Game of Thrones and Philosophy (19 page)

Within Sansa’s songs, all knights are gallant, maids are always beautiful, the season is always summer, and honor always rules. Chivalry is unproblematic because no one is unhappy with their role. There are no Aryas or Briennes or Daeneryses in the songs; there are only Sansas—women who want nothing more than to be the ideal lady.

But life is not a song, and thinking this way does not help women flourish. Even Sansa realizes this eventually. After she suffers a severe beating from the Kingsguard at her King’s command, a kind maester patches her up and tries to comfort her. Before, Sansa would have taken these gentle words to heart, as when her Septa told her, “A lady’s armor is courtesy.”
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At this point, though, Sansa disregards this coddling as worthless prattle in the face of real injustice. She realizes how vulnerable she is when there are no “true knights” to protect her. When the maester tells her, “Sleep a bit, child. When you wake, all this will seem a bad dream,” she thinks to herself before passing out, “No it won’t, you stupid man.”
14
Sansa has come full circle from thinking that chivalry dictates the proper role each person should play. Now she concludes of the men around her, “They are no true knights . . . not one of them.”
15

The Death of Modern Chivalry: Good Riddance

“I like dogs better than knights. . . . A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. And he’ll look you straight in the face.”

—The Hound
16

Homosexual love is another thorn in chivalry’s side. Martin approaches this topic mostly through Renly and Loras, who are knights and lovers. Overall, though, not much commentary is made on homosexuality throughout the series, and that is precisely the point. The people of Westeros often forget that homosexuality exists, and when they are reminded, they often remark that it is strange, or abnormal, or very rare. The chivalric love stories are always about knights and ladies. Knights and ladies play specific romantic roles; the knight who wins a tourney places a laurel on the lap of the woman he crowns the Queen of Beauty. Loras crowned Sansa, who swooned at the romantic gesture, but in the TV series, we see Loras has eyes only for Renly. Loras could not, however, crown Renly King of anything in the tourney because a knight is supposed to woo a lady, as Florian wooed Jonquil. It is known.

Medieval chivalry was homophobic, sexist, classist, ableist,
17
and probably racist, too. This is one reason why chivalry, as it has been historically construed, is not a just ethical code. The chivalry of Westeros also adopts many of these problematic ideologies from its culture at large. One might think, however, that “modern-day chivalry” is able to avoid these oppressive pitfalls and be an honorable code of ethics.

Modern-day chivalry promotes rigid expressions of sexuality as well, though. Chivalry dictates gender roles, and heterosexuality is woven throughout the chivalric interpretation of gender. Even if someone claims that being nice to other people or defending those who can’t defend themselves is a chivalrous ideal, we should recognize that the ideal comes at a price. Modern-day chivalry is invoked primarily as an ethics for how people romantically attracted to each other should interact. How people should act depends on their gender, however. Additionally, chivalry specifies rules only for interacting with someone of the opposite gender. For instance, if two women were out on a date, chivalry couldn’t dictate who should pay for the meal, or whether one should hold a door open for the other. Likewise, if two men were in a relationship, chivalry would be unable to explain how the two men should support each other. Modern chivalry presents itself as a universal code of ethics, but really, it offers guidance only for heterosexual men and women.

Simone de Beauvoir argued that modern chivalry wove itself into the heterosexual narrative of romance that many French girls in the 1940s imagined for themselves. In this narrative, men played a specific, chivalrous role: “He [a man] is the liberator; he is also rich and powerful, he holds the keys to happiness, he is Prince Charming. She [the girl] anticipates that in his caress she will feel carried away by the great current of life.”
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Girls imagine a specific role for themselves: waiting for Prince Charming to carry them away. Girls who dream of a “Princess Charming” find these dreams and desires ignored and unacknowledged.

Clearly, George R. R. Martin understands that people are not always satisfied with the roles their society encourages or dictates. Arya claims that she will not grow up to be a lady, and Brienne was so dissatisfied with her role as a highborn lady that she asserted that no one could marry her until they bested her in combat. (No one ever did.) Likewise, Daenerys proclaimed herself Khaleesi and Queen even though neither Westeros nor the Dothraki were accustomed to having women leaders. Each of these women had to struggle against social norms in order to live the kinds of lives they wanted for themselves.

