Prof. Phil Haberkern and Anthony talk knights, history, and Westeros relative to the book content behind Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (The Hedge Knight). Full spoilers for the Dunk and Egg series.
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00:19 --> 00:27 [SPEAKER_02]: probably Howard fans, for the next six or seven weeks, this podcast is going to be taken over by all things Duncan A.
00:28 --> 00:32 [SPEAKER_02]: We'll be covering night of the seven kingdoms, episode by episode.
00:32 --> 00:44 [SPEAKER_02]: This week includes full spoilers for season one of night of the seven kingdoms, we're talking about the book content on which HBO is basing the entire first season.
00:44 --> 00:46 [SPEAKER_02]: Moreover,
00:46 --> 00:56 [SPEAKER_02]: There's a big spoiler about midway through this pod about the ultimate outcome of Dunkin Egg, according to Book lore.
00:56 --> 01:02 [SPEAKER_02]: So do not listen to this podcast unless you want to be spoiled in a major way.
01:02 --> 01:12 [SPEAKER_02]: This week I'm talking to Boston University's Philip Habercorn, Philip is a regular over at Electric Book glue where I cover a song of ice and fire chapter by chapter.
01:12 --> 01:26 [SPEAKER_02]: We talk about medieval nighthood, the origins, and the evolution of nightly orders, we compare dunk with people like brawn and the hound.
01:26 --> 01:29 [SPEAKER_02]: So we cover a lot of ground in this conversation.
01:29 --> 01:36 [SPEAKER_02]: And then, a week from today, we get the first episode of Neither Seven Kingdoms and that night.
01:37 --> 01:45 [SPEAKER_02]: Steve and a few friends from the Lower Hounds will join us on this very feed to give instant reactions on the first episode of Neither Seven Kingdoms.
01:46 --> 01:50 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, without further ado, here is Professor Philip Habercorn.
01:52 --> 02:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Philip Happercorn, I am excited to talk about the Hedge Knight with you, and I am under the impression that this is your first read of the Hedge Knight, it is.
02:04 --> 02:09 [SPEAKER_03]: I was not exposed to this when it initially came out in the short story collection, and just
02:09 --> 02:19 [SPEAKER_03]: kind of was aware of Duncan Egg, but had never really taken the time to get into the text until you invited me to do this a couple months ago.
02:20 --> 02:28 [SPEAKER_02]: I think that's kind of interesting because I think of all my guests you probably got on these stories pretty early.
02:29 --> 02:43 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I've had folks who were like, you know, they were on so early that now they're on Martin's team, you know, so I've got guests like that, but as far as like a reoccurring guest, you were reading these things and they're really odd, right?
02:43 --> 02:51 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, in in the 90s, yes, so I read these like as they were coming out, you know, in hardback, but definitely had like the first.
02:52 --> 02:55 [SPEAKER_03]: paperback edition of Game of Thrones, whether it was 97, 98.
02:56 --> 03:14 [SPEAKER_03]: So yeah, from the beginning, but but just never, I don't know, if I just wasn't aware of this until much later, and it's sort of moved on to other things, given up on Martin, feeling like he was taunting us all.
03:15 --> 03:31 [SPEAKER_02]: So, all right, so you're a fan of Martin from Wayback, and this, you get this little novella, which could function as a standalone short story, and I'm kind of curious, did you enjoy this?
03:31 --> 03:34 [SPEAKER_03]: So I have like two responses to that.
03:34 --> 03:45 [SPEAKER_03]: So like as a avid reader of epic fantasy, like it's a delightful little afternoon sort of sit on the couch and read it in one go.
03:45 --> 03:48 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's just, it's a fast-paced story.
03:48 --> 03:51 [SPEAKER_03]: The reveals kind of come at the right time.
03:51 --> 03:53 [SPEAKER_03]: There's a take element, but it's so innocent.
03:54 --> 03:57 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think it's just a delightful read.
03:58 --> 04:10 [SPEAKER_03]: But then as someone who teaches with Game of Thrones and thinks more substantively about this world, I think it's just a fascinating, almost a counter-programming to game thrones.
04:10 --> 04:18 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's absolutely, he's sort of fantasy tropes that Martin is deconstructing or subverting or destroying in Game of Thrones.
04:18 --> 04:23 [SPEAKER_03]: This feels like his chance to sort of celebrate some of them in an uncomplicated way.
04:23 --> 04:26 [SPEAKER_03]: So I love thinking about it as like,
04:26 --> 04:30 [SPEAKER_03]: you know, it's almost like a pallet cleanser from Martin.
04:31 --> 04:32 [SPEAKER_03]: I'm done with the betrayal for today.
04:33 --> 04:34 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah.
04:34 --> 04:39 [SPEAKER_02]: So I think this is an interesting book to look at in terms of
04:39 --> 04:52 [SPEAKER_02]: where Martin is in the series because you know this is sort of he was sort of pressed upon to write this novella in between Game of Thrones and Clash.
04:53 --> 04:59 [SPEAKER_02]: He's probably mid-class, who knows, but as far as he tells it, this is before the publication of Clash.
05:00 --> 05:20 [SPEAKER_02]: And I wonder if a lot of his serious work into medieval history almost happens after this, novella, how much of the naivete is just simply like, someone who's not even kind of an amateur medievalist at that point writing one of these stories.
05:20 --> 05:21 [SPEAKER_03]: So that's interesting.
05:21 --> 05:30 [SPEAKER_03]: Because this definitely feels like it's more closely related to some medieval literature than it is to medieval history,
05:30 --> 05:43 [SPEAKER_03]: the tournament and the nighting and the sort of epic contest and questions about chivalry and honor, that said, you know, as I was reading this, there is a lot kind of going on around.
05:44 --> 05:54 [SPEAKER_03]: what does it take to become a knight and what would what what is the sort of tournament economy look like and how do people make their way in this world.
05:54 --> 06:09 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think you're right that he's sort of building his way towards some of the complexities we see in flash hangs or storm of swords, but I feel like he had certain things that he must have taken pretty deep dives on
06:09 --> 06:15 [SPEAKER_03]: plus a familiarity with kind of core texts and core ideas romantic in the epic traditions.
06:16 --> 06:17 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think, I don't know.
06:17 --> 06:27 [SPEAKER_03]: it's an interesting idea that he's kind of toe deep in the waters of medieval history instead of hip deep the way he will be as as the series develops.
06:28 --> 06:31 [SPEAKER_02]: I had a question from a listener that I wanted to run past you.
06:32 --> 06:40 [SPEAKER_02]: So this is a question from Ali and she said I read the first section of the hedge night to be ready for the podcast on Thursday.
06:40 --> 06:44 [SPEAKER_02]: I was struck by the similarities to a night's tale the movie because
06:44 --> 06:47 [SPEAKER_02]: I've seen it way more times than I've actually read Canterbury Tales.
06:48 --> 06:54 [SPEAKER_02]: Obviously, the Canterbury Tales came first, and Martin originally published a hedge night before the film adaptation.
06:54 --> 07:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm wondering what your thoughts are on how much influence might have taken from Trossor.
07:00 --> 07:02 [SPEAKER_03]: So that is a really good question.
07:02 --> 07:04 [SPEAKER_03]: And actually, you know, I
07:05 --> 07:06 [SPEAKER_03]: did look.
07:07 --> 07:14 [SPEAKER_03]: I was looking up the nightstale and also then came across, you know, the Wikipedia page for a nightstale, the 2001 movie with Heath Ledger.
07:15 --> 07:22 [SPEAKER_03]: It is shocking how similar that movie plot is to a hedge knight if we want to think about influences.
07:22 --> 07:24 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's pretty crazy.
07:24 --> 07:27 [SPEAKER_03]: It's all I'll say, but to the chop the chaucer source.
07:28 --> 07:32 [SPEAKER_03]: Whenever I talk about Martin as a medievalist with my students,
07:33 --> 07:51 [SPEAKER_03]: I always kind of caution them from trying to find perfect parallels, because I think Martin's great gift is, is, is, is, is prestige, right, is bricolage, like he puts together things from all sorts of different times, all sorts of different places to create this incredibly authentic seeming medieval world.
