Matthew Sawczyn I know that was a bizarre misunderstanding of LOTR. LOTR is an allegory on the Christian narrative and each character conveys an aspect of that narrative. Gollums transition to smeagle and Frodos resistance of greed is a perfect example of the battle of good and evil waged in the heart and how Jesus was the only one who truly won it and won it for the rest of humanity There's an entire Wikipedia page devoted to this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Middle-earth#:~:text=Tolkien%20was%20a%20devout%20Roman%20Catholic.&text=Tolkien%20said%20%22Of%20course%20God,%22The%20one%2C%20of%20course!
Yeah, that's definitely true. I mean, the battle is still going on in the hearts of say, Aragorn or Faramir or even Gandalf/Galadriel, but they have enough virtue to overcome it. It's not like they're robots or aren't tempted... they just choose the good consistently. Which ends up looking black/white, even if the getting there isn't.
@B K What I found compelling about Martin's writing is how he made me change my mind about so many characters. Jaime Lannister is a perfect example. I started off despising him but after a couple books I'm really hoping he does manage to redeem his honor. Or Theon Greyjoy, how I thought he deserved any punishment imaginable, then end up pitying him after he gets it.
Matthew Sawczyn that's only partially true. In LOTR the only time we see people struggle with dark thoughts or impulses is after they come into contact with the stories devil figure in Sauron or extensions of him like the one ring. Hence the whole thing about externalised evil. Any internal struggle comes as result of coming into contact with evil incarnate which coaxed it out of them. Internal conflict never has an internal source.
“People like to invent monsters and monstrosities. Then they seem less monstrous themselves. When they get blind-drunk, cheat, steal, beat their wives, starve an old woman, when they kill a trapped fox with an axe or riddle the last existing unicorn with arrows, they like to think that the Bane entering cottages at daybreak is more monstrous than they are. They feel better then. They find it easier to live." -- Geralt,The Witcher "The Last Wish"
"Why do they blame me for all their little failings? They use my name as if I spent my entire days sitting on their shoulders, forcing them to commit acts they would otherwise find repulsive. 'The devil made me do it.' I have never made one of them do anything. Never. They live their own tiny lives. I do not live their lives for them." Lucifer in Sandman
That awkward moment when people realize the author of a bunch of pulp bullshit was too high/drunk to even remember writing a bunch of his novels! Is he a genius, or are a bunch of English-speakers easily-entertained morons?
There's an authors message at the start of latter editions of Dark Tower which discusses King's fondness for Tolkien, plus I believe he said the Stand was his attempt at grand good vs evil fantasy “Only instead of a hobbit, my hero was a Texan named Stu Redman, and instead of a Dark Lord, my villain was a ruthless drifter and supernatural madman named Randall Flagg. The land of Mordor ("where the shadows lie, according to Tolkien) was played by Las Vegas.”
Riiight.. “So in your first five novels, when ****** killed **** in the first one, and the whole thing was ***** in the second, and the third isn’t really about the superflu it’s about the end where ******** Cmon now George..... lol
@@agustinvenegas5238 The plot of the book is about an insane fan of a writer who kidnaps the writer and tortures them. So a fan sending a copy of that book to a writer is scary as hell.
“The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either -- but right through every human heart -- and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained” ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956
"The battle for good and evil is waged within the individual human heart." I think this is a quote of Alexander Solzhenitsyn from "The Gulag Archipelago".
Yep. That’s usually how it goes. Hell, I know that George got the idea for the Night’s Watch and The Wall just because he was daydreaming on top of Hadrian’s Wall when he once visited there.
Kind of a prerequisite for writing fiction. I write terrible amateur fiction because I work a boring job that requires very little of me mentally so I spend ten hours a day making things up and when I get home I pass time trying to organize it.
I think the two most complex/grey characters Martin has created is Jaime Lannister and Theon Greyjoy, neither hero or villain just 2 conflicted individuals with their own motivations and demons to struggle with, you know the writing is brilliant when he can make you completely despise a character then sympathize/root for them later on in the story!
They're fantastic characters. I would add the Hound to that list. I also like his grey-toned white/black characters. Ned for example is white, and so is Jon (sort of representing Ned's spiritual successor, as did Robb). But they make the _wrong_ decisions at times due to their moral compulsions. And then you want to strangle them for it. White characters doing wrong things, or black characters doing right things-e.g., Littlefinger always has a selfish agenda, except sometimes it aligns with a good outcome, like helping Sansa-are as equally interesting as gray characters to me. They provide a similar tension in how the reader judges them. And then there's the third class, the failed white/black characters. Brienne for example being borishly good in any other story, but remaining interesting by virtue of her constant failures, a good character made compelling by being assaulted with a bad circumstance to test them. The best is when these third class characters succumb to their struggles and show signs of switching alignment in order to achieve their highest priority ideal.
Blaisem interesting. I would conjecture the hound is a character who sees himself as evil, but ends up doing good things-sometimes. I think this sets him apart as almost every character sees themselves as the good guy, but if you think about there actions they are very morally bad people, at least by our standards. I think Robert alludes to this when he talks about Ned (was it Robert, I don’t remember) being nothing more than a killer. I’m curious if the hound believes himself to be evil living in an evil world.
@@Blaisem I thought Brianne had a pretty obvious flaw of being very self-righteous and judgemental which was most visible when she interracted with Jaime for a while in the beginning.
neither character in the song of ice of fire are neither hero or villain,the closest thing to both are ned and jon for hero and joffrey and ramsay for villain,each character have their own motivations and demons,thats way this series is so fucking good,but in terms of grey characters,yeah theon and jaime are the best,i hate them in cok and got and now i love them
Lol Martin did not throw shade with that. He said he’s a fan of Lovecraft and that King probably is too with some references. Martin has expressed multiple times that he himself has several book references in his own.
I saw it as more of a friendly banter between the two. Same with the "hard name to remember". Also, King was defending Martin at the end with his remarks about spoilers.
this is an unpopular opinion, but if i like a gray character depends on their specific flaws and if it's not a good one, i prefer purely white (morally of course).
The 80's Wolf Not always. Different moralities have their places in fiction. Some stories are good with on,y bad characters. Sometimes black and white morality works too
I'm a huge fan of ASOIAF, so grey characters are much more truthful to our real lives, but damn if Lovecraft didnt create some of the most horrifying "darkness" in literature. The thing I find fascinating about Eldritch horror, isnt that the beings are "evil", its that they are so foreign and inconceivable to man's mind and understanding of the world, that it causes madness even being exposed to it, and the madness in humans causes the evil things to happen. That is some fucked up shit.
