In a Wheeler Centre interview, when George R.R. Martin was asked about the way he develops his characters, he said that, "You have to take your characters and you have to put them through crisis. That's what fiction and drama is all about."

"Things have to happen that ... [make] characters question who they are and what their place in the world is and what the meaning of it all is," he said. "To go through the dark nights of the soul and the times of fear and terror. You know, I've always taken it as my mantra, William Faulkner words in his Noble Prize acceptance speech where he said 'The human heart in conflict with itself ... is the only thing worth writing about.' I think that's true of all fiction, of literary fiction, such as Faulkner wrote, and also science fiction, and fantasy, and historical novels, and nurse novels, and whatever. I mean, if you have real characters grappling with real problems, the human heart in conflict with itself, doesn't matter if it's in a castle, a spaceship or whatever, if you have that, then you have power. And if you don't, you don't."

"[For example,] Jamie losing a hand, the very thing he defined himself with, is crucial to, I think, where I want to go with the character."