George R R Martin, Egwene, death by beheading?

[Asmodeanisdemandread]

@sutt what quote is that? I must've missed that one.

 

@dingbat that's spot on(about the details anyway) although BS has put in ASoIaF references with the jailer named Mord and one other from the same book I can't recall atm and IIRC RJ did too

[Suttree]

@sutt what quote is that? I must've missed that one.

 

Here you go mate, a few quotes touching on it...

 

Brandon Sanderson (31 August 2011)

Dang. I just pulled off something in A Memory of Light that is GRRM-esque. I'm not certain if I should apologize, feel awesome, or go take a shower.

SARAH WALTERS

 

Haven't read GRRM, should I? Also, I recommend feeling awesome and writing more of A Memory of Light, but I'm biased.

BRANDON SANDERSON

 

Depends on your threshold for content. His writing is genius, but he is very brutal. I could only stomach the first one.

BRANDON SANDERSON

 

His short stories are awesome, by the way. I've liked every one of those I've read.

BRANDON SANDERSON

 

Also, the Minas Tirith theme is playing on Pandora. Perfect.

TEREZ

 

Gah, now you've got me thinking Boromir/Gawyn.

 

Interview: Aug 31st, 2011

 

Reddit AMA (Verbatim)

Axelkappa ()

 

You previously mentioned on twitter a GRRM-esque moment in A Memory of Light. Any more on that? In the end are you going to apologize or feel awesome?

Brandon Sanderson

 

When the book is out, ask me about this. I'll tell you which one it was. It's something I was struggling with, trying different takes on. Finally, some things came together. I'll say more, but I'll put it in spoiler text. (It's not very spoilery, but some people don't want to know anything.) [highlight to read] It is a moment of awesomeness, but also is somewhat cruel. There is a death involved. It could be from the side of the Light, it could be from the side of the Shadow.

[Asmodeanisdemandread]

Thanks sutt. Definitely gonna hit Brandon up on twitter after aMoL but since I'm a GRRM fan(atic) ill probably be able to pick it out. ASoIaF is the only series I reread with the same ferocity as WoT.

[shadowofomioc]

Well, it is hard for me to see, at this point, anyone dying. We have gone a long time without a major character even getting close to being killed, despite the freakin Chosen out there hunting most of them.

 

We have had plenty " oooo this person is going to dieeee! " moments but never a " zomg I cannot believe they killed this character ! "

 

I think the last time I felt anything like that was with Moraine. And now she is back .. soo ...

 

I am not really sitting here waiting for anyone to die. Everyone will live happily ever after.

 

I think the only character who has a real chance of dying is Rand. Every single thing these books have led up to is Rand sacrificing himself for the world to save the world. If he ends up living, I really think that would be an incredibly poor choice.

[balefired-ed2]

Since GRRM is involved in this topic, I am going to assume everyone is up to speed in his stories.

 

He really does not kill that many main characters.

 

Outside of Prologue/Epilogue characters, how many POV characters have actually died and stayed dead? The only ones I can think of off the top of my head are Ned and that one Dornish prince, Quentyn, maybe? Every other POV that has been in mortal danger either somehow is shown to survive or is a zombie.

 

Most likely the axe would suddenly turn and miss Egwene, who would make a miraculous escape.

[BFG]

^ agree. The Red Wedding was a shock, but no pov characters died and stayed dead in it.

 

The thing that I would really define GRRM by is his fall/redemption arcs. After the first 3 chapters, I was never going to like Jaime, no way, not ever... Same with Cersei...

 

I wonder if the GRRM thing is to do with a character arc instead of a death. At the moment I agree with previous posters, no death would really be shocking in the last book.

[Barid Bel Medar]

Brandon revealed that it involved a death - possibly one from the Shadow, possibly one from the Light.

 

Edit: Take a look at Suttree's quote.

[BFG]

^oops, thanks Braid

[Barid Bel Medar]

No problem. To be fair it was blacked out for spoilers (although there are no real spoilers) so people may not have read it. Also, without that quote, the thinking was logical. GRRM doesn't use that much death, everyone becomes zombies, or they are unimportant deaths to the story.

 

I'll put this in spoilers because it is a heap, and it is only semi-related to the thread.

 

 

I was really annoyed at the Dornish Prince's death, it was like he was just playing on the whole "killing PoV characters" that he made so famous. It was perfectly set up with Ned, it was a genius move that was set up to happen, when you read further. Burnt-face prince however, was just killed randomly and served little point in the story other than "Gee, look at GRRM killing people, hardcore."

 

[BFG]

No problem. To be fair it was blacked out for spoilers (although there are no real spoilers) so people may not have read it. Also, without that quote, the thinking was logical. GRRM doesn't use that much death, everyone becomes zombies, or they are unimportant deaths to the story.