07:51 --> 08:01 [SPEAKER_03]: And so with Chaucer in the Nightstale, yes, you have sort of
08:01 --> 08:03 [SPEAKER_03]: But that's an essentially romantic tale, right?
08:03 --> 08:08 [SPEAKER_03]: It's about two friends who are imprisoned and fall in love with the same woman.
08:08 --> 08:10 [SPEAKER_03]: It seems impossible their love could be fulfilled.
08:11 --> 08:14 [SPEAKER_03]: There are dramatic escapes from prison or being released.
08:14 --> 08:22 [SPEAKER_03]: And then ultimately, they duel and then again, assemble a team of 100 champions each to fight for this woman's love and there's prophecy.
08:22 --> 08:35 [SPEAKER_03]: And so a lot of that is sort of stripped away where Martin Stale is much more sort of straightforward and almost pragmatic in terms of dunks motivations, but the way that final battle.
08:36 --> 08:41 [SPEAKER_03]: is described in the way it sort of plays out, feels very chocerian.
08:41 --> 08:50 [SPEAKER_03]: And you know, the nightstales also, that's Chaucer ripping off Bocaccio, who wrote an epic poem that Chaucer was familiar with.
08:50 --> 08:56 [SPEAKER_03]: It seems like, yeah, so there's already some borrowing and pastiche going on, as this travels back and forth.
08:57 --> 09:01 [SPEAKER_03]: So it's a fascinating, I think, you know, inspiration, but then when you kind of
09:03 --> 09:05 [SPEAKER_03]: Take a step back and you think about Dunkin' Egg.
09:05 --> 09:07 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, that feels almost more like Dunkin' Hote to me, right?
09:08 --> 09:11 [SPEAKER_02]: And I was thinking about Dunkin' Hote in this context, too.
09:12 --> 09:12 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
09:12 --> 09:22 [SPEAKER_02]: Um, you know, it's funny how's, well, all that you finish what you were, uh, what you were wrapping up there before I launched into the beginning.
09:22 --> 09:27 [SPEAKER_03]: Sure, no, so, but I think again, it's like, this is somebody Martin, who's read a ton.
09:28 --> 09:41 [SPEAKER_03]: and is just sort of seamlessly integrating some of these ideas in his head, but then delivering them in a way, you know, that's got these sort of unique within the unique parameters of Westeros and the Seven Kingdoms.
09:41 --> 09:51 [SPEAKER_03]: So yes, he's clearly internalized some of those storybeats from text like Chaucer, but he's turning it into something new.
09:51 --> 09:52 [SPEAKER_03]: And I think the same is true.
09:53 --> 09:57 [SPEAKER_03]: Again, like concepts of like the way he talks about Chivalry and Nighthood
09:57 --> 10:17 [SPEAKER_03]: I think it's just, I don't know, it's a fascinating process of internalizing, synthesizing, but then kind of schooling out in a way that it's got a lot of vericimillitude, so it feels real, even though it's not a perfect, like it's not a perfect parallel to anything, I don't think.
10:17 --> 10:18 [UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
10:22 --> 10:26 [SPEAKER_02]: So I am not an expert on medieval life or literature.
10:26 --> 10:33 [SPEAKER_02]: I dabble a bit and my friend Steve is not an expert on that either.
10:34 --> 10:41 [SPEAKER_02]: And we spent the last three weeks kind of like fumbling our way through a fun story.
10:42 --> 10:52 [SPEAKER_02]: Most of the time, I find funny things that I sort of tee up Steve so he can find a punchline.
10:51 --> 11:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Having listened to those podcasts, I'm wondering if there's anything that we did or said in those podcasts where you were like, oh no, face and palm
11:03 --> 11:05 [SPEAKER_03]: No, I mean, not that I can think of.
11:05 --> 11:12 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I will admit feeling very nervous about recording today because I'm, and I, I even, you know, I'll share with the listeners that I emailed you.
11:13 --> 11:14 [SPEAKER_03]: I was like, am I supposed to be funny?
11:14 --> 11:17 [SPEAKER_03]: Those were funny podcasts, and I, that's not my stock and trade.
11:18 --> 11:22 [SPEAKER_03]: But I think what was interesting to me,
11:22 --> 11:42 [SPEAKER_03]: And again, it makes sense because this was Steve's first read as well of like the skepticism or the cynicism towards Duncan the beginning about whether or not he's actually a knight or if he's sort of posing as a knight, you know, again, coming to this from Game of Thrones, it makes sense that you would kind of look for that.
11:42 --> 11:45 [SPEAKER_03]: I think, you know, having read all of this now,
11:45 --> 11:49 [SPEAKER_03]: We are supposed to sort of see sort of dunk in the tall as essentially good.
11:49 --> 11:52 [SPEAKER_03]: So maybe that's the verse.
11:52 --> 11:53 [SPEAKER_03]: So I was actually going back and looking at this.
11:53 --> 12:00 [SPEAKER_03]: And I guess it opened up the question for me of like, what does it mean to become a knight?
12:01 --> 12:13 [SPEAKER_03]: And because we see it over and over a sort of a theme in this story with Faso and with Dunk of like, what does it take to become a knight?
12:14 --> 12:17 [SPEAKER_03]: in Westeras kind of become clear over the course of the story.
12:18 --> 12:21 [SPEAKER_03]: But this is where my historian's brain kind of kicks in.
12:21 --> 12:27 [SPEAKER_03]: And yes, I went down a rabbit hole about the evolution of dubbing rituals weekend.
12:27 --> 12:32 [SPEAKER_02]: I would love to hear what sort of that rabbit hole did for you.
12:33 --> 12:38 [SPEAKER_02]: About a year ago, I was having a conversation with Carol Parrish, Jamison.
12:38 --> 12:42 [SPEAKER_02]: And I asked her, I said, you know, what makes a night?
12:42 --> 12:44 [SPEAKER_02]: Does the oath make the night?
12:44 --> 12:54 [SPEAKER_02]: Or does the, does the virtue make the night or is it a combination or is it just wealth like you're just a wealthy guy who who can afford a horse and armor.
12:55 --> 13:05 [SPEAKER_02]: Does that or and have the time to, you know, practice the Marshall training involved does that make a night and I was surprised, you know, I was trying to like nuance it.
13:06 --> 13:08 [SPEAKER_02]: I was surprised by her answer.
13:08 --> 13:09 [SPEAKER_02]: She said the oath makes the night.
13:10 --> 13:18 [SPEAKER_02]: And I thought, that's a very interesting answer to a question that I thought could go in a number of ways.
13:19 --> 13:23 [SPEAKER_02]: And if the oath makes a night,
13:24 --> 13:28 [SPEAKER_02]: I think that we should definitely question whether dunk is legitimately a night.
13:29 --> 13:34 [SPEAKER_02]: But then, of course, I think that you should also question, like, is nighthood even a, is it just a myth?
13:34 --> 13:39 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, is it a myth in the same way of like, you know, an honorary doctor?
13:39 --> 13:42 [SPEAKER_02]: It is a myth or something like that.
13:42 --> 13:46 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, I'm curious, it's like a myth we've all chosen to, like, buy into.
13:46 --> 13:51 [SPEAKER_02]: But I'm curious to hear your, where you're going with dunk's legitimacy?
13:51 --> 13:52 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
13:52 --> 13:58 [SPEAKER_03]: So I would say, I mean, to me, I would say the very base, it's actually the equipment that makes the night.
13:59 --> 14:00 [SPEAKER_03]: Do you have armor?
14:00 --> 14:01 [SPEAKER_03]: Do you have a sword?
14:01 --> 14:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Do you have a horse?
14:02 --> 14:04 [SPEAKER_03]: Because if you, if you don't have those things, you are not a night.
14:05 --> 14:06 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, full stop.
