The Story Behind's video: A Song of Ice And Fire Was Inspired By TURTLES

Most of us know George R.R. Martin for A Song of Ice and Fire. But his road to success was very long! Born in 1948 in Bayonne, New Jersey, he grew up in a federal housing project. Though his world was “five blocks long”, his imagination took him far beyond that. Little George liked to watch gripping TV shows like Thriller or The Twilight Zone. Inspired by them, he started writing when he was in elementary school. He sold monster stories to other neighborhood kids. Apart from that, he played with his turtles, the only pets allowed in his house. George kept them in a toy castle. The only problem was, they “died very soon”. Later he discovered comic books and began writing fan fiction for fanzines. Beyond that, Martin played chess and worked at the school newspaper. It’s only logical that after graduating he went to Northwestern University to study journalism. In 1970, he earned a bachelor’s degree, followed by a master’s degree the next year. The first story he sold, “The Hero”, was published in 1971 in Galaxy magazine. During the 1970s, Martin directed chess tournaments and taught at Clarke College in Iowa. He managed to avoid the Vietnam War by doing two years of alternative service. Concurrently, he kept writing. In 1976, a collection of stories “A Song for Lya” came out. Martin’s first novel, a space opera “Dying of the Light” was released the following year. But it wasn’t until 1979 that he became a full-time writer. A few years later, he moved to Hollywood to work for television. He penned several episodes for a remake of Twilight Zone. After that, Martin was hired as a writer and producer for the series Beauty and the Beast. At times he would get frustrated by TV production limitations. That’s why he embarked on a new writing adventure in the early 1990s. Inspired by Tolkien and Wars of the Roses, he wanted to create a whole different epic fantasy. That story gave rise to Martin’s most eminent work, A Song of Ice and Fire. A Game of Thrones, the first tale in the series, was published in 1996. Martin’s fame peaked when the novel’s TV adaptation Game of Thrones debuted in 2011. By that year, five out of planned seven books were written. All of them made the best-seller lists. As almost 70 years ago, Martin still uses his vivid imagination to write stories. Subscribe to The Story Behind https://is.gd/hixAAr Music by Epidemic Sound: https://www.epidemicsound.com/