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Came across this. You might like:

Fantasy also fulfills more nefarious desires. Many novels use backward settings as an excuse for backward attitudes toward women, minorities, and poor people, idealizing hierarchies stratified by class, gender, and race. Tolkien, for one, constructed a male-centric, lily-white universe in which race—whether hobbit, elf, orc, or dwarf—determines character, and the noble elves and the humble hobbits are stacked on a vertical class hierarchy. Tolkien lived at the dawn of the modern age, with two world wars, nihilism, and industrial innovation decimating the order of his universe. While his contemporaries, devout modernists like Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, and James Joyce, flicked a middle finger at the old literary traditions, Tolkien used The Lord of the Rings to return to a time of simplicity, civility, and moral absolutism.

These retroactive social structures have reverberated across the genre. The Wheel of Time, Robert Jordan’s fourteen-book series, essentializes men and women across a stark gender line: both sexes have separate functions, in society as well as in the balance of Jordan’s spoked universe. Women can channel saidar, described as a gentle river of strength, while men channel saidin, a raging, stormlike source of power. (Women also get spanked a lot.) Meanwhile, Joe Abercrombie, another bestselling high-fantasy author in the UK, writes about a murky medieval world in which a dark-skinned people called the Gurkish terrorize the white protagonists with zombie soldiers.

George R.R. Martin may be the worst offender, crystallizing all of these problematic structures in his Song of Ice and Fire books, where women are either manipulative shrews or subjugated whores. The exception is the princess Daenerys Targaryen, who is nonetheless powerless without her husband (who rapes her) and her pet dragons (who protect her). Furthermore, Martin’s tales draw on colonial racial stereotypes, via a barbaric, swarthy race called the Dothraki, who eat raw horse hearts, rape women with abandon, and provide a scathing contrast to the cool, calculating white Machiavellians grappling for the crown.

History allows fantasy writers to access values and traditions from the past, albeit a past in which dragons and elves are a common sight. And at a time when white men are losing power—to women, minorities, immigrants, and even machines—an alternate reality in which they still reign supreme can be an appealing fantasy indeed.

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I agree with the article’s assessment of GRRM’s portrait of women in his books. But to be fair, he’s not exactly flattering to the men in this books either.

Westeros is essentially a stylized Europe. Not exactly surprising that the primary characters are white. To say that the “whites” are portrayed as somehow superior to the other races is just silly. The majority of the brutality, betrayals, war crimes, rapes, etc… are done by white men in the books and are held of as a show of how bad the characters are. There is no glorification of the actions nor is it used to show how powerful and right the perpetrators are. If anything, Westeros itself is spelled out as one of the less civilized and advanced kingdoms, compared to places like Ashai’i and Qarth.

As far as the Dothraki are concerned, I get the impression that they are meant to evoke the image of the Mongol Horde. Genghis Khans’ treatment of conquered cities is quite well documented. The war on Samarkand in particular can be held up as the inspiration for how GRRM paint the Dothraki; conquered men executed, women and children given to soldiers as slaves, entire cities burned to the ground. Now, there can be some assumption that a lot of those stories are embellished both by the conquered and by the Mongols. Spreading stories of how brutal you treat cities that resist you and how merciful you are to those who pay tribute goes a long way.

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I disagree. The pin replaces the necklace, but I bet it’s still the method of her demise:

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Man, I made the mistake of actually reading that article and I’m fairly sure I’m dumber now than when I started, and that’s saying something. Here’s my favorite line:

Yeah. You really shouldn’t be able to label your setting “fantasy” if it has, you know, dirt and stuff. 'Cause we have that here too.

So… Arya, Cat, Brienne, Margery, Olenna, Asha, Usha, Ygritte, Meera, and the sand snakes. I’m fairly sure that none of them fall into the “subjugated whores” category. Are they “manipulative shrews”? My capacity to pick out shrews has always been weak, I fear. Shrewdar, they call it.

This lady thinks that Dany is powerless without her husband or dragons? Way to miss the point.

The Dothraki are rapists while the Westerosi are refined gentlemen? I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she didn’t make it to book two.

Sorry, had to vent. Reading crap like that makes my teeth itch.

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It was a throwaway line, but I found the bit about Eliot and Pound amusing. I’m not sure Ms. Landau has actually read either of them. If their style was radical, their ideas were not.

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Yeah, Pound especially quite obviously drew from the Middle Ages, but subverted the form.

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Every fantasy book starts out with some character saying, “Forsooth, none believe these so-called prophesies but old wives and moonkin. 'Tis but moonshine and piffle!”

And in every fantasy book, the prophesies come true. Every time.

