George R. R. Martin

George R.R. Martin is an American author who primarily worked on the fantasy novels that would later be remade into the popular HBO television series Game of Thrones. His storied literary career stands out due to the popularity of his works.

George R. R. Martin Background

George R.R. Martin was born in 1948 within the United States, and he is primarily a fantasy writer. He was, however, recently come into much greater fame than is normally the case for a fantasy writer, due to the fact that some of his key works have been adapted into the wildly popular HBO television show Game of Thrones. Martin has won many award over the course of his career, including the prestigious Hugo Award several times. He has had a prolific career. 

However, the general population probably just knows him as a result of the fact that his works provided the basis for that television show. 

Literary Works

Martin was writing award-winning fiction as far back as the year 1975, when he won his first Hugo award (a prestigious credential for a work of fantasy/science fiction) with his novella A Song for Lya. Martin has also produced several other works set within the same universe as this novella. 

Martin's more general fame, though, surely rests on his novel series A Song of Ice and Fire. This may be more commonly known to the general public by the name Game of Thrones, which is the title of the first part of the series.

Martin's Writing Style

Martin's writing style is characterized by complex plotlines, deep character development, and good pacing. One of the important features of his works is that he tends to kill off even important characters within his work, thereby violating a common literary convention according to which characters who draw the sympathy of the reader are usually well taken care of. 

Moreover, within the fantasy genre, Martin is notable for departing from the legacy of Tolkien by constructing complex societies and delving into the intricacies of real politics, as opposed to relying on a more simplistic "good versus evil" trope to structure most of his works. 

HBO Adaptation of Game of Thrones and Others

Martin was already successful within the fantasy/science fiction community for a long time; but his appeal opened onto the general population with the production of the HBO televisions series Game of Thrones, the first season of which aired in the year 2011. The show has been extremely popular—and also a little controversial, given the extent to which it portrays nudity and violence. In any event, the sixth season of the show began airing in April 2016, and the show has already been renewed for a seventh season. 

Martin has often been compared to Tolkien—the author of the Lord of the Rings series—for the depth with which he develops his own fantasy universe. Martin, though, has generally criticized Tolkien for what he perceives to be the ideological simplicity underlying many works within the normative tradition of fantasy literature. 

There has been some speculation and concern among fans of Game of Thrones about whether Martin will actually be able to finish his novel cycle: he has intended to include seven novels in the series, but only five of them have been published thus far. Concern is especially mounting as the television show has already caught up with all the material published thus far within the novel cycle. Martin has typically responded to these concerns with disdain, suggesting that if his fans really cared about his work, they should more respect for him than to imply that he is going to die sometime soon.