I gotta disagree with you assessment of Jamie. He did not join the Kingsguard to be like Arthur Dayne. He did it, so he could keep screwing his sister. Which goes against his oath. Everybody keeps the Kingslaying against him and that’s wrong and all as far as Jaime was concerned… Because he never cared about that oath to begin with. Keeping that in mind killing Aerys is indeed probably the best thing he had done in his life, but either way. Ned saw a man that didn’t give a crap about his oath, even if he didn’t know why he had made the oath at all, as opposed to Ned who is all about honour and stuff. He should dislike him on sight, even if he can’t rightly put it into a words.

Yeah, somebody had to kill the king. But, it may be idealistic to say, not a Kingsguard.

I’m falling on Ned’s side, even if he does have a little irrationality here.

It occurs to me that Jaime has become a stand-in for Ned’s outrage with himself. Ned sees himself, especially after cutting down his own heroes and losing his friends doing so, as a slayer not only of the king but almost of monarchy itself, of order and of the noblesse oblige which allows him to be a feudal lord with a clear conscience. If anyone else had killed Aerys, Ned might still have had doubts about the man’s character, but ultimately would have accepted it was a service to the country and let that be an end to it. He would, in the main, have had to face his recriminations alone. The fact it was a member of the Kingsguard is itself an ugly mark on the rebellion — it makes a mockery of the ToJ, and of the men who died there. It makes Ned a murderer, too, instead of a warrior for a complicated cause, which is the case he’s sold to himself.

All of that is bad enough. But while on the subject of mockery, Jaime then plays about on the throne, as if it were a token of a game instead of the center of responsibility. But instead of dismissing it as the move of a stupid boy in over his head, Ned is able to displace all his discomfort with the cause, and in so doing he inadvertently explodes the event, nailing it down as the final seal on the coffin of the man’s character.

Of course, the fact all that guilt is out-of-step with the supposed nobility of their cause also means that memories of his outrage at Jaime are also counter-intuitively subjects of shame — in addition to which I think he is aware on some level of how silly it sounds. Either way, he cannot bring himself to mention it. But as described above, Ned has been exploding its significance while the interplay of his guilt/outrage maelstrom, left unresolved, grows unabated. So, when the security of the whole realm is at stake, to say nothing of the hereditary title of his own nephew, he faces the risk of confronting (in a very nascent way) his own internal conflict or else letting his king make what he has convinced himself is an awful decision.

He chooses loyalty to crown, unsealing his wound of guilt, only to have his king and once-best friend laugh in his face. On some level, Ned knew he would which, though it should have been mortifying, instead allows him to save face. He doesn’t actually have to probe any deeper and think about his conflict regarding his role in bloody insurrection, he can just brood on how blind his friend is.

As for the line, “how he glittered,” I think the non-Ned-ness just underscores this explanation. Knowing the “offense” is a silly matter, he has to buttress it with some detail of accepted wisdom. Well, it’s known that Jaime is vain and arrogant, and all the “real men” of Westeros loathe him for it. Normally, Ned would not be in the company of the bitchy back-biters who’d try to impugn Jaime’s character simply because he dresses fancy, but he needs so desperately to legitimize his outrage, that he borrows from that tradition, attempts to trade on it with Robert, who is more of that kind.

It’s out of character, which makes it IN character.

I agree that Ned is less rigid, and much like a lot of other people, it is so when it benefits – or rather may cause less harm – him or his family when he even is able to surmise that he even is in danger.

and the comment widget floats new ones to the top of the list on the front page, so yes people see them 🙂

@Elena

You asked several weeks ago if GRRM uses unreliable narrators. I thought this statement of yours was interesting within that context: “So just because Sansa laughed at her sister in front of the princess and got her in trouble doesn’t mean anything about their relationship, except that it’s not artificially nice.” Here’s the excerpt in question (pages 69-70, GoT, American paperback):

“Jon thinks he looks like a girl,” Arya said.

Sansa sighed as she stitched. “Poor Jon,” she said. “He gets jealous because he’s a bastard.”

“He’s our brother,” Arya said, much too loudly. Her voice cut through the afternoon quiet of the tower room.

Septa Mordane raised her eyes. She had a bony face, sharp eyes, and a thin lipless mouth made for frowning. It was frowning now. “What are you talking about, children?”

“Our half brother,” Sansa corrected, soft and precise. She smiled for the septa. “Arya and I were remarking on how pleased we were to have the princess with us today,” she said.