14:07 --> 14:18 [SPEAKER_03]: In terms of like a functional, armed cavalry men who, you know, who is capable of participating in these sort of charges with the lands, like that is that is kind of like the core of nighthood.
14:19 --> 14:22 [SPEAKER_03]: And then all the other trappings around it evolve over time.
14:22 --> 14:38 [SPEAKER_03]: And so by the time we're into like the 14th century, you do have these sort of highly evolved rituals and the dubbing and the beginning of certain equipment and wearing certain things and saying certain words and a very public sort of performative aspect.
14:38 --> 14:39 [SPEAKER_03]: So that evolves over time.
14:40 --> 14:50 [SPEAKER_03]: Earlier, it seems almost like nighting is a recognition of a status change in someone.
14:50 --> 14:52 [SPEAKER_03]: where you are becoming an adult warrior.
14:52 --> 14:54 [SPEAKER_03]: And this is like 10th, 11th century.
14:54 --> 15:02 [SPEAKER_03]: So it's basically a recognition that a young man has become fully grown in a martial sense, right?
15:02 --> 15:14 [SPEAKER_03]: So in that case, their Lord, their father, almost anyone can do the knighting and it is a gift of equipment and a recognition of status and then the expectations that come with that status.
15:15 --> 15:18 [SPEAKER_03]: So the sort of evolution of the oath over time,
15:18 --> 15:20 [SPEAKER_03]: becomes more formal.
15:20 --> 15:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
15:22 --> 15:23 [SPEAKER_03]: It's what I would say.
15:24 --> 15:33 [SPEAKER_03]: But I think in this book, particularly over and over again, Nighthood is about how you act, right?
15:33 --> 15:39 [SPEAKER_03]: And so we don't get why are all the small folk cheering him on the day of his trial by battle?
15:39 --> 15:42 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, because he acted the way he's supposed to.
15:42 --> 15:43 [SPEAKER_03]: He defended the small folk.
15:43 --> 15:44 [SPEAKER_03]: He defended the week.
15:44 --> 15:45 [SPEAKER_03]: He defended a woman.
15:46 --> 15:47 [SPEAKER_03]: So that is nightly.
15:47 --> 15:48 [SPEAKER_03]: And
15:48 --> 15:55 [SPEAKER_03]: Baylor Brakesphere says, you recognize, you know, you are doing the things that we have all sworn to do, but often forget.
15:55 --> 16:02 [SPEAKER_03]: And then, of course, you know, Donx mentor, all of his lessons about why our hedge knights, the true knights,
16:02 --> 16:05 [SPEAKER_03]: What does it mean to be an oath bound warrior?
16:05 --> 16:08 [SPEAKER_03]: Like it's clear to him that it is sort of a code of ethics.
16:08 --> 16:21 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think practically speaking for Donk, I would say yes, he's a knight because he has the equipment and he's behaving according to a code of ethics, even if he only imperfectly understands it and doesn't have the fancy words for it.
16:22 --> 16:26 [SPEAKER_03]: So to me, for him, the actual oath part,
16:27 --> 16:40 [SPEAKER_03]: It is almost secondary or tertiary, but when we get to a fastaway in his dubbing, that is very clear that the words matter, and the religious content matters, and the oath matters.
16:41 --> 16:44 [SPEAKER_03]: So I don't know, I think I'd say there are multiple ways to become a knight.
16:45 --> 16:49 [SPEAKER_03]: and to be a night practically speaking, and to be a variety of the story.
16:50 --> 16:53 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think, okay, so Warriors exists forever.
16:54 --> 16:55 [SPEAKER_02]: Correct me if I get any of this wrong.
16:56 --> 17:05 [SPEAKER_02]: Charlotte main comes along, and he puts out this rule that I want all my, all my soldiers to have this equipment.
17:05 --> 17:07 [SPEAKER_02]: They have to have this equipment.
17:07 --> 17:14 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't want everyone to just have whatever willy-nilly, teenage booting Ninja Turtles weapons are available.
17:15 --> 17:18 [SPEAKER_02]: You have to have at least these things, right?
17:18 --> 17:35 [SPEAKER_02]: No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no
17:35 --> 17:37 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, so here's my question for you.
17:38 --> 17:44 [SPEAKER_02]: Let's pass, we got sort of this murky period in between the 10th century and the 12th century.
17:45 --> 17:48 [SPEAKER_02]: But let's, let's fast forward all the way to the 13th century.
17:49 --> 17:56 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, let's say you're a knight and you got the horse and you got the armor, everything's great, and then you get captured.
17:56 --> 18:02 [SPEAKER_02]: And someone's got you as a hostage, and they take away your horse and your armor are you no longer a knight?
18:04 --> 18:12 [SPEAKER_03]: Um, I'll be a night when I'm ransomed, uh, and if I'm, if I'm not ransomed, that actually is saying something about my social status as well.
18:14 --> 18:23 [SPEAKER_03]: So, uh, by the 13th century, no, it has become both the social status and also a sort of qualitative status.
18:23 --> 18:27 [SPEAKER_03]: And I know this is, it's hard to say, but a lot of that has to do with crusading ideology.
18:28 --> 18:34 [SPEAKER_03]: And so, once you start to get more explicit religious connotations to this sort of
18:34 --> 19:01 [SPEAKER_03]: a warrior cast for lack of better term and especially once we start to get specialized military orders like the hospitality hours and the Templars and you start to have a sort of religious ideology of this idealized military function that's when we really start to get towards these like
19:01 --> 19:04 [SPEAKER_03]: being described as the night describes a particular military function.
19:05 --> 19:06 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
19:06 --> 19:12 [SPEAKER_03]: Becomes a descriptor of a social class, so you're lower than a bear in, but higher than a Freeman.
19:13 --> 19:19 [SPEAKER_03]: And then it becomes a sort of ethical oath bound category as well.
19:19 --> 19:22 [SPEAKER_03]: And those things increasingly.
19:22 --> 19:37 [SPEAKER_03]: ethical and religious of yes absolutely yeah so those three things kind of converge over time never perfectly and then i'd say like yeah 1314 century when you start to get sort of like the books of shivalry and the books of knighthood and the founding of
19:38 --> 19:45 [SPEAKER_03]: like the order of the garter or the order of the star, which are these elite bands of knights and England and France.
19:46 --> 19:53 [SPEAKER_03]: So again, it's becoming increasingly codified, it's becoming increasingly elaborate, but that's a slow process of convergence over time.
19:54 --> 20:00 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, so we were making the claim like, if it well could be the Duncan never gets dubbed.
20:01 --> 20:01 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
20:01 --> 20:05 [SPEAKER_02]: But by the end of this story, there's no doubt that he's a knight, correct.
20:06 --> 20:23 [SPEAKER_02]: And it's because Baylor Breakspirre, vouches for him, fights with him, endorses, he almost Baylor Breakspirre's endorsement functions better than any kind of dubbing ceremony would have done.
20:24 --> 20:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I totally agree.
20:26 --> 20:28 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, so I guess the question is this.
20:29 --> 20:34 [SPEAKER_02]: If, in some future in novella, dunk confesses actually, I was never dubbed.
20:35 --> 20:41 [SPEAKER_02]: Would everyone around dunk now look upon him as, oh, you were a fake all along?
20:42 --> 20:43 [SPEAKER_03]: Woof.
20:43 --> 20:52 [SPEAKER_03]: I, I would say no, I mean, there's not, I don't think that this is something we can, kind of definitively answer.
20:53 --> 21:07 [SPEAKER_03]: I would say no because he has performed his nightly identity in a way that is would have convinced everyone around him that he was a night, not just his performance in the tournament, but the sort of stories that follow, right?
21:07 --> 21:10 [SPEAKER_03]: Like he is practically speaking a night.
21:10 --> 21:17 [SPEAKER_03]: So if 20 years after this or 10 years after this, there's an admission, you know, I was never actually dubbed.
21:17 --> 21:20 [SPEAKER_03]: I just, I can't see that unwriting the history.
