On Tuesday, Stevie Nicks told the Herald Scotland that she turned to the HBO series “Game of Thrones” to cope with the death of her mother and a nasty bout of pneumonia. She was crippled with grief, and she told the Herald she couldn’t leave her house for nearly five months. In that time period, she immersed herself in George R. R. Martin’s fantasy world of Westeros and wrote poems about the characters — some of the titles “On Jon Snow,” “On Arya” and “On Cersei and Jaime,” she said.
Nicks also said she’d be willing to collaborate with the producers to write music for the show. We’re hoping HBO jumps on this opportunity — Nicks’ dreamy, ethereal sound would fit perfectly into a scene with Daenerys Targaryen.
“The author (George R. R. Martin) is my age, and it blows my mind that he’s able to create this vast, interlinked world,” Nicks told the Herald. “As a songwriter I write little movies. But I can’t imagine sitting down and writing even one small book. But then probably somebody like him couldn’t imagine writing ‘Edge Of Seventeen’ or ‘Rhiannon’ — couldn’t write a whole little life in two verses and a chorus.’”
Though Martin’s novels, with his sprawling fantasy worlds, and Nicks’ songs, about love and loss, seem to be on totally separate planes, they’ve both helped their fans escape reality for years.
Nicks, during both her early years with Fleetwood Mac and her solo career, was well-known for her skills as a live singer. She’s transported audiences for decades during shows with her signature flowing gypsy gowns and gorgeous set pieces.
And the worlds Martin has created are just as immersive as a Fleetwood Mac or Stevie Nicks concert — hence his fan base of obsessive readers who have been known to name their children after characters in his books.
Even with the advent of the Internet and the ability to fact-check every movie, book, song or TV show for scientific or historical authenticity, stories — even wildly outlandish ones — have an undeniable appeal.
“Technology makes authenticity suspect, and technology gives us the wherewithal to demand it — if that’s what we really want,” Wired contributor Frank Rose wrote. “Except that it’s not what we want. It’s what we think we want ... We want to be sucked inside the computer like Jeff Bridges in ‘Tron.’ We want to be immersed in something that’s not real at all.”
It makes sense, then, that Stevie Nicks would relate to Martin’s work and relish the immersive culture of high-fantasy fiction. Her love of “Game of Thrones” and our love of Stevie Nicks all boils down to storytelling and the thrill of losing ourselves in worlds vastly different to our own.
A version of this editorial ran on page 6 on 10/7/2013 under the headline "Stevie Nicks and ‘Game of Thrones’"