Septa Mordane nodded. “Indeed. A great honor for us all.” Princess Myrcella smiled uncertainly at the compliment. “Arya, why aren’t you at work?” the septa asked. She rose to her feet, starched skirts rustling as she started across the room. “Let me see your stitches.”

Arya wanted to scream. It was just like Sansa to go and attract the septa’s attention. “Here,” she said, surrendering up her work.

The septa examined the fabric. “Arya, Arya, Arya,” she said. “This will not do. This will not do at all.”

Everyone was looking at her. It was too much. Sansa was too well bred to smile at her sister’s disgrace, but Jeyne was smirking on her behalf.

I’d wager that if you asked ten readers to summarize that chapter, the majority of them would have said something similar: Sansa got Arya in trouble and laughed at her. Neither is actually the case, but GRRM frames the events from Arya’s perspective, and that influences how readers remember events.

*Spoilers*

I like Jaime a great deal, but does anybody else find this a tiny bit hypocritical?

SoS, p.508
“Do you think the noble Lord of Winterfell wanted to hear my feeble explanations? Such an honorable man. He only had to look at me to judge me guilty.”

SoS, p.611
He remembered Eddard Stark, riding the length of Aerys’s throne room wrapped in silence. Only his eyes had spoken, cold and grey and full of judgment.

We never actually find out if Ned would have been willing to listen to his “feeble explanations.” Jaime never tried. He only had to look at Ned to judge him guilty of being irrationally judgmental. Ned never even had to say a word. Jaime “knew” just by looking at him.

Kate, I mentioned this in my reply to the comment above, but i think perhaps jaime’s sort of imperviousness to the killing itself might have been part of why ned distrust him. I know ned would have an issue with breakign an oath to protect the king even if jaime felt a strong moral imperative to remove him because he was mad, but i could understand if someone believed that an oath made to a whole man was invalidated when he became someone else. however, i think if that had been the case that jaime would have been somber, maybe even mournful over the necessity of killing a broken man. not, yeah, smirking and dreaming.

i have to confess, i did not pick out my posting avatar, just my commenting one. So i had no idea that’s what it was from, but i expect jay knew that and chose it for that reason.

@ jay – yes no maybe so?

I don’t think my opinion of Robert changed much, but I wasn’t really focusing on him to begin with. I do feel a little sorry for him as a guy who’s been made into something he was never meant to be. Robert would probably have been perfectly happy as a wandering adventurer. Issues of reader sympathy and who’s supposed to be villainous are especially interesting in this series because of the multiple POVs. From Dany’s perspective, Robert the Usurper *is* the villain. But there’s been much more sympathetic focus on Eddard and his family…and so it’s kind of unsettling to find yourself disliking someone Eddard loves.

I agree that Jaime’s choice of seat is a pretty silly thing to judge him over. Maybe it bothers Eddard so much partly because it represents Jaime’s whole blasé attitude toward the killing. The first time we meet Ned, he’s executing an oathbreaker—and that was only a man who ran away from the Wall out of terror. He would probably have expected someone in Jaime’s position to appear somber and remorseful, no matter how justified his act may have been. Instead, here’s this kid lounging about on the dead king’s throne in his fancy armor, making snarky comments and *glittering*, if you can believe it. Eddard must have found that deeply chilling.

By the way, did you know where your profile icon comes from? I assumed it was from a manga at first, but it’s actually one of the Japanese AGOT covers.

While his age constitutes “man” in this setting, I just have a hard time describing that scene as a “man” pondering to be King. I think a boy made a man’s decision and has been reaping the awards and stigma from it since–he was clearly conflicted/confused (if i remember correctly). While the passages revealing his exact line of thinking at the time (or his perhaps skewed reflection on them) I want to say love of family had a lot to do with Jaime’s decision, or at least fear for him. In some ways I view the dillema much like Stannis’s own later revealed question about supporting his brother over the Throne. II do wonder is it the act of killing itself or the betrayal that is the issues because for me clearly he had a good – almost inarguable – reason to betray Aerys, but perhaps he didn’t have to kill him (though there is no way Aerys would be allowed to survive regardless).

Indeed. People do all the time.

