Beyond the Wall: Exploring George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, From A Game of Thrones to A Dance with Drago

by James Lowder

  Then came the direwolves.

  In the first chapter where we meet the Stark family, a direwolf is found dead, sparking the soon-to-be-ill-fated Jory to proclaim, “It is a sign.” Jon Snow is more explicit, though, when he says to his father, “You have five trueborn children [. . .]. Three sons, two daughters. The direwolf is the sigil of your House. Your children were meant to have these pups, my lord.”

  The hint of destiny lingers over the scene. Powerful forces seem to link the young Stark children together with these direwolves. At this point in the book, with so little knowledge of the setting, the fantasy reader is inclined to believe that this connection has otherworldly significance and that belief is made all the stronger when Jon then discovers an albino pup, declaring, “This one belongs to me.” The direwolves not only match Ned Stark’s trueborn children, but there is also an outsider for the bastard son. Our minds are wired to look for meanings in patterns, and this pattern just begs to be more than mere coincidence.

  Catelyn sees something much more dire in this event than the arrival of pets: “[A] direwolf dead in the snow, a broken antler in its throat. Dread coiled within her like a snake, but she forced herself to smile at this man she loved, this man who put no faith in signs.” This does prove to be ominous, a sign of grim things to come, as attested by the ultimate fate of Ned Stark at the command of Joffrey (a broken antler if ever there were one).

  But what of the direwolf pups themselves? As a reader, I placed a lot of weight on the greater significance of the direwolves and on Jon’s proclamation that the “children were meant to have these pups.” I anticipated the direwolves playing a crucial role in the events yet to unfold. After all, surely such a curious origin meant they were intended for great things.

  In that respect, I’ve found the direwolves to be a great disappointment.

  Bran’s direwolf, Summer, proves his worth early on, when he rescues Lady Catelyn and protects Bran from an assassination attempt. Certainly Ghost is a useful companion to Jon Snow as he takes the black. And Robb Stark’s rise as King in the North is predicated, in no small part, on his legendary status as “the young wolf,” fighting alongside Grey Wind.

  Even by the conclusion of the first book, though, the direwolves have become, at best, background elements of the Stark children, rather than significant components of the story itself. Two are lost—one killed and one chased off—even before the Starks reach King’s Landing. And now, five books into the series, the promise of the direwolves seems even more distant. Grey Wind’s fate matched that of Robb, the two murdered under a flag of truce then grafted together in a twisted mockery of their living connection. Arya has been separated from Nymeria for years, yet maintains hints of a vague psychic link. The connections of Bran and Jon to their wolves is substantially different, and stronger, but have yet to really impact the larger storyline. Ghost vanishes for nearly half of A Storm of Swords and Jon seems barely fazed by it, even as he’s coming to terms with being a warg. Aside from Bran’s, the wolves are largely expendable.

  And that, ultimately, is the curious thing about the direwolves. They are presented as this promise, a representation of some sort of divine prophecy and intervention. The discovery scene early in A Game of Thrones seems to suggest that the wolves are intended for the children, presumably as protection. When Summer defends Bran and Catelyn, divine powers seem to be intervening to protect the young Stark family, but the protection has been inconsistent in the story since.

  The gods of Westeros are as disappointing as the direwolves. Whether present, absent, or outright dead, the deities never quite live up to the expectations of those who believe in them. In fact, it’s really a wonder that they have any followers at all.

  The Gods of Westeros

  The situation is muddled because Westeros is home to so very many gods. Let’s take a quick inventory:

  Old Gods: The northmen worship ancient gods of stone and earth and tree, as were worshipped by the children of the forest in ancient days. There appears to be no formal priesthood for these gods, and their places of worship are at special weirwood trees with faces carved in them. The First Men continued this tradition by planting a single weirwood, called a heart tree, in godswoods at their noble houses throughout Westeros.