21:20 --> 21:31 [SPEAKER_03]: And I think particularly because of the public acceptance of his status, via failures, you know, sort of, you know, being on his team and all those other things, I think that point it's done.
21:32 --> 21:42 [SPEAKER_03]: And once he gets that recognition, and then once it's reaffirmed because, you know, has a squire who's never the royal family, you know, get that affirmation.
21:42 --> 21:47 [SPEAKER_03]: I think sort of establishes his identity and his status beyond any doubt.
21:47 --> 21:49 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, well, that's very helpful.
21:49 --> 22:06 [SPEAKER_02]: I do think that there is a question about, I think that Martin's intention is to put up this guy who is literally marginalized, he's a hedge knight, he lives in the margins.
22:07 --> 22:22 [SPEAKER_02]: And yet to say, here's the sky because he is from Flee Bottom, maybe he can evince the virtues of Nighthood better than someone who grew up in the castle.
22:22 --> 22:34 [SPEAKER_02]: There's a class commentary that's happening in this work that you might find in other parts of Martin's story, but not much.
22:35 --> 22:42 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, who, who would you say is the most shivalrous figure in a song of ice and fire?
22:42 --> 22:46 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I guess Ned, but Ned's not really a knight, right?
22:46 --> 22:46 [SPEAKER_03]: True.
22:47 --> 22:47 [SPEAKER_03]: True.
22:47 --> 22:48 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
22:48 --> 22:50 [SPEAKER_02]: So, so, Brian, maybe Brian.
22:51 --> 22:55 [SPEAKER_03]: So, I think, well, I know, most of my students would say Brian.
22:56 --> 22:56 [SPEAKER_03]: Okay.
22:56 --> 22:57 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
22:57 --> 22:59 [SPEAKER_03]: And so, I think this proves your point, right?
22:59 --> 23:00 [SPEAKER_03]: Because Brian is a woman.
23:01 --> 23:05 [SPEAKER_03]: She is also a marginal figure in this system.
23:05 --> 23:08 [SPEAKER_03]: So yes, she is high status, but she's also the wrong gender.
23:09 --> 23:13 [SPEAKER_03]: And so the fact that she is working so hard and takes her oath so seriously.
23:13 --> 23:20 [SPEAKER_03]: And every day is trying to sort of embody a set of values and virtues associated with being a knight.
23:21 --> 23:23 [SPEAKER_03]: Like I think that's true.
23:23 --> 23:26 [SPEAKER_03]: And so Duncan the same way as being outside of the system.
23:26 --> 23:30 [SPEAKER_03]: And as being outside the system in some way,
23:31 --> 23:44 [SPEAKER_03]: to be to embody these virtues in a way that is, you know, natural and sincere and authentic, because they can't just rely on their name or their houses or their fencing armor.
23:44 --> 23:55 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think this is a commentary 100% on that kind of hierarchical system and the ways it can
23:55 --> 23:56 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
23:56 --> 23:59 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, Brienne subverts in a different way, right?
23:59 --> 24:00 [SPEAKER_02]: Because she is the daughter of a Lord.
24:01 --> 24:01 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
24:02 --> 24:19 [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, she has the the wealth necessary to receive martial training and have the equipment and you know, good equipment can really make make a big difference makes a difference.
24:19 --> 24:20 [SPEAKER_02]: Dunk is different.
24:21 --> 24:31 [SPEAKER_02]: He allows Martin to make some class commentary in a way that I really don't see a lot of other Game of Thrones characters making.
24:32 --> 24:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Um, and I'm not saying that he's unique, it's just that most of the POB characters we have in a song of Ice and Fire, even Davos, who has, you know, sort of modest, modest beginning to receive Nighthood, we don't meet him until he's, he's already in a night.
24:52 --> 24:57 [SPEAKER_02]: So I think it's an interesting conversation that Martin wants to have with the literature.
24:58 --> 25:13 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, and it's interesting because a character like John Snow, again, like allows certain questions to be asked around ideas of legitimacy, not a POV character, but someone like, you know, Gendry, we occasionally get sort of, yeah.
25:14 --> 25:17 [SPEAKER_03]: commentary or OSHA allows this to sort of see it.
25:17 --> 25:20 [SPEAKER_03]: So there are small glimpses, but I think you are right.
25:20 --> 25:21 [SPEAKER_03]: We don't see it.
25:22 --> 25:24 [SPEAKER_03]: It's not the center of attention.
25:24 --> 25:29 [SPEAKER_03]: The way it is with the hedge night and the big big stories more generally.
25:30 --> 25:30 [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
25:30 --> 25:36 [SPEAKER_02]: You wanted to talk about Baylor Breakspir, and I'm kind of curious to hear your take on him.
25:36 --> 25:47 [SPEAKER_02]: Both as almost the ideal of Chivalry, but also as, well, anyway, I've got a couple of other ideas on that, but I'd like to hear you your thoughts first.
25:48 --> 25:56 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I guess again, so coming to this reading for the first time, but being sort of invested in the world of Westeros,
25:57 --> 26:01 [SPEAKER_03]: He seems like he's from another story or another world.
26:01 --> 26:04 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, he's first in line to the throne.
26:04 --> 26:05 [SPEAKER_03]: He's the hand of the king.
26:05 --> 26:07 [SPEAKER_03]: He's a caring father.
26:07 --> 26:10 [SPEAKER_03]: He's a, you know, he's wise.
26:10 --> 26:11 [SPEAKER_03]: He's a decent uncle.
26:11 --> 26:13 [SPEAKER_03]: He has a world compass.
26:13 --> 26:14 [SPEAKER_03]: He's willing to bend the rules.
26:15 --> 26:17 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, self-sacrificing.
26:17 --> 26:21 [SPEAKER_03]: like, like, what, like, who is this and then he's targeting it?
26:21 --> 26:22 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, they aren't supposed to be like this.
26:23 --> 26:29 [SPEAKER_03]: So it's, it's really interesting to me that he does seem to be, you know, along with, I guess, Ned.
26:29 --> 26:36 [SPEAKER_03]: You know, one of the only decent, powerful people that we meet in this world.
26:37 --> 26:40 [SPEAKER_03]: And this is why I, it's almost like this is,
26:40 --> 26:45 [SPEAKER_03]: Martin's chance to play with all of the tropes that he's destroying and larger story.
26:45 --> 27:01 [SPEAKER_03]: So every time, he's the Deus Ex Machina of the story and you just, it's delightful and I think the ending and his fate, like the story needed that, like to actually really feel bad about what happens to him.
27:02 --> 27:07 [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know, it's just he breaks all the rules that Martin establishes about what power does to people.
27:08 --> 27:35 [SPEAKER_02]: That's right, and even with Ned, there are questions about Ned's honor going way back to his early days and Robert's rebellion, and so even with, so you're right, he does feel like he was transported from some other story, right, of course, Martin has the power to kill someone like this.
27:36 --> 27:49 [SPEAKER_02]: And it's pretty common that if there is a character like this, if there's a little glimmer of hope in the story, then at some point Martin's gonna snuff it out because that's what he does.
27:50 --> 27:50 [SPEAKER_02]: It's what he does.
27:52 --> 27:54 [SPEAKER_02]: But dunk still exists, right?
27:56 --> 28:00 [SPEAKER_02]: And for just a moment, for a brief moment,
28:01 --> 28:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Dunk pledges himself to Baylor Breakspir.
28:04 --> 28:05 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
28:05 --> 28:14 [SPEAKER_02]: And you almost think that that is formative of his identity, like I could get behind you, I could be your man.
28:15 --> 28:24 [SPEAKER_02]: And then he's given the opportunity to sort of be in the employ of the Targaryens generally, right?
28:24 --> 28:25 [SPEAKER_02]: And it refuses that.
28:26 --> 28:31 [SPEAKER_02]: So even though the one glimmer of hope
28:31 --> 28:41 [SPEAKER_02]: You have the spirit of Baylor Breakspir, living on in this, you know, young, dumb guy, and he's going to do the best he can.