This is not to argue that societies shouldn’t be in the business of helping people understand and choose different social roles. The argument against chivalry isn’t an argument for social anarchy. The Southron religion in Westeros, for instance, worships the Seven: the Father, the Mother, the Smith, the Warrior, the Maiden, the Crone, and the Stranger. Focusing on these as seven societal roles/positions is not necessarily unjust or oppressive, since the roles are distinct but not mutually exclusive. A person can be a father and a smith. A single woman could be maiden, mother, and crone in her life. Therefore, it’s possible for Catelyn to see the image of her maiden daughter Arya in the warrior. When she does, Catelyn muses on a piece of theology: “Each of the Seven embodies all of the Seven. . . . There was as much beauty in the Crone as in the Maiden, and the Mother could be fiercer than the Warrior.”
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Societal roles can help us form identities, build communities, and understand our strengths and weaknesses. Societal roles are not oppressive unless groups of people are categorically denied access to roles of value (like being a warrior, valiant and honorable). Bran’s case is a little more complicated; he is crippled and so cannot fulfill his dream of being part of the Kingsguard. This fact in itself isn’t oppressive; the oppression comes when Bran thinks he will not be able to fulfill any valuable role in life. His father’s bannermen encourage this thought by whispering that it would be more honorable for Bran to kill himself. It is not until Jojen comes along that Bran realizes being a knight is not the only way to be a hero—cripple and hero are not mutually exclusive categories.

Recognizing that people do not function in only one social role their whole lives can help us understand the extent to which our societies encourage us to take on different roles, to explore and change our social identities. Chivalry missteps when it presumes to know which roles are best for us based on our gender and based on its presumption of our sexual orientation. In this way, chivalry is akin to a well-meaning but too-restrictive parent. It needs to let its children grow up and find their own way in the world.

Women, Not Wards: What Has Humanity Made of the Human Female?

Beauvoir argues that even if there are biological differences between men and women, it is cultures and societies that put certain values and meanings on those differences. Gender has primarily a cultural meaning (not a biological one), and so if we want to see why Beauvoir thinks that “one is not born, but rather, becomes a woman,”
20
then we must ask ourselves “what humanity has made of the human female.”
21

Chivalry has made the human female into a Lady. Well, historically, it made certain women into ladies (specifically, highborn European women). Even if we try to strip chivalry of its classist and ethnocentric trappings, it still clings to its sexist framework. The chivalric lady is a kind of ward and not an autonomous human adult. This is not to say that it’s unjust to have anyone ever be a ward under someone else’s protection; many people consider their children to be their wards. However, children eventually outgrow their roles as wards. The problem is having someone as a ward permanently when they are able to function as an autonomous person.

Feminist philosophy, therefore, sees chivalry as oppressing women by formulating a specific role that not all women want for themselves, and, further, by devaluing the role that women are supposed to play. Of course, some women fit naturally with the ideal of what being a “lady” entails, but many don’t. By propping up the lady as the best and most proper image of a woman, chivalry silences many other forms of womanhood, demanding that all “proper” women look and act a certain way. Under chivalry, a lady can be seen as honorable, but never quite as honorable as a knight, since a knight can help others besides himself. The ward is never as valuable as the sword that protects him or her, or as the man who wields the sword. Men are also limited by chivalry; being a “knight (in shining armor)” or a “prince (charming)” may offer a bit more breathing room to express one’s personality, but not if a man wants to do anything ladylike, such as singing, dancing, or—heaven forbid—sewing.

Some might object that thinking of chivalry along gender roles is too simplistic. Even in Westeros there are myriad subcultures in which gender roles are tweaked and changed. For instance, in Dorne, it is not out of the ordinary for a woman to have martial training. The Dornish were descended from the Rhoynar and their warrior-queen Nymeria, after all. However, this means that other regions of Westeros categorize women from Dorne based on their ethnicity. Dornish women are known for being not quite like “regular” women of Westeros. For instance, when Tyrion is asked about the strangest thing he’s ever eaten, he asks if a Dornish girl counts. Ethnic exceptions exist for gender roles, but in being exceptions, they leave the rule untouched.

In the end, power dynamics can be hidden in how we conceive of ourselves as men, women, citizens, adults, children, and nations. As a result, we can imprison people when we believe we are actually helping them. Instead, we should examine the cultural connotations of what being a knight or a lady means, and try to understand that if we are seeking a just ethical code, chivalry is not a good choice. If a knight is a follower of chivalry who upholds justice and promotes human flourishing, then “there are no true knights.”

NOTES

1
. George R. R. Martin,
A Dance with Dragons
(New York: Bantam Books, 2011), p. 878.

2
. George R. R. Martin,
A Storm of Swords
(New York: Bantam Dell, 2005), p. 339.

3
. George R. R. Martin, “The Hedge Knight,” in
Legends
, ed. Robert Silverberg (London: Voyager, 1998), p. 518.