  The Seven: With the Andal invasion, which occured over six thousand years before the events in the novels, came the religion of the Faith of the Seven. The seven deities are reflections of each other, similar to the concept of the Trinity in mainstream modern Christianity, though they also contain analogs to elements of paganism. They are: Father, Mother, Warrior, Maiden, Smith, Crone, and Stranger.

  The Drowned God: The Ironborn of the Iron Islands worship a brutal deity called the Drowned God. Belief in the Drowned God informs all of their traditions, especially their pirate culture, because it leads them to treat conquest, rape, and plunder as a divine act.

  R’hllor, Lord of Light: R’hllor is a foreign god that is becoming more dominant in Westeros, mostly through the militant conversion imposed by Stannis Baratheon. Of all the gods, R’hllor is the one in whose name the most overt supernatural wonders have been invoked.

  The Many-Faced God: Though not based in Westeros, this is an amalgamated religion that sees the death gods of all faiths as representing a single being. The followers of the Many-Faced God form a cult, the Faceless Men, which teaches assassination as a religious practice. The cultists appear to be granted the power to alter their appearance. The Stranger of the Seven is considered one of the faces of the Many-Faced God.

  The Great Other: Priests of R’hllor indicate that there is another dark god “whose name must not be spoken.” This god is the antithesis of R’hllor, representing darkness, cold, and death.

  There are other gods mentioned throughout the series, mostly in reference to those worshipped within the Free Cities and Valyria, but they have less of a bearing on the book’s central events than these.

  Not all epic fantasies go to so great a length to incorporate clear and diverse religious structures into their worlds. Read through Tolkien, for example, and you will find hardly a mention of a priesthood or specific religious doctrine, despite the strong evidence of religious themes and overt manifestations of forces both good and evil. The closest thing to a deity we run across in Middle-earth is Tom Bombadil and, frankly, he seems like he’d be indifferent to any form of worship directed his way.

  Even in series that contain specific religious traditions and orders—such as Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time books—these traditions often align in clearer ways with the positive and negative forces at the heart of the universe. Those forces may be defined as good and evil, law and chaos, or some other spectrum, but religions often have relatively clear places within the ethical cosmology.

  The lines between good and evil are not nearly so clear within Westeros. Or rather, there is a very clear line, but it’s a physical one, not a religious one. The Wall stands between the dark, cold Others and the realm of man. Despite the presence of the Free Folk north of the Wall, the cosmology of Westeros seems to define this domain as belonging to the world’s evil forces. It is far less clear that an equivalent force of good is at work south of the Wall.

  The metaphysical threat in the series, from the very first page, has been the Others north of the Wall, but this threat remains largely absent from most of the major plotlines developing in the series. The readers and Jon Snow know of the danger, but the threat’s escalation has been glacial in its progression compared to the whirlwind of activity in King’s Landing or even Valyria. Most characters don’t even really believe that the Others exist, and those who do favor conflicting interpretations of what they are.

  There is no ambiguity about their nature among the R’hllor priests. To them, the Others serve R’hllor’s nemesis, the Great Other, reminiscent of the Christian split between God and Satan. The priest Moqorro explicitly says to the Ironborn, “Your Drowned God is a demon. [. . .] He is no more than a thrall of the Other, the dark go
d whose name must not be spoken” (A Dance with Dragons). To the Lord of Light’s followers, all faiths but R’hllor represent the Great Other.

  The other faiths seem to at least leave open some form of broader polytheism. This is explicit in the case of the Faceless Men and the Faith of the Seven, but for other religions it is a bit less clear. For example, worshippers of the Drowned God may not necessarily think the Seven don’t exist; they just think that their god is superior.

  Though some Westerosi religions are more sympathetic than others, we’re given hints that they all may contain elements of truth. Characters believe or disbelieve in the gods based on their own temperaments, not because they typically have any real reason to think that one has more validity than the others.

  Hearing the Voice of Gods

  One of the chief teachings of most religions is that the deity or dieties communicate their will to devotees in some meaningful way. Prophecy, even if only in the form of strong intuitions and inner spiritual guidance, seems almost a requirement of religion. Merely from a practical standpoint, a religion that claimed its deities remained absolutely silent to the faithful would have a serious recruiting disadvantage.

