#BookishThoughts- A Defence of @GameOfThrones

In light of the recent article by Sarah Ditum and numerous in real life occurences, I felt compelled to sit down and write why I, as a a reader and book blogger, love both the books and television series of ‘A Game Of Thrones’ by George RR Martin. (HBO TV show developed  by David Benioff and D.B Weiss)

I grew up as a comic book loving, horror novel devouring nerd, and this is exactly the kind of show and books I would never have dreamed were possible as a teenager, being laughed at for reading Stephen King and James Herbert in school whilst my contemporaries lapped up ‘Sweet Valley High’ and Jane Austen.

However, what I could not have predicted is the sheer level of contempt and snobbery people feel able to wield towards a genre heavy show, usually followed with the non-sequiter ‘Well, everyone’s different aren’t they’, to explain away their shitty, dismissive attitude.

Well no. Not everyone is different. I, for example, could give chapter and verse on precisely why you could not bribe me to watch any reality shows or soap operas. There is a thought process behind this as well as analysis on why these things are not for me.

However, knee jerk reactions because something is popular, because you find watching sex and full frontal nudity on tv uncomfortable, there is too much swearing, you cannot stand bloodshed, why you think something is less worthy as it’s full of ‘tits and dragons’ is an entirely different matter.

This kind of snobby elitism is absolutely fine when it’s fantasy or sci-fi we are cocking our noses at, apparently.

I am writing this from a place of anger , thanks to the Twitter ‘friend’ who spoiled this week’s episode last night -cheers! loved your cogent thinking on what happened!-,thanks to the ‘I don’t read those books’ attitudes and thanks even a trip to the shops today.

I wore my ‘Night’s Watch’ hoody , it was the nearest one to grab on the way out the door,and it’s comfortable.

‘What’s the ‘Night’s Watch’?’, the man on the till asks.

‘Characters in ‘Game Of Thrones’, ‘ I answer as I am packing my bags.

‘Oh I don’t watch that…’

‘Why?’

‘I just don’t’

‘Well how do you know you don’t like it if you haven’t even watched it?’

‘I just know.’

‘It’s easy to be dismissive when it’s something popular’

‘Everyone’s different, I don’t even watch ‘Harry Potter’ there’s lots of popular things I don’t like’

ARGHHHHH!!!!

No one does this when you are wearing a band t-shirt or some slogan top! They don’t pull down your musical tastes!! At least not in my experience, but hey, have the ‘Night’s Watch’ symbol on your breast and it’s a free for all.

It’s not the fact that people so openly feel they be offensive, nor my anger at being offended , it’s the sheer elitist attitude that doesn’t seem to prevail elsewehere.

Yes the books are not perfect, you could take them to task on the way that women are portrayed or the  lack of inclusivity , something which could be levelled at damn near every t.v show or book in a patriarchal, white dominated culture! For crying out loud, Agatha Christie, that venerated dame, was more offensive in her terminology, than so many of GRRM’s books!

There may be clunky episodes, there may be awkward bits but the whole is so much greater than the sum of its parts. It’s escapist and complicated and beautiful,resonant and lit in light and shade that is what makes it so watchable. The books have yet to be finished, GRRM has told his outlines to David Benioff and D.B Weiss ,yet there is still room for his books to end differently. So there is much left to explore and be excited about.

It’s so exciting, for a studio as big as HBO to take money and throw it behind a fantasy show,it demonstrates that there is an audience for it. People laughed at Peter Jackson and said that you cannot keep an audience going for 3 years to watch a trilogy, no one will have the patience to sit through a 3 hour plus movie…and then do the same next year and the year after. But we did. And we keep coming back for more. 8 years of the tv series of ‘Game Of Thrones’, 23 years of the novels, to date, as well as spin offs in development. It’s a juggernaut of fantasy which has allowed other production companies to take risks in their storytelling.

As for those declaring it is ‘anti-woman’ or ‘anti-feminism’, wake up. Some of the strongest characters in it are the women. The actresses have lots of control over their character arcs, including in scenes of a sexual nature and if you don’t believe that sex can be used as an act of war you are deluded. In a world where approximately 300 million women and girls are at risk of, or have had Female Genital Mutilation, can you really say that rape is far fetched or an unecessary plot arc? It isn’t shoe horned in there as an after thought. The women are centred in this and given an amount of agency you rarely see in mainstream television. They are not just used and cast aside as adjuncts to their male counterparts.

Much as ‘Star Wars’ and ‘Alien’ heralded a new era of fantasy and sci-fi , so did ‘Game Of Thrones’. It is ground breaking, high quality drama, featuring some of the best names in British acting. We have watched the characters grow up on screen and come to be invested in their fates and lives. And GRRM is not afraid to kill his characters and leave them dead. The emotional investment in this series is huge, and now that it is coming to an end, there seems to be a peculiar cachet attached to saying ‘I have never watched it’. And being proud of it.

Neil Gaiman’s ‘American Gods’  examines the way that so called societal advances have led to people abandoning their faith to replace it with new ones, and in the same way ‘Game Of Thrones’ examines the plight of immigrants, entitlement, privilege and corruption of power.

And this is why, after concluding my latest blog tour committments, I am going to go back to being a book reviewer on here ,alone . Having spent weeks weighing up my f*** budget, I have decided the books I care about and want to champion are going to be my focus. Not to be riding a trend or part of creating a buzz, the time has come to step back and readjust priorities , to stop chasing after titles and proofs with my hand out…it’s just not me anymore,and probably never was.

Book blogging has allowed me to reconnect with my roots, which are firmly horror and sci-fi/fantasy based and I have loved being part of tours. But the elitist attitudes that I have been watching from the sidelines in the book blogging community, are just not compatible with my vision for what I want this blog to be about. And the whole ‘Game Of Thrones’ debacle has been the tipping point to help me decide to back off and enjoy the quiet life. It’s my forum to talk about books which matter to me, maybe it will reach someone out there and maybe turn them on to their new favourite author. And that’s all I intend it to be.

Dracarys.