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Chapter 61: Daenerys
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
Tyrion eats dinner with Tywin and Tywin’s closest confidants. Tywin proposes that Tyrion and his band of mountain clans serve on the front lines of the upcoming battle with the Stark army. The Stark army is about a day away. Tyrion isn’t happy about being on the front lines, but he reluctantly agrees to command the troop to save face. Tywin says that Tyrion will stay with the mountain clans, but Gregor Clegane will command them. Tyrion returns to his tent angry. Bronn has found a sex worker for him named Shae. Tyrion explains to Shae that he wants her to stay with him for as long as he chooses—it could be a day or a year—and to be his companion in addition to having sex with him.
Tywin displays his tendency to reject and diminish Tyrion. Even though Tyrion succeeded in bringing the mountain clans to the Lannister army and led those mountain clans on a long and potentially perilous journey, now that Tywin is in charge, he immediately relegates Tyrion to a secondary role and elevates Gregor in his place. Gregor’s gargantuan size accentuates the fact that Tywin’s rejection of Tyrion is based on his smaller stature.
Themes
Tyrion wakes in the middle of the night to battle horns. The Stark army marched through the night, taking the Lannister army by surprise. The Stark army will be upon them in about an hour. Tyrion clumsily gets on his armor and stumbles out of his tent. During the battle, Tyrion and the mountain clans fight strongly. Tyrion faces several enemy soldiers himself in close combat. By the end of the fight, about half of the 300 people from mountain clans are dead, but the Lannisters have won the battle.
The Starks attempt to gain an advantage by surprising the Lannisters but still lose the battle. For his part, Tyrion shows that, along with his other skills, he is a formidable fighter despite his father’s repeated dismissal of his worth. The death of people from the mountain clans also shows the high stakes of the conflict between the Lannisters and Starks, as it leaves hundreds (and, ultimately, thousands) of people dead who were not at all involved in the initial conflict.
Themes
Tyrion talks with Tywin after the battle and asks if he and the mountain clans ruined Tywin’s plans. He suspects that Tywin hoped the Stark army would slaughter them all. Tywin says a win is a win. Tyrion was wounded in the battle, and he asks to see a Maester. Tywin’s army also captured several commanders of the Stark army during the battle, but Robb wasn’t among them. Instead, Tywin’s men say, there are reports that Robb is riding south with a battalion toward Riverrun.
The news that Robb is taking a battalion south to Riverrun suggests that Tywin’s victory in battle may have been a tactical, planned defeat on the part of the Starks. That idea reinforces the importance of strategy and ingenuity when playing the “game of thrones,” as a reliance on honor alone is unlikely to deliver victory, whereas ingenuity can provide strategic advantages.
Themes