  The will of the gods is difficult to interpret in Westeros. Beyond the direwolves omen, the track record of accurate prophecies has been much spottier. Perhaps Ned Stark is wrong to “put no faith in signs,” but the series as a whole implies that prophecies are not statistically safe bets. This isn’t a slip of the author, because the story specifically addresses the prophetic fumbles.

  A Clash of Kings begins with an ominous red asteroid hurtling through the sky, but various individuals interpret the sign as a portent of very different things. None of the interpretations really seem to be borne out by subsequent events.

  One has to imagine that Melisandre is surprised at the mismatch between the victories she’s seen in her flames and those she’s witnessed in real life. When she does finally let her air of confidence slip, she justifies the failure of the world to match her prophecies by placing the blame not upon her perfect and infallible Lord of Light, but upon herself. “The vision was a true one. It was my reading that was false. I am as mortal as you, Jon Snow. All mortals err” (A Dance with Dragons).

  There are more cynical views of prophecy, pointing the finger of blame at the prophecy rather than the prophet. Tyrion Lannister says, “Prophecy is like a half-trained mule. [. . .] It looks as though it might be useful, but the moment you trust in it, it kicks you in the head” (A Dance with Dragons). But it is Archmaester Marwyn who really gets the prize for impuning prophecy with a graphic and colorful analogy:

  “Gorghan of Old Ghis once wrote that a prophecy is like a treacherous woman. She takes your member in her mouth, and you moan with the pleasure of it and think, how sweet, how fine, how good this is . . . and then her teeth snap shut and your moans turn to screams. That is the nature of prophecy, said Gorghan. Prophecy will bite your prick off every time.” (A Feast for Crows)

  It is significant to note that even the cynical observations do not reject the premise that prophecy can provide a true glimpse of what is to come; instead, they cast doubt on our own ability to wield prophecy in a useful way, even if it is true. Again, the dead direwolf proves illustrative: Catelyn urges Ned to accept the position as the King’s Hand in large part due to the omen, because she fears that rejecting it will harm Robert’s pride. Pricks aren’t the only body parts lost by prophecy.

  Choosing Your Religion

  Much as in our own world, choice of religion in Westeros seems to be a matter more of familial or even regional tradition than personal choice. The faiths of Catelyn and Ned Stark demonstrate a situation in which each remains true to the gods of their ancestors. Despite the fact that they have a septa in charge of the education and care of their daughters, the boys are expected to hold to the faith of their father. This isn’t just a Stark tradition, either. Samwell seems to describe a fairly common chain of belief when he identifies the religious lineage of House Tarly: “I was named in the light of the Seven at the sept on Horn Hill, as my father was, and his father, and all the Tarlys for a thousand years” (A Game of Thrones).

  Still, freedom of religious choice does exist within Westeros, because Samwell then chooses to make his oath to the Night’s Watch in the weirwood, beside his new brother, Jon Snow. As Samwell says, “The Seven have never answered my prayers. Perhaps the old gods will” (A Game of Thrones).

  A Song of Ice and Fire begins presenting a pluralistic, religiously tolerant Westeros, but that tolerance definitely wanes as the series progresses. Stannis Baratheon becomes a radical devotee of R’hllor, forcing religious conversion as part of fealty oaths and conquests, and Cersei reinstates the militant orders of the Faith of the Seven, the Warrior’s Sons and the Poor Fellows, which ultimately gain enough power to depose her on their own authority. This trend toward theocratic militarism within Westeros had been weeded out in centuries past and its return does not bode well for the world.

  Assuming that one avoids coercion, it’s unclear that a new arrival in Westeros would find any compelling reason to follow any religion, except for social advantages. Catelyn Stark, a devout follower of the Seven, “had more faith in a maester’s learning than a septon’s prayers” (A Game of Thrones) when it comes to medical care. Even Asha—as Ironborn as they come—laments, “The Drowned God did not answer. He seldom did. That was the trouble with gods” (A Dance with Dragons). Throughout Westeros, it seems that the gods may be worshipped, but they can hardly be relied upon to deliver aid when it is most needed.