28:41 --> 28:46 [SPEAKER_02]: And it's kind of an odd thing to have on the landscape of West Rose, like,
28:48 --> 29:02 [SPEAKER_02]: here, you know, dunk is an outlier in a lot of ways, but embodying the spirit of Baylor Breakspirer is almost too much to hope for the sea of gray morality.
29:03 --> 29:03 [SPEAKER_02]: It's true.
29:03 --> 29:10 [SPEAKER_03]: And I should look this up before we got on, but what do we know historically?
29:10 --> 29:11 [SPEAKER_03]: Why don't go in the lore?
29:11 --> 29:13 [SPEAKER_03]: What ends up happening to egg?
29:13 --> 29:18 [SPEAKER_02]: So I think, I mean, spoilers for people who don't want.
29:19 --> 29:22 [SPEAKER_02]: But you could, you could look it up in the history of the world.
29:22 --> 29:24 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, this is why we have a more formation.
29:24 --> 29:30 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think people that are interested in experiencing the show for the first time know not to be listening to this.
29:30 --> 29:31 [SPEAKER_02]: That would make sense.
29:33 --> 29:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I'm going to spoil something that's pretty major.
29:43 --> 29:46 [SPEAKER_03]: Um, what do you think of the season finale game with Ron?
29:46 --> 29:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, right.
29:46 --> 30:12 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no
30:12 --> 30:24 [SPEAKER_03]: Baylor, he transmits on to egg as a sort of formative, you know, like this is the way to ensure we don't get area on or some other horrible time on the throne.
30:24 --> 30:33 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think it makes sense that, you know, he's carrying out a mission on behalf of the seven kingdoms and on behalf of, you know, his deceased, momentary, leash, Lord.
30:34 --> 30:37 [SPEAKER_03]: But he would, he would have been asked to do.
30:37 --> 30:40 [SPEAKER_03]: So that's really, okay, that's satisfying.
30:42 --> 30:50 [SPEAKER_02]: Now, of course, all of this, all of this said, you know, Martin has chosen to revel in these other stories.
30:50 --> 30:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
30:51 --> 30:57 [SPEAKER_02]: He's going to write a 100-page book on this, what he's going to write.
30:59 --> 31:07 [SPEAKER_02]: Five thousand on his love crafty and world of weird creatures and anyway.
31:07 --> 31:10 [SPEAKER_02]: I wanted to talk a little bit about Dunkiote.
31:10 --> 31:11 [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
31:12 --> 31:20 [SPEAKER_02]: I just think it's fantastic to think that almost as soon as Nighthood was a thing.
31:20 --> 31:26 [SPEAKER_02]: There was a merger of fiction and reality.
31:27 --> 31:31 [SPEAKER_02]: Like these early nights, I feel, you know, rewinding long before Don Kyoto.
31:32 --> 31:36 [SPEAKER_02]: These early tournaments would sometimes like cause play as our theory and legends.
31:37 --> 31:38 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
31:38 --> 31:39 [SPEAKER_02]: It's so fascinating to me.
31:39 --> 31:45 [SPEAKER_02]: The amount of mythology that goes into this myth that everyone also believes.
31:47 --> 31:52 [SPEAKER_02]: And then you've got this literature that kind of,
31:52 --> 31:56 [SPEAKER_02]: Like pumps up the night and makes him almost a superhero, right?
31:56 --> 32:00 [SPEAKER_02]: Who has to fight mythological monsters and things like that.
32:01 --> 32:08 [SPEAKER_02]: And then you've got a subversion in Don Quintote, it doesn't come for you to tell the 1600s or whatever.
32:10 --> 32:10 [SPEAKER_02]: Is that right at the 1600s?
32:10 --> 32:13 [SPEAKER_03]: I think it's mid-16 century.
32:13 --> 32:13 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, yeah.
32:14 --> 32:17 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, I was off by a hundred years, but,
32:18 --> 32:22 [SPEAKER_02]: I just think it's so interesting that you've got this, I don't know you're right.
32:22 --> 32:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Subversion to the concept of knighthood.
32:28 --> 32:58 [SPEAKER_02]: that is playing with this this idea is this guy virtuous or is he a fool or is he both the holy fool the holy fool and I must think that Dunk is a little there's a little bit of this conversation happening in Dunkin egg as well absolutely so first of all you were right it was published in 1605 and 1615 so it is 17th century sometimes I get it right there you go I will then
32:58 --> 32:59 [SPEAKER_02]: I am too.
32:59 --> 33:10 [SPEAKER_03]: So I think this idea of the simplicity of Duncan, everything is sort of right there on the surface with him is a hundred percent part of the attraction.
33:10 --> 33:27 [SPEAKER_03]: And it allows all the things that are happening and how much of an open book he is emotionally that he it makes him a really good sort of avatar for the reader to sort of imagine how we might feel in that situation.
33:27 --> 33:29 [SPEAKER_03]: better at that than don't get.
33:29 --> 33:44 [SPEAKER_03]: So there's one piece of that, but I do think, again, his sort of moral or intellectual simplicity is a way of kind of commenting on how artificial and how fake the whole culture,
33:45 --> 33:47 [SPEAKER_03]: around nighthood and be.
33:48 --> 33:52 [SPEAKER_03]: And so, you know, you keep kind of thinking about this myth of nighthood or shivalry.
33:52 --> 33:59 [SPEAKER_03]: And yes, it's a myth, but it's also, maybe it's more almost like an ideal, you know, like this dream of nighthood.
34:00 --> 34:07 [SPEAKER_03]: And then every once in a while, someone like Baylor breaks beer or Duncan can actually kind of almost realize the dream, but you're much more likely.
34:07 --> 34:14 [SPEAKER_03]: to get, you know, Aryan killing a horse or, you know, whatever, that sort of the dirty pool kind of knighthood.
34:15 --> 34:22 [SPEAKER_03]: So I don't know, do we think of Duncan is almost, is he the anti-hound from Game of Thrones?
34:22 --> 34:23 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, he is.
34:23 --> 34:24 [SPEAKER_02]: I was thinking about that.
34:24 --> 34:30 [SPEAKER_02]: He, because, you know, you would expect someone like that, not the Hound.
34:30 --> 34:31 [SPEAKER_02]: I was thinking of Braun.
34:32 --> 34:33 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, sure.
34:33 --> 34:33 [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
34:34 --> 34:35 [SPEAKER_02]: Let's talk about the Hound in a bit.
34:35 --> 34:39 [SPEAKER_02]: I was thinking about Braun in the sense that Dunk is almost bizarre.
34:39 --> 34:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Braun.
34:40 --> 34:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Braun.
34:41 --> 34:48 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, he's low-born, but he has figured out the rules of the game.
34:48 --> 34:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
34:48 --> 34:58 [SPEAKER_02]: And he knows which rules to bend and which ones to break to make himself so valuable that he will eventually receive a night hood.
34:59 --> 35:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, so that that's his rags to riches story.
35:03 --> 35:09 [SPEAKER_02]: Dunk is the Bizarro Bronn because, you know, he sort of starts at the same place.
35:10 --> 35:12 [SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't understand politics very well.
35:13 --> 35:16 [SPEAKER_02]: He's not going to connect his way to the top.
35:17 --> 35:21 [SPEAKER_02]: He's going to make blunder after blunder after blunder, and it's going to work out for him.
35:22 --> 35:23 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
35:24 --> 35:24 [SPEAKER_02]: So I don't know.
35:24 --> 35:28 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, those two are interesting parallels.
35:29 --> 35:29 [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, that's great.
35:29 --> 35:33 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, I mean, they're both protectors to small, powerful people.
35:33 --> 35:34 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah.
35:34 --> 35:37 [SPEAKER_02]: So OK, I took that in a different direction.
35:37 --> 35:38 [SPEAKER_02]: And you were going to compare them to the hound.
35:39 --> 35:44 [SPEAKER_03]: I was just thinking about like because the hound is so explicitly critical of knighthood.
35:44 --> 35:53 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's a constant way, you know, within, I'm thinking about the first book with the second book, too, like all of his dialogues with Sansa.
