deconstructing Jorah Mormont

therookscastle left a comment in my ask, which I will copy/paste here. I’m making this its own post because my reply got a bit lengthy and meta-y.

I was in the shower this morning, and it occured to me that the story of Jorah Mormont and Lynesse (sp?) Hightower is a deconstruction of the whole “Good brave warrior guy gets knighted and wins the heart of a beautiful woman thoguh his bravery and prowess” thing. Its like…. the final kiss happens and then the curtains fall and they… what? Go back to his hovel?

Yep.  As he tells Dany in A Clash of Kings, he was the happiest man in the world…for a fortnight, which is how long it took to sail from Lannisport to Bear Island.

Jorah’s whole story—and the stories of most of the knights in the series—is a deconstruction of the traditional portrayal of knighthood.  That’s one of the reasons why I think Jorah’s story relates so well to Sansa’s—because they both have this certain outlook on the world and then the world is just like, lol no that is not how it works and they see this mythical system that they’ve hinged their hopes and dreams on just completely fall apart/not withstand the test of actual life events.

I mean, in addition to all the other stuff he did to to cater to her (including spending all of his money, alienating his family, putting his smallfolk at risk, etc.) Jorah built a ship for Lynesse.  A motherflipping SHIP.  So that he could travel with her to other tourneys to try to bring the magic back.   When that didn’t work, he still kept trying, until he ruined himself.

He gave up everything he is - down to, in the end, his identity - for the idea of courtly love.  The stories say this means he gets the girl, the girl loves him back.  This idea, more than the Old Gods or the New, has been his religion, the thing he believes in, that he would go to the ends of the earth for.

That is the fucking tragedy of Jorah Mormont.  He isn’t a “nice guy,” or a creep. He is, as he tells Kasporio at the end of A Dance with Dragons, a fool in love. 

Um.

I have a lot of Jorah Mormont feelings.

*takes a breath*

I don't think Tyrion ever tries to justify or rationalize away what happened to Tysha. And I really don't think he ever tries to say "oh well, she got what she wanted" or anything like that. Throguhotu the book he's constantly thinking abotu her and shows that he still loves her, but he was told by his father and brother that the whole thing was a lie. Finding out that it wasn't was what broke him.

I guess I’m not seeing exactly where we’re disagreeing here? I definitely think that Tyrion finding out that Tysha did indeed love him is what pushed him to his breaking point, and here’s why: Tyrion sees himself (and has always seen himself) as having done something horrible, something unforgivable to Tysha. I’d never argue that he doesn’t feel guilt over what happened Tysha - what he was forced to do to her. I know lots of people do, citing that he never explicitly referred to the event as rape prior to ADwD, when he had already learned that Tysha was not a sex worker.

But there are plenty of clues that he did think of it as rape - and felt crushing guilt over the ordeal. Most notably, the “my cock betrayed me” line. If Tyrion hadn’t felt that what was happening to Tysha was wrong, then why did he feel so betrayed by his own body when he couldn’t stop himself from becoming aroused (the only thing that could have prevented Tywin from forcing him to sleep with her)? Clearly, the guilt that he couldn’t control his own bodily reactions (as no one can) still eats at him a decade later.

But here’s the thing: another thing Tywin’s “harsh lesson” taught Tyrion was that no one would ever love him because he was essentially undesirable. Sex workers were the only people who would ever dare be intimate for him - and them, only for a price. (ie. Tyrion is so unloveable that loving him is actually a job, for which someone must be reimbursed.)

When Tyrion comes to the realization that Tysha wasn’t a sex worker and that not only did she truly love him (for free, no strings attached), she expected his protection and care, Tyrion is forced to deal with the fact that, not only has he raped a woman (again, I will stress here that I do not think of Tyrion as a rapist, but he most certainly does), he’s raped the only woman who has ever and could ever love him. God, he’s done pretty much the worst thing ever to the person who least deserves it in the world. The person who was willing to look past his gross undesirablility and still want him.

And like I said in the post I think you’re referring to, if he could do that to Tysha, what was there to stop him from killing Shae and his father, who had never loved him at all?

So yeah, I do think Tyrion could rationalize what happened to Tysha. Because although he recognized it was horrible, he could at least tell himself that all she wanted from him was not protection or love, but money (because loving him was a job anyway, right, and she was just doing what she was paid to do) - and in the end she got it. Was that an a-okay way to think of it? Certainly not. But it allowed him to function - to largely not deal with the memory of what happened at all.

Do you happen to know the name of Jorah's first wife? I can't find it anywhere.

She’s never named — he only tells Daenerys in ch.12 of A Clash of Kings that she was “a Glover of Deepwood Motte.”

My personal headcanon is that she’s the older sister of Galbart and Robett Glover, who I’ve named Erena, as Erena is the canonical name of Robett’s daughter - so my headcanon is that bb!Erena was named after older, dead Erena. :) 

…that is an inappropriate place for a smiley face. but yes. 

ETA: She very easily could have been a cousin of Galbart and Robett’s or something as well.  That’s just my personal spin on things.