#Theon and der verlorene are 180° degree turns on the same angle

[dontbotherwiththepronunciation]

☕️ OTP: Nameless ladies

(Yes, I am targeting you with this) ≖‿≖

Your emoji looks like Nanami smiling before realising she is adopted.

2.

Th€yne? Thram$ay? Gre¥$now? Nah man, let's Stan the true unproblematic hot Ironborn x thirsty Mainlander OTP:

Captain of the Myraham's daughter x Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter.

I want them to hook up. Let the captain of the Myraham's daughter live her erotic saltwife fantasy with the one (1) woman in Asha's crew that we know of, the one ironborn hot murderous pirate who would actually understand the struggle that is to act as a narrative prop for some authorial entity to showcase one of the Greyjoy's siblings lack of ideological integrity.

I have been marinating in my own theories with little to no contact with the fandom since 2016. I have a lot of weird non-sensical thoughts that might be overreaching in their significance but you know that already and the worst possible thing that could develop from posting this is that people will laugh at it.

I think that Kyra and Urri serve as similar narrative props for Theon & Aeron, I think Jeyne & Falia also serve as similar narrative props for Theon & Aeron and I also think that the Captain of the Myraham's Daughter & Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter serve as similar props for Theon & Asha.

In Theon's case the concept of the captain of the myraham's daughter has already been discussed countless times and in all honesty I don't have much to add to it. Yes, he does treat her rather disrespectfully, he does take advantage of her in a way, he doesn't really care for her physical pleasure, he is dismissive of her uneasiness and has a few unkind thoughts about her which made him so loathsome, but all in all I wouldn't call him abusive or violent. Just disappointing.

There is something unbelievably funny about how bad that sexual encounter goes though. The captain of the myraham's daughter is endearingly enthusiastic about the concept of thraldom and salt wives and even begs Theon to take her with him, something he denies her.

Why though? He has been romanticising the Old Way (Or what he thinks he understands about this idolised and romanticised view of the Old Way) the entire journey and if he truly considers himself to be one of the exemplary Ironborns who would take what they wanted with no qualms, why does he leave her there? She could have even served as an example of virility or status, a mark to say "I am Ironborn. I haven't forgotten our history and culture."

But no, he just leaves her there to the mercy of an angry father.

I know she has been read as a narrative vessel hundreds of times and she is one, but the message behind her presence varies depending on interpretation and, to me, this could be (among other things) a way of displaying Theon's subconscious lack of ideological compromise, which we see often through the text (his reaction to the raids on the stony shore, his disappointment at how commonly the other Ironborn treat him, Smiler, etc.)

To me Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter is also evidence for an ideological divide concerning Ironborn culture and tradition, but she is there to signify Asha's, not Theon's.

Ironborn culture is so interesting to me and I tend to think of it more fondly than I'm probably supposed to because of hundreds of reasons I've already told you about and one of those is that it allows women more liberties than most of Westeros but still chains them to a place of submission compared to men. A woman might be the captain of her own ship, which would make her a queen if going by Theon.

"If every captain was a king aboard his own ship, as was often said, it was small wonder they named the islands the land of ten thousand kings." (Theon | ACOK)

I think on the video games they could even become priestesses for the Drowned God, so if going by that as canon world-building (we shouldn't but it would be cool) they could also find a place in religious organisations. They can be stewards. The only two female stewards we have met in asoiaf are Iron Islanders (Manifesting for Noseless Jeyne to become Pyke or Harlaw's steward at the end of ADOS).

And yet...the most gender-non-conforming Ironborn woman we've met, asides from Asha...doesn't even get a name.

It seems curious to me how Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter is only known as that: "Hagen's daughter" and this coming from ASHA out of all characters who is actively struggling with her culture's sexism in order to get the seastone chair for herself.

Most Iroborn characters are referred to by mentioning some physical feature or disability accompanying their name, but in her case, instead of her name, we get her father's name used with a possessive apostrophe.

The main difference between Asha's character archetype and Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter's, is that one of them is lowborn and the other not, which could be a way of highlighting how class differences still exist among Ironborn, who consider themselves to be equals in their superiority of other races but still have a feudal hierarchy, but in all honesty the class issue is (in my opinion) overshadowed by how both characters identities are so depending on their fathers.

The text often remarks on Asha as someone who was "groomed" (the very use of that word in fanon text already has some unconscious troublesome connotation I don't agree with) into her personality by her father.

This girl forgets herself. Balon let her believe she was a man." "Balon’s sons are dead. All I see is Balon’s little daughter!" (Aeron | AFFC)

Never do they ever speak of her as "Asha" when it is about her wanting the crown; it's about Balon's daughter. (In a way it reminds me of the Northerner's going to save Arya and also not referring to her as such. They speak of "Ned's girl")

But anyway, I never really expected them to refer to Asha as Asha, but I would have hoped Asha would have been conscious enough of her struggles to recognise her fellow warrior woman as more than just her father's shadow.

Whenever people speculate on how Asha's interactions with other gender-non-conforming women (ex. Brienne, Arya) might look like, I just think of Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter. and wonder whether this comes from a place of class privilege or unconsciousness against the thing she is consciously fighting against.

I have no idea what Asha's endgame might look like and usually, I like seeing her as Theon's puppeteer, but if we have to witness her settling to be the unofficial ruler or perhaps not even a ruler at all, it would be sad to see her haunted by her father's shadow. It also makes me wonder whether she really ever had a chance at the Kingsmoot.

Whatever, another possibility I like to fantasise about is simply that Asha and Hagen's beautiful red haired daughter hooked up, dated, had a messy breakup and now Asha is trying to distance herself from her.

That's a funnier alternative. Would also add angst and maybe some comedic potential to the nameless ladies OTP.

Ship, ship, ship, I ship.

#for my birthday I wanted to commission someone to draw or write them as a 70s ertica or something #I can't even read eotica without being triggered but I think the sapphics deserve it. #I'm gonna make them on sims medieval #asoiaf #asha greyjoy #*shrek 2 voice*: they (the women this is about) don't even have tags #I love it when grrm pulls an All the Names on us #He learnt from Saramago and for that I respect him #theostrichsdaughter #has to read All the Names! #I have to reread All the Names again #I have to revisit the all the names/Theon Greyjoy/der verlorene analysis when I finish the term #no one would understand nor be interested in that but I'm used to that #Theon and der verlorene are 180° degree turns on the same angle #Asha is der verlorene while Theon is Arnold but also Theon is the actual Verlorene while Asha is the true Arnold their parents dreamed of #Alannys/Mutter Balon/Vater Theon-Asha/Der Verlorene-Arnold but inverted. #I have to finish translating der verlorene #I have to finish the term #I have to go to Europe #I have to morrow tomorrow #*cries* #god this fucking escalated #otp: they don't even have names #speaking