George is humorous but subtle which add spice to the jest, eloquent but relatable, philsophical then explanatory in his interviews...and I knew he is always going to be the bigger person when he is grouped with his colleagues....
Interesting. I agree with GRRM that in real life we’re all a mix of black and white, and some of his best characters, like Jaime Lannister and Joshua York, embody this perfectly. Yet he’s also given us some of the blackest hearts in all of fiction.
but I but agree that that Tolkiens books is black and white that his own. Bilbo steals the ring and lies to his that he has it. The dwarves are not all good neither are the elf king. Boromir and Gollum both has good and evil in them. The orc are all evil but there are also all evil beings in Martins books like the White Walkers and Ramsay Snow.
People don't get why people seem like pure evil in A Song of Ice and Fire. Tommen was treated as unimportant by Joffrey and Cersei, that's why he's so weak-willed. Joffrey is a piece of shit but Martin makes him gray because you can see *why* he's such a piece of shit, his mother manipulated him his whole life (unlike his siblings), his father was ashamed of him and he wanted to be what he considered to be a good king. Boltons are sociopaths (who mostly are just born that way) and there're good Freys, the bad ones have a reason as well: they were always being made fun of because they didn't help House Tully until they had a clear chance.
Munzur there isn't such thing like being born evil in real life also review your principles the characters you mentioned are pieces of shit there is nothing to justify their behaviour though martin is at fault here because of his nihilism and lack of believe
@@balabanasireti Joffrey was a sadist early on though. I think he cut a pregnant cat open or something like that as a young kid (which is when Robbert completely distanced from him) Pretty sure part of why he's so messed up is because of genetics, because of being at least second generation inbred and/or getting Cersei's terrible temper. He drew the short straw on genetics compared to his sibblings plus had much more expectations and attention on him as the firstborn.
It’s interesting that King said you can’t spoil a book cause it’s a story. It’s an entire experience. The book isn’t just one surprise that can be ruined. That’s actually a very writer thing to say. We as readers and not writers, would never think that way. We think of it as a present with part of the wrapping paper torn. If we can see part of the present, not only is the surprise ruined, but in some ways the entire present is ruined because we consider the surprise of what the present is as part of the gift. King is thinking about it as this eternal gift that you’ll have forever. We think of it as a gift for today and today only. This is why we want the next book so bad. We want to feel that surprise again. And this is why the great writers don’t pump them out when they’re not ready, because they think of it as an eternal gift that should last a lifetime.
Evil came on Arda from Melkor, but the evil itself was a different kind of Music. It is about black and white, but its also about that both good and evil are present in everyone, and all strugle between those two sides. Martin and Tolkien are a lot more similar than he thinks. And yeah, noone said that orcs are irredimable. And he probably could not remember Silmarillion, with all of elves killing their brothers, hate on Valar, elf pride and ignorence and clearly no-saint humans. Not enough death? Feanor - dead. Tingol - dead. Boromir - dead. Fingolfin - Dead. Companions of Beren - Tortured and killed by werewolf. A lot of elves - killed by brothers and destroyed in wars. Sons of Feanor - cursed and killed. Dwarf kings - dead. Numenor - fucking drowned in ocean by Eru.
What I like is seeing a black/white scenario in the beginning but the white becomes more and more grey overtime in order to defeat the black. It shows something of a loss of innocence and the discovery for the hero that they’ll need to cross some of their own lines for the sake of those they care about.
@@monmothma3358 No, Martin absolutely lets King speak he just doesn't say much of value. I find King is very down to earth person who rarely gets as philosophical as Martin when speaking. He seems to save a lot of that for his writing.
I can see exactly what George is saying about good and evil. It’s very simple in LOTR who is good and who is evil, for the most part. We’ve grown to understand the nuances between each, but a part of us still desires a world where the good is GOOD and the evil is EVIL. It’s very clear and easy to understand. There’s a lesson to learn from those stories, the same as a lesson to learn from more nuanced stories. But I think it is easier for people to identify with the experiences and struggles of the “good guy” than it is to follow the path of multiple characters who equivocate between good and evil. We want to be inspired and driven to do good, and fictional stories provide us with those examples. Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, the original Star Wars trilogy (which turns everything on its head at the very end). There’s a difference between a realistic story and a story that we want to be realistic. It’s a fine line and the best writers know how to straddle it. This is part of why the Star Wars prequels were disliked at the time they came out. The execution was subpar, but the story was fascinating. And it painted our heroes as more “gray” than the black and white we were used to in the original trilogy.
George: This brief spot-on analysis of one of your books/characters in which I will read into the heart of the human condition, mythos, and conflict Stephen: Oh he yeah haha totally yeah huh....
Well in Tolkien I remember ONE Orc (Uruk) who showed redeeming qualities, and that was Ugluk. I was fascinated by him because he seemed to have some sense of a code, and also seemed to exercise more self-control than the others.
Throne Games works because multiple people compete for the thone and you can call it like that reffering to it as an event or competition and Game of Thrones the book/series name.
George asked Stephen if his father inspired him to become a writer or something and Stephen replied with " nah my father didn't do much of an thing. He walked out on my mother when I was a young child. He said he was going out for some cigarettes and never came back. They must've been some rare brand because he's still searching"
"You can't spoil a book!" Wisest words on books have never been said! People who read books only for the reveal at the end (when the book has that, read The Scarlet Letter and then tell me what was the big reveal that the author didn't spoil on page 5, please!) are missing out on so much I can't even say!
Ignorance propels stupidity and vice versa. Maybe their schools and teachers failed to teach them anything about the existing literary devices? Maybe their parents didn't care to tell them, or they were uneducated themselves? Maybe, even, they're too lazy to learn it on their own? Whatever it may be, the world needs the unwitty. Idiots are God's creatures too, and we need to love them regardless of the dangers brought by their stupidity.
Needful things imo is a perfect example of the real world “evil”. We are all capable of it and even willing to do it depending on what our greatest desires are.
George really makes a good point here, I’m a huge fan of supernatural/magic/whimsical themes in stories and I am not well read on Stephen King but even just seeing the movies like Stand By Me, The Shining and IT, my favorite aspect is the unsettling ability of the human characters to be scarier and more villainous than some monster under the bed.
