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fictionallisa · 1 year

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Dany Month Day 19

“The battle was followed by the day's first folly, a tilt between a pair of jousting dwarfs, presented by one of the Yunkish lords that Hizdahr had invited to the games. One rode a hound, the other a sow. Their wooden armor had been freshly painted, so one bore the stag of the usurper Robert Baratheon, the other the golden lion of House Lannister. That was for her sake, plainly. Their antics soon had Belwas snorting laughter, though Dany's smile was faint and forced. When the dwarf in red tumbled from the saddle and began to chase his sow across the sands, whilst the dwarf on the dog galloped after him, whapping at his buttocks with a wooden sword, she said, ‘This is sweet and silly, but …’

‘Be patient, my sweet,’ said Hizdahr. ‘They are about to loose the lions.’

Daenerys gave him a quizzical look. ‘Lions?’

‘Three of them. The dwarfs will not expect them.’

She frowned. ‘The dwarfs have wooden swords. Wooden armor. How do you expect them to fight lions?’

‘Badly,’ said Hizdahr, ‘though perhaps they will surprise us. More like they will shriek and run about and try to climb out of the pit. That is what makes this a folly.’

Dany was not pleased. ‘I forbid it.’

‘Gentle queen. You do not want to disappoint your people.’

‘You swore to me that the fighters would be grown men who had freely consented to risk their lives for gold and honor. These dwarfs did not consent to battle lions with wooden swords. You will stop it. Now.’” -ADWD, Daenerys IX

Dany saving Penny and Tyrion for @hereforperioddrama! I love this moment ❤️

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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No, Azor Ahai being just a tale to inspire people to unite is not more woke than if Azor Ahai is a real prophecy fulfilled by one person. This fandom has been so brainwashed by this “the only thing that matters is for everyone to unite” idea, that they ignore blatant evidence in the text that contradicts their own ideas. R+L=J is accepted as canon in the fandom. And yet, Daenerys being Azor Ahai is not accepted as canon, even though the evidence for Dany being Azor Ahai is even stronger than the evidence for R+L=J (because this fandom has a serious problem in accepting that a woman is the chosen one of their high fantasy, meanwhile Jon being a secret prince is welcomed because that makes the male hero more special). Saying that Azor Ahai is just a tale to make people unite is not “woke”, it’s just denying a female protagonist her chosen one role (a role that isn’t usually fulfilled by female characters in fiction). And it’s ignoring canon, because GRRM hits us over the head with the evidence that Dany is Azor Ahai/Prince that was promised. If you want to believe (with flimsy evidence) that some other character fulfills the Azor Ahai prophecy, fine, but don’t deny that Dany fulfills the prophecy, and don’t deny that it’s a real prophecy, because GRRM didn’t hit us over the head with the evidence of Dany being Azor Ahai just for it to be just a tale.

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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I love that Daenerys Targaryen has significant parallels with all the major ASOIAF characters (as well as with many of the minor and the historical ones too). I love that comparing and contrasting her with them almost always highlights her epicness and/or how special her place in the narrative is.

Daenerys Targaryen is not just a queen, she’s a queen regnant and Lord of the Seven Kingdoms, i.e., a she-king. This means that she can be compared and contrasted not only with Cersei and Margaery or with Alysanne and the other Targaryen queens consort, but also (in fact, especially) with Stannis and Robb or with Aegon the Conqueror and the other Targaryen monarchs that succeeded him.

Daenerys Targaryen is not just a claimant to the Iron Throne like Stannis, Young Griff and Renly, she’s the only one of them who is a POV character.