This was the Kingsguard, the old Kingsguard, with the White Bull, Barristan the Bold and the Sword of the Morning. And yet, only a 17 year old boy had the courage to do what was needed to save the city and the Kingdom. Not Rhaegar, or Ser Arthur Dayne. All he got for it was a infamous name.
Frankly, I lost all respect for the Kingsguard when they let the King torture his wife without any action, and let Rikard Stark burn. Men who call themselves paragons of virtue do not do these things, nor would they serve a monster like Aerys. And yet, Ned admire these men and hate Jamie…

Don’t forget the whole ‘saving an entire city (over 10,000 people at the least) from burning to the ground in unquenchable flames’ bit.

Hi gecc, thank you to tweak my language there. hate probably is too strong a word, although for me the only people I’ve ever felt I hated had it rooted in the fact that i both despised and mistrusted them… I think i mentioned later that robert should NOT trust the lannisters because they are oathbreakers–so yes the fact that jaime the king’s guard had killed the king was absolutely a reason for ned to never trust him. or robert, in my opinion. but to me if the only reason besides that fact, which robert already knew, that ned had to distrust him further was him sitting on the throne…i just don’t see that as being enough. although I had not really considered that it’s chilling for a 17 year old boy who’s just killed how many men to be that blase about it–very good point from kate below. this is one of the places where i wish martin didn’t paint with such broad strokes…if ned saw something sociopathic in that (vs a young man who’s basking in what he sees as glory) then perhaps it should have been said? lol. but that’s why we have forums like this, isn’t it, to point all these things out to one another? 🙂

My 2 Cents:
Hate is way too strong a word. Deep contempt and complete distrust is much closer to the truth.

My Dad is very much like Ned. A man of Black & White. Like Martin Luther said: “Here I stand, I can do no other.”

For a man like Ned, people are defined by the sides they pick and their steadfastness to that decision. You pick a side and live with the consequences.

Jaime’s sin was not killing the mad king. Jaime’s sin was swearing an OATH to protect the King and THEN killing him. In Ned’s mind, a man is measured by the worth of his word.

Jaime swore an oath and broke his word. How do you measure a man if his word means nothing?
You need to know what is in his heart. And Ned believes that he saw a glimpse of Jaime’s heart when he found him sitting on the throne.

Here’s a man that will lie to your face, who’s word means nothing, and who wonders what it would be like to be a king. Ned cannot believe that Robert would give command of half his armies to such a man. It is not about deeds (good or bad), but about mettle (and in Ned’s eyes, Jaime has none).

Ned slew Ser Arthur Dayne (the Sword of the Morning) in combat, but he would’ve had no qualms in naming Arthur Dayne Warden of the East. Ser Arthur Dayne, was a man of his word.

The test of one’s vows is a recurring theme on these books. And figuring out what is the right decision is never easy when the line between Black and White is not clearly marked.

You can (of course) claim that Ned broke his wedding vows. Who is he to judge? But I believe that in his mind “Love (for others – Not oneself)” makes a difference. Jon Arryn broke with the king out of love for his wards. Robert out of love for Lyanna.

I for one, love these moral quandaries. Much like the scene in the movie “Doubt” between Meryl Streep and the abused? little boy’s mother (Mrs. Miller). Meryl Streep is out to protect the boy by getting him out of the school and “exposing” a child molesting priest ( a clear line it would seem), but then Mrs. Miller’s reply suddenly turns the world upside down for us all.
Or that final decision in “Gone Baby Gone”, where Casey Affleck has to decide whether to return a little girl to her mother or leave her with her abductors (again, a clear line… NOT!).

======= SPOILERS BELOW =========
@Jay

Sadly, I think Ned would’ve still decided to kill Ser Jorah even after learning the reasons why Jorah sold the poachers to the slavers. Perhaps seeing it as love to himself more than to his wife.

Jon Snow breaks his Night Watch vows twice and Robb his vow to wed a Frey as well (but all for the love of another).

And of course, Lyanna knew Ned. And she knew what a PROMISE from Ned entailed. But that as they say, is another story.

That said, I think he understands the decision to continue with taken vows and the value of keeping one’s word, such that Arthur Dayne can remain a great knight despite his defense of the mad king Aerys. The problem is not that Jaime turned, as Robert and Ned themselves turned. The problem is that Jaime turned when it was most advantageous for himself–such that even if he had been in disagreement with the king before, Jaime does not consider how he might help others by acting, he only considers himself.

I fully confess that I am not in disagreement with your reading of Ned’s actions as somewhat problematic, I only want to suggest that Martin’s characterization leaves room to see how Ned could come to this point. It’s damn good writing.