SPOILERS FOR THE DARK TOWER I really like how anticlimactic the Crimson King was. We went through this whole journey with Roland's Ka Tet and in the end the ultimate evil is a crazy screaming old man on a balcony. For me it works with King's philosophy on endings in that it was never about fighting this ultimate, external evil. The meat of the story was the journey itself.
its kind of what i like About Roland from the Dark Tower he's the protagonist has a moral code BUT will cross that line if it means getting closer to the Tower and the idea that no matter how many times he goes through the loop he still has trouble learning that his ultimate goal will fail because he will always doggedly pursue it
Both are equally intruiging. To an extent, evil can be externalised, and sometimes the greatest evil is in the human hearts. The choice to choose whether or not to act in the best or worst interests does come down to the will of the individuals. Just in from a storytelling standpoint, I find both equally engaging and enthralling.
The effect an 'elite' which has infested a government, media, police and financial services has on the general population, that is external evil, people choosing to conform. Of course there is also evil within the individual human heart as there is good, the thing with evil is only a true solipsist, a narcissist can be untouched by others words, while a good person can withstand anything.
I believe outside evil gives us promptings, but humans choose it. Outside evil is not really effective, but good and evil are indeed "waged within the individual human heart"
4:15 Awesome reaction ! Having recently read all 5 published books of the Song of Ice and Fire series, I want Roland of Gilead to stay in the books. The Game of Thrones show is pretty good, but terrible when compared to the books, and I don’t want that to happen to Roland & his ka-tet
I read the A Song Of Ice And Fire books first and watched the show afterwards. It all depends on expectations. I wanted to experience the story in written form because I knew the show could not keep up with the books in that regard. And then I watched the show and I was really looking forward to how the actors bring the characters to life, how the Directors of Photography, the Special Effects guys, the CGI department and everyone else bring the world to the screen. And with that they did an amazing job, in my opinion. And as a bonus, I got a few really nice extra scenes that could not be in the books due to point of view restrictions. I would watch an adaptation of the Dark Tower series if it had a similar budget and great cast, but nothing half-hearted. In the latter case I would rather keep faith with the written version.
I disagree. I think the show is better than the books. Yes, I do enjoy some of the extra detail in the books regarding character history etc... but Martin rambles on about nothing for far too long in the books. He's not Joseph Conrad and his books aren't heart of darkness. Also, I really really don't like the "perspective" writing style. I know everyone thinks that's all very clever, but I just find it distracting. I much prefer the way the show presents the story. We understand the character's view points from the excellent dialog and a shared history of them dealing with all these issues. Something to me that doesn't come across as well in the books. But whatever...I get that the book readers will always have their bias against the show. I had no dog in the fight because I came to the books at the same time as the show. I do think the books are going to follow a story line with Tyrion, that I believe the show was thinking of doing but then changed their minds on due to time restrictions with wanting to finish the series. I could be wrong but if he does write it like that it's going to be cool. In the end, I like the fact that the show took it's direction and George will take his, and overall it will be the same thing, just arrived at differently.
Martin could just hire King to finish "A Song of Ice and Fire". At least the parts Martin perhaps find less enjoyable writing. He'd make a massive profit and could do something less demanding with his time. But then again, perhaps it would be better to hire younger people, potentially with a long career ahead of them in writing and to whom the publicity alone would be exceptionally valuable.
I don't think GRRM gives Tolkien enough credit in regard to gray characters. Boromir is definitely gray. Gollum is gray. Heck, even Gandalf himself is morally gray as he forces and coerces a hobbit into "adventures" without guaranteeing their well being.
Tolkien himself was never fully sure on what to do with the orcs, the idea of a race of people who are inherently evil troubled him immensely, and he didn't like the idea. But if there were good orcs, that might make the heroes of the story somewhat less good and noble
"I hate this thing about spoilers wah wah wah" YES!!!!! YES!!!! YESSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!111one When I was about eight years old, I read a MAD Magazine parody of (the real) RoboCop that gave away all of the major plot points. I mean ALL of them. The way Murphy dies, the way he is reborn as the titular superhero, his initial successes in stopping crimes, even the big twist after arresting Boddicker. About the only thing MAD did NOT give away was the final line. And when I got sick, diagnosed with diabetes, and allowed to watch the thing on VHS a year later (in 1988), the nine year old me was absolutely fukking blown away. Open-mouthed with amazement. To this day, I still proclaim it the greatest film ever. You know why? 1) Paul Verhoeven is among the greatest directors who ever lived. Ever. 2) Ed Neumeier and Michael Miner hit it out of the park with the script. 3) Everyone else involved in the film gave 1000 percent with their elements. Even the guy doing the drunken slurred speech just before RoboCop enters the precinct for the first time is clearly right into it. Put simply, RoboCop had more in its toolbox than just surprise. And it is far from the only example. Instant Family has Isabela Moner acting rings around most of the adult cast. The real Total Recall had Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michael Ironside competing to see who could pull the most frightening angry poses. And so forth. If surprise is the only element you have to hook your audience, that means your creative work is SHIT. I hope one day Stephen repeats that last sentence to an audience, because the world nears to hear it.
Everyone loves a story of Good v.s. Evil, but they are ultimately stories for children. The next level is people doing good and evil deeds in accordance with their beliefs/principles and desires/ambitions, the world that we know. Perhaps you wouldn't do what a certain character does in a certain situation, but you can understand it. A really good story is one that makes you question your own beliefs on what good and evil even are.
Most of Tolkien evil figures where good and magnificent guys in the beginning but GRR Martin can't know this if he never read the Silmarilion. The orcs are tortured elves, they can't redeem themselves they are too much corrupted, same for Sauron. He had several opportunities to redeem himself but he always chose the bad side willingly because he is so power hungry. Tolkien despised power hungry people, that is why he portrayed Boromir has fool when he advised to use the ring against Sauron. You can only be corrupted by power in the eyes of Tolkien and refusing to use power is the real fight against evil for Tolkien. Hobbits are selfish, self-absorbed people, proud people, they would not fit in our global world but they are good people in the eyes of Tolkien because they chose to not go after power by refusing to get involved with the matters of the world. However you can't always do that, sometime you need to get involved and that might burn you even if you resist the temptation of power, this is the story of Frodon
Totally agree with King about spoilers. Ultimately you're reading the book or watching the series to enjoy the journey itself. Otherwise you can just skim the cliff notes :)
George R. R. Martin was saying one sentence and King needed 4 minutes to repeat all But he didn't give a aswer to the question about good and evil that Martin didn't mentioned.