Daenerys Targaryen is not just one of the POV rulers, she also happens to be the only POV ruler with power in her own right and who isn’t in a subservient position in any way (Jon is Lord Commander, but he’s also the king’s advisor and is running the equivalent of a penal colony, so the stakes are much lower than Daenerys ruling a city and dealing with opposition from half the world; Tyrion and Ned are Hands of the King; Cersei is queen regent, which means that her power stems from Tommen’s kingship). Also, Daenerys has the clearest parallels with Aragorn and her ADWD storyline was deliberately written by GRRM as a response to the lack of information from Tolkien about what makes Aragorn a good king. Finally, if one compares her ADWD storyline with Jon’s, one can see how many roles she occupies at the same time: the administrator (Jon), the monarch (Stannis), the most magical character linked to fire and prophecies (Melisandre) and the leader of the disenfranchised (Mance; note that Daenerys was forced to leave her homeland, was enslaved and currently doesn’t belong anywhere - that’s the exact same situation of many of the former slaves of Slaver’s Bay, who come from different places and have different races, ethnicities and backgrounds. Daenerys empathized with them right away because she is one of them. Her detractors may accuse her of being an outsider, but that’s because they prioritize the viewpoint of the Ghiscari slavers. The freedmen, like Daenerys, come from many different places and are outsiders to the noblemen too).

Daenerys Targaryen is an extraordinary conqueror and strategist. Aegon the Conqueror made the Westerosi bend the knee with the help of his dragons, 15-year-old Daenerys Targaryen overthrew the slave masters primarily thanks to her own battle plans, not her dragons. Robb Stark captured castles in the westerlands motivated by personal injury and his actions had local impact; Daenerys Targaryen conquered three cities motivated by her desire to abolish slavery and her actions had worldwide impact.

Daenerys Targaryen is not a typical member of her family, she is the main leader and representative of House Targaryen in a way that Jon/Bran/Arya/Sansa or Cersei/Jaime/Tyrion can’t ever claim to be. Their fathers Ned Stark and Tywin Lannister had large roles in the main story and, in the Starks’ case, their older brother Robb is more well-remembered than any of them (at least so far). Meanwhile, Daenerys’s father Aerys II was already dead before she was born and before the main story began, which allowed her to carve her own path outside of his influence. Moreover, her accomplishments are already greater than both of her older brothers’. She became the face of her family in a way that matches (in fact, even surpasses) Ned with House Stark and Tywin with House Lannister.

Daenerys Targaryen is not a typical mother, she’s both Mother of Dragons and Mhysa. Her motherhood is transcendental in a way that Catelyn’s or Cersei’s aren’t because it is not related to blood ties or to her fertility. Instead, it’s associated with her unprecedented feat of reviving an extinct species, with her ability to make up the magic as she goes along, with her leadership, with her revolutionary nature, with her compassion for thousands of people. Additionally, unlike the other major mothers, Daenerys is the only one who isn’t doomed to go “mad” despite all the losses and hardships she faced.

Daenerys Targaryen is a hero, which is especially clear when her actions are contrasted with House Stark’s, whose brand of “heroism” has been mostly to react to personal injury so far. Ned Stark participated in Robert’s Rebellion because his father and brother were killed. Ned’s son Robb wanted Northern independence because his father was killed. Ned’s vassals want to start another war in the name of the Starks because of their loyalty and their outrage about the Red Wedding. Their motivations, sympathetic as they may be, have never involved the commoners. In contrast, GRRM had Daenerys empathize with the former slaves, start a war in their name and abolish slavery despite them not being associated with her through oath of fealty or blood relations or lands. She was specifically singled out by the author as the one leader who “wants equality for everyone”. It’s a stark contrast (pun intended) to the actions of the main family (at least as a unit) of the story. Sadly, it’s easier (for some fans) to root for the heroes mostly reacting to personal injury who never made any mistakes of large scale consequences since they never got to be in authority. Or for the heroes fighting against ice zombies (though, to be fair, Jon haven’t even faced them in ADWD, his main challenge was to conciliate the Free Folk and the Night’s Watch, so the stakes of his storyline are much lower when one compares his problems with Dany dealing with enemies from all over Essos raising armies to defeat her). It’s harder to do the same with the hero who takes an active stance against social injustices and who wrestles with hard questions about when political violence is justified (which never have easy, clear-cut answers) and all the negative ramifications that come with them.

