I tried. I did. And I failed.
I tried watching Game of Thrones and didn't make it past the first 4 episodes. I might try again.
I just tried reading the book and only got about half-way through it before putting it down in favor of picking up the Hobbit again.
This weekend in Illinois was a good metaphor for this. Winter had been coming then it was in the 60s (with tornadoes) all weekend.
Recently I had been a big Conan kick thanks to +Jason Vey and I was impressed on how good they were now reading as an adult than when I tried reading them as a kid. I had hoped that GoT was going to be similar in that respect (better than I remembered). No such luck.
Though I love the imagery of a long winter coming after a period of long summer, I would have thought the people of the world would have been more anxious about it's coming. Maybe in later books. Still though I could not help but think this was the same planet from the 4th Doctor's Key to Time episode, The Ribos Operation. Something I am planning on using in my current AD&D game.
Maybe I should try to reread Jack Vance now. I actually enjoyed what little I read of the Dying Earth books.
Funny, I thought the same thing. Where's the anxiety. You'd think they'd be more stressed out about it.
ReplyDeleteI once tried listening to the first book on CD while driving acrss the country. I made it through most of the book, but when I went back to try to finish it...meh. I couldn't remember who was who, what was happening, and why I should even be interested. The only two things that come to mind about that book when I think about it are the incest and the excessive descriptions of food. Yeah, I'll take Robert E. Howard, or even Tolkien over Martin any day of the week.
ReplyDeleteThe long summer and winter theme was also used as a device in the Helliconia series by Brian Aldiss way back when.
ReplyDeleteI'm actually reading through Jack Vance's The Dying Earth right now. I finally picked it up and its pretty good so far. In general I don't have much time to read so having the condensed stories like that is nice.
ReplyDeleteRe: anxiety over the coming winter - most of the people of Westeros no longer believe that it will be anything more than a slightly colder version of their current situation. They think that the real horrors of Winter are things that exist only in their bedtime stories. It's also worth considering that the Summer/Winter cycle in Song of Ice and Fire is not at all related to anything in our world's physics. It doesn't occur along any regular, predictable schedule, for instance.
ReplyDeleteWhatever, I don't mean to be a defender of the series (though I do like it quite a lot, and in fact consider it one of my current major influences in fantasy gaming; in fact, I am currently reading the fifth book in the series). Not everyone is going to like everything. Either you are the sort who will like complex, intricate, plans-within-plans political maneuvering in a story with a cast of thousands or you aren't. Some people might even like the former but get lost in the minor details that Martin uses (one pair of characters' complicated and incestuous relationship, which is really a very minor plot element that mainly exists to provide a defining arc of development for one character and a couple of plot complications for a few more, and Martin's food porn are mentioned above).