George has written so many characters I don’t know if I like for example Jamie, the hound, John snow. They all have done bad things but some have good in there hearts. This interview shows my two favourite authors just chatting. PS Annie Wilkes would get George writing faster 😂😂
Both RR and tolkien have both internal and external sources of evil. Georges sauron is the white walkers, and Tolkiens internal struggle would be shown in characters like Boromir.
"Evil comes from Sauron, or Morgoth from before, and there are orcs which are irredeemable, against the good people... the battle of good and evil is waged in the individual heart." If only Tolkien had some grey characters,(the elves of valinor left the land which was for them, in rebellion of their god, and fought wars between one another, same with the line of numenor who rebelled against god, and worshiped Morgoth, engaging in brutal acts, and human sacrifice to achieve immortality) and if there was a ring object of some kind that brought the worst out in people, and this evil is so bad, it corrupts the main character by the end preventing its destruction, except for the fact that the evil was ultimately self-destructive. If only Tolkien didn't have this narrow view of good and evil, if he had included these plotlines of men and elves committing evil deeds, and this ring that corrupts people's hearts, would have made for an interesting story.
Martin doesn't Tolkien well enough, at least not as well enough as he thinks he does. In Tolkien, evil is externalized only in the beginning. But through time, it seeps to the roots of everything so much that Tolkien comments it would not be possible to remove the evil of Morgoth from the world without destroying everything. Sauron is of course the metaphor for evil personified. Although a pale imitation of Morgoth, he is the last Big Bad of the world. LOTR is written as taking place at the "edge of history" of our own world, when magic fades and things begin to resemble the gritty realism of the known world.
'The world isn't split into good people and death eaters. We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the path we choose to act on' - Sirius Black, Order of the Phoenix. 'It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are. Far more than our abilities' - Albus Dumbledore, Chamber of Secrets.
*Martin:* I'm the biggest Lord of the Rings fan in the world. *King:* Me too. *Martin:* Yeah... Lmao, he knows he doesn't even need to argue 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 Edit: "The Throne's Games" He did that on purpose because Martin forgot the name of N. 🤣
Evil is both internal and external. We each struggle with it, but we are shaped by our environments and victimization. The hurt lashes out, the abused becomes the abuser, etc. Evil perpetuates itself in cycles.
Just listening to them talk, especially during the Lovecraftian discussion: The reason GRRM takes so long to write is the same reason he expounds a lot on concepts, whereas SK obviously understands the same concepts but has a very laissez-faire, devil-may-care simplicity to his responses; it's all very organic to SK, so I have no doubt that he just "runs with it".
Unstoppable writing force vs immovable writing object
Facts
Who is who?
Shining I don’t think you need to ask that question
@@sar0jam no seriously who's who?
@@luciferparker5063 King is the unstoppable writing force Martin is immovable writing object
"The battle for good and evil is waged within the individual human heart."
I cannot think of anyone who would agree with you more than Tolkien.
Matthew Sawczyn I know that was a bizarre misunderstanding of LOTR. LOTR is an allegory on the Christian narrative and each character conveys an aspect of that narrative. Gollums transition to smeagle and Frodos resistance of greed is a perfect example of the battle of good and evil waged in the heart and how Jesus was the only one who truly won it and won it for the rest of humanity
There's an entire Wikipedia page devoted to this: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_in_Middle-earth#:~:text=Tolkien%20was%20a%20devout%20Roman%20Catholic.&text=Tolkien%20said%20%22Of%20course%20God,%22The%20one%2C%20of%20course!
BK has the right of it.
Yeah, that's definitely true. I mean, the battle is still going on in the hearts of say, Aragorn or Faramir or even Gandalf/Galadriel, but they have enough virtue to overcome it. It's not like they're robots or aren't tempted... they just choose the good consistently. Which ends up looking black/white, even if the getting there isn't.
@B K What I found compelling about Martin's writing is how he made me change my mind about so many characters. Jaime Lannister is a perfect example. I started off despising him but after a couple books I'm really hoping he does manage to redeem his honor. Or Theon Greyjoy, how I thought he deserved any punishment imaginable, then end up pitying him after he gets it.
Matthew Sawczyn that's only partially true. In LOTR the only time we see people struggle with dark thoughts or impulses is after they come into contact with the stories devil figure in Sauron or extensions of him like the one ring. Hence the whole thing about externalised evil. Any internal struggle comes as result of coming into contact with evil incarnate which coaxed it out of them. Internal conflict never has an internal source.
“People like to invent monsters and monstrosities. Then they seem less monstrous themselves. When they get blind-drunk, cheat, steal, beat their wives, starve an old woman, when they kill a trapped fox with an axe or riddle the last existing unicorn with arrows, they like to think that the Bane entering cottages at daybreak is more monstrous than they are. They feel better then. They find it easier to live."
-- Geralt,The Witcher "The Last Wish"
👏👏👏👏👏
"Many a anti-fascist conduct their love life like they're invading Poland." - W.H. Auden
@@contactkeithstack I agree, but this doesn't seem like the right place for that discussion.
I love that book
"Why do they blame me for all their little failings? They use my name as if I spent my entire days sitting on their shoulders, forcing them to commit acts they would otherwise find repulsive. 'The devil made me do it.' I have never made one of them do anything. Never. They live their own tiny lives. I do not live their lives for them." Lucifer in Sandman
That awkward moment when George RR Martin knows more about Stephen King’s books than Stephan King.
Who is Stephan King? ;)
Yeah, that is the way it seemed to me too
To be fair Stephen was high and drunk while writing a portion of his stories lol
That awkward moment when people realize the author of a bunch of pulp bullshit was too high/drunk to even remember writing a bunch of his novels! Is he a genius, or are a bunch of English-speakers easily-entertained morons?
@@Oleander410 inarguably its both.
We're lucky to be alive in a time where both of these legends co-existed at the same time. I can listen to these two talk forever.
Wait .. you're not comparing Martin to King...? Martin wrote ONE series ... King has written 56 novels and 6 collections of short stories.
@@Nautilus1972 martin did not write one series, he's written many others. Don't discount martin purely off of kings success.
@@Nautilus1972 Stephen king is meh
@@Nautilus1972 quality > quantity buddy
GRRM: ...I'm the biggest Tolkien Fan out there!
SK: ME TOO!