  The one exception may be R’hllor, who works the most overt miracles in his name. However, the nature of R’hllor’s miracles bring into question whether he’s truly the noble Lord of Light that his followers proclaim. Who really wants to worship a god that gives birth to murderous shadow-creatures? If you were trying to put faith in a moral deity, R’hllor might not be your top pick.

  The strongest voice in favor of R’hllor’s role as supreme and exclusively good deity is Melisandre, but her credibility is dubious, in no small part because she is introduced by murdering an elderly maester. That act is arguably self-defense, though her gleeful demeanor still lingers unfavorably. Beyond that, we know that she’s unapologetically murdered at least three men and advocated the ritual sacrifice of children.

  When Ser Davos says, “It seems to me that most men are grey,” Melisandre replies: “If half an onion is black with rot, it is a rotten onion. A man is good, or he is evil” (A Clash of Kings). This philosophy doesn’t bode well for either Melisandre or R’hllor, both of whom certainly seem to have some rot about them.

  In fact, the entire series forces Melisandre’s moral absolutism into doubt, as we are regularly given characters who seem to be thoroughly vile but are later revealed to have noble aspects to their nature—and vice versa. Part of the draw of the books is that the characters are complex and multifaceted, with flaws and virtues constantly in conflict. Even the heartless Cersei Lannister is portrayed as a once-frightened child who lost out on the chance at a great destiny and also as a fiercely protective mother, both traits that engender some measure of empathy—just enough to keep the reader from cheering unconditionally at her degrading downfall.

  In a world where every person is, in fact, grey, where good and evil are found cohabiting in every noble, knight, and peasant, why would it be any different among the gods? Really, it only makes sense that it would be hard to tell the good from the bad. And what option does that leave to the person looking for a god to worship?

  Rejecting the Gods

  One path left open is that taken by Tyrion. “If I could pray with my cock, I’d be much more religious” (A Clash of Kings), he notes, but short of that, he has no particular use for gods. His brother Jaime has pretty much gone the same route. If ever there was a time when Jaime embraced the worship of the gods, it has long since passed. When his hostage, Hoster Blackwood, declares rather uncertainly, “The gods are good,” Jaime�
��s immediate thought is “You go on believing that” (A Dance with Dragons).

  Strictly speaking, these characters haven’t rejected the existence of gods. They aren’t necessarily atheists, but they reside somewhere on the agnostic spectrum. The religious people they run across seem peculiar to them, unfathomable in their desire to embrace deities that, if they exist, seem at best capricious and at worst outright malicious.

  Of the Lannister siblings, Cersei, curiously enough, has the most faith in the divine powers. She believes that she was prophesied by the gods to become queen of the Seven Kingdoms, yet this doesn’t stop her from committing incest in a sept (in front of her son’s corpse, no less) or murdering the High Septon. And those are just her offenses specifically against the Faith of the Seven.

  Even those characters who have clung more strongly to their religious convictions don’t seem to receive any particular reward for it. The most extreme examples of divine favor—the resurrections of Beric Dondarrion and ultimately Catelyn Stark—aren’t the sort of rewards that most of us would pray for.

  The ambiguous status of religion in the series seems an intentional act on the part of George R.R. Martin, who described himself in a July 2011 Entertainment Weekly interview as a “lapsed Catholic” and acknowledged that most would call him “an atheist or agnostic.” He went on to say, “And as for the gods, I’ve never been satisfied by any of the answers that are given. If there really is a benevolent loving god, why is the world full of rape and torture? Why do we even have pain? I was taught pain is to let us know when our body is breaking down. Well, why couldn’t we have a light? Like a dashboard light? If Chevrolet could come up with that, why couldn’t God? Why is agony a good way to handle things?”