Book signing
Oct. 25th, 2005 08:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ladyofastolatWell, we went to GRRM's book signing yesterday, braving wind and rain and bouncy ferries. I did my usual "let's leave lots of margins for error, for things to be late," so we ended up arriving really early. We'd intended a quick meal in Pizza Hut, but ended up having to eat deliberately slowly. We still ended up with 40 minutes to kill in a pub.
Then the signing. He talked for a while first, talking about the reasons for this book taking so long. It was all familiar stuff to anyone who follows his website, or the various fan sites and forums. Then he took questions. A couple asked characterisation-related issues, to which he answered with a discussion of how real people aren't all good, or all bad, so he likes everyone to have shades of grey. He doesn't do external "Good" v. "Evil" in his stories, because he sees such struggles as being internal. All of his characters have a bit of himself in, but Tyrion has the most, "though I'm taller."
Someone asked about his habit of killing major characters, and asked what other characters would die. GRRM looked at him incredulously, and said, "Look, I'm not going to answer that, am I?" He then spoke about how he want readers to know from the start that no-one is safe. He finds books boring if you always know that the hero will be safe, even though he's facing impossible odds, because it's only 100 pages into the book, and you know he has to live.
He also spoke about magic. He stressed that the answer to the "why are seasons so strange in this world" was a fantasy explanation, not a science fiction one. However, he prefers fantasy to be very magic-light. "Magic is like anchovies," he said, telling a story about how he once had a small bit of anchovy on a pizza, and liked it, so then ordered an entire anchovy pizza, and hated it.
Someone asked him about language and names, saying that his language had got more archaic as the series went on. GRRM said he tried to write mostly in modern English, but avoiding modern slang, and peppering it with bits of archaicism for mood. He said his first draft of AGoT was full of "mayhaps" until an editor said "mayhaps" made him tremble, thinking that "forsooth" was just around the corner. So he compromised, and now older characters say "mayhaps", while younger ones don't.
He also did a conscious decision to duplicate names - to have more than one person with the same name. It happens in real life, and it certainly happened in medieval England.
He said a few character names out loud, revealing that "Jaime" is pronounced "Jamie." "Catelyn" he said out loud, but I can't remember how he said it, except that it was definitely three syllables. "Cersei" started with an "S", but I can't remember whether it was "Ser-sigh", or "Ser-Say".
Anyway, I must rush now to get to work, so it'll have to be quick. After questions, he signed some books, and we went home, and now I've got to go out into the pouring rain and do my half-term storytimes, and - I hope - swap this borrowed car for our own car. The garage was supposed to have our car for two days, but have had it for nearly six. Grr!
Then the signing. He talked for a while first, talking about the reasons for this book taking so long. It was all familiar stuff to anyone who follows his website, or the various fan sites and forums. Then he took questions. A couple asked characterisation-related issues, to which he answered with a discussion of how real people aren't all good, or all bad, so he likes everyone to have shades of grey. He doesn't do external "Good" v. "Evil" in his stories, because he sees such struggles as being internal. All of his characters have a bit of himself in, but Tyrion has the most, "though I'm taller."
Someone asked about his habit of killing major characters, and asked what other characters would die. GRRM looked at him incredulously, and said, "Look, I'm not going to answer that, am I?" He then spoke about how he want readers to know from the start that no-one is safe. He finds books boring if you always know that the hero will be safe, even though he's facing impossible odds, because it's only 100 pages into the book, and you know he has to live.
He also spoke about magic. He stressed that the answer to the "why are seasons so strange in this world" was a fantasy explanation, not a science fiction one. However, he prefers fantasy to be very magic-light. "Magic is like anchovies," he said, telling a story about how he once had a small bit of anchovy on a pizza, and liked it, so then ordered an entire anchovy pizza, and hated it.
Someone asked him about language and names, saying that his language had got more archaic as the series went on. GRRM said he tried to write mostly in modern English, but avoiding modern slang, and peppering it with bits of archaicism for mood. He said his first draft of AGoT was full of "mayhaps" until an editor said "mayhaps" made him tremble, thinking that "forsooth" was just around the corner. So he compromised, and now older characters say "mayhaps", while younger ones don't.
He also did a conscious decision to duplicate names - to have more than one person with the same name. It happens in real life, and it certainly happened in medieval England.
He said a few character names out loud, revealing that "Jaime" is pronounced "Jamie." "Catelyn" he said out loud, but I can't remember how he said it, except that it was definitely three syllables. "Cersei" started with an "S", but I can't remember whether it was "Ser-sigh", or "Ser-Say".
Anyway, I must rush now to get to work, so it'll have to be quick. After questions, he signed some books, and we went home, and now I've got to go out into the pouring rain and do my half-term storytimes, and - I hope - swap this borrowed car for our own car. The garage was supposed to have our car for two days, but have had it for nearly six. Grr!