Oh, and have I mentioned that Daenerys Targaryen is the character with the most overt clues of being Azor Ahai/Prince That Was Promised/Stallion Who Mounts the World? Like with the birth of the dragons, uniting all the khalasars and then leading humanity to victory against the Others will be two more unparalleled feats of hers among the characters of the current timeline. Additionally, as she becomes surrounded and influenced by prophecies, we get to see how Daenerys has a healthy relationship with them in contrast to other characters like Cersei and Stannis.

All these attributes and accomplishments are made even more remarkable when one contrasts them with what doesn’t necessarily make Daenerys Targaryen unique. Yes, Daenerys became the most powerful person in her world, but she also lived in poverty among lowborn people without the privilege of a castle or a formal education, which lends itself to comparisons with Davos and Melisandre. Yes, Daenerys is a queen, but she’s also a young girl who loves songs and stories and idealizes her family members, which lends itself to comparisons with Arya, Brienne and Sansa. Yes, Daenerys is a loving, compassionate mother, but she was also raised by her abuser throughout all of her formative years, which lends itself to comparisons with dysfunctional families like the Lannisters, the Greyjoys and the Cleganes. And so on.

Daenerys Targaryen has a very special place in the narrative, which I think should be acknowledged not only to appreciate her character, but also to understand why GRRM chose to isolate her from everyone else. Why would GRRM be confident that his readers would still be interested in Daenerys despite the fact that she doesn’t interact with any of his other major characters for most of the story? Is it merely because of her dragons, as her detractors say?

No.

It’s because, as the list above showed, Daenerys’s narrative importance and accomplishments are unmatched. They had to be. Daenerys’s character and storyline had to be connected to pretty much everyone else’s in significant, thematic ways in order for her to earn an entire continent, as well as her place as the Fire of ASOIAF. That is why Daenerys is guaranteed to have a major role in all the three main plotlines of ASOIAF. That is why Daenerys is so iconic and represents this book series in a way that no individual Stark could ever do. That is why Daenerys has to be so many things at the same time: a POV character and a claimant to the Iron Throne, a mother and the main representative of her family, the most powerful person in her world and a former slave, a ruler and a conqueror, a she-king and a young girl, quite possibly the story’s main hero and savior. That no other ASOIAF character can come close to her narrative importance or to her in-universe accomplishments is kind of the point because Daenerys had to encompass everything that is great about ASOIAF in order to carry her own storyline. And I’m excited for TWOW because, as she moves closer to Westeros, her importance will only increase more and more.

Daenerys Targaryen is like fine wine. She gets better and better the more time passes, the more you think about her and the more you realize how all the other ASOIAF storylines somehow lead back to hers. Dany’s storyline almost always looks that much more epic and greater in comparison to them because she carries her storyline on her own, so the author had to make sure she caught our attention.

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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Daenerys Targaryen is the only “Mother of Dragons” in ASOIAF

It is important to understand why Daenerys is the only character who has earned the title “Mother of Dragons” in the series. It is her central epithet and perhaps her defining characteristic, what sets her apart as a literary icon both within the series and in the cultural zeitgeist.

“Mother of__” is not a title exclusive to Daenerys. Motherhood is a theme that George R.R. Martin explores extensively, through characters like Catelyn Stark (”mother merciless”) and Cersei Lannister. Much has been written on his sidelining and pathologization of motherhood as well, what with some mothers, like Lysa Arryn, being written as insane, and other mothers, like Rhaella Targaryen, being treated as voiceless off-screen martyrs. Thus, Daenerys, Catelyn, and Cersei remain his most important and most fleshed out maternal characters.

The importance of “Mother of Dragons” is its relation to Daenerys. It is not a title given to every woman who’s given birth to a Targaryen––otherwise, Rhaella, Aema Arryn, etc, various women who’ve had Targaryen children would all be called mother(s) of dragons. Yet it is only Dany who receives this epithet.

