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George R. R. Martin Quotes
born 1948 United States
George Raymond Richard Martin (born George Raymond Martin September 20, 1948) is an American novelist and short story writer in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres, a screenwriter, and television producer. He is best known for A Song of Ice and Fire, his international bestselling series of epic fantasy novels that HBO adapted for its dramatic series Game of Thrones.
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There's a beast in every man. And it awakens when you put a sword in his hand.
A woman's life is nine parts mess to one part magic ... and the parts that look like magic often turn out to be the messiest of all.
A Clash of Kings (1998)
They may get invited to the premiere and they come out of the premiere looking like all of their children had just been gassed, with a stunned look on their face because everything has been changed.
If I could pray with my cock I'd be a lot more religious.
Sure. Some of the reviews have been very flattering, but the series is not finished yet. The end needs to be as strong as the beginning.
Arya watched them die and said nothing. What good did it do you to be brave? ... There were no brave people on that march, only scared and hungry ones.
Children are a battle of a different sort ... A battle without banners or warhorns, but no less fierce ... As hard as birth can be, what comes after is even harder.
A Clash of Kings (1999)
Kings lack the caution of common men.
It doesn't seem to matter what gods you pray to. We all die, in the real world and in fantasy worlds, and if there was some religion where you did not die I suspect that would be, that god would become very popular.
It is the people who speak to me, the men and women who once lived and loved and dreamed and grieved, just as we do.
infinity plus interview (2001)
"Why do you let people call you a dog? You won't let anyone call you a knight."
A Clash of Kings (1999)
I was always intensely Romantic, even when I was too young to understand what that meant.
infinity plus interview (2001)
I'm not an "American First" (and maybe because I read science fiction) I'm a "Terran First". I'm a human being first. And I have this sympathy for other human beings no matter what side of the giant ice wall they happen to be born on.
At Tuscon 43 (2016)
The battle between good and evil is a legitimate theme for a Fantasy (or for any work of fiction, for that matter), but in real life that battle is fought chiefly in the individual human heart.
infinity plus interview (2001)
I suppose I am still a believer in the now unfashionable "heroic" school, which says that history is shaped by individual men and women and the choices that they make, by deeds glorious and terrible.
infinity plus interview (2001)
I hear you jeering. Pfui. Those of you who know my work only from A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE may not be aware that I was once considered the most romantic science fiction writer of the 70s, back when I was doing my Thousand Worlds stuff.
I've been killing characters my entire career, maybe I'm just a bloody minded bastard, I don't know, [but] when my characters are in danger, I want you to be afraid to turn the page (and to do that) you need to show right from the beginning that you're playing for keeps.
"Ah, but when the Queen proclaims one king and the Hand another, whose peace do they protect?" Lord Petyr flicked at the dagger with his finger, setting it spinning in place. When at last it slowed to a stop, the blade pointed at Littlefinger. "Why, there's your answer. They follow the man who pays them."
My reading of history has shown me that simply 'being a good man' is not enough. That there are many kings who are good men and yet bad kings. And even good kings sometimes make disastrous decisions. So government is complex, politics is complex.
As a writer, my goal, (which I'm never going to achieve, and I know that, and no writer can achieve that,) but my goal is to make you almost live the books... I want you to fall through that page and feel as if these things are happening to you.
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