George R.R. Martin Interview Round Up
The author of A Song of Ice and Fire has been making the interview rounds to promote his latest release, The World of Ice and Fire. In interviews with ABC, New York Magazine, and The Wall Street Journal, George R.R. Martin discussed frustrating fan questions, A Song of Ice and Fire spinoffs, and his television debut.
Some of the more interesting tidbits, below.
New York Magazine spent 801 minutes with Martin the weekend he was in New York for the 92Y talk. (The video of that talk here.) The profile is appropriately food-obsessed, remarking on every dish ordered. My favorite quote was on the questions he’s tried of being asked.
“I’m so tired of being asked who my favorite character is,” he says. “And I particularly dislike the question about who’s going to finish the books after I die. I told a Swiss journalist to F-off for that one.”
As for Winds of Winter spoilers in this interview, there are none. But Martin did offer up one thing we fans should keep in mind:
Daenerys Targaryen was given the histories of her world as a wedding gift but neglected to read them. “But you know who does know a lot of that?” he says coyly. “Tyrion.”
I suddenly have this image of Tyrion as the Hermione to Dany’s Harry.
Martin also recorded an appearance on the Wall Street Journal‘s inaugural WSJCafe. You can watch the full 30 minute video above. He discussed potential future writing about Westeros–but not the story at hand.
“Now that’s not to say that I won’t ever write about Westeros again…. I want to return and write about it again, write about some of the other countries, and other times and other places. So there are a lot of stories there that I can tell. ”
On the other hand, Martin does seem to have realized his comments on the diversity of the fantasy genre last summer were taken pretty hard by some fans. He’s still defensive, but his quote also sounds a note of hope.
“It’s so monocultural because it’s mostly been written by white men. I’m a 66 year old white man…I do see evidence that that’s changing.”
And finally, Martin appeared on Good Morning America‘s “Burgers and Books” on ABC. Not much on the books themselves in this one, as ABC prefers to remind everyone that Martin once wrote a pretty popular series for their network back in the day.
Considering it was Martin’s experience writing Beauty and the Beast that drove him to start ASOIAF to begin with,(ironically “because he didn’t want to have to write a tale that would fit within a TV budget”), I suppose we should say thank you.
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