Character
Brienne of Tarth is a fictional character in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series of fantasy novels and its television adaptation, Game of Thrones. She is a promine…
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Investigate this subjectBrienne of Tarth is a fictional character in George R. R.
Brienne of Tarth is a fictional character in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series of fantasy novels and its television adaptation, Game of Thrones. She is a prominent point of view character in the fourth novel, A Feast for Crows.
Brienne is introduced in the second novel of the series, 1998's A Clash of Kings, as a warrior fighting for the honor of serving in the Kingsguard of Renly Baratheon. She later swears her loyalty to Catelyn Stark and vows to return the captive Jaime Lannister to King's Landing in exchange for Sansa and Arya Stark, whom Catelyn believes are being held by the Lannisters. She additionally appears in A Feast for Crows (2005) and A Dance with Dragons (2011). Because she is a woman, Brienne is barred from serving as a knight, even though she is one of the most honorable and skilled warriors in all of Westeros. Her personal struggle towards honor, justice, and recognition has received significant critical attention, as has her complex relationship with Jaime, and she is one of the more popular characters in both the novels and television show.
In the television series, Brienne is portrayed by English actress Gwendoline Christie and is introduced in season two. After appearing as a recurring cast member for two seasons, Christie was promoted to the main cast from season four onwards. Christie has received significant critical praise for her portrayal. For her performance in season three, she was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress on Television and for two Screen Actors Guild Awards, alongside the rest of the cast, for the third and fourth seasons. In 2019, she was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her performance in the series's final season.
Brienne is the daughter and only surviving child of Lord Selwyn Tarth, lord of Evenfall Hall on the island of Tarth. House Tarth is a bannerman to House Baratheon, the lord paramount of the Stormlands. Brienne's mother died when she was a child; she had a single older brother, Galladon, who drowned when she was 8, and two younger sisters, both of whom died in infancy. As a child, Brienne was under the tutelage of Septa Roelle, who found fault in everything about her and destroyed her self-esteem. She told Brienne that, though a man would marry her, as she is heiress to her father's land, he could never desire her.
Brienne's father tried to find her a suitor to wed. This proved to be difficult, however, due to both Brienne's resistance and her ungainly appearance. Nonetheless, three successive but ultimately unsuccessful betrothals were attempted. The first was when she was 7 and her fiancé was 10, but he died of an illness. Next, a betrothal was brokered by the lord of the land, of poor House Connington, to his young, newly knighted heir, Ronnet, but young Ser Ronnet broke the betrothal the first time he met Brienne.
Brienne's father's last attempt was to betroth her at 16 to Ser Humfrey Wagstaff, a middle-aged friend of his who was castellan of another house. Humfrey informed Brienne that she was expected to give up her training and become more feminine after their wedding. Brienne rejoined that she would acquiesce, but only if Wagstaff could beat her in combat. Their fight resulted in three broken bones and a broken betrothal.
Brienne had begged Tarth's master-at-arms Ser Goodwin to teach her to fight. As her skills grew, so did her confidence. He made her get over her inability to inflict pain by slaughtering pigs. At one point in her history, Brienne met Renly Baratheon when he visited her island on a coming-of-age tour. He treated Brienne with courtesy and respect, and danced with her; as a result, she fell in unrequited love with him. When the War of Five Kings begins, with Stannis and Renly Baratheon both claiming the crown, Tarth remains neutral, but Brienne gets her father's permission to go independently and declare for Renly.
Brienne is described as unfeminine in appearance and is considered unattractive. She is very tall, muscular, flat-chested, and ungainly, with straw-colored hair and broad, coarse features that are covered in freckles. Her teeth are prominent and crooked, her mouth is wide, her lips are swollen, and her nose has been broken more than once. However, her large blue eyes are described as rather beautiful by both Catelyn Tully and Jaime Lannister.
In the novel A Feast for Crows, Brienne describes herself as "the only child the gods let [my father] keep. The freakish one, one not fit to be son or daughter." In "Beyond the Wall", a collection of essays, Caroline Spector describes Brienne as a "study in heartbreaking contradictions. She embraces the romantic ideals of her culture, both emotionally and through her actions, but is continually betrayed by the real world simply because she cannot turn herself into the woman the Westerosi legends tell her she should be."
Charlie Harwood of HBO Watch describes Brienne as "loyal, stubborn, headstrong, and judgmental. Despite the repeated insults from knights, who mockingly call her 'Brienne the Beauty', she holds a simple idea of knighthood, believing that knights should be chivalrous and always honor their vows." In an interview for SFX magazine, Gwendoline Christie described Brienne as an outsider who has had to develop "outer strength that often matches or supersedes that of any man in order to be treated with equality. She doesn't want to get married...yet she's internally romantic...she has an overriding sense of honour and what is right, and that's what makes her such a brilliant character to play: that her outer is so stable and masculine, but inside she's so fragile."
Brienne joins Renly Baratheon's army when he marches on King's Landing. She wins a melee at Bitterbridge held by Renly and is permitted to join Renly's Rainbow Guard as her prize. When it becomes apparent that Renly will be forced to battle his surviving brother, Stannis Baratheon, Brienne is assign
Source: Brienne of Tarth (CC BY-SA)
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