Painting with Shades of Grey: The Hero and the Anti-Hero in Medievalist Fantasy Literature

J.R.R Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire are two landmark works in the genre of medievalist fantasy literature. The main argument of this thesis is that, despite the apparent similarities between the works, they portray and utilize the tradition of the heroic in contrasting ways. This thesis explores the opposing uses of medievalism in each series, and examines the use of ensembles of characters as opposed to a singular protagonist. The thesis draws a direct comparison between the heroic and the anti-heroic by character analyses of one character from each work, Jaime Lannister from A Song of Ice and Fire and Aragorn from The Lord of the Rings. Finally, this thesis offers an analysis of each author’s writing of war, and uses biographical and epistolary sources to examine the cultural context of the novels and each author’s aims in writing them. Through these approaches, this thesis will show the contrast between Tolkien’s use of the heroic and Martin’s anti-heroic, as well as providing analysis of how they are portrayed and why they are important elements in each of the works