The reason it is so significant that Daenerys is the Mother of Dragons is that dragons were dead for over a century. Daenerys was not supposed to have birthed dragons:

“Dragon’s eggs, from the Shadow Lands beyond Asshai,” said Magister Illyrio. “The eons have turned them to stone, yet still they burn bright with beauty.” (Dany II AGOT)

Ser Jorah lowered his eyes respectfully. Illyrio smiled enigmatically and tore a wing from the duck. Honey and grease ran over his fingers and dripped down into his beard as he nibbled at the tender meat. There are no more dragons, Dany thought, staring at her brother, though she did not dare say it aloud. (Dany II AGOT)

There were nineteen skulls. The oldest was more than three thousand years old; the youngest a mere century and a half. The most recent were also the smallest; a matched pair no bigger than mastiff’s skulls, and oddly misshapen, all that remained of the last two hatchlings born on Dragonstone. They were the last of the Targaryen dragons, perhaps the last dragons anywhere, and they had not lived very long. (Tyrion II AGOT)

The dragons have been dead for a century, such that the mere possibility of hatching a dragon egg, let alone riding a dragon, has become a children’s story, a song, nothing but a memory. No one was supposed to wake dragons from stone. And the symbolic representation of this is important too: with Robert’s Rebellion, Viserys and Daenerys become the last Targaryens, their House incredibly weak. Dragons are physically dead, and their House is exiled, hunted, and impoverished, barely hanging on.

What Daenerys does in Dany X AGOT is a miracle borne of her sacrifice and intuition. Over the course of AGOT, there are several references to dragons both in Dany’s chapters and in other chapters, such as Ned, Arya, and Tyrion’s chapters. Dany initially has no idea that the dragon eggs can hatch, but through her experiences with the Dothraki and her own prophetic dragon dreams (traits that she shares with House Targaryen, with other characters such as Daeron the Drunken, Daenys the Dreamer, and Rhaegar Targaryen all having prophetic dreams and visions), Daenerys pieces together the clues to successfully birth her dragons.

It’s important to note that no one else does what she does in the series, or sacrifices what she sacrifices, to birth the dragons. She does all of this before the reader learns of the prophecy of Azor Ahai, before Stannis is declared Azor Ahai, and before Daenerys is declared Azor Ahai by Maester Aemon and the Red Priests of Volantis. She herself is still unaware of the prophecy. The birth of the dragons did not happen by accident, luck, or overnight; it required Dany’s intelligence and bravery to take place. This is confirmed within the text and by GRRM:

“They are mine,” she said fiercely. They had been born from her faith and her need, given life by the deaths of her husband and unborn son and the maegi Mirri Maz Duur. Dany had walked into the flames as they came forth, and they had drunk milk from her swollen breasts. “No man will take them from me while I live.” (Dany I ACOK)

The whole point of the scene in A Game of Thrones where Daenerys hatches the dragons is that she makes the magic up as she goes along; she is someone who really might do anything. (GRRM)

The magical aspect of this cannot be understated. With the birth of the dragons, Dany has brought back magic to the world:

“Half a year gone, that man could scarcely wake fire from dragonglass. He had some small skill with powders and wildfire, sufficient to entrance a crowd while his cutpurses did their work. He could walk across hot coals and make burning roses bloom in the air, but he could no more aspire to climb the fiery ladder than a common fisherman could hope to catch a kraken in his nets.” Dany looked uneasily at where the ladder had stood. Even the smoke was gone now, and the crowd was breaking up, each man going about his business. In a moment more than a few would find their purses flat and empty. “And now?” “And now his powers grow, Khaleesi. And you are the cause of it.” (Dany III ACOK)

Xaro looked troubled. “And so it was, then. But now? I am less certain. It is said that the glass candles are burning in the house of Urrathon Night-Walker, that have not burned in a hundred years. Ghost grass grows in the Garden of Gehane, phantom tortoises have been seen carrying messages between the windowless houses on Warlock’s Way, and all the rats in the city are chewing off their tails. The wife of Mathos Mallarawan, who once mocked a warlock’s drab moth-eaten robe, has gone mad and will wear no clothes at all. Even fresh-washed silks make her feel as though a thousand insects were crawling on her skin. And Blind Sybassion the Eater of Eyes can see again, or so his slaves do swear. A man must wonder.” (Dany V ACOK)

“They, hmmm, seem to be working better than they were.” Hallyne smiled weakly. “You don’t suppose there are any dragons about, do you?” “Not unless you found one under the Dragonpit. Why?” “Oh, pardon, I was just remembering something old Wisdom Pollitor told me once, when I was an acolyte. I’d asked him why so many of our spells seemed, well, not as effectual as the scrolls would have us believe, and he said it was because magic had begun to go out of the world the day the last dragon died.” (Tyrion XI ACOK)

Dany’s magic is so powerful that the birth of her dragons ushers in magic back into the world, which strengthens the warlocks, the alchemists, and the various sorcerers and priests of the world in both Westeros and Essos. This is a unique effect of the birth of the dragons.

