Re-reading Song of Ice and Fire

Chapter 29, Sansa
Summary
Sansa’s dream comes true, she attends the tourney of The Hand. She watches knights joust and is unmoved when Gregor Clegane kills one of the fresh knights going against him. After the jousting is done Sansaattends feast with Joffrey. After the party Joffrey’s Hound, Sandor Clegane, escorts her to her chambers.

Quotes

Sansasat with her hands folded in her lap, watching with a strange fascination. She had never seen a man die before. (…) The young knight in the blue cloak was nothing to her, some stranger from the Vale of Arryn whose name she had forgotten as soon as she heard it.

The queen had done it; she was the one to hate, her and Arya. Nothing bad would have happened except for Arya. She could not hate Joffrey tonight. He was too beautiful to hate.

There was a brazier in the room. Gregor never said a word, just picked me up under his arm and shoved the side of my face down in the burning coals and held me there while I screamed and screamed. You saw how strong he is. Even then, it took three grown men to drag him off me.

Commentary

When I was reading this chapter for the first time I was struck by the amount of new characters Martin threw into the story. The stream of names seemed unending, the lords, knights, realms, definitely too many to remember. You might enjoy knowing the house names and their history when you’re reading the book for a second time.

As for Sansa, Martin is doing his best to make sure readers hate this character. Each passing chapter brings out her worst features. She’s still mad at Arya, but somehow managed to idealize her precious prince, who was the sole reason for her troubles.

There were two things I particularly liked about this chapter. The first one was how Martin described the jousts. I really felt excitement of watching the tourney myself. The other one was more grim, it was Hound’s story about how his face got burned. Ser Gregor Clegane, The Mountain That Rides, is introduced.

Chapter 15, Sansa
Summary
Sansa and Arya are invited to ride with Queen and princess Myrcella in the wheelhouse. Sansa is thrilled about it, Arya refuses to do it, she prefers to go riding with her new friend, butcher-boy Mycach. When Sansa goes to meet with the Queen she finds out that she’s welcoming new escort sent to them from Kings Landing. Ser Barristan, Ser Ilyn and King’s brother Renly are introduced. Queen wants to talk to them, so instead of joining her in the wheelhouse Sansa goes riding with Joffrey.

After drinking too much wine Sansa and Joffrey stumble upon Arya and Mycach training swordplay with broom handles. Joffrey wants to teach Mycach a lesson for hurting sister of his betrothed. Arya doesn’t let him hurt the butcher boy and hits him in the head. When Joffrey goes after her, he’s attacked by Arya’s direwolf, Nymeria. Mycach, Arya and Nymeria run away.

Quotes

Sansa could never understand how two sisters, born only two years apart, could be so different. It would have been easier if Arya had been a bastard, like their half brother Jon.

A grey blur flashed past her, and suddenly Nymeria was there, leaping, jaws closing around Joffrey’s sword arm. The steel fell from his fingers as the wolf knocked him off his feet, and they rolled in the grass, the wolf snarling and ripping at him, the prince shrieking in pain.

Commentary

The hatred between sisters grows. We knew that Arya was jealous of Sansa’s looks and skills, now we find out that the feeling goes the other way too. Sansa is jelous of the love their father has for the younger girl. Sansa can’t understand why her father approves the wild things her sister does. It’s clear that he thinks she’s better than Arya, which immediately made me dislike her character.

What struck me about Sansa in this chapter was how shallow and self-centred she was. She fell in love with price Joffrey before she got to know him. She couldn’t comprehend how someone would want to go ride horse instead of sitting on a pillow and eating lemon cakes. And when her betrothed went after her sister with the sword in his hand all she could think was that they were ruining her beautiful, romantic day with the prince.