GRRM: ...YeAh
there was actually an awkward pause there LOL
There's an authors message at the start of latter editions of Dark Tower which discusses King's fondness for Tolkien, plus I believe he said the Stand was his attempt at grand good vs evil fantasy “Only instead of a hobbit, my hero was a Texan named Stu Redman, and instead of a Dark Lord, my villain was a ruthless drifter and supernatural madman named Randall Flagg. The land of Mordor ("where the shadows lie, according to Tolkien) was played by Las Vegas.”
Yeah, don't read too much into it. They're both a bit odd, no put-downs going on.
What are they going to do? Have a trial by combat to see who's the biggest fan?
Stephen Colbert is also...
Stephen king's voice is nice and calming. But his books are not.
Stephen King sounds like my grandma.
Kind of Ronald Reaganish
Some are! "Later" & "Elevation" were pretty calming.
His books are so definitely not...
Lol.
To have a man like Stephen king say “I’m a big fan of yours”, your life is now complete
GRRM just spoiled all of King's books. This guy is dangerous.
Riiight..
“So in your first five novels, when ****** killed **** in the first one, and the whole thing was ***** in the second, and the third isn’t really about the superflu it’s about the end where ********
Cmon now George..... lol
Well King spoiled "Carry" at the 20th page of "Carry" :D
sending misery to a writer is the best joke/threat I've heard this week. 😂
Don't get it, can you explain it please
@Lord Manhammer not sarcastic, just forgetful😅 oh yeah i remember that movie! Didn't knew it was also a book
agustin venegas it was based on a book that Steven King wrote... you know the guy on the left in this video..
@@agustinvenegas5238 The plot of the book is about an insane fan of a writer who kidnaps the writer and tortures them. So a fan sending a copy of that book to a writer is scary as hell.
“The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either -- but right through every human heart -- and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained” ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956
"The battle for good and evil is waged within the individual human heart."
I think this is a quote of Alexander Solzhenitsyn from "The Gulag Archipelago".
niggaz be bitin'
nice
Neil Vanderveen it is 👍🏼
Read Crime and Punishment
These guys must have been massive day dreamers growing up
Bet they still are
Yep. That’s usually how it goes. Hell, I know that George got the idea for the Night’s Watch and The Wall just because he was daydreaming on top of Hadrian’s Wall when he once visited there.
Sad how this world tries to stomp out daydreaming eh
@@jaydee9262
Maybe, but it cannot be get rid off. People naturally spend a huge amount of time in the landscape of their mind.
Kind of a prerequisite for writing fiction. I write terrible amateur fiction because I work a boring job that requires very little of me mentally so I spend ten hours a day making things up and when I get home I pass time trying to organize it.
I think the two most complex/grey characters Martin has created is Jaime Lannister and Theon Greyjoy, neither hero or villain just 2 conflicted individuals with their own motivations and demons to struggle with, you know the writing is brilliant when he can make you completely despise a character then sympathize/root for them later on in the story!
They're fantastic characters. I would add the Hound to that list. I also like his grey-toned white/black characters. Ned for example is white, and so is Jon (sort of representing Ned's spiritual successor, as did Robb). But they make the _wrong_ decisions at times due to their moral compulsions. And then you want to strangle them for it. White characters doing wrong things, or black characters doing right things-e.g., Littlefinger always has a selfish agenda, except sometimes it aligns with a good outcome, like helping Sansa-are as equally interesting as gray characters to me. They provide a similar tension in how the reader judges them. And then there's the third class, the failed white/black characters. Brienne for example being borishly good in any other story, but remaining interesting by virtue of her constant failures, a good character made compelling by being assaulted with a bad circumstance to test them. The best is when these third class characters succumb to their struggles and show signs of switching alignment in order to achieve their highest priority ideal.
Blaisem interesting. I would conjecture the hound is a character who sees himself as evil, but ends up doing good things-sometimes. I think this sets him apart as almost every character sees themselves as the good guy, but if you think about there actions they are very morally bad people, at least by our standards. I think Robert alludes to this when he talks about Ned (was it Robert, I don’t remember) being nothing more than a killer. I’m curious if the hound believes himself to be evil living in an evil world.
@@Blaisem I thought Brianne had a pretty obvious flaw of being very self-righteous and judgemental which was most visible when she interracted with Jaime for a while in the beginning.
neither character in the song of ice of fire are neither hero or villain,the closest thing to both are ned and jon for hero and joffrey and ramsay for villain,each character have their own motivations and demons,thats way this series is so fucking good,but in terms of grey characters,yeah theon and jaime are the best,i hate them in cok and got and now i love them
Even Tywin’s actions are justifiable.
SK: ...the thrones games
GRRM: AM I A JOKE TO YOU
Stephen King and Geaorge RR Martin talking together makes me giddy!
Love George's lil spandex with the skull and crossbones design, very fitting.
The subtle shade is subtle but there
"You ripped off Lovecraft and you know it"
"I don't even know the title of your thrones game shit"
Lol Martin did not throw shade with that. He said he’s a fan of Lovecraft and that King probably is too with some references. Martin has expressed multiple times that he himself has several book references in his own.
I saw it as more of a friendly banter between the two. Same with the "hard name to remember". Also, King was defending Martin at the end with his remarks about spoilers.
I'm with you in general. Doesn't seem like these guys actually like each other.
@@charlesbirdsong6782 yeah King’s a big fan of the Lovecraft
Grey is always better than black/white. It makes more interesting stories in movies, novels, comics etc.
this is an unpopular opinion, but if i like a gray character depends on their specific flaws and if it's not a good one, i prefer purely white (morally of course).
Talking in certainties isn't good for stuff like this.
The 80's Wolf Not always. Different moralities have their places in fiction. Some stories are good with on,y bad characters. Sometimes black and white morality works too
Black, White, Grey....etc.. we need to move on. We’ve only begun to write.
I'm a huge fan of ASOIAF, so grey characters are much more truthful to our real lives, but damn if Lovecraft didnt create some of the most horrifying "darkness" in literature. The thing I find fascinating about Eldritch horror, isnt that the beings are "evil", its that they are so foreign and inconceivable to man's mind and understanding of the world, that it causes madness even being exposed to it, and the madness in humans causes the evil things to happen. That is some fucked up shit.
Two geniuses walk into a bar and the rest is history
George just spent 4 minutes of this just telling Stephen King how good he was.
I love the way King rambles. He's a cool dude and I'd love to share a drink with him and Martin and just talk about fiction.
George seems like a huge King-Fanboy 😅
*George RR Martin:* Carrie, The Mist, The Dome...
*Stephen King:* Thrones Games
*George RR Martin:* 🤨
LOL
"Rosebud is the sled" deserved more than it got.
