The Tartan

Editorials featured in the Forum section are solely the opinions of their individual authors.

So they call me the reader these days. Books, paragraphs, you know me. Over the summer, I got tired of nostalgia-watching mid-2010s (“mid” referring to both the time period and quality) sitcoms on Max, and since I don’t have a subscription for Hulu or Tubi or FreeWee or Peeble or Glompy, I couldn’t nostalgia-watch “Parks and Recreation” either. 

Hence, I picked my sorry ass up and walked over to the library built by His Benevolence, Andrew Carnegie, where I had to talk face-to-face to a librarian and admit what kind of book I wanted to read. Frankly, the interaction was horrible and made me want to saw my arm off. Have you ever walked up to a complete stranger and told them you’re looking for George R. R. Martin books? I might as well have been wearing a Zelda triforce graphic tee or wearing my Discord-scented cologne. I might as well have admitted to this librarian’s face that I was afraid of talking to girls in highschool. I might as well have walked up to the librarian carrying a Jon Snow funko-pop and baring my shoulder to show off my direwolf tattoo. It was one of the most debasing experiences of my life, but it was all worth it because then she told me where to find the George R. R. Martin books, which is typically what happens when you ask questions of a librarian.

We all remember “Game of Thrones,” right? Who can forget that violent, steamy, uncensored millennial pop culture phenomenon that led to thousands of newborns being named Daenerys (until the airing of the season eight finale, after which thousands of parents undoubtedly flooded their state’s bureau of records with applications to change their child’s name back to Ryleigh). It was a pretty good show. I watched one episode nearly every day during the summer of 2020 because it was an engaging piece of fiction that prevented me from thinking too hard about myself. (COVID summer was tough if your sense of self primarily stemmed from academic achievement.) After I watched the show, I decided I needed to rewatch the show in my head with the help of the books. For roughly the next two years, I spent my evenings and select weekend afternoons chugging my way through Martin’s endless descriptions of food while periodically checking my phone to Google things such as “Who is Kevan Lannister?” I recommend the books conditionally; if you liked the shows and you aren’t going to be put off by George R. R. Martin describing the size and shape of the penis belonging to the obvious self-insert character, Samwell Tarly, you might enjoy the books as well.

Then I finished the books, so I went in search of speculative fan theories to sate my desire to know how the story will end. If we’re being honest, I was in that shit DEEP. I spent many a long, arduous morning shifts at the Chappaqua Swim and Tennis club listening to YouTube videos and podcasts explaining why the events of the yet-to-be-written “The Winds of Winter” can be perfectly predicted if you understand that the White Walkers are actually the result of The Pact made between the First Men and the Children of the Forest during the Age of Heroes. The fan theory that R+L=J is mere child’s play when you understand how deep the iceberg goes. Hot Pie is Quaithe. Stannis didn’t summon a ghost to kill his brother, Renly’s chest just did that.

Over the summer, I read “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” a self-contained set of three novellas that take place 100 years before the events of “Game of Thrones.” The story follows Dunk, a big lad who is also a knight, and his squire, Egg (short for Aegon), as they traipse around the seven kingdoms taking odd-jobs from small lords and fighting for what’s right. It is perhaps one of the most tasteful and well-written pieces of male power fantasy I’ve ever seen. 

Have you ever wanted to be a socially-awkward seven-foot-tall teenager who can kill people who do bad things? Have you ever fantasized about eschewing modernity and RETVRNing to a different era, when men were men but the main characters were never in real danger? Have you ever dreamed of going to a medieval tourney and proving to all of your bullies that you are bigger and stronger than all of them? Have you ever wanted to be so big and strong that girls swoon the moment they meet you (but you still can’t talk to them because you’re scared)? This book is for you, if you have ever felt that way.

Going into this book, I had never felt much kinship with George R. R. Martin, primarily because I have been compelled to consider the size and shape of his genitals (this situation creates what I consider to be a power imbalance, and makes me a little uncomfortable). However, I became so engrossed in this book that now I believe I understand George at a deeper level. 

The plot is far less complex than “Game of Thrones,” it contains no sex, and it’s a lot more centered on the physical geography and natural beauty of Westeros. It’s a cinematic and emotionally simple book where the main characters win and the bad guys generally get what’s coming. It’s like “The Catcher in the Rye” if Holden Caulfield was less of a scumbag and he was also seven feet tall. It’s like if the John Wick movies had fewer incel undertones. It’s a wholesome, simple novel about a big lad who just wants to do the right thing, but is sometimes forced to kill the Bad Guys (and when he does, he feels a little bad about it).

If you think about it (and I’ve been thinking about it), our culture is obscenely fixated on stories about an unassuming, lonely male protagonist who exact spontaneous and completely justified violence on a deserving enemy. All of Batman, the John Wick movies, “The Punisher,” “Mad Max,” every Spaghetti Western that’s not about a dog, “Joker,” “Taxi Driver,” “Drive,” “Baby Driver” (the association between this genre and the automobile is kind of interesting when you think about it), pretty much every spy movie, every movie about a cop who has to work outside the system to Get the Job Done, “Die Hard,” and of course the highly lauded and deeply avant-garde first-person perspective film, “Hardcore Henry” (2015). It makes you (by which I mean me) wonder if this archetype was perhaps embedded in our cultural conscience by three centuries of violently settling a continent, and that the prevalence of this character in modern cinema is an ugly reflection of our desire to continue righteously exerting power on those who are evil or defective. John Wick was a good movie, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t like all the undertones.

Unlike those mad men, Dunk is a nice boy living in a world where he is big, and so people assume he is a mean, tough guy who wants to kill. The culture around him is obsessed with hierarchy, the righteousness of the highborn, and the right of royalty to exert their power through wanton slaughter. Everybody is mean and doesn’t understand him. His muscles are big, but his heart is bigger. It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if more people wanted to be like Dunk.