35:53 --> 35:53 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
35:53 --> 35:54 [SPEAKER_03]: Or about like you think,
35:55 --> 35:57 [SPEAKER_03]: You know, you have these stories in your head.
35:57 --> 35:58 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
35:58 --> 35:59 [SPEAKER_03]: Look at the reality.
35:59 --> 36:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, come on, like a true night.
36:02 --> 36:05 [SPEAKER_02]: A true night is something that exists in stories.
36:05 --> 36:07 [SPEAKER_02]: True nights are myths.
36:07 --> 36:08 [SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.
36:08 --> 36:10 [SPEAKER_03]: And I am going to say that out loud.
36:10 --> 36:11 [SPEAKER_03]: I will refuse to be.
36:11 --> 36:14 [SPEAKER_03]: a night because it's bullshit, right?
36:14 --> 36:17 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, marriageance, hitting little girls in the stomach.
36:17 --> 36:19 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, that is the opposite of nighthood.
36:19 --> 36:21 [SPEAKER_03]: And yet, he's a member of the Kingsguard.
36:21 --> 36:24 [SPEAKER_03]: He's being held up as the pinnacle.
36:24 --> 36:26 [SPEAKER_03]: And so he exposes it in one way.
36:26 --> 36:40 [SPEAKER_03]: And I was saying the dunk is a critiques the system in some ways, not quite as overtly, but through his actions and his moral compass and his moral simplicity, everything he does,
36:40 --> 36:49 [SPEAKER_03]: is almost, you know, it shames other nights into remembering their vows just by being.
36:50 --> 36:51 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's really interesting.
36:51 --> 36:52 [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know.
36:52 --> 36:58 [SPEAKER_03]: Again, I don't get that clearly believes in this institution or the set of values in a way that happened.
36:58 --> 37:02 [SPEAKER_03]: It's not, but both of them kind of exist as critiques do it.
37:02 --> 37:04 [SPEAKER_03]: I guess that's why I was parents.
37:04 --> 37:05 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
37:05 --> 37:05 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
37:05 --> 37:06 [SPEAKER_02]: I want to talk
37:06 --> 37:07 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, okay.
37:07 --> 37:11 [SPEAKER_02]: So I don't know a lot about this, but
37:12 --> 37:24 [SPEAKER_02]: There's this moment when Duncan is in the tower cell, and he's thinking back to what Sir Arlan used to say about, look, the hedge night is really the only true night.
37:25 --> 37:25 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
37:26 --> 37:31 [SPEAKER_02]: And the reason why is because the hedge night can choose the cause he wants to fight for.
37:32 --> 37:32 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
37:33 --> 37:38 [SPEAKER_02]: If you want to choose a particular Lord to fight for, that's what you make in a choice.
37:39 --> 37:47 [SPEAKER_02]: If you wanted to choose to defend the virtue of a lady that's your choice, if you become a cattle knight, you don't get to choose your own battles anymore.
37:47 --> 37:47 [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
37:48 --> 37:50 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm pretty sure that this is Martin's view on this as well.
37:51 --> 37:51 [SPEAKER_03]: I think so.
37:51 --> 37:52 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
37:52 --> 38:00 [SPEAKER_02]: So then I thought, well, but is this even a thing or is this like a mythology built for West Rose?
38:01 --> 38:03 [SPEAKER_02]: Because as far as I know,
38:03 --> 38:05 [SPEAKER_02]: you become a night because you're first wealthy.
38:06 --> 38:29 [SPEAKER_02]: And then I, you know, did a little search on night's errand, which are wandering nights that exist in medieval literature that basically like have these guys going on adventures so that they can prove their qualities as a night, otherwise these guys are just, you know, paid champions, mercenaries.
38:29 --> 38:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Right, or they're just performers who happen to do well in tournaments or whatever, it's almost like you need this world of chivalry that exists outside of the tournament.
38:40 --> 38:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Right, right outside of the castle, where they're going out and they're like, they're bringing justice to an ingest land, right, they're, they're their cowboys, right, we cowboys with white hats.
38:51 --> 38:56 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, although it's, and it's very often just romantic, right?
38:56 --> 38:58 [SPEAKER_03]: It's very often the love of the lady and sort of.
38:58 --> 39:04 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, moving your worth to her because you know, it would be someone like when you get something like, um,
39:04 --> 39:13 [SPEAKER_03]: The Lancelot and Gwynnivier tales that are told where Lancelot is going around and performing all these tasks and an effort and you know, that's still an illicit love.
39:13 --> 39:14 [SPEAKER_03]: He's cockledingly king.
39:14 --> 39:19 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, but that's part of that's part of the great romance of it or you know, go in.
39:19 --> 39:24 [SPEAKER_02]: You would expect that a great night will woo a woman, right?
39:24 --> 39:27 [SPEAKER_02]: That is absolutely part of that night's character.
39:27 --> 39:40 [SPEAKER_03]: most often an unattainable woman or so there's usually some sort of, yeah, some sort of element that this is not quite appropriate or it's doomed from the start.
39:41 --> 39:47 [SPEAKER_02]: So I guess the question is what do we think about that commenter?
39:47 --> 39:52 [SPEAKER_02]: Is the is the night
39:52 --> 39:56 [SPEAKER_02]: their lower in rank than someone like Lance a lot as interesting.
39:56 --> 40:01 [SPEAKER_03]: I think there are multiple kind of nightly ideals.
40:01 --> 40:06 [SPEAKER_03]: So yes, I think there is something wistful and longing for that kind of
40:06 --> 40:12 [SPEAKER_03]: You know, again, don't kill a day going around, trying to write me in justices of the world.
40:13 --> 40:26 [SPEAKER_03]: But then you would also have someone like, you know, Roland, who is, you know, the loyal servant of Charlemagne and so there, that's a nightly ideal that is very explicitly kind of in service to a just lord.
40:26 --> 40:29 [SPEAKER_03]: Now, it's interesting that you have to put Roland.
40:30 --> 40:50 [SPEAKER_03]: back a couple of centuries to be a truly worthy and just Lord, but yeah, because Charlemagne's court and Camelot really are the settings of most of these tales because it allows for people to imagine an idealized set of relationships with tension and bastardity and cockledery and all those things mixed in.
40:50 --> 40:52 [SPEAKER_03]: But it's an interesting idea.
40:52 --> 40:56 [SPEAKER_03]: I think you do need these imagined ideals
40:57 --> 41:15 [SPEAKER_03]: to remind people of what they're supposed to be, but also, because I mean, they're just, they're good stories about these known figures, but raised to heroic heights, or taking the idea of a tournament and then multiplying it by a thousand.
41:15 --> 41:16 [SPEAKER_03]: Or, you know, yeah.
41:17 --> 41:19 [SPEAKER_03]: And I think that's a lot of what it is.
41:19 --> 41:24 [SPEAKER_03]: The magnification of these ideals or expectations around a certain class
41:25 --> 41:27 [SPEAKER_03]: cultural consumers as well as cultural producers.
41:27 --> 41:36 [SPEAKER_03]: So you get these stories of the Knights, Aaron, or the perfect, the perfect soldier night who tragically does defending his Lord.
41:36 --> 41:42 [SPEAKER_02]: It's almost like you need, like, how are we going to bring adventure?
41:42 --> 41:44 [SPEAKER_02]: You've got this, you've got a superhero.
41:44 --> 41:46 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, but we've got to raise the stakes.
41:46 --> 41:47 [SPEAKER_02]: Exactly.
41:47 --> 41:51 [SPEAKER_02]: We've got to put him in a situation that will be a challenge for him.
41:52 --> 42:12 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, so let's put the Hulk on some planet because, you know, it's it's like you've got to put these people in these otherworldly situations like you got to fight a giant you got to fight a dragon absolutely because you're the superhero and we want to test your prowess, but we also want to test your virtue along the way, right?
42:13 --> 42:14 [SPEAKER_02]: There's also that part of it.
42:14 --> 42:18 [SPEAKER_03]: there is some virtue, but prowess is really, is, is central.
