Parental Combo Platter: RAD+ALJ=Makes More Sense
Aug 29, 2016 20:54:14 GMT
voice, SlyWren, and 3 more like this
Post by markg171 on Aug 29, 2016 20:54:14 GMT
Honestly for me, the truth of the matter is right there in Arthur's duel with the Smiling Knight. Arthur toyed with him. It's just hidden under the veneer that Jaime himself remembers the duel as something fantastic and incredible.
Jaime, a 15 year old, had already fought the SK to a draw
And he’d held his own against the Smiling Knight, though it was Ser Arthur who slew him.
Barristan had already beat the Smiling Knight
Rescued Lady Jeyne Swann and her septa from the Kingswood Brotherhood, defeating Simon Toyne and the Smiling Knight, and slaying the former.
The fact that Barristan had already beaten the Smiling Knight and Simon Toyne is actually one of the more damning pieces of evidence. We know from GRRM himself that Arthur with Dawn is a better fighter than Barristan. If Barristan can beat the SK, which he did, then Arthur can too. He'd already know basically for sure when he duels SK that he can win, because someone he's better than already has defeated him. And again, a 15 year old managed to fight him off.
Plus, look who else Barristan fought: Simon Toyne. Toyne, not the Smiling Knight, was the leader of the Brotherhood. If Barristan had already defeated the SK, and then went on to go kill Toyne as well, then when Arthur kills the SK, he kills him after the Brotherhood has already been defeated. Arthur killing SK is done after Barristan's already ended the Brotherhood. There is zero point besides arrogance to engage in a single combat duel after the Brotherhood has already been routed by your forces, and you happen to already know you're better than the guy you'll be fighting.
Then it's a fact that Arthur had already landed dozens of blows that got past the SK's defences
the robber knight told him as they resumed, though he was bleeding from a dozen wounds by then.
A knight in armour is nigh impenetrable. You have to hit parts of the knight's body where he's vulnerable because otherwise your sword will simply bounce of the plate. Armour is incredibly good at stopping swords. If Arthur has already landed a dozen blows on the SK that hit all the weak points in the SK's armour, otherwise he couldn't be wounded, then he's already hit the SK at least 12 times in places where he should've been able to end the duel as he'd gotten past the SK's sword, possibly shield, and armour. He had the man dead 12 times already and didn't finish him off.
Think back on all the other duels in the series. No one ever takes a dozen wounds. They take like 3 max and then they're dead. Arthur, supposedly the finest swordsman who ever lived, is the guy who lands the most inconsequential blows we've ever seen, against a guy we know he's better than. That makes zero sense unless he's not trying.
Then Arthur immediately kills the SK as soon as the duel resumes
“It’s that white sword of yours I want,” the robber knight told him as they resumed, though he was bleeding from a dozen wounds by then. “Then you shall have it, ser,” the Sword of the Morning replied, and made an end of it.
Arthur literally says he's going to kill the SK... and then he does. If he'd been trying the whole time, how did he land 12 blows beforehand and not kill the SK, and then immediately kill him after he literally says he's going to kill him? Because he wasn't trying until then. And then he immediately dispatches him exactly as we know he could've based on the fact that Barristan, someone Arthur's better than, had already bested him.
Arthur wasn't trying. He could've won whenever he wanted to. And he did.
Plus, Jaime ends the whole thing by immediately saying that the men back then were made of finer steel, or maybe that he was just 15 at the time and thought so.
The world was simpler in those days, Jaime thought, and men as well as swords were made of finer steel. Or was it only that he had been fifteen?
Martin is immediately placing it right in the forefront of our minds that Jaime is looking back on the past with very rose tinted glasses. Which I mean he undoubtedly is. Take a look at the list of men he says who were supposedly made of finer steel
They were all in their graves now, the Sword of the Morning and the Smiling Knight, the White Bull and Prince Lewyn, Ser Oswell Whent with his black humor, earnest Jon Darry, Simon Toyne and his Kingswood Brotherhood, bluff old Sumner Crakehall.
All these men of finer steel died. That should tell us right there that they weren't as good as Jaime remembers, that he just happened to be 15 and idolized them to be greater than they were. Again, Martin shows us this exact thing when Jaime tries to tell Gatehouse Ami about the Smiling Knight
We all do. "When I was a squire I told myself I'd be the man to slay the Smiling Knight."
"The Smiling Knight?" She sounded lost. "Who was that?"