George is humorous but subtle which add spice to the jest, eloquent but relatable, philsophical then explanatory in his interviews...and I knew he is always going to be the bigger person when he is grouped with his colleagues....
Interesting. I agree with GRRM that in real life we’re all a mix of black and white, and some of his best characters, like Jaime Lannister and Joshua York, embody this perfectly. Yet he’s also given us some of the blackest hearts in all of fiction.
but I but agree that that Tolkiens books is black and white that his own. Bilbo steals the ring and lies to his that he has it. The dwarves are not all good neither are the elf king. Boromir and Gollum both has good and evil in them. The orc are all evil but there are also all evil beings in Martins books like the White Walkers and Ramsay Snow.
People don't get why people seem like pure evil in A Song of Ice and Fire. Tommen was treated as unimportant by Joffrey and Cersei, that's why he's so weak-willed. Joffrey is a piece of shit but Martin makes him gray because you can see *why* he's such a piece of shit, his mother manipulated him his whole life (unlike his siblings), his father was ashamed of him and he wanted to be what he considered to be a good king. Boltons are sociopaths (who mostly are just born that way) and there're good Freys, the bad ones have a reason as well: they were always being made fun of because they didn't help House Tully until they had a clear chance.
Munzur there isn't such thing like being born evil in real life also review your principles the characters you mentioned are pieces of shit there is nothing to justify their behaviour though martin is at fault here because of his nihilism and lack of believe
@@sortehuseAre we really sure that the others are evil?
@@balabanasireti Joffrey was a sadist early on though. I think he cut a pregnant cat open or something like that as a young kid (which is when Robbert completely distanced from him) Pretty sure part of why he's so messed up is because of genetics, because of being at least second generation inbred and/or getting Cersei's terrible temper. He drew the short straw on genetics compared to his sibblings plus had much more expectations and attention on him as the firstborn.
It’s interesting that King said you can’t spoil a book cause it’s a story. It’s an entire experience. The book isn’t just one surprise that can be ruined. That’s actually a very writer thing to say. We as readers and not writers, would never think that way. We think of it as a present with part of the wrapping paper torn. If we can see part of the present, not only is the surprise ruined, but in some ways the entire present is ruined because we consider the surprise of what the present is as part of the gift. King is thinking about it as this eternal gift that you’ll have forever. We think of it as a gift for today and today only. This is why we want the next book so bad. We want to feel that surprise again. And this is why the great writers don’t pump them out when they’re not ready, because they think of it as an eternal gift that should last a lifetime.
''The line between good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.'' - Alexandr Solzhenitsyn.
Evil came on Arda from Melkor, but the evil itself was a different kind of Music. It is about black and white, but its also about that both good and evil are present in everyone, and all strugle between those two sides. Martin and Tolkien are a lot more similar than he thinks. And yeah, noone said that orcs are irredimable. And he probably could not remember Silmarillion, with all of elves killing their brothers, hate on Valar, elf pride and ignorence and clearly no-saint humans. Not enough death? Feanor - dead. Tingol - dead. Boromir - dead. Fingolfin - Dead. Companions of Beren - Tortured and killed by werewolf. A lot of elves - killed by brothers and destroyed in wars. Sons of Feanor - cursed and killed. Dwarf kings - dead. Numenor - fucking drowned in ocean by Eru.
thank you, someone else in the comments who understands tolkien
What I like is seeing a black/white scenario in the beginning but the white becomes more and more grey overtime in order to defeat the black. It shows something of a loss of innocence and the discovery for the hero that they’ll need to cross some of their own lines for the sake of those they care about.
Bad moral here stay away from me
Ever read Watchmen?
Martin is far more philosofical than King, the way he speaks and how he explained it 👌🏻
Naah, he just didn't let King speak (or so it seemed from this clip). What King says is just as profound.
@@monmothma3358 naaaah you didn't pat attention I see
@@monmothma3358 No, Martin absolutely lets King speak he just doesn't say much of value. I find King is very down to earth person who rarely gets as philosophical as Martin when speaking. He seems to save a lot of that for his writing.
King is a realist. Martin is a fantasist. You can tell because Martin is extremely obsessed with religion
@@fatfrankthepeteacher4237 wtf are you talking about??
I can see exactly what George is saying about good and evil. It’s very simple in LOTR who is good and who is evil, for the most part. We’ve grown to understand the nuances between each, but a part of us still desires a world where the good is GOOD and the evil is EVIL. It’s very clear and easy to understand. There’s a lesson to learn from those stories, the same as a lesson to learn from more nuanced stories.
But I think it is easier for people to identify with the experiences and struggles of the “good guy” than it is to follow the path of multiple characters who equivocate between good and evil. We want to be inspired and driven to do good, and fictional stories provide us with those examples. Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, the original Star Wars trilogy (which turns everything on its head at the very end).
There’s a difference between a realistic story and a story that we want to be realistic. It’s a fine line and the best writers know how to straddle it.
This is part of why the Star Wars prequels were disliked at the time they came out. The execution was subpar, but the story was fascinating. And it painted our heroes as more “gray” than the black and white we were used to in the original trilogy.
Two great masters of writing
George: This brief spot-on analysis of one of your books/characters in which I will read into the heart of the human condition, mythos, and conflict
Stephen: Oh he yeah haha totally yeah huh....
6:09 Thank you, Steven King! How many times have I read and reread both your's and GRRM's books! Not a one has ever been spoiled.
Well in Tolkien I remember ONE Orc (Uruk) who showed redeeming qualities, and that was Ugluk. I was fascinated by him because he seemed to have some sense of a code, and also seemed to exercise more self-control than the others.
We are so fortunate to have this discussion between two legendary writers. Everyone needs to cherish this!
“Rosebud is the sled.”
Savage.
Did King really call it the Thrones Game? lol
Throne Games works because multiple people compete for the thone and you can call it like that reffering to it as an event or competition and Game of Thrones the book/series name.
@@sechmascm Tower Dark Series
game of thrones = thrones game so it's correct.
kevnar the thrones games
When your steven king you can say whatever you want about other writers
Needful Things was one of his best Lovecraftian examples.
Stephen King is so funny! His sense of humor is crazy.
George asked Stephen if his father inspired him to become a writer or something and Stephen replied with " nah my father didn't do much of an thing. He walked out on my mother when I was a young child. He said he was going out for some cigarettes and never came back. They must've been some rare brand because he's still searching"
@@Spongebrain97 lol, I'm guilty that I cracked up at this
“Ya the most is going to be a show I think it’ll be good” haha
Never realized just how smart George is like Jesus Christ this guy knows so much shit.
