50 pages • 1 hour read
George R. R. MartinA Feast for Crows
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2005A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Repression and Illicit Sexuality
Noticing Sam avoiding Gilly the day after he slept with her, a Summer Islands woman approaches him on the ship. She tells him that “there is no shame in loving” and “if your septons say there is, your seven gods must be demons” (595). Here, a more liberated attitude toward sex is contrasted with that which predominates in Westeros. Sam was raised to believe that sex outside of marriage, or for any other goal than procreation, is immoral. These values are enforced by strict social censure of deviance and an internalized culture of shame. This is shown in the opprobrium directed at Margaery when she is suspected to have had an affair. In its most extreme form, this attitude manifests in groups which take vows of chastity. As seen with Sam and the Night’s Watch and Ser Arys and the Kingsguard, this involves a promise to renounce sex altogether for “duty” (214). It also means strong feelings of self-loathing and shame when, as happens with both characters, they break those vows.
However, this does not apply to everyone. In A Feast for Crows, the moral and sexual standards expected of most people and groups like the Night’s Watch, contrast markedly with the behavior of elites. Wealth and unchecked power encourage behaviors that would be considered taboo even in the most liberal societies. This is evidenced first by Lord Baelish in relation to Sansa. Baelish murders his wife and Sansa’s aunt when she starts to question Baelish’s affection for the 13-year-old Sansa. He then makes Sansa pretend to be his daughter, ostensibly to protect her but often as a pretext for inappropriate and sexual contact. For example, after successfully tricking Lord Nestor into believing it was a singer who killed Lysa, Baelish “put two fingers on [Sansa’s] left breast” (177). He then asks Sansa, “can you be my daughter in your heart?” (177). Likewise, when reunited with Sansa outside the Eyrie, Baelish “pulled her closer, caught her face between his hands, and kissed her on the lips for a long time” (708).
Elsewhere, twin sister and brother Cersei and Jaime previously engaged in an incestuous relationship that produced Joffrey, Myrcella, and King Tommen, and they continue to toy with the idea of restarting it. Most disturbingly, this happens when Jaime is standing vigil over Tywin’s still decaying corpse. Cersei approaches him there and tells Jaime, “you are me, I am you. I need you with me. In me” (141). Her sexuality seems bound up with narcissism and death, as well as family power and purity. Conversely, her aversion to marriage and revulsion at her murdered ex-husband stem from a similar source. Yet this should not just be understood as a comment on the moral corruption engendered by power. It also reflects a fear on the part of powerful houses that they would “dilute” their blood lines by breeding with outsiders. This was a common problem in the medieval Europe on which the author draws, and it led similarly to the interbreeding and megalomania seen in the novel.
The Conflict Between Religious and Secular Authority
As Cersei is delayed outside the Great Sept on her way to see the new High Septon she notes the absence of two high ranking and sycophantic priests, Raynard and Torbert. She recalls how “Torbert always made a show of getting down on his knees to wash her feet” (469). This symbolizes the way in which religion in Westeros had previously served established power, and how its leaders had become “plump” (470) from doing so. In contrast, the new High Septon stresses the opposite. As the High Sparrow says, just “as men bow to their lords, and lords to their kings, so kings and queens must bow before the Seven Who Are One” (471). The crown and secular power must serve religion. Religion should not serve the crown. Concomitantly, church leaders should not seek favors and riches from that power. This commitment is represented by the sale of “a crown of rare beauty” (471) given by Tywin to the previous High Septon.
If fighting corruption is itself a good thing, then it also contributes to another positive goal: helping the poor. As Cersei derisively acknowledges, the High Sparrow “feeds them, coddles them, blesses them” (465). He sells the material riches of the church: its crowns, rings, and “robes of cloth-of-gold and cloth-of-silver” (471) to accomplish this. These deeds are rooted in an understanding of and genuine concern for the suffering of ordinary people. The High Sparrow developed this attitude as a travelling priest, tending to small villages which have now been destroyed. It is also something which evolved from the experience of his humble origins.
However, despite these attributes, the High Sparrow and his followers have a darker side. This can be seen when Cersei offers to legalize the Faith Militant. She asks, “is it gold you want? […] Or do you want these dusty laws of Maegor’s set aside?” (475) The High Sparrow chooses to forgive the crown’s debt to the church, forgoing huge quantities of gold that could be used to aid the poor, in return for power. As he says, “the Warrior would lift his shining sword again and cleanse this sinful realm of all its evil […] Let the wicked tremble!” (475) The High Sparrow prioritizes having a military force over more noble goals. Worse, the main purpose of this power is not to protect the weak, but to punish alleged “sin.” This is seen most explicitly in the way the sparrows degrade and torture Margaery, Ser Osney, and Wat. Sympathy for the oppressed gives way to the violent policing of morals. With its own apparatus of oppression, the new Faith comes to resemble the secular power it claims to oppose.
Justice and Revenge
When Brienne’s party arrives in Maidenpool, “They found Lord Tarly in the fishmarket, doing justice” (232). He is deciding penalties for various individuals found guilty of crimes. A man who has stolen from a temple is to have seven fingers amputated. A man who mixed sawdust with flour is to be fined and whipped, and a man who has cheated at dice will have a nail put through his palm. At first glance, this all seems barbaric. However, on closer scrutiny this process is a necessary, albeit rough way in which the subjects of his town can feel that there has been redress for offenses against their persons and community. Furthermore, done by a third-party with no investment in the cases, the penalties are seen to be broadly fair, requiring no further action.
The same cannot be said for the way “justice” is pursued by many of the novel’s characters. Obara, Cersei, Arya, and the Hound all pursue redress for imagined wrongs in ways that are intensely personal, often disproportionate, and invariably motivated by irrational anger. Obara is a good example of this. When invited to look at the children playing by Doran, she says that “I’d get more pleasure from driving my spear into Lord Tywin’s belly” (37) and pulling his guts out. She also talks about sacking Old Town. Clearly her “justice” for her father’s death is really about vengeance. It takes little account of reason or the cost in innocent lives. Meanwhile, Cersei seeks revenge on her brother Tyrion for supposedly killing her son Joffrey, yet Tyron was not responsible. She has hundreds of dwarfs slain and the tower of the Hand burned down in her misguided bid to punish him. Hers is a classic example of the folly of taking justice into one’s own hands. This can also be seen in how this desire for vengeance warps her, her anger leading her to declare to an imagined Tyrion, “I shall dip your head in tar and give your twisted body to the dogs” (267).
However, revenge can be just as destructive when pursued by a group. This is evidenced with the “Brotherhood Without Banners” in the Riverlands. The group of outlaws attack and hang Lannister soldiers and their supporters, in retaliation for the locals killed and abused by those troops. This merely perpetuates an endless cycle of violence and retribution where the Lannister soldiers hang and kill their men in turn. “The Hangwoman,” the half-dead resurrected version of what had been Catelyn Stark, is a metaphor for this problem. Rather than letting the past die, even if this is painful, revenge leaves characters constantly marked by the event they want to avenge. Thus, it is said that “the flesh of her face clung in ragged strips from her eyes down to her jaw” (725). Revenge leaves even the most noble looking like grim parodies of their former selves.
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By George R. R. Martin
