I’ve stopped worrying if George R.R. Martin will ever finish The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring and started worrying about the author himself. He shared some very serious mental health struggles in a recent “Not a Blog” post. It followed other public comments about his many frustrations. Not all of his fans are exactly gracious about the possibility he will never finish A Song of Ice and Fire. But one very famous fan certainly is giving Martin some grace. Fellow author Brandon Sanderson defended the man he calls “the great patriarch of the fantasy genre” by explaining that writing is an art and not a trade. He also called for understanding for the struggles that come with the craft while also saying even if he were asked he would never finish Martin’s story.
During an interview with IGN, Sanderson shared his thoughts on one of the biggest topics in literature, George R.R. Martin’s incomplete novel series. When asked if he any sympathy for the man who created Westeros, Sanderson said, “Absolutely.” He then offered some platitudes about Martin’s kindness and over-sized role in the fantasy realm before imploring others to also understand the difficulty Martin faces. His words are worth seeing in full:
At the same time, writing can be a lonely profession, and we all know the difficulty of a book that just WILL NOT work. I’ve been fortunate that books like that have always been side projects for me, ones I can abandon without it causing too many ripples in my career. The only thing that will lead to A Song of Ice and Fire being finished is our support, patience, and effort to remember what makes books special: the fact that they are one of the few mass media art forms that are still largely created by individual human beings.
Sanderson also addressed whether he would ever finish A Song of Ice and Fire as he did with Wheel of Time. “Respectfully, I’m the wrong person to do this – and I think most fans of both of our works would agree,” he said. He then added if he were to do it he’d try to make it as much like Martin as possible, but ultimately he wouldn’t because there are “much more natural fits out there” for the task. Not that it matters. Martin has previously said if he dies before he finishes, the series it will remain unfinished.
That’s fine with Sanderson. He says no one “owes” anyone a book because that’s not how it works. All anyone, including both him and Martin, “owe” readers is their best effort. But you can’t force a story because writing is not a job. As Sanderson notes, “It’s an art, much like making music… and sometimes, you lose that music.”
Sanderson hopes Martin hasn’t lost his music “forever.” I don’t either, but if he, has no amount of yelling at him will make him find it again. But giving him the same kind of grace and understanding Brandon Sanderson has might help.