 

I'll put this in spoilers because it is a heap, and it is only semi-related to the thread.

 

 

I was really annoyed at the Dornish Prince's death, it was like he was just playing on the whole "killing PoV characters" that he made so famous. It was perfectly set up with Ned, it was a genius move that was set up to happen, when you read further. Burnt-face prince however, was just killed randomly and served little point in the story other than "Gee, look at GRRM killing people, hardcore."

 

 

 

in response to the spoiler above (spoilers for GRRMs Dance with Dragons

 

 

 

Doesn't it fulfil the curse of the sun(son) setting in the east? I'm not sure about the need for him to be a POV character but I think somehow we needed to get enough information about him that it wasn't just a random death to fulfil the curse to allow Dany (once the rest has happened) to have a kid again?

 

Although I've only read Dance once and reread a few bits for debates (with friends, I haven't been active in online debates for Song for a few years so I don't know what the latest theories are). Once aMoL is out, I'll be rereading in full.

 

I used to say that GRRM could write some of his characters walking in a circle for a book and I'd still want to read them because his characters are so interesting - but he did push it with Feast and Dance (although Feast improved for me on rereading)

 

(My only response as this isn't the forum for it)

 

 

[Asmodeanisdemandread]

@balefired-2 Ned's death was a MAJOR shock on GoT granted yes he was the only MAJOR pov character to die thus far but still, Robb's death, cats death (yes she did die regardless that she came back as stone heart) and quentyn still hit home because they were important. Maybe not for the reasons everyone thinks but they WERE important.

[Tainayndra]

I'm pretty much dislike Egwene, with the disclaimer that I think RJ made Egwene to be a polarizing character. (He could obviously write heroic women characters, so Egwene was meant to be polarizing since Page 1.) But when I quit reading WoT after Bk 6 (I just read spoilers every few years to keep up), and I realized RJ wasn't going to kill her off (and I was right!) — and I mean Egwene was a reason I quit reading — it stuck with me that RJ had something in mind for her. Not some wonder Amrylin Seat (I don't think there'll be such a thing in the next age, at least not as it is now), and not some darkfriend; I think RJ wanted Egwene to be polarizing for a reason besides "whoo, she finally got her head chopped off."

 

Personally, putting aside my hatred of the character (because I think it was manipulated to tell the story), I'd like to see her sacrifice herself to properly seal the DO seal after they fix the Bore and need to seal the DO away the right way. Of course, I'd always thought, "That's Rand," but as I read spoilers for other books, and Egwene's (undeserved, imo) growing importance, I figured Rand and his women would survive into the next Age, rebuild, etc, but something would drive Rand mad, thus repeating the cycle again — and I think Rand would pretty much go mad thinking that Egwene got stuck with DO Sealing duties for eternity. Especially heinous since her biggest fear is bondage (though she'd be the bonder, not the bonded).

 

I think such a thing would make the readers look at Egwene way differently in the end (which is needed), and authors love to jerk us around like that, so take a polarizing character and have her save the day, and also point the way to how the cycle could start again without TELLING that story. (There'd have to be a lot more backstory on the Forsaken, imo, and the AOL, for them to pull this off well.)

 

Yeah, she needs to die, but die well, to explain why RJ didn't give her good edits but kept her so important, and did little to improve her demeanor. (I don't buy the "strength" argument; Nynaeve's got her beat but is awesome nice, and also freakin Verin and Cadsuane... all strong women, but they show some humility and less stupidity). But no, Egwene's not "evil evil", like Cersei or Lanfear, but she's not Eddard Stark either. She's ...maybe Littlefinger (under-the-radar strong, self-important; sometimes very questionable; may yet have heroic ending due to his his loyalty/love for Cat).

 

I'm guessing if he's not talking about Lan's death, which would KILL me and I'd never read it, he's talking about Egwene's. Egwene and Rand are the stars of the show; one of them has got to go. In a bittersweet way. Egwene's got that edit; even her fans would love that she sacrificed herself for the world, esp if she were the only one who could do it, and Rand got angsty about it.

 

(I LOVE GRRM, had to comment, sorry so long!)

[David Selig]

I'm pretty much dislike Egwene, with the disclaimer that I think RJ made Egwene to be a polarizing character. (He could obviously write heroic women characters, so Egwene was meant to be polarizing since Page 1.) But when I quit reading WoT after Bk 6 (I just read spoilers every few years to keep up), and I realized RJ wasn't going to kill her off (and I was right!) — and I mean Egwene was a reason I quit reading — it stuck with me that RJ had something in mind for her. Not some wonder Amrylin Seat (I don't think there'll be such a thing in the next age, at least not as it is now), and not some darkfriend; I think RJ wanted Egwene to be polarizing for a reason besides "whoo, she finally got her head chopped off."