There is also thematic relevance to Dany’s character journey contained within the title “mother of dragons”. For starters, “waking the dragon” is something that appears throughout Dany’s AGOT storyline:

Dany said nothing. Magister Illyrio was a dealer in spices, gemstones, dragonbone, and other, less savory things. He had friends in all of the Nine Free Cities, it was said, and even beyond, in Vaes Dothrak and the fabled lands beside the Jade Sea. It was also said that he’d never had a friend he wouldn’t cheerfully sell for the right price. Dany listened to the talk in the streets, and she heard these things, but she knew better than to question her brother when he wove his webs of dream. His anger was a terrible thing when roused. Viserys called it “waking the dragon.” (Dany I AGOT)

Ser Jorah’s face was drawn and sorrowful. “Rhaegar was the last dragon,” he told her. He warmed translucent hands over a glowing brazier where stone eggs smouldered red as coals. One moment he was there and the next he was fading, his flesh colorless, less substantial than the wind. “The last dragon,” he whispered, thin as a wisp, and was gone. She felt the dark behind her, and the red door seemed farther away than ever. “… don’t want to wake the dragon, do you?” (Dany IX AGOT)

All her life, Dany has been told that Rhaegar was the last dragon, and that her duty is to endure her brother’s abuses and obey him as her true King. “Waking the dragon” is initially the mantra her abuser uses against her, before physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing her. In her last prophetic dragon dream (Dany IX AGOT), Dany sees herself as the last dragon, wearing Rhaegar’s armor. This is before she births the dragons. Thus, the concept of “waking the dragon”, even beyond its relevance to the Azor Ahai/TPTWP prophecy (”waking dragons out of stone”), is important to Dany because it’s a symbolic reclamation of her autonomy, both physical and political. It represents her strength, courage, and freedom from patriarchal violence (her brother’s abuse, Drogo’s ownership of her, being relegated to the sidelines because of her gender). “Waking the dragon” for Dany is not just physically waking her dragon sons from stone; it is awakening herself, her potential, her liberation from gendered oppression. The undying call her the “daughter of death” because the deaths of men in her life who’d have taken her place pave her path. Dany can reach her full potential once she’s free of these patriarchal chains.

Secondly, Dany experiences a traumatizing miscarriage, which permanently affects her sense of motherhood and identity. Mirri Maz Duur tells her that she is infertile. There are theories that Dany is not actually infertile and that Mirri was lying. Nevertheless, Dany herself thinks she’s infertile, and this impacts how she conceives of her motherhood:

Even Captain Groleo was glad of that, now. There had been one small fire, easily extinguished; against that, Balerion suddenly seemed to have far fewer rats than she’d had before, when she sailed under the name Saduleon. And her crew, once as fearful as they were curious, had begun to take a queer fierce pride in “their” dragons. Every man of them, from captain to cook’s boy, loved to watch the three fly … though none so much as Dany.

They are my children, she told herself, and if the maegi spoke truly, they are the only children I am ever like to have. (Dany I ASOS)

Dany felt a lightness in her chest. I will never bear a living child, she remembered. Her hand trembled as she raised it. Perhaps she smiled. She must have, because the man grinned and shouted again, and others took up the cry. “Mhysa!” they called. “Mhysa! MHYSA!” They were all smiling at her, reaching for her, kneeling before her. “Maela,” some called her, while others cried “Aelalla” or “Qathei” or “Tato,” but whatever the tongue it all meant the same thing. Mother. They are calling me Mother. (Dany IV ASOS)