Martin is no exception to this rule. If a random old dwarf woman shows up in a chapter babbling about some dream she had where a princess slays a giant in a castle made of snow, you can damn well bet the bank a princess will slay a giant in a castle made of snow. (And sure enough it did happen, though maybe not in the way people were expecting.)

What Martin is a genius at is misdirection - convincing people he is in no way doing exactly the thing he is in fact doing. There are still people who will still swear up and down that ASOIAF is a low-fantasy novel even though it’s crammed full of armies of the undead, dragons, spells, shapechanging, and dead characters coming back to life. And it’s all because he does a masterful job of saying, “Nothing up my sleeve!” every once in a while.

(Mind you, just because the prophesies are all going to come true, that doesn’t mean they will come true in the way you expect.)

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Jesus wept. And to think someone actually got into student debt to learn to write shite-by-numbers like this.

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Going by the trend in past episodes, I’m assuming Shae will get it through the back of the head, with the pin exploding out of her face in a shower of blood & gore.

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While Tyrion rapes her.

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Couldn’t agree more. The book does have some poor portrayals of women, but it also has some poor portrayals of men too.

I was just about to rattle off that list.

But, this flows further into the nature of criticism and art conversation. Art criticism is hard. GRRM isn’t trying to make a broad statement about women in his books. He is writing his fantasy world, which is governed by the fantastical world views of the characters. This is a common misconception about artists and their art, that somehow their artistic and stylistic choices are in some way reflected upon them. I don’t know if GRRM was writing with a satirical edge (a lambasting of male-centric monarchies and male culture) but somehow I think that more often his sex and violence are devices used to pull the reader out of their conceptions of what society is. They build up the stakes in your mind, and since westeros is so vastly different than earth, it makes sense for him to do so. When a character is murdered or raped in a horrendous way, you don’t go “How crazy is that? This is insane!” because you are accustomed to the rules of that world. Women are not treated well, and are second class citizens. When poor Sansa is taken away. You fear for her. You know what this world is capable of. GRRM has written it that way.

I think that it is terribly difficult to criticize any form of artistic expression. It is difficult and probably unwise to criticize the motivations for artistic choices. Motivations and meaning between the lines is the whole point of art. Questioning it makes you sound like you have a superior mind than the artist. The whole “I could have done it better” argument. The proper way to criticize art (and particularly writing) is to question consistency of character motivations, stylistic wordplay, and overall general flow of the prose. I may not agree with what character X is doing, but that isn’t my choice to make. But, if I think it is inconsistent and poorly explained that character X chose to do something, I can comment on that.

I haven’t read that article, but I have heard that argument before, and that assumption is from someone who hasn’t read the books. I only say that because I kinda felt the same way after reading that first book, but upon continuing the story I changed my views. The female characters are probably the most powerful in the entire books, in a world run by men. If you really do take the time to read the books, (and not just skim them, or watch the show) you realize how deep these characters are. Not only do they kick ass, fight for themselves, but they are burdened by being women in a horrible society that treats them as second class citizens.

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Sometimes criticism isn’t about the text, but uses the text as a scaffolding for other ideas. That can work well, but this particular essay demonstrates no real familiarity with ASOIAF from the author. I’m intrigued by the idea that white guys would be attracted to moments in history which favored them (even more than today), but the writer didn’t use the text in the right way to prove it. Which is too bad, because it’s a worthwhile thought. What is the appeal of medievalism? My bet is that people like the texture of these contexts – swords, war, cloak & dagger, magic – and don’t care at all about the underlying attitudes. Then again, there’s so much gross fantasy (and sci-fi, which is interesting) writing.

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That would certainly work as a murder weapon. I’m not entirely convinced, however, that Shae will be murdered by Tyrion. She just doesn’t seem that interested in money (having rejected a fat purse offered by Varys to go away) that I believe she would hook up with Tywin willingly.

My take on how it will play out is more along this line: Tywin has gotten hold of her, but has coerced her into giving testimony against Tyrion and Sansa. Afterwards he keeps his word and does what he repeatedly has threatened to do: Hang the next whore of Tyrion’s that he finds. This will be what later triggers Tyrions vengeance.

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That would be a pretty major departure from the books, but it’s not like they haven’t done that before.

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I think the show did a good job of showing Tyrion basically writing off his dad and Shae for good tonight and I expect it to play out like the books, in that he kills them both. I wonder if they will have Tywin fucking Shae though.

The Theon/Reek scenes continue to be painful for me to watch. I am close to fast forwarding them.

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I LOL’d when the credits showed Braavos as a giant piggy bank.

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That was a fun episode.