 

Personally, putting aside my hatred of the character (because I think it was manipulated to tell the story), I'd like to see her sacrifice herself to properly seal the DO seal after they fix the Bore and need to seal the DO away the right way. Of course, I'd always thought, "That's Rand," but as I read spoilers for other books, and Egwene's (undeserved, imo) growing importance, I figured Rand and his women would survive into the next Age, rebuild, etc, but something would drive Rand mad, thus repeating the cycle again — and I think Rand would pretty much go mad thinking that Egwene got stuck with DO Sealing duties for eternity. Especially heinous since her biggest fear is bondage (though she'd be the bonder, not the bonded).

 

I think such a thing would make the readers look at Egwene way differently in the end (which is needed), and authors love to jerk us around like that, so take a polarizing character and have her save the day, and also point the way to how the cycle could start again without TELLING that story. (There'd have to be a lot more backstory on the Forsaken, imo, and the AOL, for them to pull this off well.)

 

Yeah, she needs to die, but die well, to explain why RJ didn't give her good edits but kept her so important, and did little to improve her demeanor. (I don't buy the "strength" argument; Nynaeve's got her beat but is awesome nice, and also freakin Verin and Cadsuane... all strong women, but they show some humility and less stupidity). But no, Egwene's not "evil evil", like Cersei or Lanfear, but she's not Eddard Stark either. She's ...maybe Littlefinger (under-the-radar strong, self-important; sometimes very questionable; may yet have heroic ending due to his his loyalty/love for Cat).

No way. Littlefinger is an outright villain, guilty of all kinds of terrible crimes and totally selfish. There's nothing remotely heroic about him. Egwene has her fair share of flaws, but she's clearly one of the good guys.

[AesSedaiGuy]

I agree, Littlefinger is a well written and interesting character, but hardly one of the heroic protagonists ... He singlehandedly betrayed Ned Stark. I think Jaime has more redeeming qualities than Littlefinger.

 

Egwene is very much, to me, like Catelyn Tully Stark. A nominal "good guy" with questionable decisions, reactions and motivations.

[Rand the Plumber]

Egwene is very much, to me, like Catelyn Tully Stark. A nominal "good guy" with questionable decisions, reactions and motivations.

 

That's a good point.  Egg-salad is always in the side of right, but so far that has always been "good for the Tower, and good for the world" or "good for the Tower, and therefore good for the world".  I'm not disagreeing with her (well, maybe on the last bit, a little), but has she ever had a moment like Nynaeve where she actively considered telling the WT where to stick its Great Serpent ring because it wasn't acting in the best interests of humanity?  I don't recall one.  We've seen the opposite, for example her reaction when she hears of women being bonded, even after she knows that the Taint has been removed.  An ordinary Aes Sedai might be forgiven for feeling that that was a Crowning Moment of Squick, but the Amyrlin can't afford to have such kneejerk reactions.

 

I like Eggers, and I think that she has Done Good, but I think that in some circumstances that has been by default rather than by design.  It'll be better when she's dead.

[AesSedaiGuy]

Interesting take. We shall see ...

[Viperswhip]

I too hope she bites the dust, I have really disliked her as well, though she's been fine at times, and she was pretty cool in the action scenes of TGS and ToM, she didn't impress me in any other ways. I guess she wishes that 51 Aes Sedai were killed instead of bonded? Did she even think of how dire the alternatives were? These women were sent to destroy the Black Tower and she heaps the blame on Rand instead of thanking her lucky stars that Rand had explicitly stated that no Aes Sedai could be harmed (she doesn't know that, but she should have wondered why the Aes Sedai were not simply killed).

 

I do wonder how much of her obstinacy is a result of Halima laying a compulsion on her. She came around awfully quickly on the Oath Rod issue.

[AesSedaiGuy]

Wow, interesting ... I hadn't thought about that, since Halima has kind of just been gone from the Egwene story. But maybe you're right ...

[Viperswhip]

Yep, a Forsaken had access to her head for months, and Egwene has no way to detect Saidin, so I don't know if we will ever find out, but if there is no compulsion there, then Halima is the lamest ever Forsaken, like worse than Asmodean who just wanted to play tunes.

[AesSedaiGuy]

Agreed. Although, I wish RJ had convo'd with GRRM on how to write an interesting and complicated bad guy ...IMO

[Dollhouse]

A GRRM moment? Well, since it is the end of the series and pretty much anyone can die, the only way I can think of to to make it a GRRM moment is to make the death bittersweet and wrong... probably pretty descriptive as well. I think it will be one of the "dark friends" dying. Since a lot of darkfriends will die, having a particular scene where the death is somewhat painful to read is a good way to go GRRM yes?