4
. George R. R. Martin,
A Clash of Kings
(New York: Bantam Dell, 2005), p. 757.

5
. “Women’s History: Gloria Steinem Quotes,”
About.com
, accessed June 2011,
womenshistory.about.com/cs/quotes/a/qu_g_steinem.htm
.

6
. George R. R. Martin,
A Game of Thrones
(New York: Bantam Dell, 2005), p. 473.

7
. Ibid.

8
. Martin,
A Clash of Kings
, p. 47.

9
. Gayatri Spivak, “Righting Wrongs,”
South Atlantic Quarterly
103 (2004), p. 542.

10
. Simone de Beauvoir,
The Second Sex
(New York: Alfred K. Knopf, 2009), p. 12.

11
. Martin,
A Game of Thrones
, p. 220.

12
. Martin,
A Clash of Kings
, p. 132.

13
. Ibid., p. 50.

14
. Ibid., p. 490. In a small way, a lady’s courtesy can be her armor; Sansa’s composure and politeness do save her from beatings in a handful of circumstances; however, it’s not foolproof armor. As polite as Sansa is, Joffrey is sometimes just in a foul mood and so she amasses a collection of bruises from Ser Meryn and Ser Boros (since it is not kingly for a king to hit his lady . . . himself).

15
. Ibid., p. 490.

16
. Ibid., p. 288.

17
. “Ableist” refers to manifestations of a discriminatory attitude toward people who are not considered able-bodied, that is, people with disabilities. When the bannermen in Winterfell whisper that Bran would have more honor if he killed himself rather than living as a cripple—that’s ableist.

18
. Beauvoir,
Second Sex
, p. 341.

19
. Martin,
A Clash of Kings
, p. 497.

20
. Beauvoir,
Second Sex
, p. 283.

21
. Ibid., p. 48.

PART FIVE

“STICK THEM WITH THE POINTY END”

Chapter 17

FATE, FREEDOM, AND AUTHENTICITY IN
A GAME OF THRONES

Michael J. Sigrist

“Never forget what you are, for surely the world will not. Make it your strength. Then it can never be your weakness.”
1

“Winter is coming.” For centuries these well-worn words may have expressed little more than the stern mind-set of the North, but they take on a prophetic and fatalistic force as the drama of
A Game of Thrones
unfolds.

Fatalism is the idea that the future has been set in advance and cannot be changed. “Winter is coming.” Nothing can be done to avoid this. The best one can do is to prepare. Let’s call this idea—that the future is already determined—“metaphysical fatalism.”
2
Metaphysical fatalism
is an ancient idea that endures to this day. Any notion that the future has already been written, that certain events are destined to happen, or that one’s future has been predetermined assumes the truth of metaphysical fatalism.

We can link that sense of fatalism to two other concepts—
freedom
and
authenticity
—in order to better understand the dramas and destinies that conspire in Westeros. Many philosophers believe that fatalism poses an insuperable challenge to human freedom. If the future is already written, then nothing can be done to change it; therefore human freedom is an illusion. This view implies its converse: if we
are
free, then it is fatalism that is the illusion. These two views vie uneasily throughout A Song of Ice and Fire. It seems that one can believe
only
in freedom
or
in fatalism, but that may be the real illusion. Perhaps you can believe in both.

The Freedom to Be or Not to Be

Take the story of Daenerys Targaryen, a tale that begins well before the first chapter of
A Game of Thrones
. Her father, the Mad King Aerys II, was slain by Jaime Lannister. Fleeing King’s Landing, her mother, Rhaella, gives birth to Dany and Viserys aboard a ship and then dies. Daenerys and her brother, born of the dragon blood and heirs to the House Targaryen, spend their childhood as paupers on the streets of Braavos, only to end up as wards of the mysterious Illyrio Mopatis. When we first meet Dany, she is a shy young girl, only vaguely aware of the intrigues in which she herself unwittingly plays a central role. If fate is at work at this point in Dany’s life, it seems to come at the cost of her own freedom and self-
determination. Her youth, her gender, and the machinations of her brother and Illyrio are forces shaping her life in ways she can scarcely recognize, let alone control. Her fate appears to be out of her hands.

Readers will know that the Dany who emerges from the fires of Khal Drogo’s funeral pyre—and the Dany who unleashes herself on the East in the later books—is anything but the shy, meek girl we meet at the start. This later Daenerys owns the stage like perhaps no other character in the series—a woman in full control of her actions, upending the world, waging war, trampling on convention, responsible only to herself. And yet, her resolve and fortitude are made possible by her sense of fatalism, not despite it. It is only when she is certain that fate is somehow in control that she feels truly free.

