorn, son of Arathorn, bat-shit crazy lightly. One must take all of the facts into consideration. Now slowing down my efforts is my commitment to a man I hold in high esteem, one Tiny Pterosaur who has graciously allowed me to beta one of his works. So I have to put in the time to read at least a chapter of his stuff before I go on this crazy adventure.

Ok, that took a couple of hours less than I thought it would to track my copy of Game of Thrones, so I will now render my opinion. (I know you're waiting on baited breath, right?) First let me say to the Pterosaur, on your book so far, so good. I'm loving it. But back to the bee in my bonnet.

Now as much as I would like to say that Sean Bean is, er, crazy. I don't think he is. Now I'm not saying I agree with him, only that the R + L = J theory is a valid source of speculation. And seeing as how I'm in a gracious mood and all, I will line up the cogent arguments for this theory first and then I will state why I think he's wrong. (And I know, I'm going to be arguing the minutia of character with the man who brought Ned Stark to life and all, but hey I never said I wasn't bat-shit crazy.)

First of all the theory itself. R=Rhaegar Targaryen heir to the Seven Kingdoms, his father Aerys is mad and provokes the rebellion. L=Lyanna Stark, Ned's sister and betrothed to Robert Baratheon. And J=Jon Snow, a bastard raised as Ned's a year ish younger than Ned's first born Robb by Catelyn. Ok, so GOT gets started some 15 years after the rebellion successfully over throws Aerys, killing Rhaegar and Rhaegar's heir. We know this because Daenerys is fourteen in this book and Rhaergar's sister. We are not told the cause of the rebellion, only that Aerys is mad. Ok. The theory goes, Ned watched Lyanna breath her last breath and he made a deathbed promise to her. He found her dying (in a bed of blood, but that's the TV show not the book, so I'm sticking with the book) too late to be saved. And the question is...what was the promise Ned made to her. Ned tells Robert Lyanna is dead, and Robert, apparently in the know, kills Rhaegar for "what he did to Lyanna."

So for the sake argument, I'm going to let the gentleman's side go first. I'm pretty sure Rhaegar raped Lyanna and whatever happened as a result of the rape is what led to her death. I don't think Sherlock Holmes could bat that conclusion down, no matter how vague Martin chooses to be about it. After all, after you eliminate the impossible, what ever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. So what do we know? We know Lyanna, sixteen at the time, died somewhere away from Winterfell and Ned brought her bones home to rest in a crypt. We know this because Robert goes to visit her first thing when he gets to Winterfell.  We are told, on page 35-6 of  GOT version where SB is on the cover, Ned "was with her when she died". She begs "Promise me, Ned."... "in a room that smelled of blood and roses." ..."The fever had taken her strength...but when he gave her his word, the fear had gone out of his sister's eyes." The case is further strengthened when Ned wakes from the an old dream (nightmare) of "Lyanna in her bed of blood." And we have the argument where Robert sends out assasins and promises a title to anyone who'll kill Daenerys and her brother. So that's a pretty good circumstantial case for Jon being Lyanna's son by Rhaegar.

The case against is much weaker, but still there. First of all, to people who think this is a trick Martin won't do...have you been reading or watching the series? Seriously, because he's and underhanded bastard not above anything. But I wonder a few things. One we first learn of how Lyanna died in Ned's POV. It's his limited flashback we are a part of. In the very paragraph we learn of her last moments, it's clear in Ned's mind at least that the promise he made her was to bring her bones home to rest. He explicitly tells Robert this before his mind wanders back to her last moments. And while I have called Martin an underhanded bastard once already in this paragraph, that's really bad form on his part. Yeah, I know we're talking about a master of the plot points, and my biggest hatred of the books is the unfair plot twist. I absolutely hate the manipulations and Martin's slight of hand. Sometimes I don't like the plot point (like when Ned was killed), but there, though I was disappointed and somewhat shocked, I actually got what he was doing, he was destroying the traditional hero's journey. But this would be manipulation beyond the pale. First of all, though I am well aware of that the most dangerous lies are the ones we tell ourselves, withholding Jon's parentage at this moment does nothing for the book. We the reader could be intimately let in on Ned's best kept secret. There's no reason for Ned to lie to himself in this situation or to remember selectively. (And if we are supposed to believe it a word here or there would have rendered the same effect without being manipulative.)

