If you’ve been on the internet any time in the past decade, you’ve probably seen the familiar chorus: “Where’s The Winds of Winter?” It’s become a meme, a plea, and sometimes a demand hurled at Game of Thrones creator George R.R. Martin every time he announces… well, anything that’s not the next book in A Song of Ice and Fire series.
This week, Martin addressed that ever-persistent noise head-on in a characteristically frank and personal post on his Not a Blog, triggered by the announcement of a new project: an animated adaptation of Howard Waldrop’s A Dozen Tough Jobs.
“I know, I know. Some of you will just be pissed off by this, as you are by everything I announce here that is not about Westeros or THE WINDS OF WINTER. You have given up on me, or on the book.”
From there, the post took a sharp turn into brutal honesty, and maybe a little sarcasm, as Martin rattled off the recurring criticisms he’s heard over the years.
“I will never finish WINDS, If I do, I will never finish A DREAM OF SPRING. If I do, it won’t be any good. I ought to get some other writer to pinch hit [finish it] for me…
“I am going to die soon anyway, because I am so old. I lost all interest in A Song of Ice and Fire decades ago. I don’t give a shit about writing any longer, I just sit around and spend my money.”
He didn’t stop there. Martin pointed out that many fans seem to resent anything he does outside Westeros, whether it’s Wild Cards, his award-winning short stories, or the many anthologies he’s edited with the late Gardner Dozois.
“You may hate everything else I have ever written… You don’t care about any of those, I know. You don’t care about anything but WINDS OF WINTER. You’ve told me so often enough.”
But if it sounds like Martin’s throwing in the towel, think again.
“Thing is, I do care about them, and I care about Westeros and WINDS as well. The Starks and Lannisters and Targaryens, Tyrion and Asha, Dany and Daenerys, the dragons and the direwolves—I care about them all. More than you can ever imagine.”
Martin isn’t brushing off Winds of Winter. He’s telling fans, in his own slightly grumbly, very George R.R. Martin way: I’m still in this. I still love these characters. I’m just not going to sacrifice every other part of my creative life to satisfy one demand. Fair enough, but it’s taking so damn long!
Martin hasn’t abandoned Westeros. He’s just trying to live a full creative life outside of Westeros. Fans have been waiting so long for the book, though, that there’s not much more patience.
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