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The Others, also called “white walkers,” symbolize the potentially apocalyptic threat of climate change that humanity faces. The novel opens with a description of the Others killing two Night’s Watchmen, causing another to flee. Because the novel opens with that scene, the threat of the Others hangs over the ensuing political infighting and resultant war in Westeros. The threat the Others pose, the novel thus suggests from the very beginning, is huge—and is perhaps even bigger than any of the novel’s political concerns.
Seasons in Westeros are unpredictable, and the current summer has lasted for close to a decade. The warming temperatures lead some to believe that they are enjoying the Great Summer, an interminable season of warmth supposedly promised by the gods as a reward for universal good human behavior. In contrast to that view—which the novel portrays as willfully naïve—the Starks utter the slogan of their House: “winter is coming.” Winter promises to be cruel and punishing in and of itself, but the presence of the Others makes the impending winter potentially catastrophic because winter will enable the Others to venture beyond the currently colder climes north of the Wall into the territory humans occupy in the south. With that in mind, the literal change in climate in A Game of Thrones (represented by the impending change from summer to winter) portends catastrophic disaster for humanity, symbolizing the threat that climate change poses to humanity in our contemporary moment.
As the threat of the Others increases, the Night’s Watch, which is supposed to guard Westeros against the Others, has been rapidly losing recruits. Its numbers have dwindled from about 5,000 men to 500, and Castle Black (where members of the Night’s Watch live) has fallen into disrepair. People have become so caught up in their lives and conflicts south of the Wall that they have forgotten about the Others. They feel like it’s unimportant to defend against a threat they cannot see and which they don’t believe is real, reflecting contemporary skepticism regarding the danger of climate change and the lack of coordinated global action. As the Others continue to kill people they find, thus increasing their ranks as those people are revivified as Others themselves, the threat they pose to humans only grows. The novel suggests that the Others, and the climate change they represent, pose an existential threat to humanity, and that they could feasibly destroy all of humankind unless people overcome their political and interpersonal conflicts to band together to collectively address that threat.
The Others Quotes in A Game of Thrones
The A Game of Thrones quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Others. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Prologue
Quotes
“It was the cold,” Gared said with iron certainty. “I saw men freeze last winter, and the one before, when I was half a boy. Everyone talks about snows forty foot deep, and how the ice wind comes howling out of the north, but the real enemy is the cold. It steals up on you quieter than Will, and at first you shiver and your teeth chatter and you stamp your feet and dream of mulled wine and nice hot fires. It burns, it does. Nothing burns like the cold. But only for a while. Then it gets inside you and starts to fill you up, and after a while you don’t have the strength to fight it. It’s easier just to sit down or go to sleep. They say you don’t feel any pain toward the end. First you go weak and drowsy, and everything starts to fade, and then it’s like sinking into a sea of warm milk. Peaceful, like.”
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Chapter 1: Bran
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“Robb says the man died bravely, but Jon says he was afraid.”
“What do you think?” his father asked.
Bran thought about it. “Can a man still be brave if he’s afraid?”
“That is the only time a man can be brave,” his father told him.
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Chapter 2: Catelyn
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“Ben writes that the strength of the Night’s Watch is down below a thousand. It’s not only desertions. They are losing men on rangings as well.”
“Is it the wildlings?” [Catelyn] asked.
“Who else?” Ned lifted Ice, looked down the cool steel length of it. “And it will only grow worse. The day may come when I will have no choice but to call the banners and ride north to deal with this King-beyond-the-Wall for good and all.”
“Beyond the Wall?” The thought made Catelyn shudder.
Ned saw the dread on her face. “Mance Rayder is nothing for us to fear.”
“There are darker things beyond the Wall.” She glanced behind her at the heart tree, the pale bark and red eyes, watching, listening, thinking its long slow thoughts.
His smile was gentle. “You listen to too many of Old Nan’s stories. The Others are as dead as the children of the forest, gone eight thousand years. Maester Luwin will tell you they never lived at all. No living man has ever seen one.”
“Until this morning, no living man had ever seen a direwolf either,” Catelyn reminded him.
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Chapter 17: Bran
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North and north and north he looked, to the curtain of light at the end of the world, and then beyond that curtain. He looked deep into the heart of winter, and then he cried out, afraid, and the heat of his tears burned on his cheeks.
Now you know, the crow whispered as it sat on his shoulder. Now you know why you must live.
“Why?” Bran said, not understanding, falling, falling.
Because winter is coming.
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Chapter 22: Arya
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“Let me tell you something about wolves, child. When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Summer is the time for squabbles. In winter, we must protect one another, keep each other warm, share our strengths.”
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Chapter 26: Jon
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Fat and awkward and frightened he might be, but Samwell Tarly was no fool. One night he visited Jon in his cell. “I don’t know what you did,” he said, “but I know you did it.” He looked away shyly. “I’ve never had a friend before.”
“We’re not friends,” Jon said. He put a hand on Sam’s broad shoulder. “We’re brothers.”
And so they were, he thought to himself after Sam had taken his leave. Robb and Bran and Rickon were his father’s sons, and he loved them still, yet Jon knew that he had never truly been one of them. Catelyn Stark had seen to that. The grey walls of Winterfell might still haunt his dreams, but Castle Black was his life now, and his brothers were Sam and Grenn and Halder and Pyp and the other cast-outs who wore the black of the Night’s Watch.
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Chapter 37: Bran
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“Mance be damned,” the big man cursed. “You want to go back there, Osha? More fool you. Think the white walkers will care if you have a hostage?”
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The Others Symbol Timeline in A Game of Thrones
The timeline below shows where the symbol The Others appears in A Game of Thrones. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Prologue
...Will sees a shadow approaching Ser Waymar. The figure, which Will refers to as an Other, is tall and has eyes that are bluer than any human’s. Will sees four more...
(full context)
The Other and Ser Waymar fight. Ser Waymar parries the Other’s attacks but keeps taking steps back....
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Chapter 1: Bran
...enslave and murder others at will. And they kidnap women and sell them to the Others.
(full context)
...says because he was a wildling who would have kidnapped women to sell to the Others. Ned tells Bran that in truth, the man deserted the Night’s Watch. Since he had...
(full context)
Chapter 2: Catelyn
...Wall). Ned says wildlings must be killing those men. Catelyn says it might be the Others. Ned says that Catelyn has been listening to too many stories. Others haven’t existed for...
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Chapter 24: Bran
...crows are liars. She then tells Bran the story of the white walkers, or the Others, who roamed the earth thousands of years ago. They were cold, dead things that felled...
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Chapter 37: Bran
...back beyond the Wall because he doesn’t want to face the “white walkers,” or the Others.
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Chapter 53: Bran
...says they do beyond the Wall. She says there are worse things too, like the Others, or white walkers, who have cold hands and blue eyes. She says that Bran should...
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