George Martin revealed how the work on "The Winds of Winter" is progressing - and which of the characters is destined for a different fate than in "Game of Thrones"
George R. R. Martin spoke again about the fate of "The Winds of Winter". Fans of "A Song of Ice and Fire" have been waiting for the sixth novel in the series for almost fifteen years, and in a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the writer admitted that he continues to work on it — although the process is slower than he would like.
According to Martin, the work is often hampered by a lack of mood and parallel obligations. Having dealt with them, he hopes to get down to the novel and bring it to an end.
"I was made to understand very clearly that 'The Winds of Winter' is a priority. But I'm not always in the mood for it. I want to deal with other things first — novellas about Dunk and Egg and the continuation of 'Fire and Blood'. If I get rid of everything else, I think I can finish 'The Winds of Winter' pretty soon."
At the same time, the interview does not specify when exactly these words were said. Earlier it became known that Martin had already given the showrunner of "The Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" sketches of about a dozen stories about Dunk and Egg for экранизации. It is not clear whether he meant these materials or new stories to which he planned to return only after the completion of "The Winds of Winter", or whether some of them will still see the light of day before the release of the novel.
The process is also slowed down by constant edits to what has already been written. Martin admits that he regularly returns to finished chapters and rewrites them — sometimes several times.
"I'll open the last chapter and say, 'Oh, shit, this isn't very good,' and start all over again. Or I'll decide that the chapter about Tyrion doesn't stick, and I'll switch to Jon Snow. But if I'm not distracted, sooner or later I'll get involved anyway."
Separately, the writer touched on the topic of the saga's finale. According to him, he originally planned far more deaths than in the series "Game of Thrones". However, the success of the экранизации influenced some decisions. Thus, Sansa Stark in the book version could have died, but now she has a chance to survive the events of the cycle.
"I was going to kill more characters. Not the ones who were killed in the series. They made a happier ending. I don't see a happy ending for Tyrion — his story is tragic from the very beginning. I wanted to kill Sansa, but she's so attractive in the series... maybe I'll leave her alive."
These words only strengthened the long-standing suspicions of fans: the finale of the literary version of "A Song of Ice and Fire" was planned to be noticeably darker than the television version. At the same time, Martin emphasizes that he intends to finish the story himself and is not going to pass it on to another author.
"If something happens to me, the book will remain unfinished."
The writer, however, again did not name specific dates for the release of "The Winds of Winter", only emphasizing that if he does manage to finish the book, it will become the largest novel in the series — back in 2024, the manuscript exceeded a thousand pages.