The coincidence of fate and freedom is not solely a privilege of Dragon princesses. Most of us intuitively understand that fate and freedom are not really as opposed as may first appear. Many of us struggle to find a meaning or purpose that has been, as it were, decided for us, and we believe that discovering this purpose will prove profoundly liberating. But should we take this as anything more than an inspiring sentiment? Could it really be that a purpose one has not chosen is the key to one’s freedom? Consider again the case of Dany: perhaps her belief in her own fate is mistaken, though it provides the resolve she needs in order to succeed in her freely chosen mission. Or conversely, perhaps her sense of autonomy is the illusion needed in order for her to fulfill her destiny.

The French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980) believed that human beings, and human beings alone, were utterly free of fate. He coined a pithy slogan to explain this idea: “Existence precedes essence.”
3
Everything besides humans, according to Sartre, has an essence or nature. An essence is that which makes a thing the kind of thing that it is. For example, while there are vastly many different kinds of trees, there is something that is true of each one by virtue of which it is a tree. This essence need not be some ethereal property “treeness” that is there in addition to bark, leaves, root systems, or cell structure. A thing’s essence might just be a set of necessary and sufficient properties. Sometimes a thing’s essence—this is especially true of artifacts and tools—is just the use or purpose for which it is made, as the essence of a hammer is to drive nails, and of a watch to tell time.

Philosophers from ancient to modern times have tried to discover the human essence, in the hope that this would reveal the meaning of human life. For example, the Greek philosopher Plato (424–348 BCE) believed that the human essence is reason, and therefore that the best life for a human is a rational life devoted to wisdom. By contrast, another Greek philosopher, Epicurus (341–270 BCE), believed that humans, like all animals, are essentially pleasure-seeking beings, and he argued that therefore the best human life is one dedicated to achieving an optimal amount of pleasure.
4

Westeros is a world where a person’s purpose or essence is determined by the categories of class, status, and tradition. Robb’s purpose in life is to succeed Ned as the head of House Stark. Robb can either live up to this purpose or fail; it is not something that he can choose for himself. Similarly, a woman cannot rule a kingdom in Westeros, which is why Lady Lysa may only rule in regency for her son, Lord Robert, just as Cersei may wield power only in regency for Joffrey. Cersei, of course, laments this fact, and Arya Stark consciously struggles to overcome it, but nearly every character takes gender to be an essential fact. (Brienne is the exception that proves the rule.) More generally,
what
one is determines
who
one is. Station is not something one can rise above, nor sink below. Jon is a bastard, and no matter what he achieves, he will never be heir to Winterfell.
5

Sartre tried hard to dispel this kind of essentialism. He believed that humans were very different from anything that has an essence. Sartre’s pithy slogan notwithstanding, it is not so much that human existence precedes essence as that human existence
precludes
essence. Sartre argued that if anything defines human beings, it is our unconditioned and absolute freedom to choose to be the kind of beings that we are.
6
And since we are free to be anything, then we are in fact nothing, which is just another way of saying that human beings have no essence.
7
No person is
essentially
a man or woman, lord or liege, just as no person is essentially a rational being or a pleasure-seeking being.

How does Sartre know this? He believes that absolute freedom reveals itself through reflection and in certain moods. Before any action, one can always pause and reflect upon
why
one is about to act. What does one find in these moments of reflection? We discover motivations, desires, attitudes, and goals,
none of which can force us to act
. To act, you must choose, and this choice itself has no ground or cause other than the fact that you make it. The individual is always responsible for each and every choice. Cersei, for example, may try to excuse her actions on grounds of necessity: she
must
arrest and silence Ned because what he knows will bring ruin to the House of Lannister and Joffrey’s Kingship. She might think that her own desires or preferences have nothing to do with this. But of course this is wrong. She
does
have the choice; in fact, she has chosen.

We are also aware of our freedom through certain moods, the most important of which is anguish (
Angst
, as it is sometimes referred to in the original German). Think of Eddard as he faces the choice to become Robert’s Hand. He surely knows the likely consequences. He knows well the fate the Hand has held for those before him, and is likely to hold, not only for himself, but also for the entire House Stark. We may never be asked to serve as the King’s Hand, but each of us has experienced moments of decision where we know that our choice, whatever it is, will lock in one future while foreclosing others. To feel that one’s entire life is at stake in the moment is anguish, which Sartre, following the German philosopher Martin Heidegger (more on him later!), interprets as a fear not in the face of some threat coming from the world, but the fear that accompanies the knowledge that one must decide one’s entire life.

