What’s up with the creepy, gory visions that Melisandre has of Patchface?

I’ll take a flyer on maybe Patchface being the one who kills Melisandre.

Just read your Sam chapter analysis. Holy fuck, you’re brilliant.

Well gawrsh…

Except for the very last episode, I haven’t watched the show past s2e3. In this episode, Jon said that there are about 1 million people in the North. I know that your own population estimates follow the 1% men under arms rule. Do you have any idea of roughly what numbers George had in mind to ensure compatibility with his story line? Looking at the Mormont harvest failing because all the men are fighting down south – What % of men need to be absent for this to be realistic? – Thank You, RSAfan.

That’s not quite what Jon said:

“A million, give or take.”

“That’s more people than the entire North crammed into that.”

So that’s less than a million. Which would suggest that the North has 3.5% of its population under arms, which is 3.5 times the normal rule.

More likely, the North has 3-4 million people and this was a weird mistake on the writers’ part.

Did D&D really say they don’t believe in themes? If that’s the case, I’m starting to wonder if they’re the type of ASOIAF fans who think that the series is meant to be a total deconstruction. I doubt it, since they give the heroes some moments, but it’s clear that they’ve misread a lot of what the series is supposed to be. It does explain why they got Stannis and Melisandre so wrong if they don’t believe in themes like people not being what they seem at first.

“When I asked Benioff and Weiss if it was possible to infer any overall intentionality to the upcoming 10 episodes, they sneered. “Themes are for eighth-grade book reports,” Benioff told me.” (source)

So there you have it.

(1) In a medieval setting, what are the disadvantages (when looking at the polity as a whole) of having a parliamentary type organization in control, as apposed to a strong central monarchy (suppose that instead of the Tullys, your own Order of the Trident was put in charge of the Riverlands post Conquest)? (2) Could such a system, endorsed by the Targaryen monarchy, even coexist alongside the other lord paramouncies? – Thank You, RSAfan.

Parliamentary government is not inconsistent with strong central monarchies – if we take Edward I of England as an example, here was a strong centralizing monarch who used Parliament as a vehicle for gaining internal consensus to higher levels of taxation needed to finance wars of conquest in Wales and Scotland. Indeed, one could argue that it’s a sign of strength, to give up exclusivity of power in exchange for making the wider political class and its wealth and power and status part of the monarchy’s governing system.
Certainly. Medieval parliaments were pretty heavily weighted in favor of the nobility, after all. Indeed, the “Commons” consisted of knights as well as burghers for a good long while, only gradually became the more dominant branch in the 17th century, and it wasn’t until 1911 that the House of Lords’ veto was abolished.

Would you be care to share your thoughts on King Lear in general? Recently played Cornwall in a production of it and I’m interested in your thoughts. Thanks!

It’s my favorite Shakespeare tragedy, a play of such ferocity and real human fear that the first time I saw it as a kid of all of ten years old it freaked me right the fuck out.

It was the RSC at Stratford-upon-Avon and the production had this enormous moon hanging over the stage, and when Gloucester was blinded, the moon cracks and starts spilling sand down like an hourglass. And the mix of the violence of “out, out vile jelly” and the moon breaking, I felt this sense of genuine cosmic terror, like the planets were coming apart and we were going to fall off the planet and into the void.

Thankfully, there was an intermission and I was calmed down, but holy hell.

Lear may not be the tightest of Shakespeare’s tragedies, its writing might be a bit more Whitman than Dickinson, but for sheer elemental force it cannot be beat.