As Mhysa and Mother of Dragons, Dany proves that you don’t have to physically give birth to be a mother. This is incredibly important not only for her storyline but for women and queer people everywhere, and people of diverse body types, who may want families but may not have the physical capacity to give birth. It is a very humanizing portrayal of what it means to be a mother, to embody motherhood, to seek a family and companionship, even if you can’t biologically have children. It disrupts and subverts the idea that motherhood and family should be based exclusively on biology and reproductive capacity, transforming how we perceive the relationship between a “mother” and a “child”, a queen and her subjects, and the concept of family itself. Dany is always longing for love and for a home she never knew, and her ability to retain a maternal identity even after losing the physical capability to be a mother is foundational to her storyline. Taking away the significance of Dany being an actual mother to her three dragons (having a dream of her thighs soaked with blood in her first prophetic dragon dream, feeling the eggs warm in relation to her emotions, calling the dragon eggs Rhaego’s “brothers”, the dragons suckling on her breasts) undermines this theme and message.

Thirdly, an overarching theme GRRM is interested in is the play between light and dark, monster and hero, the human heart in conflict with itself, as he’s fond of speaking about. Most of his major characters struggle with internal moral conflict, self-deprecation, and the bifurcation of identity. For Daenerys, this is represented in her dual identities as queen and young girl, mother of dragons and Mhysa, Targaryen heir and Queen of Meereen. Given both her traumatizing experiences and the burden on her shoulders, Daenerys is an incredibly self-reflective and, in fact, self-deprecating person. She thinks about her failures and mistakes and crucifies herself for the pain her people endure. Dany thus conceives of herself as a “monster”, and even reframes herself as one:

Mother of dragons, Daenerys thought. Mother of monsters. What have I unleashed upon the world? A queen I am, but my throne is made of burned bones, and it rests on quicksand. Without dragons, how could she hope to hold Meereen, much less win back Westeros? I am the blood of the dragon, she thought. If they are monsters, so am I. (Dany II ADWD)

Somewhere beneath those roofs, the Sons of the Harpy were gathered, plotting ways to kill her and all those who loved her and put her children back in chains. Somewhere down there a hungry child was crying for milk. Somewhere an old woman lay dying. Somewhere a man and a maid embraced, and fumbled at each other’s clothes with eager hands. But up here there was only the sheen of moonlight on pyramids and pits, with no hint what lay beneath. Up here there was only her, alone. She was the blood of the dragon. She could kill the Sons of the Harpy, and the sons of the sons, and the sons of the sons of the sons. But a dragon could not feed a hungry child nor help a dying woman’s pain. And who would ever dare to love a dragon? (Dany II ADWD)

What have I done? she thought, huddled in her empty bed. I have waited so long for him to come back, and I send him away. “He would make a monster of me,” she whispered, “a butcher queen.” But then she thought of Drogon far away, and the dragons in the pit. There is blood on my hands too, and on my heart. We are not so different, Daario and I. We are both monsters. (Dany IV ADWD)

… and folded. The dragon gave one last hiss and stretched out flat upon his belly. Black blood was flowing from the wound where the spear had pierced him, smoking where it dripped onto the scorched sands. He is fire made flesh, she thought, and so am I. (Dany IX ADWD)

No. You are the blood of the dragon. The whispering was growing fainter, as if Ser Jorah were falling farther behind. Dragons plant no trees. Remember that. Remember who you are, what you were made to be. Remember your words. “Fire and Blood,” Daenerys told the swaying grass. (Dany X ADWD)

Fans often unfairly use Dany’s identity as the Mother of Dragons to claim that she will go dark or mad, that she is a villain, and a tyrant. They claim that having dragons is not a replacement for rebuilding a nation. Yet Dany has already considered the ramifications of draconic power and has agonized over the great power she has in her hands, especially after Drogon kills Hazzea. When Dany critiques herself for her failures, she calls herself a monster or a butcher––this is then unironically used by the fandom to claim that she’s going mad. When Daenerys realizes that the Meereneese peace is false and reclaims her fire and blood - her dragon - identity, it is further used by fans as proof that Dany “can never accept peace” and that she will die in a political power struggle.