SPOILERS

I think we are basically in agreement and I think Martin in a way exhibits the characteristic in Ned that you imply in this very chapter, not even or just with just Jaime, but with Jorah Mormont. While each reader may perceive the level of reaction different, it is the extremity of the reaction to Mormont that feel that really gets me, not the thought itself.

SPOILERS

I agree with you to a point, Skyweir, but I think Ned is less rigid than you paint him here. If he believed as strongly in the rules he would never have rebelled, yes? He would never have given Cersei the chance to leave the city with her children, he would have acted very differently throughout the books, I would argue.

For my money, the character that represents the limits of acting with regard to the rules is Stannis, and perhaps we might see Robert as the other side of the coin in this regard, acting as he sees fit without concern for consequences. Ned is somewhere in between the two, I would argue; far more rule bound than Robert, far less rigid than Stannis. In truth I think he would make a better king than either of them.

SPOILERS

Which is why I think she loses all the time, because she’s not playing to win anything, she’s just crazy and invents shit. For a female in this setting she is the top of the pole. The Queen, the mother of the King, and later regent. Now before everybody goes crazy on me about that being pretty sorry compared to men who are not her social status THAT is exactly her failure. She was in a position to make change by not being crazy, it became even more evident when she preferred Joff over Tommen who would have allowed her to take a stance and be an example of everything she thought she (woman) were lacking. She had the best family/father to make it happen if she wasn’t a complete psychopath

SPOILERS

I might be biased, since I really can’t stand Ned and holds him responsible for a lot of the problems of the Realm, but I find Jamie to be the wronged party here.
Ned is a classical black and white guy, a deontologist in the worst sense of the word. He dislikes Jamies actions because they go against the RULES, which he holds to be inviolate. Ned would condemn thousands to death because of his rules, and indeed he does so on many occations.
Jamie, on the other hand, saves huge amounts of lives by sacrificing his “honor”. He is a consequetialist. His honor is not worth the life of thousands. Could Ned have made that sacrifice, if he was in Jaimies place. Or could the ever lauded “Sword of the Morning”? I think they would have let the city burn, because of their oath.

When writing this I considered noting the bankrolling of Robert’s lifestyle (it’s noted later how much debt he put the crown in) but I think in this case Robert is rather scaleable. What I mean by that is I don’t think Robert EVER had a problem having a good time and I could easily see him in Storm’s End having a merry old time. I just don’t see Robert as somebody who would suffer drastically by not having the crown’s wealth behind him. For sure, he’d always lived a life of privilege but I just don’t see him being put off by being someone like an Oberyn. While I don’t have the paperwork, I’m sure the Lord of Storm’s End doesn’t have to pinch pennies on drink and food, and I don’t think the position lends itself to being difficult to pull company in bed. I don’t however doubt that the Lannisters themselves kept the flow going for their own ends (looking loyal).

Regarding Jaime, if that is the case then Ned should DESPISE the likes of Arthur Dayne and The White Bull, grown men who knew damn well of Aery’s odd behavior. he should hate Rhaegar for not deposing his father (he may in fact, but we see no indication of it). It is not like Aerys suddenly flipped at that moment with only Jaime there. While I know that in Westeros people have to grow up faster, we are still talking about a teenager, a “boy” as Robert put it. This is not to excuse Jaime, who had certainly proven himself up to the task of making decisions in the heat of battle, but it seems enough where Ned would give him a break and have other shit to worry about. Certainly, I get the “in the moment” knee jerk reaction from Ned, but I mean the guy is bringing it up more than a decade later and it’s a little silly from somebody of Ned’s experiences and responsibilities. We are talking about somebody who is qualified for the position and Ned is bringing up what he did when he was 17. I do get the idea that maybe Jaime didn’t deserve the deathstroke, that maybe Ned felt like it should have been someone who “judged” him, where he felt Jaime killed him out of convenience. Is that possible? If so, he couldn’t have been more wrong, the through not fault of his own. I think I would have been like “damn dude, you alright–let’s get a drink?” The reason why I say this is because what had Jaime done prior to this that was not laudable (that was public knowledge?) that he doesn’t deserve some compassion or benefit of doubt? Wasn’t he knighted by the Sword of the Morning himself?

