Masculinity In A Song Of Ice And Fire

Chapter Three | Masculinity and the Impact of War on Bodies and Minds
“Even if the boy does live, he’ll be a cripple. Worse than a cripple. A grotesque. Give me a good clean death.” The “instead” that follows Jaime’s statement in the first book of the A Song of Ice and Fire series is silent, but strongly implied. His younger brother Tyrion, the dwarf, disagrees: “Speaking for the grotesques [...] I beg to differ. Death is so terribly final, while life is full of possibilities.” Within these two lines, multiple issues arise, most importantly as far as this text is concerned, the links between the construction of masculine identity and the idea of bodily wholeness. From the very start of the series, Martin calls upon a fairly traditional binary

Jaime and Tyrion provide an excellent example for a discussion of how bodily wholeness relates to perceived masculinity, and the role that masculinity plays in warfare. Though in the first book it appears as if Martin has framed the concept of masculinity within its most familiar paradigm--i.e., Jaime of the normative male body and profession as compared to Tyrion of the non-normative male body and profession--the author slowly but skillfully engineers a reversal of fortunes for both characters, at least in terms of their bodily experience. Ser Jaime is captured, held prisoner, and loses his sword hand, a part of his body inherent in his ability to achieve prowess and honor. Tyrion, on the other hand, is captured, effects his own release, administrates the kingdom as King Joffrey’s Hand, and leads knights and mercenaries into battle. Through these characters, this chapter explores the three related concepts of war, masculinity, and military-related injury; how they are interrelated and interdependent. In it, I focus foremost on the character of Jaime Lannister, knight of the Kingsguard and acknowledged as one of the best fighters in the land of Westeros and seek to engage in a discussion of the effects that war and combat can have on the body and mind of the soldier, what sorts of scars and wounds are inflicted, and the consequences

To that effect, Paul Longmore has suggested that “the goal of warfare is not framed solely in terms of killing the enemy. The purpose is to ‘disable’ the enemy, with the implicit message that disablement, whether interpreted literally or metaphorically, is equivalent to defeat or to being rendered powerless.” Perhaps, to build upon both Scarry and Longmore, it would be accurate to suggest that the main purpose and outcome of war is the creation of disabled bodies. And in terms of the recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, this certainly seems to be the case. The Department of Defense reports over 50,000 members of the Armed Forces have been wounded in action, while just under 7,000 have been killed in the Afghanistan and Iraq war zones. These numbers come from a Congressional research report last updated in February of 2014. However, as of December 2012, the Department of Veterans Affairs reported that the number of service men and women who had sought treatment from them “since returning from war zones in Iraq and Afghanistan” was over 900,000. At the time, the number of new patients seeking assistance was about 10,000 per month; this continuous rise in usage contributed to administrative issues in serving the large population of veterans in need of care. The