"The Smiling Knight?" She sounded lost. "Who was that?"
In case you don't remember, Gatehouse Ami is the daughter of Merrett Frey. A GUY WHO FRIGGEN FOUGHT THE BROTHERHOOD WITH JAIME. The daughter of a man who rode against the Brotherhood with Jaime doesn't even know who the Smiling Knight is. Granted Merrett spent most of the campaign in shame unlike Jaime, but still. Jaime talks a big game about the Smiling Knight, but people from the next generation don't even know who he is. He was not some big timeless baddie, he was just a local minor outlaw. Jaime calls the SK the Mountain of his youth, but that's an incredible stretch as Gregor Clegane was killing princes and princesses 15 years before he ever started pillaging the Riverlands. Gregor has been a terror for decades, the Smiling Knight was a terror for a few short months, and the Smiling Knight has been forgotten already not even 20 years later. He was nowhere close the Mountain of Jaime's youth. Again, the greatest swordsman who ever lived, should have no trouble beating him.
And secondly, we know that a lot of those men weren't made of finer steel, that yes Jaime was just 15 at the time. Obviously the outlaws need no introduction for why they weren't finer steel, but like we know that guys like Arthur, Oswell, and Gerold, were all breaking their oaths and committing treason against Aerys by helping Rhaegar with Harrenhal
Perhaps by now he should have grown used to such things. The Red Keep had its secrets too. Even Rhaegar. The Prince of Dragonstone had never trusted him as he had trusted Arthur Dayne. Harrenhal was proof of that. The year of the false spring.
The memory was still bitter. Old Lord Whent had announced the tourney shortly after a visit from his brother, Ser Oswell Whent of the Kingsguard. With Varys whispering in his ear, King Aerys became convinced that his son was conspiring to depose him, that Whent's tourney was but a ploy to give Rhaegar a pretext for meeting with as many great lords as could be brought together. Aerys had not set foot outside the Red Keep since Duskendale, yet suddenly he announced that he would accompany Prince Rhaegar to Harrenhal, and everything had gone awry from there.
The memory was still bitter. Old Lord Whent had announced the tourney shortly after a visit from his brother, Ser Oswell Whent of the Kingsguard. With Varys whispering in his ear, King Aerys became convinced that his son was conspiring to depose him, that Whent's tourney was but a ploy to give Rhaegar a pretext for meeting with as many great lords as could be brought together. Aerys had not set foot outside the Red Keep since Duskendale, yet suddenly he announced that he would accompany Prince Rhaegar to Harrenhal, and everything had gone awry from there.
"Aye. I will." Ulmer, stooped and grey-bearded and loose of skin and limb, stepped to the mark and pulled an arrow from the quiver at his waist. In his youth he had been an outlaw, a member of the infamous Kingswood Brotherhood. He claimed he'd once put an arrow through the hand of the White Bull of the Kingsguard to steal a kiss from the lips of a Dornish princess. He had stolen her jewels too, and a chest of golden dragons, but it was the kiss he liked to boast of in his cups.
If you don't get the last one about Gerold, Gerold is guarding Elia, Rhaegar's wife, and a large amount of money, right around the time that Harrenhal would've been being planned and organized given that both the Kingswood campaign and Harrenhal take place in 281.
So we already know the 3 of the men "of finer steel" were actually all oathbreakers, trying to depose their king.
Jaime then also says that Lewyn, Oswell, and Darry were also made of finer steel too. Well we know that Lewyn was keeping a paramour, so he too was also breaking his oaths back then. Nor were we ever given any hints in the books that Lewyn was particularly special (he got his white cloak because Elia married Rhaegar, not because he necessarily was the most deserving). Oswell we've never really been given any hints in the books that he was particularly special either. Jonothor Darry might've well not even existed we know so little about him. We don't even know who killed him for god's sake, it's just so unimportant because he's so unimportant. Once again, these men of finer steel, don't really hold up except in the memory of a 15 year old Jaime.
Jaime looks back on the duel between Arthur and the SK and thinks it was amazing, because just like he thinks, he was 15 at the time. The hints are all there that he's looking back on everything with rose tinted glasses, that things didn't quite play out the way he remembers, that the good guys weren't so good, and the bad guys weren't so bad.
Maybe Martin actually is just playing things straight and Arthur was the perfect knight, but I doubt it. I don't at all trust how Jaime remembers the duel with the Smiling Knight, and we do know Jaime's got his rose tinted glasses on to explain why.