Rather than seeing how nuanced and poignant Dany’s internal struggle with identity is, fans routinely demonize her for being the Mother of Dragons. To then take that epithet and apply it to an unrelated character that does not struggle the way Dany specifically does with her dragon identity, and who does not receive the hatred or villification Dany does for being the Mother of Dragons, is a disservice to Dany’s character and to GRRM’s intentional writing. Monster identity is not a theme unique to Dany, but being the Mother of Dragons specifically is. And reconciling her Mother of Dragons side with her Mhysa side is going to be very important for Dany’s character growth.

In short, different characters have aspects that make them original. These characters all contribute to ASOIAF in their own ways. Dany is the Mother of Dragons, and this title and the struggles, identities, experiences, and themes embodied therein are specific and exclusive to Daenerys. Mother of Dragons is about Dany’s Targaryen heritage; her specific experience as an exile and scion of House Targaryen; her reclamation of sexual and political autonomy from patriarchal violence; her longing for home and family; her maternity and motherhood especially in light of her (alleged) infertility; her moral and internal turmoil with the limits of power and her responsibilities as Queen; and her relationship to the magical storyline. There are many ways fans can appreciate other characters without stealing what belongs to Daenerys; just as we can appreciate Daenerys for who she is, so too can we appreciate other characters for who they are, without needing to take something that belongs to Dany and haphazardly trying to apply it elsewhere.

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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i don’t know how any of you can read “when the red star bleeds and the darkness gathers, azor ahai shall be born again amidst smoke and salt to wake dragons out of stone.” and think azor ahai is anyone other than daenerys

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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With so many different theories predicting Dany’s downfall and death, it can be easy to forget that, by successfully waking dragons out of stone, Dany was established as Azor Ahai Reborn/Prince that Was Promised, Drogo as her Nissa Nissa and the dragons as her Lightbringer. Also, as a result, the Fridged Woman trope was gender flipped; while the male protagonist’s female love interest is most often killed off for the sake of his development (the trope is even played straight with AA/NN to be contrasted with Dany/Drogo), in Dany’s story her husband is sacrificed to further her development and to allow her to save the world.

So, to bring attention to how GRRM played with the trope, I commissioned a fanart from @kill-a13 depicting Daenerys Targaryen literally driving a flaming sword through her husband. Some notes that I gave to the artist:

I asked them to show Lightbringer glowing with red and black flame (the color of the dragon that Dany ultimately rides) while Drogo is stabbed to represent the fact that the dragons (which are heavily implied to be Lightbringer; like the Red Sword of Heroes, they are drawn from the fire and described as “hot to the touch” and “a flaming sword above the world”) were born partly thanks to his sacrifice. Pretend that the flames are there.

I asked them to draw Dany wearing armor, just like in her dragon dream from AGOT Daenerys IX. In that scene, we’re primed to expect Rhaegar to be “the last dragon” wearing armor, but then Dany lifts the visor and sees herself instead. That moment breaks our expectations and is representative of Dany succeeding her brother and becoming a leader and a hero in her own right. So I thought it’d be fitting to have her wearing armor because both her dragon dream and this piece highlight her tendency to surpass her male relatives in everything.

I asked them to include the red comet (also unsubtly called the dragon’s tail) because it appears for the first time right before Dany lights the pyre and hatches her dragon eggs (making it extremely likely that it specifically heralds her rebirth amidst salt and smoke to wake dragons out of stone).

I asked them to draw dragon wings coming out of Dany’s back to symbolize her rebirth as the Mother of Dragons (“I know that somewhere out upon the grass her dragons hatched, and so did she”). I told them to paint them red because she’s “a true Targaryen”.

I asked them to show Dany looking unhappy because her husband entered a vegetative state for reasons outside of her control. Her decision to put him out of his misery was nowhere near as morally questionable as Azor Ahai sacrificing Nissa Nissa (in fact, even if 14-year-old Dany had planned to kill him, she would have been justified because she was his sex slave). Neither were the sacrifices of Rhaego and MMD; the former was murdered by MMD and the latter was executed like any noble would have done to punish their child’s murderer.