That said, I have no issue with Ned not liking Jaime, certainly Jaime’s demeanor (and nature) allows for it, but he kind of goes overboard with it. I mean he calls him “Kingslayer” in a manner that I took as negative, but what you’re saying is Ned is fine with it, he should have just done it earlier? It seems like Jaime can’t win because Ned seems to be in love with the rest of Kingsguard who did nothing for years. What about the great Barristan the Bold? He defended Rhaegar – who in some manner started ALL of this – almost to his death and certainly watched Aerys commit heinous acts. In some way, and this is somewhat an excuse, Ned is extending/bridging his last interaction with Jaime with the letter they got from Lysa condemning House Lannister. You can kind of see it in Ned’s head, “I knew it, 15 years ago I saw him sitting on the throne and now they are making their move!”.

Couple of points:

1) Money: Robert loves his parties, and the Lannisters are quite wealthy. Aside from the reasons why he would get into bed with them at the beginning, much of his willingness to slide more power their way is that they are funding the hell out of his enjoyment. I know it’s not the only thing to consider, but I feel we would be remiss in our understanding of the situation if we did not consider this.

2) Family: Jaime’s killing of the king and sitting on the throne is not truly the thing that makes Ned distrust him, its the disgust at the Jaime’s cowardice regarding it. I don’t mean to suggest that he hates Jaime for being a coward and killing an unarmed king–if it came down to it and the king was unarmed in a room with Ned, I suspect the situation would quickly turn into an execution. Instead, I would like to suggest that there is disgust at Jaime’s decision to do this so long after it really means much of anything. The city was taken. The war was over. Now is the time to demonstrate your loyalty? Now is the time to make it a game, to smile at the men who had done the hard work? Now is the time to jest with the man whose family had been killed by the man you had sworn to protect, long after your actions mean anything other than a cynical demonstration that yes, you were on the rebels’ side all along? When if you had really believed you might have killed him long ago and spared these people the pain they suffered?

I am with you in terms of liking Jaime, I confess–but I think I am completely against you in terms of Ned’s ‘letting go’ of his dislike of Jaime. If I were in his position I would never be able to look at Jaime without thinking, “This man watched my family die. This man did not act when they burned and strangled. This man jested over the war, made the question of who should be in power a joke when the decision means so much.”

Ned doesn’t have all the information, surely, but I don’t know if I could let things go, and I am not sure it is reasonable to ask him to do so.

Hi! 😀

Actually, by short time, I mean just a few hapters up. I can’t remember how many, but suffie it to say that you’ll know it when you read it. really, you will. 🙁

Now as to why I initially liked him….well, because of Ned. I was introduced to Ned first, and even through his children I found much to like. Ned’s reaction to the news of Robert’s coming was immediate joy, and so I thought “Oh cool, a best friend!”. Robert greeted Ned warmly, he wanted to pay respects to Ned’s sister. He’d been in love with Ned’s sister! He wanted Ned to help him run the kingdom. So many reasons to see Robert in a positive light! But the more I learned of Robert, the more I began to see him as…gah! How much can I tell you? I’m not really sure, so I’ll stop right here.

But those are my reasons. I understand Ned, and admire and like him. I found I didn’t really understand Robert. Or rather, I did, but didn’t admire him as I initially had.

Oh, just to say, I love Ned, but I also wanted to punch him sometimes!

interesting…would “short time” mean by this point in the story or was it a bit further up? also what was the immediate reason you liked him so much? (you don’t have to expand on what made you realize it wasn’t enough if that’s still to come in the story)
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Yes, my opinion of Robert did change. Drastically. I began to realize that there was a very specific reason I had liked him in the first place, and that reason wasn’t strong enough. I don’t want to give spoilers, so I’ll just say that I began to dislike him after just a short time. Really, a SHORT TIME!! But perhaps this was because my reactions were immediate and visceral…still, no matter the reasons or justifications, my opinion changed radically.

SPOILERS @Jay

“They were lesser players in a game that was beneath them and literally beneath their contempt.”

My reactions to Robert in particular have always been harsh, so I truly love that you gave me perspective with that statement! Robert was a doer, not a thinker, and fighting, drinking, and whoring was the simple life he craved. Lord of Storms End would have been enough for him, I think, and I’ve heard it suggested by others on other websites that maybe Ned SHOULD have grabbed the crown. I remain convinced he would never touch it, though.

As to Ned….so much to think on and respond to! For now I’ll agree that Ned’s reaction to Jaime was just silly. He was sitting there but NOT claiming the throne. Get over it!