 

But why would we even care about any of the darkfriends? I mean Demandred is probably a pretty cool guy and Moridin has that whole "magnificent bastard" going for him... but do we really care if they get offed? For us to care we'd had to have formed some sort of real attachment to them... so there would be two possibilities...

 

1. A character many of us liked and never suspected being a pawn of the shadow is suddenly revealed to be a darkfriend and then killed while fighting.

 

or

 

2. Cyndane,

 

 

Yes I'm that obvious. Naturally I would write about Cyndane, but really I feel there are far to few posts about her. So let me explain why I think her death could be made into a GRRM moment.

 

Now, Mierin took the name Lanfear as her own but has since being resurrected refused to acknowledge that she or even was Lanfear. In a few of my other posts if interested you guys can read why I stress that while Lanfear was Mierin, Cyndane might be Mierin but she certainly isn't Lanfear. But enough of that... back to the point I was making;

 

Mierin is certainly being tortured by the shadow and there is no doubt in my mind that she wants to be saved. It doesn't make her good though, she just doesn't want to die again or suffer.

 

Despite what surtree claims, there is no evidence that Cyndane doesn't love Lews... does that mean she didn't want power? No... I'm not saying that, I'm just saying that there is still enough love there for a love-drama to play out. And this is where it starts getting good.

 

I haven't read the books, I ordered them 9 hours ago so I should have them around the 8th...

 

I will however make use of a quote by Sanderson as well as a spoiler view by Terez.

 

WHAAAAAT. That seriously can’t be right. …Can it? [later] Well, okay, I was right that it wasn’t right, go me, but that sucks almost as badly! Gah!

 

and the quote by Sanderson:

 

When you read the book, what Cyndane is up to should be of paramount importance to you, and DO NOT believe everything that you think happens in the book.

 

I believe these things refer to the same thing. Actually, is it to much of a spoiler using "hint" Terez gave us?

 

So, say Lews saves Mierin only for her to betray him and give some speech about how she is going to kill him yada yada, lets make her a little bit out of character for bonus points. Then have her get Rand's bond and attack Egwene, she will remember Egwene as somebody she wanted to kill [FoH], But then we will get a POV and it will be revealed that while still evil, what she is doing is some sort of Xanatos gambit? If it succeeds it might be crucial for the "light" to win (of course it is for her own selfish desire, maybe thinking that she can get Lews to love ect ect)

 

This scene will fulfill the prophecy of the Daugther of the Night making the shining walls crumble (see Egwene). Anyway for the GRRM to work it would be crucial that we believe up to that point that Cyndane is acting out of just pure hate, making readers hope that somebody saves poor Eggy... then with her pov revealed, it should make make readers hope for her success or at least hope that the scene wont end tragically.

 

Enter Gawyn with his three blood rings. I don't like Gawyn, I hate his character but that is also why I find him one of the more interesting people to read about. Theories about him killing Rand of Shaddar Haran are to far removed from what he is; he isn't one of the heroes... he was never meant for great deeds. His place in the books is as a man that do great deeds for the people he love and to save the woman he is in love with.

 

So it would be that "awesome moment" that Sanderson mentioned... even if we hate his guts and even if many of us think Eggy is a bad character, the fact that he decides to use the rings knowing he will die to attack one of the forsaken, in order to save the woman he loves is theoretically "awesome". Likewise it would also be cruel if this was Cyndane's only chance to be saved and what people thought she was doing was just one of her doing theater (she was always a drama queen so it is in her character). Not only denied the love or even a chance to survive, but nobody would be the wiser... possibly not even Rand.

 

Then she dies, probably in some very gruesome explicit way... I can imagine him slicing her up with a sword perhaps? and Rand suffers the backlash of her death and her final thoughts, maybe then realizing she actually did love Lews... or worse, he doesn't realize it at all which might be even more cruel.

 

Well, I know I would rage at least... I would call THAT a GRRM moment.

[AesSedaiGuy]

Bravo! That was riveting! Bravo, indeed! Great ideas!

[Suttree]

Hard for me to discuss without spoilers at this point Dollhouse. Look forward talking with you when you've finished AMoL.

 

Without touching on AMol however you can hardly call RJ claiming it's laughable she would do good for Rand's sake(without it furthering her own goals) and the LTT quote about power "no evidence". Add to that all the other info we get on her character from the BWB and RJ and it should be very clear what her actuall goals are IMO.

[msbee]

This sounds like something I wrote in the 'daughter of the night' thread yesterday, only taken to a whole new level.

My post was an off-the-cuff summary of something I remembered working on a while back - I think I'll have to go and see if I can resurrect it, maybe tidy it up and get it posted before I get the book.

 

@ Suttree

Your comment makes it even more interesting, even if you give nothing away.