I guess the title of this post mostly refers to Cersei and Asha, but really, the four chapters covered here contain a lot of strong women, to the point where I'd call the more interesting character in Ser Arys' chapter Arianne rather than The Soiled Knight. As a side note, it occurred to me while reading these chapters that I'm 300 pages into this book and nothing has really happened yet. I'm not really complaining, because what's being discussed is still pretty interesting, but compared to the plot-heavy elements of previous books - especially Storm - it's a little glaring to have 300 pages of just talking with nothing actually happening. It's not unusual to have set-up chapters before a major event, but it seems like much of the action has died down, yet the Lannisters are always referencing a war that appears to largely be over. I think part of the difficulty here is that Martin didn't know what was happening in the north at the time, and since Dance has to take place largely concurrently with Feast, he can't do anything in Feast involving the north without knowing what happened. That sidelines Stannis and other northern characters who remain in the north. Or it could be that I'm entirely wrong and events are yet to come in this book, but that strikes me as a major limitation of the format he chose.
Asha: Asha is an interesting choice. We've seen Damphair and in previous novels Theon, and now Asha. I think later we see Victarion as well. Other than the Starks and the Lannisters, we've never had an eye into so many characters in a single family as we have with the Greyjoys, who really seem an odd choice since at the moment they are really so far removed from the greater events of Westeros. The variety of viewpoints so far in this book is staggering. Only Brienne and Cersei are getting serious repeated facetime. I thought her Uncle's comment at Harlaw was pretty interesting: "What has happened before will perforce happen again." Has someone been watching Battlestar Galactica? ("This has all happened before, it will happen again") Lots of questions regarding Asha. How reckless is she? How bold? Her behavior with Tristifer was interesting. Actually the whole encounter was pretty interesting. Lots of gender role reversal going on there. First off, even his name sound fairly feminine. Tristifer? Part of me wants to identify it with a name like Christopher, but comes off as more of a Jennifer. Anyway, there's the fact that he's pined for her for years, saving himself for her, while she has been out whoring and drinking on the coasts of Westeros. Major role-reversal. Then she slaps him down hard. What's interesting in her conversation with Tristifer isn't just that she's another gender-bender, it's that she rejects a myriad of traditional female roles; wife, mother, daughter and even sister (given her brief interactions with Theon). She's a female Theon, but without even the few moral compunctions that Theon picked up in Winterfell. She might not want to literally be a man, but she likes the lifestyle. I think she has a better chance than Cersei of actually achieving her dream of sitting a throne of power, but that chance still seems slim. Though Cersei and her both desire the same goal (to rule in their own name), Asha appears to clearly be made of sterner stuff.
Cersei: Speaking of King's Landing's resident nutcase. I wonder if the "raging fire" referred to at the end of the chapter was in reference to the burning of the Tower, or if that's a reference to the rage Jaime must have felt at her announcement that Osmund would be attending to her that night. It's a clear slap in the face from her to him. She continues to see Tyrion behind every corner, and literally behind every wall. It seems the discourse between Cersei and Jaime has changed, in that she insults his intelligence a lot more than she used to (and that's relative to the fact that she never used to regularly abuse him). She actively loathes him now. I think this in part because Jaime has outgrown her. He's evolved as a character, and she's devolved a bit. She liked him when they were on the same (very low) moral playing field, and when he was her minion to a degree. Now that he's refusing to support her, she hates him. Part of the problem there is that now he's more her equal, or at least, stands up for himself, so she doesn't like him. I also hate the disdain that Cersei has for Tommen. He's a king, gentle soul. Like I said in my last entry, he's a part of Jaime that has only recently risen to the surface, but she clearly favors her crazy dead son. Interesting that Sandor Clegane is alive. And I love the irony in Cersei deriding Margery Tyrell from flitting from King to King in an attempt to be Queen, in essence marrying for power, when all of Cersei's choices from day one have been about her acquiring power either for her family or for herself personally. Ironically, Margery might not be acting out of love, but Cersei is - love of power.
The Soiled Knight: Ser Arys Oakheart, Kingsguard, sworn to protect little Myrcella Baratheon. Nice to finally be back in Dorne! Lots more cultural touches about Dorne here, and I can't say I care for some of them. The food is super hot, because the landscape is super hot, and oh, the women are hot-blooded and hot-tempered, and highly sexual creatures. Honestly what I find the most problematic here is the way Martin treats hot, foreign environments, which is eerily similar to how English writers wrote about African and Carib women and environs during Colonial times. But this is fiction, so I'll assume that the similarities are coincidental, and take this more as evidence of laziness to create a less stereotypical culture than an outright allusion. Arianne is defying some of my early expectations of how she might be. I hadn't expected this whole super sexy, manipulative side of her. Martin pulled the wool over our eyes with our first impressions of her as the doting daughter. Also interesting how we get little snippets of Aemon Targaryen. Arianne repeats the line from Harlaw about events repeating themselves over and over. It's kind of sad that Ser Arys is perfectly able to identify the character flaws that lead to serious lapses of judgment by the men of the Kingsguard. and yet he willingly walks right into one with Arianne. Oh well, they aren't called character flaws for nothing. Arys is laughably malleable, though his conflicted nature is neat. We've seen Jaime struggled with some of his duties to the Kingsguard before (plus, you know, the Kingslaying), but Jaime skirted right around the ones regarding sex and kids. Arys has his biggest problem with the vows of chastity and no child having. What damage can Arianne really do? If the Prince dies, Arianne could marry Arys, declare Myrcella for queen, and Dorne could attack the north (well, relatively the north, I mean, I live in Michigan and consider Ohio part of 'the south') feeling perfectly justified. Other than that, I don't see what she could be going for. But she's clearly cunning, perhaps even more so than the Sand Snakes, who I could see her freeing if the Prince died.
Brienne: Her backstory is interesting, though it doesn't yet do anything to really complicate or expand on her character. It's just more evidence that she had a rough, non-traditional childhood and that no one respects her. What I did like about this chapter was Randyll Tarly, who we finally get to see have a more significant role. By all accounts, he's an extremely stern, but fairly decent guy considering he lives in Westeros. His judgments are harsh, but he's not being random or unfair in his punishments, and he's actually helping real people, which we've seen precious few doing. He seems to stand for tradition, both in his work ethic and in his rigid beliefs in gender roles. I thought Brienne's observations about women were interesting. She says that women can be just as cruel as men. She said that in the same chapter that she described a pretty cruel joke that the men of Renly's camp played on her. But one of the things I like most about these books is the way they defy gender role stereotypes (even while indulging in them), and that having women be cruel and selfish isn't off-limits. Both genders have characters that represent various points of the moral spectrum. It's fair. Though I will say that the "good" women have generally been somewhat boring. Brienne might be a badass, but she's a snoozefest, and everyone wants to throttle Sansa. Arya is the only badass who is also interesting, but she's still a child. Still, at least there's variety!
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