42:19 --> 42:30 [SPEAKER_03]: And I think that's one of the things that Martin gets right about this world is just like almost the cult around strength that arms and that you have to have that.
42:30 --> 42:34 [SPEAKER_03]: And if you do have it, almost anything else is forgivable.
42:35 --> 42:37 [SPEAKER_01]: So long as you have that.
42:41 --> 42:47 [SPEAKER_02]: What else about this story as you were reading it for the first time, I sort of struck you as interesting?
42:47 --> 43:03 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I think the whole idea of the trial by battle as a way of settling this dispute, because it's something again, like, I had done some research on this in teaching, because you have, you know,
43:03 --> 43:13 [SPEAKER_03]: Tyrion has a couple of trials by battle and kind of trying to get it the history of this form of trial by ordeal.
43:13 --> 43:24 [SPEAKER_03]: And then when you get the seven on seven, which obviously is symbolically significant because of you know, the particular religious beliefs in West rose, but I was like, is this ever really happened?
43:24 --> 43:30 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, if we ever had group trips by battle,
43:30 --> 43:53 [SPEAKER_03]: It's a hundred champions each of the nights it's a year to gather their team of a hundred, yeah, and then they fight and I say, okay, and then there's a story about the great night Jifwa discharney, who is in the 14th century fought for the French in the hundred years war where he actually offered.
43:55 --> 44:06 [SPEAKER_03]: the English that there is a huge battle sort of in the offing that if each had to save to save men's lives, each side should choose a hundred people and fight it out in between the armies.
44:07 --> 44:08 [SPEAKER_03]: That was turned down.
44:09 --> 44:09 [SPEAKER_03]: It didn't happen.
44:10 --> 44:19 [SPEAKER_02]: But the idea because the idea was out there in the world, it was almost too delicious not to create a story about.
44:19 --> 44:25 [SPEAKER_03]: Well, I mean, in Charney is fastening because I mean, he was a very successful soldier.
44:25 --> 44:30 [SPEAKER_03]: He rose from relatively low rank to become a member of the order of the star.
44:30 --> 44:33 [SPEAKER_03]: And like, he was actually the standard bearer for the king of France.
44:33 --> 44:36 [SPEAKER_03]: So he and he wrote a book of shivalry.
44:37 --> 44:37 [SPEAKER_03]: Hmm.
44:37 --> 44:41 [SPEAKER_03]: So he wrote like a handbook for nights after being a practicing night.
44:42 --> 44:43 [SPEAKER_03]: through his whole life.
44:44 --> 44:51 [SPEAKER_03]: But he also kind of infamously tried to bribe his way into a city to win a battle.
44:51 --> 44:55 [SPEAKER_03]: He promised he was once ransomed.
44:56 --> 44:57 [SPEAKER_03]: There is a huge captured.
44:57 --> 44:59 [SPEAKER_03]: And he told the person who was holding a prisoner.
44:59 --> 45:00 [SPEAKER_03]: He gave me a year.
45:00 --> 45:02 [SPEAKER_03]: I need to go back to France to raise the funds.
45:02 --> 45:04 [SPEAKER_03]: And I'll be back to pay my ransom and he just never did.
45:04 --> 45:07 [SPEAKER_03]: So those are clear breaks with Chivalric.
45:07 --> 45:12 [SPEAKER_03]: ethics, but he is still considered a great night because of, you know, in the balance.
45:15 --> 45:21 [SPEAKER_03]: He did enough honorable things and had that sort of military prowess that he was deemed a great night.
45:21 --> 45:22 [SPEAKER_03]: So there are all these things.
45:22 --> 45:27 [SPEAKER_02]: It's interesting to me that we have the bad stuff about him or as well, right?
45:27 --> 45:33 [SPEAKER_02]: Because some of those things, if history decides that you're a great night, sometimes those things fall away.
45:33 --> 45:49 [SPEAKER_03]: I think yes, unfortunately his life was well-cronicaled by others, so, or I guess unfortunately for him, but it's like there's also flexibility in Chivalry where sometimes, subterfuge or trickery is okay because that is a sign of cunning and prudence.
45:49 --> 45:58 [SPEAKER_03]: Other times, usually when it doesn't work, you know, it's underhanded, so it just sort of the outcome often determines, you know, the valence of the actions.
45:58 --> 45:59 [SPEAKER_03]: Even in the literature.
45:59 --> 46:01 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, but yes, sorry.
46:02 --> 46:03 [SPEAKER_03]: So just I love travel by battle.
46:04 --> 46:11 [SPEAKER_03]: Like the idea of like let's resolve this even in a case where the facts of the case are well known.
46:12 --> 46:12 [SPEAKER_03]: He punched him.
46:13 --> 46:14 [SPEAKER_03]: He kicked him in the face.
46:14 --> 46:15 [SPEAKER_03]: This is open in chat.
46:17 --> 46:31 [SPEAKER_03]: But the idea of trying to get it just this capital J justice, rather than the rule of law or the letter of the law, I guess I should say, it's a really fascinating kind of contrast to me.
46:32 --> 46:37 [SPEAKER_02]: I was interviewing this guy who wrote this, it was a book of economics.
46:37 --> 46:37 [SPEAKER_03]: Okay.
46:38 --> 46:42 [SPEAKER_02]: It was a professor of economics who wanted to find different
46:42 --> 46:45 [SPEAKER_02]: times in history to research.
46:45 --> 46:53 [SPEAKER_02]: So he learned just enough about trial by battle to write it one chapter in a book about this, okay?
46:54 --> 46:58 [SPEAKER_02]: And the conclusion he came to was, which I totally disagreed with.
46:59 --> 47:07 [SPEAKER_02]: The conclusion he came to was that it's actually, it's actually was a more just way to solve a problem.
47:08 --> 47:19 [SPEAKER_02]: because it allowed someone who didn't have maybe the resources to actually win in the end, right?
47:19 --> 47:28 [SPEAKER_02]: Is this sort of leveling the playing field so that money doesn't always rule the day or something like that?
47:28 --> 47:28 [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
47:28 --> 47:32 [SPEAKER_02]: And then I said, yeah, but you're going to fight to the death.
47:32 --> 47:36 [SPEAKER_02]: He's like, well, not really because they have their armor so good.
47:37 --> 47:40 [SPEAKER_02]: that oftentimes you wouldn't actually have to kill the guy.
47:41 --> 47:46 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, you just win the battle, kind of like dunked us, you know, the guy yields, right?
47:47 --> 47:50 [SPEAKER_02]: You just say Craven and the battle's over.
47:50 --> 47:50 [SPEAKER_03]: There you go.
47:51 --> 47:54 [SPEAKER_02]: And I thought, this is nonsense.
47:55 --> 47:57 [SPEAKER_02]: This is the worst way to solve your problem.
47:57 --> 47:59 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, you have a legal dispute.
47:59 --> 48:06 [SPEAKER_02]: The person who's better at poking sharp things at the other person is then favored by the heavens.
48:06 --> 48:08 [SPEAKER_02]: This is ridiculous.
48:08 --> 48:21 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, but then his response was, I'm sorry if we get the guy's name, his response was, yeah, but a lot of the way that we in an act justice in the modern world is pretty ridiculous, too.
48:21 --> 48:24 [SPEAKER_02]: So anyway, it was an interesting conversation.
48:24 --> 48:33 [SPEAKER_02]: I had this conversation about three years ago, so I'm a little bit vague on it, but I'll send you the book title later.
48:33 --> 48:40 [SPEAKER_03]: It's an interesting idea, and if you, for instance, were to point to, you know, Donk's case, you'd be like, he's right, right?
48:40 --> 48:51 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, this is a case and point that Donk is in fact has the just cause, and it allows him to escape punishment that seems totally out of sync with the crime that's been committed.
48:51 --> 48:53 [SPEAKER_03]: So, hooray for trial by battle.
48:54 --> 48:58 [SPEAKER_02]: Um, well, you could look at like, he's yeah, he's a, he's a big, strong guy.
