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Lord Varys In Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince

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As modeled by Niccolò Machiavelli in The Prince, a great leader should hold an even amount of love and fear over his citizens. In today’s day and age, many principles from this work have been disproven but as we take a look at contemporary art, such as television, it is seen that many ideas have found their way in. In the story told by the show Game of Thrones many characters embody traits Machiavelli describes in The Prince, some more rather than others. Although this character is not a prince currently, his intelligence and political prowess make him, Lord Varys, my Prince. Lord Varys is a quiet but very influential character in Game of Thrones and he serves the realm which gives him the right to the throne in a Machiavellian manner. Lord …show more content…

He uses this to his advantage however and that is what molds him into a great “prince”. After a botched military career and the deficiency of fortune and power from birth, Varys knew he had to pave his own path to reach the top of the hierarchy in the Seven Kingdoms. Varys began a Machiavellian stance here, because “Those private citizens who rise to become princes solely as a result of good fortune have little trouble rising, but much trouble remaining on top” (Machiavelli 348) as Machiavelli said himself. The Spider works hard to establish his credibility and integrity by making sure he is always of service to those who may destroy him in the end. Varys creates a deep network of spies, he calls his little birds, made up of local children and orphans to help gather information throughout the realm. This pushes Varys very high up and gets him a job with King Aerys II Targaryen because everyone needs auxiliaries, or allies, during all the chaos that goes on in this city. Although Machiavelli describes auxiliaries as, “…useless and dangerous” (Machiavelli 357) and armies that help aid in time of war, the King in Game of Thrones needs as many trustworthy people in his corner as possible and with Varys’s skill in gathering secrets and other important information he became the number one auxiliary in which everyone wanted on their

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