He does not realize the Silmarillion has nuanced and morally gray characters like Feanor and his sons.
I love these two, very complimentary attributes
"You can't spoil a book!" Wisest words on books have never been said! People who read books only for the reveal at the end (when the book has that, read The Scarlet Letter and then tell me what was the big reveal that the author didn't spoil on page 5, please!) are missing out on so much I can't even say!
Ignorance propels stupidity and vice versa. Maybe their schools and teachers failed to teach them anything about the existing literary devices? Maybe their parents didn't care to tell them, or they were uneducated themselves? Maybe, even, they're too lazy to learn it on their own? Whatever it may be, the world needs the unwitty. Idiots are God's creatures too, and we need to love them regardless of the dangers brought by their stupidity.
I like how they basically talks about each other's books more then asking about them.
Two masters of storytelling.
Needful things imo is a perfect example of the real world “evil”. We are all capable of it and even willing to do it depending on what our greatest desires are.
It's insane how many books Stephen has written.
Stephen King and George rr Martin should both write a horror, and fantasy book series.
Would have never imagined these two being so cordial, happy surprise.
I loved the movie version of The Mist. Strangely, when I first read it, I pictured Laurie Holden as Amanda Dumfries. Lo and behold, it came to be!
George really makes a good point here, I’m a huge fan of supernatural/magic/whimsical themes in stories and I am not well read on Stephen King but even just seeing the movies like Stand By Me, The Shining and IT, my favorite aspect is the unsettling ability of the human characters to be scarier and more villainous than some monster under the bed.
SPOILERS FOR THE DARK TOWER
I really like how anticlimactic the Crimson King was. We went through this whole journey with Roland's Ka Tet and in the end the ultimate evil is a crazy screaming old man on a balcony. For me it works with King's philosophy on endings in that it was never about fighting this ultimate, external evil. The meat of the story was the journey itself.
its kind of what i like About Roland from the Dark Tower he's the protagonist has a moral code BUT will cross that line if it means getting closer to the Tower and the idea that no matter how many times he goes through the loop he still has trouble learning that his ultimate goal will fail because he will always doggedly pursue it
Great👍👏 video👍🔥🔥
0:15
GRRM: There can only be one!
SK: ...
GRRM: I don’t suppose you’re going to a wedding any time soon?
It's awesome the R.R is such a great writer but it's even better that he's a voracious reader as well
6:15 thank you so much for this
Sk kinda reminds me of Hosea Mathews from RDR2 from the way he talks and looks, so similar.
I would never have thought that on my own but wow I agree
Man, I really want to watch this entire thing.
Love Gestapo its still on CZcams
czcams.com/video/v_PBqSPNTfg/video.html
Both are equally intruiging. To an extent, evil can be externalised, and sometimes the greatest evil is in the human hearts. The choice to choose whether or not to act in the best or worst interests does come down to the will of the individuals. Just in from a storytelling standpoint, I find both equally engaging and enthralling.
The effect an 'elite' which has infested a government, media, police and financial services has on the general population, that is external evil, people choosing to conform. Of course there is also evil within the individual human heart as there is good, the thing with evil is only a true solipsist, a narcissist can be untouched by others words, while a good person can withstand anything.
I believe outside evil gives us promptings, but humans choose it. Outside evil is not really effective, but good and evil are indeed "waged within the individual human heart"
This video should have Millions of Views......
4:15 Awesome reaction ! Having recently read all 5 published books of the Song of Ice and Fire series, I want Roland of Gilead to stay in the books. The Game of Thrones show is pretty good, but terrible when compared to the books, and I don’t want that to happen to Roland & his ka-tet
I read the A Song Of Ice And Fire books first and watched the show afterwards. It all depends on expectations. I wanted to experience the story in written form because I knew the show could not keep up with the books in that regard. And then I watched the show and I was really looking forward to how the actors bring the characters to life, how the Directors of Photography, the Special Effects guys, the CGI department and everyone else bring the world to the screen. And with that they did an amazing job, in my opinion.
And as a bonus, I got a few really nice extra scenes that could not be in the books due to point of view restrictions.
I would watch an adaptation of the Dark Tower series if it had a similar budget and great cast, but nothing half-hearted. In the latter case I would rather keep faith with the written version.
I disagree. I think the show is better than the books. Yes, I do enjoy some of the extra detail in the books regarding character history etc... but Martin rambles on about nothing for far too long in the books. He's not Joseph Conrad and his books aren't heart of darkness. Also, I really really don't like the "perspective" writing style. I know everyone thinks that's all very clever, but I just find it distracting. I much prefer the way the show presents the story. We understand the character's view points from the excellent dialog and a shared history of them dealing with all these issues. Something to me that doesn't come across as well in the books.
But whatever...I get that the book readers will always have their bias against the show. I had no dog in the fight because I came to the books at the same time as the show.
I do think the books are going to follow a story line with Tyrion, that I believe the show was thinking of doing but then changed their minds on due to time restrictions with wanting to finish the series. I could be wrong but if he does write it like that it's going to be cool.
In the end, I like the fact that the show took it's direction and George will take his, and overall it will be the same thing, just arrived at differently.
Yeah, the dark tower film was so bad, it didn't deserve to be capitalized in this sentence.
Martin could just hire King to finish "A Song of Ice and Fire". At least the parts Martin perhaps find less enjoyable writing. He'd make a massive profit and could do something less demanding with his time. But then again, perhaps it would be better to hire younger people, potentially with a long career ahead of them in writing and to whom the publicity alone would be exceptionally valuable.
Two fantastic authors.
The package arriving w a copy of misery to GRRM 😱 I can just hear the person saying - “finish the books or else!” 🤣
I love how Berserk approached evil.
I don't think GRRM gives Tolkien enough credit in regard to gray characters. Boromir is definitely gray. Gollum is gray. Heck, even Gandalf himself is morally gray as he forces and coerces a hobbit into "adventures" without guaranteeing their well being.
Tolkien himself was never fully sure on what to do with the orcs, the idea of a race of people who are inherently evil troubled him immensely, and he didn't like the idea. But if there were good orcs, that might make the heroes of the story somewhat less good and noble
Legend has it that each cross bones on grr martins straps represents each lovable character he killed in got
GRRM discusses the very nature of good and evil within each of us, King's response "I have a new TV show coming out".