Pretty cool that we got to see Bravos and the Iron Bank. I really liked the top-down opening shot of Stannis’ ship, though the Titan of Bravos looked very CGI to me. Davos’ soliloquy to the bankers was pretty good… even if I’m not sure that I would have been swayed by the whole “he cuts off his friends’ fingers, so you know he’s good for the money!” approach.

Maybe it’s Book 4 PTSD, but whenever Dany shows up on the screen in Meereen, I have to stifle a yawn. That said, the dragon goat-be-que scene was pretty well-rendered, and I think the throne room scene will nicely set up later scenes where Dany is endlessly confronted by (possibly fake) burnt goat bones and then the bones of… well, you know. It also looks like they are taking a different route to showing the difficulties of ruling Slaver’s Bay than GRRM did in the books – I like the moral repercussion aspect of her emotionally-driven crucifixion action last week.

In the past I haven’t liked the Theon/Ramsey stuff too much – it has always struck me a half torture pron and half a way of keeping an actor on the screen for very little payoff. This week however, we got some of that payoff as Theon/Reek is shown to be so completely broken that he’ll actually bite the hand that’s feeding him. Feeding him freedom, that is.

I have to say that showing all the scars on Theon’s body in the bath scene was pretty dramatic. I’m just glad that the show-runners decided not to pan down; Ramsey’s petty little smile and downward glance was much more effective.

As an aside and related to the conversation on the previous page, as we were shown Asha’s assault force infiltrating the walls my wife made the comment: “You know what I really like about this show? All the different ways they portray women, both strong and weak.” I’ll have to forward her the stupid article.

Finally, the meat of the episode: the King’s Landing stuff. The Small Council meeting was fine in that it at least shows that Tywin is concerned about Dany and her growing power. We also got a throwaway line about Jorah Mormont being devoted to Dany… I wonder if that will be the extent of that arc? Wasn’t he cast out of Dany’s service by this point in the books? I also wonder if Mace Tyrell will get any redemption in the future – he’s just such an obvious buffoon here.

I really loved the trial scenes. Really great stuff. I liked the rows of bleachers, I liked how Tywin was so wonderfully comfortable in the Iron Throne, and I liked all the not-so-subtle indignities that were heaped on Tyrion like the chains. Dinklage really did a good job of of showing a resigned disappointment as all of his actions and words were twisted back on him; lots of excellent emotions shown (mostly) without words.

I especially liked the scene with Tywin and Jamie. Charles Dance really inhabits this role well, from his arrogant poise to the smarmy way he’s always a move ahead of everyone else. Jamie’s shock when Tywin immediately agrees to his plan to save Tyrion was excellent - especially the look Tywin gives his wayward son afterward: of course you’re resigning and going back to Casterly Rock, try to keep up.

And of course the final scene was great, almost entirely due to Dinklage. Emmy bait at its best. His heart breaking at seeing Shae; his quiet plea for her to stop throwing their pillow talk out as a twisted mockery of itself; and of course his fevered, snarling rant at the end.

When the credits started to roll, my wife cried out, “God, I love this season!” I have to agree, it’s great stuff.

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Great, great episode. A couple of middling efforts over the past two weeks and then back to form with an absolute rocket in an episode I wanted called “Davos goes to Bravos”, but could also have been titled “Peter Dinklage wins another Emmy.”

Also, British fans of the show of a certain age will be delighted to see you know who in Bravos. “This is a local bank, for local people. We’ll have no trouble here!”

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And maybe also non-British fans of the show of many ages because Sherlock.

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Yeah, episode was very good, glad to see that the show can deliver when it moves to plot points from the books. This is why they need to stick to the books more. The stuff from the books (at least book 3) are the best.

Though, I didn’t mind the Ashyara stuff too much this episode, as they can’t really do the reek reveal from the books, so changing this to add more tension is good. Though, if they really want more Ashyara, they have the whole Kingsmoot storyline, with Euron. They could do that. Maybe next season. I hope so, because that actress is awesome. (Though according to that article she is either a whore or a shrew, I can’t figure which).

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Of course I loved the Tyrion trial scene. Good stuff from Dinklage.

Tywin deftly snapping Jaime in his strategy was awesome. The look on Jaime’s face when he realized how easily he’d been maneuvered into leaving the guards and forsaking yet another vow was great.

Varys and Oberyn was terrific. With Petyr gone to the Aerie, we’ve had a distressing lack of the Varys banter. It was nice to get some verbal sparring.

Unfortunately, Yara/Asha raid on Ramsay’s keep was dumb as fuck. Instead of letting the shirtless guy unlock the dog cages, why not throw an axe at him or something?