Secondly with have Ned's idea of honor to deal with. We know Ned doesn't love and had never loved Catelyn but de's loyal and faithful to her. They clearly have a very intimate relationship as they are post coital when the news arrives from Lysa. So the real question here is faced with two options that are dishonorable, which is Ned most likely to choose. Is he going to undermine the trust of his wife and allow her to hate his sister's kid with a lie? or is he going to own a mistake he made that "dishonored (him) and Catelyn in the sights of gods and men." (page 92) He even tells Robert Jon's mother's name is Wylla,( page 92, again) which if he's lying compounds the lie. And again we are in Ned's POV, so there's no need to lie. Further more, though Robert is the one who brings up the subject, Ned could have easily turned to conversation honorably without lying.  I don't think I'm so far out on a limb to believe that Ned has a hard time lying. And when put in a similar circumstance, Ned tactfully finds a way to keep both his honor and his loyalty. When Robert lies dying and Ned has worked out that Cersei's children where illegitmate Ned wrote the will so it said "my heir" instead of "Joffery". (page 422) And in the next sentence "the deceit made him feel soiled." How is going feel lying the Catelyn day in and day out year after year and not have that strain on their marriage. And we know at the beginning their marriage is under almost no strain.

Thirdly Catelyn is an astute woman, and she didn't work it out. Thirdly I've been married for as long as Catelyn and Eddard were married in the book (I'm hoping some tyrant doesn't come along and whack off my husband's head, that would suck) and I can tell you even in a bad marriage a secret like that won't last. Surely they've had a heated argument or two over the subject of Jon, so how likely is Ned to take Catelyn's verbal abuse for his sister's sake? And did Ned think so little of Catelyn that she couldn't keep the secret when everything's she's ever done is for Ned whom she had learned to love fiercely? Ned trusted her with all of Winterfell and he wouldn't trust her with his sister's secret? That makes no sense.

Ok, but if Jon isn't Lyanna's child then what happened to her? One, I'm thinking that the R+L=baby theory on some level has to be accurate. If Lyanna wasn't raped, why is Robert so filled with hate for the man so many years later? And raping her until she was pregnant would punish both the Starks and Robert for the rebellion. So we now have a pregnant Lyanna who died on a bed of blood with fever that is somehow connected to "three knights in white cloaks and tower long fallen". (page 354)   And childbirth is a difficult thing frequently leading to the death of the mother, especially before this more modern age. Lyanna's fever is probably a result of a uterine infection that killed her. But just because Rhaegar got her pregnant doesn't mean the child lived or that Lyanna didn't miscarry. We have no idea just how small Lyanna was, but a teenager with immature organs is at high risk for miscarriage which could just as easily kill her as childbirth. Also, even if the baby was term and had lived, these three knights in white cloaks could easily have killed the baby on Rhaegar's orders further weakening Lyanna's will to live. It's perhaps not as interesting or cloak and dagger as the R+L=J theory, but realistic.

Now if the theory turns out to be accurate, I'm going to be really, really, really pissed. Let me tell you why. The number one rule of Theater Expirence 101 Western Carolina University circa 1994 had to do with the willing suspension of disbelief. Rule one was for actors, directors and writers alike. "You can do anything in the world you set up, but at every turn the internal rules must be consistent."  Martin has played around with the idea of unreliable narrators in this series, but to selectively manipulate us in this way is beyond the pale. It breaks the contract between reader and writer. Eddard Stark has been present to us as a man of his ideals, a man who finds it hard to compromise his ideals to survive in the real world. For Eddard to have lied to me, the reader, at every turn is a reason to quit the show, the book and the series. It violates the space I hold sacred, my ability to imagine the characters presented to me. I do not want to feel tricked into having done it wrong and I will. It is a disservice to me and offensive. I had expected the places where the theory comes from to be a bit vague and they were, but to lie patently to me about Jon Snow when you don't have to? There's something really wrong with that. Eddard could have deflected and still been in character and that would have put on the side of SB.

One last thing before I go, the interview SB gave concerning the theory he openly speculated that he would be brought back to play 15 year younger himself. And considering they've already screwed with Ned's age when they cast Bean for the part, I guess I can't really complain about him making the reappearance. But in the book the man is supposed to be about 20 at Lyanna's death and hell I can't pass for 20 any more. Just my humble opinion, so I think it's as likely as not that they will cast someone younger to player the younger Stark, and if they do might I lobby for Tom Felton. I'm kinda partial to guys who play villians and Felton does it so well....

Love,

Melanie