I love the way George always says "an bydaway..." 2:30
"I hate this thing about spoilers wah wah wah"
YES!!!!! YES!!!! YESSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!111one
When I was about eight years old, I read a MAD Magazine parody of (the real) RoboCop that gave away all of the major plot points. I mean ALL of them. The way Murphy dies, the way he is reborn as the titular superhero, his initial successes in stopping crimes, even the big twist after arresting Boddicker. About the only thing MAD did NOT give away was the final line.
And when I got sick, diagnosed with diabetes, and allowed to watch the thing on VHS a year later (in 1988), the nine year old me was absolutely fukking blown away. Open-mouthed with amazement. To this day, I still proclaim it the greatest film ever. You know why?
1) Paul Verhoeven is among the greatest directors who ever lived. Ever.
2) Ed Neumeier and Michael Miner hit it out of the park with the script.
3) Everyone else involved in the film gave 1000 percent with their elements. Even the guy doing the drunken slurred speech just before RoboCop enters the precinct for the first time is clearly right into it.
Put simply, RoboCop had more in its toolbox than just surprise. And it is far from the only example. Instant Family has Isabela Moner acting rings around most of the adult cast. The real Total Recall had Arnold Schwarzenegger and Michael Ironside competing to see who could pull the most frightening angry poses. And so forth.
If surprise is the only element you have to hook your audience, that means your creative work is SHIT.
I hope one day Stephen repeats that last sentence to an audience, because the world nears to hear it.
The fact that one person liked your post shows no one cares
I could listen to them talk for hours
Everyone loves a story of Good v.s. Evil, but they are ultimately stories for children.
The next level is people doing good and evil deeds in accordance with their beliefs/principles and desires/ambitions, the world that we know.
Perhaps you wouldn't do what a certain character does in a certain situation, but you can understand it.
A really good story is one that makes you question your own beliefs on what good and evil even are.
Most of Tolkien evil figures where good and magnificent guys in the beginning but GRR Martin can't know this if he never read the Silmarilion. The orcs are tortured elves, they can't redeem themselves they are too much corrupted, same for Sauron. He had several opportunities to redeem himself but he always chose the bad side willingly because he is so power hungry. Tolkien despised power hungry people, that is why he portrayed Boromir has fool when he advised to use the ring against Sauron. You can only be corrupted by power in the eyes of Tolkien and refusing to use power is the real fight against evil for Tolkien. Hobbits are selfish, self-absorbed people, proud people, they would not fit in our global world but they are good people in the eyes of Tolkien because they chose to not go after power by refusing to get involved with the matters of the world. However you can't always do that, sometime you need to get involved and that might burn you even if you resist the temptation of power, this is the story of Frodon
Totally agree with King about spoilers. Ultimately you're reading the book or watching the series to enjoy the journey itself. Otherwise you can just skim the cliff notes :)
George R. R. Martin was saying one sentence and King needed 4 minutes to repeat all
But he didn't give a aswer to the question about good and evil that Martin didn't mentioned.
Every villain is a hero in his own story
One word...... ("yes")
Much love
Jesus. Such great convo
George has written so many characters I don’t know if I like for example Jamie, the hound, John snow. They all have done bad things but some have good in there hearts. This interview shows my two favourite authors just chatting. PS Annie Wilkes would get George writing faster 😂😂
Both RR and tolkien have both internal and external sources of evil. Georges sauron is the white walkers, and Tolkiens internal struggle would be shown in characters like Boromir.
"Evil comes from Sauron, or Morgoth from before, and there are orcs which are irredeemable, against the good people... the battle of good and evil is waged in the individual heart."
If only Tolkien had some grey characters,(the elves of valinor left the land which was for them, in rebellion of their god, and fought wars between one another, same with the line of numenor who rebelled against god, and worshiped Morgoth, engaging in brutal acts, and human sacrifice to achieve immortality) and if there was a ring object of some kind that brought the worst out in people, and this evil is so bad, it corrupts the main character by the end preventing its destruction, except for the fact that the evil was ultimately self-destructive.
If only Tolkien didn't have this narrow view of good and evil, if he had included these plotlines of men and elves committing evil deeds, and this ring that corrupts people's hearts, would have made for an interesting story.
“Rosebud is the sled” why didn’t anyone laughed at that. Fucking hilarious
know what evil is? it's making us WAIT EIGHT FUCKING YEARS FOR ANOTHER BOOK
SK: I hate when people make a big deal outta spoilers.
GRRM: Rhaegar and Lyanna are Jon Snow's parents.
Good stuff. Hope King could teach his writing productivity to GRRM lol
yes like getting high when writing
have you read game of thrones?
Nobody laughed, but when Martin said nonchalantly, “Rosebud is the sled”, I started dying.
Martin doesn't Tolkien well enough, at least not as well enough as he thinks he does. In Tolkien, evil is externalized only in the beginning. But through time, it seeps to the roots of everything so much that Tolkien comments it would not be possible to remove the evil of Morgoth from the world without destroying everything. Sauron is of course the metaphor for evil personified. Although a pale imitation of Morgoth, he is the last Big Bad of the world. LOTR is written as taking place at the "edge of history" of our own world, when magic fades and things begin to resemble the gritty realism of the known world.
'The world isn't split into good people and death eaters. We've all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the path we choose to act on' - Sirius Black, Order of the Phoenix.
'It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are. Far more than our abilities' - Albus Dumbledore, Chamber of Secrets.
love the dark tower ice n fire best books
He doesn't understand Tolkens view on evil then.
King is super weird, I love it. I live a town over from him, he owns a radio station that plays rock
The ending of the novel Revival freaked me out more so then most of King’s books.
*Martin:* I'm the biggest Lord of the Rings fan in the world.
*King:* Me too.
*Martin:* Yeah...
Lmao, he knows he doesn't even need to argue 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Edit:
"The Throne's Games"
He did that on purpose because Martin forgot the name of N. 🤣
Evil is both internal and external. We each struggle with it, but we are shaped by our environments and victimization. The hurt lashes out, the abused becomes the abuser, etc.
Evil perpetuates itself in cycles.
It would’ve been awesome if Kathy Bates snuck up on George in the middle of this interview 😂
Just listening to them talk, especially during the Lovecraftian discussion: The reason GRRM takes so long to write is the same reason he expounds a lot on concepts, whereas SK obviously understands the same concepts but has a very laissez-faire, devil-may-care simplicity to his responses; it's all very organic to SK, so I have no doubt that he just "runs with it".