Ned must decide whether his primary loyalty is to the realm or to his family. Later, when Cersei demands his confession of treason, he faces an even starker choice: is it my family, or my honor, for which I live? Facing these choices in full awareness that in so choosing, you are choosing a life (will I be a traitor to my country, or to my family?) is what Sartre, again following Heidegger, calls “authenticity.”

Anguish, Sartre says, rips us from our everyday existence—our being as father, friend, worker, and so on—and forces us to decide for that existence as a whole. We can do so authentically or inauthentically. If we are inauthentic, we push the enormity of such moments off onto forces we claim to be unable to control—such as fate! Sansa, as she stands before King Robert and is forced to choose between her fiancé and her family, chooses, as we know, the former. Surely Sansa is one of the most frustrating—and therefore most artfully drawn—characters in
A Game of Thrones
. Despite the manifest evidence, Sansa refuses to believe that Joffrey is anything other than a chivalrous prince, or that the Lannisters are anything but regal and upstanding wards. Sansa’s inauthenticity shows itself in “bad faith,” as Sartre calls it, by refusing to take ownership of herself and her situation.
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To Sansa’s mind, it is as if she has no choice but to lie about Joffrey’s attack against Mycah, as this is what loyalty as a fiancée requires.

Authenticity thus defined is the very opposite of fatalism. To accept fate is to relinquish one’s freedom. Daenerys, if this theory is correct, may believe that fate is guiding her actions, but in reality it is only her choices and her freedom that drive her. If she does not recognize this, she is, in Sartre’s view, inauthentic.

Que Sera, Sera (What Will Be, Will Be)

Fate is often associated with justice. If not in this life, then in the next, the good shall be rewarded and the evil punished. Fate and justice do not seem to align in this familiar way in Martin’s books. Some argue that this is what makes Martin’s books unique, bestowing a sense of realism on a series otherwise firmly within the fantasy genre. If fate is operating in A Song of Ice and Fire, it does not seem to be a force for justice, but rather something cold and pitiless, sometimes allowing good characters to needlessly die while bad characters succeed.

What sort of fate, then, might be operating in Westeros, if not the fate of cosmic justice? Metaphysical fatalism says nothing about the moral order of the universe. It says only that the future has already been determined. The Macedonian philosopher Aristotle (384–322 BCE) worried that the truth of metaphysical fatalism would nullify human freedom. In a treatise on the logical form of language, Aristotle considers the following argument in support of fatalism: Suppose that someone were to say, “There will be a sea battle tomorrow,” and someone else were to assert the opposite, “There will not be a sea battle tomorrow.”
9
Since the second statement is only the negation of the first, one of these statements must be correct. Why is that? Aristotle was the first systematic logician and had elsewhere established that every proposition must be either true or false. For very many propositions, of course, we may never know which is the case. “There are exactly seventeen extraterrestrial civilizations,” “Caesar ate three eggs one morning in 45 BCE,” “Every even integer greater than two can be expressed as the sum of two primes”—we may never know, for any one of these propositions, whether it is true or false. All the same, Aristotle reasoned, surely each proposition has to be one or the other, true or false. He called this principle “the principle of bivalence.” A commitment to bivalence left him in a bind when it came to propositions about the future. If “There will be a sea battle tomorrow” is true, then it must be the fact that there is a sea battle tomorrow that makes it true. Hence we can infer that if the statement is true, the fact it describes
must
be the case, for otherwise the statement would not be true. But to say that something in the future
must
be the case is to endorse fatalism. If it’s true that there will be a sea battle tomorrow, then
necessarily
there will be a sea battle tomorrow, and nothing can be done to change that fact.

Aristotle worried that if this argument were sound, human freedom would mean nothing; it would mean that we are powerless to affect the future. The truth of fatalism thus would mean that we neither have control over our lives nor possess individual responsibility. To avoid this conclusion, Aristotle decreed that for this one class of propositions (propositions about the future), the law of bivalence should be suspended. Thus, if you say to someone, “Tomorrow it will rain,” that statement, according to Aristotle, is neither true nor false. Some may take comfort in the fact that this means that one could never be wrong with a claim about the future, but of course it equally follows that one could never be right.

The Roman orator and politician Cicero (106–43 BCE) spelled out more explicitly the threat that metaphysical fatalism seems to pose to human agency. It is called the “Idle Argument,” for it concludes that if fatalism is true, then there is no reason to do anything. Take the following example: