#roddytheruin

I can’t say I like him very much as he’s given to us in A Game of Thrones. His complete disregard for Ned’s wishes and advice and his absolute refusal to assert any type of authority to protect Ned’s children from Cersei’s wrath at the Trident in spite of Ned supposedly being his favorite person in the world--the brother he chose and all that--really made me lose any respect for him. Then his physical abuse of Cersei (regardless of how awful she is, there is no justification for physical abuse!) made me dislike him further.

BUT, Ned loves him. Which means at SOME POINT, Robert must have had at least some positive qualities that appealed to Ned. And he got thousands of men to follow him in committing TREASON because that’s what the Rebellion was in simple legal terms. So he must have been a man that could inspire confidence in others. So, I try to look at him as a whole person. What happened to him between Robert’s Rebellion and A Game of Thrones to make him so different from the man Ned remembers? Could he have been a good king in other circumstances? Could he have been a better man? Or was he always awful, and Ned was just blinded by youthful hero worship for the bigger, stronger, more confident, more handsome young man who always seemed to get what he wanted and got everyone’s respect and admiration?

My personal thoughts on these questions are that Robert was always self-centered, and somewhat superficial in most of his relationships except with a very few people--Ned, for instance. Robert truly believes Ned is a better man than he is although his swaggering pride would never let him say it out loud. And since Ned HAD known real friendship from Robert, he was somewhat oblivious to his friend’s inability to form strong relationships easily. Young, naive Ned believed that as long as Robert loved Lyanna, he would stop whoring around and be the husband she deserved. Older Ned, of course, realizes that was never going to be the case. I believe Robert would have been a better husband to Lyanna than he was to Cersei because he did care for her, inasmuch as he could care for a woman, but he would have been possessive, and he would have been unfaithful because he wouldn’t have seen either of those things as bad. A man is supposed to be possessive of his wife, and if a man sees a pretty girl he’d like to bed for the sheer pleasure of it, that has nothing to do with his wife--even one he professes to love. And Lyanna would have become increasingly bitter and unhappy with her situation, and Robert would have undoubtedly become a worse husband over time in response to that.

I don’t think there is any universe in which Robert would have made a good king. He doesn’t have the temperament to actually rule the kingdom and honestly hasn’t the slightest interest in doing it. He’s a warrior and a good one. I do think he could have been a better man had he never become king and had he been surrounded by people who actually supported him and even cared about him all his life. His marriage to Cersei, dependence on the Lannisters, and the toxic bunch of schemers on his Small Council really served to speed the erosion of what strength of character he did have over the years--pushing him further into alcoholism and self-destructive behavior. His being king, which means no one could really refuse him anything, made his self-centeredness much worse over the years. Basically, every bad character trait Robert had was exacerbated by his years on the Iron Throne.

He does have his good traits. He’s actually pretty honest. He speaks his mind. Honor does matter to him even if his concept of it has become warped over the years. He’s brave. He absolutely will fight and die for a cause he believes in. Had the Rebellion never occurred and Robert remained the Lord of Storm’s End all his life, ended up wed to a woman who was content to be the Lady of his castle and tolerant of the occasional infidelity (NOT Lyanna Stark, in other words), given the opportunity to lead men in battle from time to time, and had good advisors like Maester Cressen who were infallibly loyal to his House to help him with the boring (to Robert!) administrative duties of lordship, I think he likely could have been a much happier and, yes, better man. Still no one I’d want to be my ruler or certainly not my husband, LOL, but a decent, if overly self-centered man who still respected himself enough to earn the respect of others.