Apologies for my absence last week!
In terms of research, what I’ve been doing is mostly looking into works on the fantasy genre: its history, its function, the theory behind it, etc. I’ve found some books that are making their way to me via the CUNY library system, so we’ll see how it goes!
I’ve also been thinking on my characters for my thesis, and this is a writeup I did that I meant to hand out in class, but my printer wasn’t cooperating:
For my thesis, I think I will focus on several important women and follow their trajectory throughout the Song of Ice & Fire novels.
Two characters I think that need to be discussed together are the sisters Sansa and Arya Stark. Each presents a very different image of femininity: Sansa is ladylike and loves romance and chivalry, whereas Arya would much prefer to wield her own sword. Though it would be easy to fall into the trap of scorning Sansa’s traditional femininity and glorifying Arya’s inclination towards traditional masculinity, Martin puts them both into situations that play to their strengths. Sansa’s quietness and love for courtly values—traits that are often conflated with weakness or dimwittedness—pay off when she is a political prisoner during the war in the Red Keep. Arya’s aggressiveness pays off as she battles her way through Westeros and across the Narrow Sea into Essos.
Another pair of characters who I like to look at side by side are Cersei Lannister and Catelyn Stark. On the surface, they couldn’t appear more different: Cersei is scheming and cunning, constantly craving political power, while Catelyn is much more measured and maintains her own honor code. But they are also incredibly similar: they both were married off in political alliances during and after Robert’s Rebellion, they both derive much of their power from their roles as mothers, both have proven that they would do anything to protect their children, both wielded a certain amount of political power, and both were, at some point, the mothers of a kings. How each chose to use her power is what I find fascinating. I would also like to explore Cersei as one of the primary villains of the series, and what it means for a woman to be cast as a villain while still being a three-dimensional character.
Other characters I would like to examine are Daenerys, the exiled princess set to reclaim her homeland of Westeros, and Brienne of Tarth, a woman who chose the life of a warrior instead of a lady.
