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Chapter 22: Arya
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Game of Thrones, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Politics and Power
Climate Change and Collective Action
Gender and Power
Honor and Integrity
Identity
Summary
Analysis
Dany feels sullen in her new life with Khal Drogo. But one night, she has a dream where she stands beside a dragon as it shoots fire from its mouth. After that dream, she feels revitalized. One day, Dany rides her silver horse through the Dothraki plains. When Jorah catches up to her, she says that he should tell the others, including her brother, to stay behind as she rides farther ahead. As she’s riding ahead, Viserys catches up to her and admonishes her for giving him orders. He moves to hit her, but a Dothraki soldier comes up from behind and tears him down from his horse. Dany commands Viserys to walk back to camp alone. A man without a horse is a sign of great shame in Dothraki culture, and Dany wants everyone to see how pitiful Viserys is.
Daenerys and Viserys act as foils for each other. In this case, the novel shows that Viserys has power over Daenerys based solely on the position that the patriarchy has granted him because of his gender. He has no innate leadership qualities, though, whereas Daenerys has already earned enough respect from the Dothraki people that they follow her orders and defend her against him.
Themes
On the ride back, Dany and Jorah talk about Viserys’s claim to the Crown. Jorah tells Dany that he doesn’t think highly of Viserys, and Dany says Viserys will never be king. No one respects him, and he couldn’t command an army even if he had one. That night, Dany talks to her servants about dragons. Two say that there are no more dragons, but another, Doreah, tells Dany the myth that dragons came from the moon. There once were two moons, Doreah says, but one of the moons traveled too close to the sun. The heat cracked it open, and hundreds of dragons came out. One day, she says, the same thing will happen to the other moon. Dany then asks Doreah for advice about having sex with Khal Drogo. Days later, on her 14th birthday, Dany finds out that she is pregnant.
Daenerys directly calls out Viserys’s ineffectuality as a leader. The contrast between Viserys and Daenerys—who is already showing the kind of leadership qualities that her brother lacks—implicitly critiques patriarchal power. In this case, Viserys is the assumed heir to Targaryen power based on his gender, while Daenerys is denied power because of hers. However, the novel portrays Daenerys as a much more capable leader than Viserys, challenging the assumptions of several characters in the novel that men are more suited to power than women.
Themes
