68 pages • 2 hours read
George R. R. MartinFire & Blood
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2018A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Conquest and Power
The desire for conquest and power motivates most of the characters in the novel. What form that power takes, and the uses to which the characters put that power, are frequently determined by class and gender. Gyldayn’s history primarily focuses on kings, queens, nobles, and religious authorities. For Aegon the Conqueror, power came by right of conquest and superior weapons—in this case, dragons. As later generations claimed, Targaryens were different mostly because they have dragons. Aegon translated his military win into the authority to govern by being a judicious king who ruled with intention. He also balanced his adherence to his Valyrian culture with that of the country he had conquered. These actions shored up his authority after the Conquest.
The subsequent generations of the Targaryen dynasty did not win the country through conquest and were forced to accommodate their power to what indigenous Westerosi traditions found acceptable. Dragons and the potential for violence they represent were not enough to maintain power, as the end of Maegor’s rule shows. George R. R. Martin shows that many of the revolts that threatened Targaryen power came from ignoring other power sources as well.
While much of the power in this history remained in the hands of great men and women, power was not based on might and class alone. The Faith of the Seven, the strength of the smallfolk when combined, and even loyalty to one's house or region were sources of power. The Targaryens’ eventual loss of power, while not recounted in this volume, was already beginning. Aegon III’s rejection of dragons—weapons of conquest and instruments of might—was problematic. The smallfolk’s embrace of populist religion in the mouths of countless Shepherds also undercut the power of the Targaryens. Ultimately, the Targaryens refused to fully adapt to the culture surrounding them, leading to their downfall.
Women were largely subjugated to men legally and culturally, but they still managed to exercise power through the use of “soft power.” Alysanne Targaryen used the women's court and marriage to bring women to the Targaryen side. Through her charm, she strengthened the alliance with the Starks. Mysaria and Tyanna of the Tower used sexual allure to obtain security and power. Gender dynamics were such that this was never enough, and such women were frequently accused of being witches. Women also relied on cleverness, theft, and control over information to create alternate bases of power. Alys Westhill stole dragon eggs to create a life that exceeded the restrictive confines of Westeros, both socially and geographically. Mysaria. for a time, exercised power through sexual allure, and later she became a master of spies. These women usually only obtained power during times of disorder, however. Ultimately, being powerful in Westeros was a matter of being born a nobleperson, using symbols of legitimacy and power effectively, and being flexible enough to adapt to change.
Historical Narrative and Truth
The primary narrator in this fictional, popular history is Gyldayn, a trained historian whose understanding of history is academic and a product of his view of what constitutes history. Martin’s approach to crafting this fictionalized history is attentive to the rhetorical context in which he wrote Fire and Blood, but the way Martin represents the construction of historical narrative calls into question the idea of a single truth.
In “A Conversation Between George R. R. Martin and Dan Jones,” Martin explains that his publishers originally asked for a “‘concordance’” (731) that would help fans of both the HBO show and the House of Ice and Fire book series keep track of the many characters and plots in the books. There are 18 books and several collections in other genres listed in Martin’s other works list in the front matter of Fire and Blood. With such an extensive body of work in this world, one important constraint Martin faces in constructing his fictional historical narrative is continuity; he must ensure that Fire and Blood and the other works are consistent with each other. There are many examples of discontinuities between Fire and Blood and the other works (see Martin’s “Errata of Fire & Blood,” available at the Westeros.org website, for examples). In the same interview, Martin notes that he always tended to like “the popular version of [an event] better than […] the boring academic version” (731). The genre of the entertaining but not completely true popular history is thus another important part of the rhetorical context for Fire and Blood.
