The world of Ice and Fire, created by George R. R. Martin, is vast, consisting of a myriad of characters emerging from different areas in the map of the known world, consisting of the two continents: Westeros and Essos. It is a treat that Martin is able to give a unique personalities, and catchy names to this uncountable number of characters, no matter their importance to the plot. Martin’s skill in crafting minor characters should not be overlooked like his other books that are not Game of Thrones. These seemingly insignificant characters often play important roles in moving the plot forward and adding depth to the story.
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George R. R. Martin describes writing smaller characters
In an interview, Martin was asked a complex question about his writing:
“Your books have a lot of characters that have a lot of potential, but they’re only in books are really short time. I think you know characters like Weasel or the small brown girl Nettles, so I was wondering, when you write characters like these do you have like a backstory in mind, do you know what happens to them in the future, or are they only in your head for the brief time that they’re actually in books”
Martin gave a detailed response to this question related to minor characters.
Martin on creating backstories for minor characters
Regarding the backstory of such a character, Martin said:
“I usually always have a backstory of a minor character now; it might not be a really detailed backstory, you know I’m not saying I could fill up a whole book with the backstory of Weasel, but I kind of know where it came from, and how she got to where she was.
He continued, addressing how he plans the future of the smaller character once they’re not in the plot anymore:
I don’t necessarily know what happened to her after she parts from our characters; that’s another issue. If she comes back to the story and I’ll probably figure out what happened between then and now.”
Martin ended by complimenting fellow fiction writer Jack Vance, revealing how he “keeps Vance’s approach in mind” while writing his characters.
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