48:58 --> 49:00 [SPEAKER_02]: He's almost set the feet tall.
49:01 --> 49:04 [SPEAKER_02]: It looks like the gods are going to favor this guy most most good time.
49:04 --> 49:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
49:05 --> 49:08 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, his overactive pituitary gland was a blessing for God.
49:08 --> 49:16 [SPEAKER_03]: Um, but I, I think, so what's interesting, that was a lot of times, trial by battle was actually meant to.
49:17 --> 49:33 [SPEAKER_03]: It was so hard and so lengthy a process and very expensive that oftentimes the resort to trial by battle was actually kind of a way of forcing the parties to come to a compromise because it's not something that where it happens instantly.
49:33 --> 49:56 [SPEAKER_03]: I think in most cases in French lots like 60 days and you have to sort of, you know, pay for all of this stuff and pay for your second and sort of set up the arena and bring in the, you know, there's, there's a lot of money involved so much and so it's why it's one of the reasons it's relatively rare historically speaking is because it's just it's net basically to force people to try to come to a settlement.
49:56 --> 49:58 [SPEAKER_03]: without losing honor.
49:58 --> 50:06 [SPEAKER_03]: Now, the other times, we see our often times in like cases where the facts are in dispute.
50:06 --> 50:20 [SPEAKER_03]: And because you know, a jury can't sell that, witnessed testimony can't solve it, we have conflicting versions of events and when the court kind of throws its hands up in the air, it's like, okay, well, how are we going to settle this?
50:20 --> 50:30 [SPEAKER_03]: That's when you often will get like famously, you know, Jacques Ligree, um, yeah, the movie the last tool, you know, right, there's a case of sexual violence.
50:30 --> 50:31 [SPEAKER_03]: There are no witnesses.
50:31 --> 50:33 [SPEAKER_03]: We have deeply conflicting versions of events.
50:33 --> 50:34 [SPEAKER_03]: It's a matter of honor.
50:35 --> 50:41 [SPEAKER_03]: So it has to be settled, you know, that's the most kind of famous case of this probably from the Middle Ages.
50:43 --> 50:45 [SPEAKER_03]: But that's not the issue here.
50:45 --> 50:59 [SPEAKER_03]: So Martin is kind of playing really fast and loose with historical precedent, but it's because we want this, as you say, like the heightened drama where the ideal knight is fighting for his life against tyrannical prints.
50:59 --> 51:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Like we need this to happen in this way.
51:03 --> 51:03 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
51:04 --> 51:04 [SPEAKER_03]: Oh, it's so great.
51:04 --> 51:06 [SPEAKER_03]: You know, it's a great resolution to the story.
51:07 --> 51:28 [SPEAKER_02]: So I wanted to, the other thing about this story that I thought should be mentioned before you wrap up is that for all of the intricacy that Martin brings to his stories, the one good Targaryen has dark hair.
51:28 --> 51:55 [SPEAKER_02]: it's like it comes down to the the absolute most simple you know the guys that blonde hair generally going to be bad the guys that brown hair are generally going to be good to get some streak you might make it out okay yeah all right right teriyan's got two different colors of hair so he's going to live in liminal space and i just think it's really funny
51:56 --> 52:05 [SPEAKER_02]: So much of his plots come down to these really simple indicators of personality.
52:06 --> 52:06 [SPEAKER_03]: Oh my gosh.
52:07 --> 52:09 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, that is pretty funny.
52:09 --> 52:14 [SPEAKER_03]: That it's rules for navigating Westeros, right?
52:14 --> 52:16 [SPEAKER_03]: Never go to a wedding if you're invited.
52:18 --> 52:19 [SPEAKER_03]: good ever happens in a wedding feast.
52:19 --> 52:20 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
52:20 --> 52:22 [SPEAKER_03]: Never trust someone with blonde hair.
52:25 --> 52:26 [SPEAKER_03]: We have to think of a few more.
52:27 --> 52:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Uh-huh.
52:28 --> 52:33 [SPEAKER_02]: Or the other another rule for Martin is never Mary for love.
52:36 --> 52:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Never Mary for love.
52:37 --> 52:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Only ever Mary for political advancement.
52:41 --> 52:46 [SPEAKER_02]: No relationship that Mary's
52:49 --> 52:51 [SPEAKER_03]: Like, trying really hard to think of one.
52:51 --> 52:54 [SPEAKER_03]: And it doesn't work.
52:56 --> 53:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm sure someone will write in and say, yeah, but what about, you know, it's true.
53:01 --> 53:01 [SPEAKER_03]: It's true.
53:02 --> 53:02 [SPEAKER_03]: It's true.
53:02 --> 53:09 [SPEAKER_02]: As a general of thumb, you know, don't, in fact, weddings in general or or bad occasions.
53:09 --> 53:13 [SPEAKER_02]: Just don't, just don't, don't go to court.
53:13 --> 53:17 [SPEAKER_02]: Don't ever let the king make a proclamation,
53:17 --> 53:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, sitting on the day is like that that's only ever going to be bad.
53:21 --> 53:32 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I mean, now the question too, well, it's not because of Don, because of bail or like, yeah, we might have earlier said like in a song by some fire.
53:33 --> 53:35 [SPEAKER_03]: You never trust the night, right?
53:35 --> 53:42 [SPEAKER_03]: If someone has gone through the ritual, or something, you probably should avoid them at most costs.
53:42 --> 53:46 [SPEAKER_03]: But, now we know, there can be good nights.
53:47 --> 53:50 [SPEAKER_02]: There can be good nights, they are not common.
53:50 --> 53:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Now, West Rose.
53:52 --> 53:57 [SPEAKER_02]: But if there was one, when they be fun to follow and see what kind of adventures they got into,
53:58 --> 54:23 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, and then also let us see what the small folks life is like and let us see how they experience, you know, the world of the highboards as spectators and as kind of fringe participants instead of the center of attention, that's the fun of this especially as it goes on is this is really piece of is I think Martin is just like there is so much to this world I've created the constraints of the story I'm telling don't allow me to explore.
54:24 --> 54:34 [SPEAKER_03]: So let me just, let me contrive some way to hang out in the westernlands and the riverlands and I, you know,
54:34 --> 54:35 [SPEAKER_03]: all these places.
54:36 --> 54:37 [SPEAKER_03]: And it's a good time.
54:37 --> 54:38 [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not going to lie.
54:38 --> 54:39 [SPEAKER_03]: I enjoyed it.
54:39 --> 54:39 [SPEAKER_03]: I enjoyed it.
54:40 --> 54:45 [SPEAKER_02]: It's a really fun, you know, it's almost quaint, you know, by comparison.
54:47 --> 54:52 [SPEAKER_02]: But yeah, if you just want to revisit West Rose for an afternoon, it's a good time.
54:53 --> 54:56 [SPEAKER_02]: Does this make you want to watch the show?
54:56 --> 54:59 [SPEAKER_02]: Does it make you want to read future novellas?
55:00 --> 55:02 [SPEAKER_03]: Yes, yes, and yes.
55:02 --> 55:04 [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I think this is going to make
55:05 --> 55:14 [SPEAKER_03]: For a really interesting show, there are pieces of it that I'm like, oh, how are you gonna draw this out or add tension around an episodic structure?
55:14 --> 55:15 [SPEAKER_03]: Doesn't perfectly work like that.
55:16 --> 55:25 [SPEAKER_03]: But I mean, the final trial of my battle is gonna be just sick, so I will watch it just to get to that and simply because like,
55:26 --> 55:33 [SPEAKER_03]: I like Dunkin' Egg, you know, like I like these guys, I would like to hang out with them for a while, and that's right.
55:33 --> 55:38 [SPEAKER_03]: So for those reasons, yes, I will watch and I won't just be, and I think, again, I would go back to these novellas.
55:40 --> 55:51 [SPEAKER_03]: No, so I think it'll be good.
56:46 --> 56:57 [SPEAKER_02]: And bye and bye and a cocoon of horror.