Fire and Blood is fictional, but Martin dramatizes what it means for a historian to be interested both in good storytelling and truth. In many ways, Gyldayn’s history is typical of definitive histories. Fire and Blood is history from above, meaning that Gyldayn mostly focuses on the doings of powerful figures rather than ordinary people. The careful genealogy in the back matter and the narrative’s many noble and royal names are evidence of that approach. Gyldayn selects firsthand accounts of eyewitnesses over accounts from people at a remove from the events—again, another typical choice of a trained historian. Finally, Gyldayn more frequently relies on sources that show continuity with other sources; that preference works both as a typical approach to constructing reliable historical narrative, and it lets Martin keep continuity between Fire and Blood and the other Westeros books.
Gyldayn is an academic historian, but Martin uses his explicit discussions about historiography—the methods he uses to construct his historical narrative—to make what could be a boring narrative about the generations of Targaryens more attentive to storytelling. In Chapter 12, “Heirs of the Dragon: A Question of Succession,” Gyldayn explains that he must “digress to say a word about sources” (355) and then introduces The Testimony of Mushroom. Mushroom’s work is full of “salacious rumors” (356) in contrast to the more “ponderous” (356) history of Septon Eustace. Septon Eustace’s religious bias is obvious in the virtuous motives he imputes to the highborn. While it might be usual to find entertaining but false stories in the footnotes of a definitive history, Martin has Gyldayn include whole chunks of testimony from Mushroom that are clearly false but entertaining. Storytelling wins out over in-world truth in these instances.
Martin makes several other choices—Gyldayn’s frequent references to how official court chronicles fail to align with other sources, references to gaps in the historical record of pivotal events, and even biting criticism of romanticized versions of events—to show that other interests aside from objectivity can shape historical narratives. For example, Gyldayn focuses on the fact that Jaehaerys had a full garrison backing him when Rogar and the young prince faced off over Jaehaerys marriage to Alysanne; he discounts the romantic version in which Jaehaerys makes speeches about love and honor. The threat of force, not love, carried the day.
Martin shows Gyldayn shuffling through conflicting sources or even admitting that there are gaps in the record, as when Gyldayn admits he doesn’t know what happened to Maegor I on the night he died. The implication for the reader is that history is about constructing a plausible narrative, and there may be no one truth after all.
Revenge and Betrayal
Revenge and betrayal were at the heart of the Dance of the Dragons. The pivotal betrayal began when lords who swore to recognize Rhaenyra as heir betrayed their oaths to Viserys. This betrayal reverberated down through the generations, leading to multigenerational cycles of violence. Some characters paid the price for revenge and betrayal, while others did not; the difference between the former and the latter frequently mapped onto caste and gender.
Prohibitions against breaking oaths sworn in front of a king or septons, the duty to protect one’s kin, and obligations to avoid harm to the guests under one’s roof were important parts of Westerosi ethics and religion. Westeros was essentially a feudal society, so these oaths are frequently based on the master or overlord one serves. When the lords in Westeros decided to break their vow of loyalty, they did so because they saw a female monarch as illegitimate, and their class and gender allowed them to see their betrayal of Rhaenyra as a restoration of order rather than revenge. War was the result, and many on both sides lost their lives. After all this, one of Rhaenyra’s sons still ascended to the throne.
There were limits to how much society tolerated powerful people who betray others for the sake of power. Maegor the Cruel gained his name and the distrust of lords and smallfolk alike because he readily broke oaths and avenged himself on those he saw as betrayers. His responses to betrayal were disproportionate, however, distinguishing them from fair justice. When Maegor suspected that Alys of Harroway betrayed him with 20 men to conceive a child—an outrageous claim from the mouth of a rival—he killed 33 men and Alys to avenge this slight to his honor. Although he was able to maintain power to a certain extent because of his might and his dragons, he lost the goodwill of the people and damaged the reputation of all of House Targaryen because of his actions.
When people of lesser status such as Mysaria—a woman, a foreigner, and a commoner—engaged in such actions, they were vulnerable to the people who gave them their power. Mysaria died a terrible death when Maegor discovered her plot against Alys of Harroway. What was acceptable for Maegor was not fine for her. In general, people tolerated violent acts of revenge and betrayal in those with greater might, so long as those acts reinforced the structure of Westerosi society.
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