Unlocking Game of Thrones

Writers are always looking to improve their writing, and we do this partly by writing and partly by reading others' works and learning from them, especially books similar to our stories. Sometimes, I read a passage from a book and find myself utterly in love with it because of how beautifully the author had manipulated the English language. Other times, I would marvel at how cleverly a plot and scheme is delivered.

In this article, I will break down the writing style of arguably one of the most famous fantasy writers, George R.R. Martin, the creator of Game of Thrones.

If you have read (or are reading) Game of Thrones, high five! If you haven't, it won't affect your reading this article at all. So, that being said, let's get started.

STRUCTURE

Let's look at Martin's general structure. The story starts with a prologue that is usually of someone we will never see again. As an example, let's look at the prologue of the third installment.

"The day was grey and bitter cold, and the dogs would not take the scent. The big black bitch had taken one sniff at the bear tracks, backed off, and skulked back to the pack with her tail between her legs. The dogs huddled together miserably on the riverbank as the wind snapped at them. Chett felt it too, biting through his layers of black wool and boiled leather. It was too bloody cold for man or beast, but here they were."

The atmosphere of the opening sentence is very mysterious but down to earth in the description. There were questions raised immediately. What dogs? What tracks? This draws the readers in to keep on reading about it. The whole thing is very ominous and usually has a warning of some sort that the main character will stumble upon. The point of the prologue is to be ominous enough to draw the readers in, and Martin does exactly that. Following the main character, Chett, the prologue ends on a disturbing note, as the characters hear a warning for enemies - the Others - approaching.

Chett is never again seen in the book, but his whole purpose is to get the reader interested enough to keep reading.

Now let's move to the actual writing of Martin. The sentences, as we've seen, are not too long and elaborate as the works of Dickens and the Brontes. They are short, compound sentences and at the first glance, aren't so different from other works. The short phrases make it easy for the readers to understand, unlike the long prose from classic works, and tend to draw in more readers.

But of course, the books are nicely written. Take the opening paragraph from above. Immediately after describing the dogs, verbs such as "snap" and "bite" were used, verbs generally associated with dogs. It's often the little things that make a passage very beautiful.

Following the prologue, each chapter is dedicated to one character. There is no set sequence of who will be featured next - that depends on the plot of the story.

POINT OF VIEW

POV's are probably very familiar to you. Not only do we learn about it again and again in school, they are an essential part of story writing. While it could be said that the plot dictates the story, characters are really the ones who move the plot along.

The whole series of Game of Thrones follows a structure of rotating third-person limited point of view in which we see everything the character sees and knows how they feel about everything. An example would be when Jojen was telling Bran to stay, Bran was very resentful, and we know this because it was explicitly stated: "How would you know? Brand thought resentfully."

Another thing that is very prevalent in Martin's works and many other authors' works is italics to show thoughts, as we just saw. Martin does this, so we know all about a character's thinking process, and therefore, allows us to understand why the characters chose to do what they did. Understanding where the characters are coming from also allows us to sympathize with the characters. Even if we saw Queen Cersei as a villain at first, our opinion of her changes as we get to know her through her chapters. In fact, Game of Thrones revolves around this notion that everyone is a hero in their own story. This alone makes the series a very interesting read, and can give us a headache too due to our hated villains appearing very human and oftentimes charismatic.

This way of storytelling through multiple perspectives is, obviously, also a good way to keep us up to date on the various plots of the story. For a series with a complex plot and spread all over the fantasy world of Westeros, the multiple perspectives are very much needed. So if you are about to embark on a journey of writing a very complex story, having multiple perspectives is probably the way to go.

One thing I want to caution you about though, is the way you go about having different perspectives. Martin used this technique largely because of the complex plot of his story. However, different POV's could lead to the reader knowing too much about what will happen next and losing their interest in the story. One pet peeve I have with stories, especially love stories, is that they have separate POV's for the lovebirds before they profess their love. Even though this feels exhilarating to read at first, it gets boring after a while.

The different points of views are also good for plot and character development. A deep understanding of the character as the result of writing in their perspective can give rise to new story arcs that will make the story more interesting. Also, in Game of Thrones, it reflects the nature of the world. In most cases, especially in history, people are not saints or villains. They are oftentimes the product of their upbringing and experiences. Thus, this way of writing is very good for a realistic plot, though set in a fantasy world, as well as unique characters.

However, portraying different characters also presents several problems, one of them being the characters shouldn't be too alike. This is one thing we have to keep in mind as we write. For example, all the bad guys shouldn't sneer when they are being interrogated, and your characters can't all bite their lips as they think. Moreover, if your characters, like in Game of Thrones, are of various age groups, make sure they don't all think and act the same way.

So, that's that. An analysis of the structure of Game of Thrones. For someone who is trying very hard to write a good story involving a power struggle between several aristocrats, Game of Thrones has been of help to me. Hopefully, this article made you think about the structure of your story and how you could improve on it. That said, we should only take so much from a story. Don't let it influence your whole plot!

I will end with a quote from George R.R. Martin that ties in with portraying different characters. "The only person we ever really know inside and out is ourselves, and we have to reach into ourselves to find the power that makes great fiction real."

Content Created by Daisy (the13thbluecat)

References: A Storm of Swords (Game of Thrones, Book 3)