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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Motifs in Dany’s storyline ↳ Visual, metaphoric, and linguistic parallels between Dany and Azor Ahai (part 1). Davos I ACOK // Davos III ASOS // Jon XI ASOS // Jon III ADWD vs. Dany I AGOT // Dany III AGOT // Dany IX AGOT // Dany X AGOT // Dany I ACOK // Dany III ASOS // Dany VI ASOS // Dany III ADWD

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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DAENERYS TARGARYEN APPRECIATION MONTH 2021

Day 8 - Prophecies and visions: Some of the main clues showing that Daenerys is Azor Ahai/Prince that was Promised

“No one ever looked for a girl,” he said. “It was a prince that was promised, not a princess. Rhaegar, I thought … the smoke was from the fire that devoured Summerhall on the day of his birth, the salt from the tears shed for those who died. He shared my belief when he was young, but later he became persuaded that it was his own son who fulfilled the prophecy, for a comet had been seen above King’s Landing on the night Aegon was conceived, and Rhaegar was certain the bleeding star had to be a comet. What fools we were, who thought ourselves so wise! The error crept in from the translation. Dragons are neither male nor female, Barth saw the truth of that, but now one and now the other, as changeable as flame. The language misled us all for a thousand years. Daenerys is the one, born amidst salt and smoke. The dragons prove it.” (AFFC Samwell IV)

The whole point of the scene in A Game of Thrones where Daenerys hatches the dragons is that she makes the magic up as she goes along; she is someone who really might do anything. — GRRM

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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Daenerys

"The sword is wrong, she has to know that . . . light without heat . . . an empty glamor . . . the sword is wrong, and the false light can only lead us deeper into darkness, Sam. Daenerys is our hope. Tell them that, at the Citadel. Make them listen. They must send her a maester. Daenerys must be counseled, taught, protected."

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fictionallisa · 2 years

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MAIN CLUES THAT POINT TO DAENERYS TARGARYEN AS AZOR AHAI/PRINCE THAT WAS PROMISED

GRRM: Fire is love, fire is passion, fire is sexual ardor and all of these things. Ice is betrayal, ice is revenge, ice is… you know, that kind of cold inhumanity and all that stuff is being played out in the books.

GRRM: Well, of course, the two outlying ones — the things going on north of the Wall, and Daenerys Targaryen on the other continent with her dragons — are of course the ice and fire. of the title, “A Song of Ice and Fire.”

Viserys I on House of the Dragon [note that Aegon I’s prophecy came from GRRM himself]: Aegon saw absolute darkness riding on those winds, and whatever dwells within will destroy the world of the living. When this great winter comes, Rhaenyra, all of Westeros must stand against it. And if the world of men is to survive, a Targaryen must be seated on the Iron Throne. A king or queen strong enough to unite the realm against the cold and the dark. Aegon called his dream ‘The Song of Ice and Fire.’

+ bonus:

In a Game of Thrones video about the religions of Westeros, GRRM confirmed that Azor Ahai and Prince that Was Promised are one and the same (and not two different prophecies about two different saviors) when he says that the prince that was promised will receive Lightbringer as a token from R'hllor. Hence why the gifset collects evidence showing that Dany is Azor Ahai and Prince That Was Promised.

D&D confirmed in Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Unofficial Untold Story of the Epic Series that show!Arya killing the Night King was an original, last minute decision made for the sake of shock value that 1) highlights how fickle they were (since they even considered to have a non-POV character like Sandor Clegane save the day) and 2) will have no bearing on the ASOIAF books. This is especially interesting considering 1) the fact that Jon killing Dany was also D&D’s idea, 2) the book foreshadowing for Dany being AA/PTWP, 3) GRRM having previously disproven a theory about Dany burning a place and suggesting that she’s not involved in the second dance of the dragons (which makes it unlikely that she will ever burn KL in the books) and 4) GRRM saying that he’s moving forward with his 1991 ending (which is noteworthy because Dany survives in his 1993 outline). All in all, every book related evidence suggests that Dany will continue to be written as a heroic figure in A Song of Ice and Fire.

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