title: Corazon Aquino

text: Pope Benedict XVI, in his letter to Archbishop Rosales, recalled Aquino's "courageous commitment to the freedom of the Filipino people, her firm rejection of violence and intolerance" and called her a woman of courage and faith.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: U.S. President Barack Obama, through White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, said that "her courage, determination, and moral leadership are an inspiration to us all and exemplify the best in the Filipino nation". U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed sadness over the death of Aquino, to whom she had sent a personal letter of best wishes for recovery while she was still in hospital in July 2009. Clinton said that Aquino was "admired by the world for her extraordinary courage" in leading the fight against dictatorship.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: South African President Jacob Zuma called Aquino "a great leader who set a shining example of peaceful transition to democracy in her country".


title: Corazon Aquino

text: Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, through the British Ambassador in Manila, sent a message to the Filipino people which read: "I am saddened to hear of the death of Corazon 'Cory' Aquino the former president of the Republic of the Philippines". She also added, "I send my sincere condolences to her family and to the people of the Philippines. Signed, Elizabeth R".


title: Corazon Aquino

text: Russian President Dmitry Medvedev stated in a telegram to President Arroyo that "the name of Corazon Aquino is associated with a period of profound reforms and the democratic transformation of Filipino society". Medvedev also lauded Aquino's sympathy to Russian people and her contribution to the improvement of Russian-Filipino relations.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: Timor-Leste President José Ramos-Horta and Wan Azizah, wife of Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, came to the Philippines to express their sympathies and attend Aquino's funeral.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: Soon after her 2010 release from her two-decade prison sentence, Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar publicly cited Aquino as one of her inspirations. She also expressed her good wishes for Aquino's son, then-incumbent president of the Philippines Benigno S. Aquino III.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: After her peaceful accession to the presidency and the ousting of President Marcos, Aquino was named "Time" magazine's Woman of the Year in 1986. In August 1999, Aquino was chosen by "Time" as one of the 20 Most Influential Asians of the 20th century. "Time" also cited her as one of 65 great Asian Heroes in November 2006.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: In 1994, Aquino was cited as one of "100 Women Who Shaped World History" in a reference book written by Gail Meyer Rolka.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: In 1996, she received the J. William Fulbright Prize for International Understanding from the Fulbright Association.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: In 1998, she was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award in recognition of her role in peaceful revolution to attain democracy.


title: Corazon Aquino

text: Since her death in 2009, the legacy of Corazon Aquino has prompted various namings of public landmarks and creations of memorials. Among these are as follows:


title: Corazon Aquino

text: In 2008, a musical play about Aquino entitled "Cory, the Musical" was staged at the Meralco Theater. It was written and directed by Nestor Torre Jr. and starred Isay Alvarez as Aquino. The musical featured a libretto of 19 original songs composed by Lourdes Pimentel, wife of Senator Aquilino Pimentel, Jr.


title: Britt Lower

text: Brittney Leigh Lower () is an American actress known for her roles as Liz in "Man Seeking Woman", Tanya Sitkowsky in "Unforgettable" and Helly R in "Severance".


title: Britt Lower

text: Lower was born on August 12, 1978, in Heyworth, Illinois, to Steven Lower and face painting artist Mickey Lower. After graduating from Heyworth High School in 1996, Lower earned a Bachelor of Science in Communication from Northwestern University in 2008, emerging successful after years of failed attempts.


title: Britt Lower

text: Lower had a recurring role as technology expert Tanya Sitkowsky in the 2011 series "Unforgettable". In 2015, she began what's considered her breakout role in the FXX comedy series "Man Seeking Woman", portraying Liz Greenberg, the sister of the main protagonist. Lower was signed for a recurring role in the Hulu original series "Casual" in season 2, as Sarah Finn. She has also appeared in commercials for Verizon.


title: Britt Lower

text: Lower appeared as a guest on "The Big Alakens" "Big Lake" marathon fundraiser episode of "The George Lucas Talk Show."


title: Britt Lower

text: In 2022, Lower was in the main cast of the Apple TV+ psychological drama series "Severance". She will also appear in the second season of "American Horror Stories".


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Rudy Gobert-Bourgarel ( ; born June 26, 1992) is a French professional basketball player for the Minnesota Timberwolves of the National Basketball Association (NBA). He also represents the French national team in their international competitions. Standing at tall with a wingspan of long, he plays the center position. He is considered one of the NBA’s best rim protectors.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert has won the NBA Defensive Player of the Year award three times, tied for third-most in NBA history. He is a four-time All-NBA Team member, six-time All-Defensive First Team member, and three-time NBA All-Star. Gobert was also the NBA blocks leader in the 2016–17 season and the NBA rebounding leader in the 2021–22 season. Gobert was named to the All-NBA Second Team in 2017, and the All-NBA Third Team in 2019, 2020 and 2021.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In March 2020, Gobert tested positive for COVID-19, becoming the first NBA player with a confirmed case of the virus. After teammates of Gobert's on the Utah Jazz, including Donovan Mitchell, also tested positive, the NBA postponed the 2019–20 season until its resumption on July 30 of the same year.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert was born in Saint-Quentin, Aisne, in the north of France. His father, Rudy Bourgarel, is from Guadeloupe and played college basketball in the United States for the Marist Red Foxes from 1985 to 1988. Bourgarel played professional basketball in Paris and Saint-Quentin, where he met Gobert's mother. Gobert's parents split when he was around three years old; he stayed with his mother in Saint-Quentin and made regular trips to Guadeloupe for his father. Gobert started playing basketball in 2003 for the JSC St-Quentin club, before later joining the Saint-Quentin BB club. In 2007, he joined Cholet Basket's cadet categories training center and in 2010, he participated in the FIBA Europe Under-18 Championship with the French under-18 national team, where he finished as the team's best scorer and rebounder.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: From 2009 to 2011, Gobert mostly played for the Cholet Basket junior team, managing just one game for the senior team in 2010–11, recording 6 points, 5 rebounds, 1 steal and 1 block in 13 minutes on May 10, 2011 against Pau-Lacq-Orthez. In 2011–12, he averaged 4.2 points and 3.6 rebounds per game in 29 games for Cholet. During the next season in 2012–13, he averaged 8.4 points and 5.4 rebounds per game in 27 games.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert declared for the 2013 NBA draft and set NBA Draft Combine records for wingspan (7 feet 8½ inches) and standing reach (9 feet 7 inches) in the 2013 combine. These dimensions earned him the nickname "The Stifle Tower." The record for wingspan was broken a year later by Walter Tavares.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On June 27, 2013, Gobert was selected with the 27th overall pick by the Denver Nuggets. He was later traded on draft night to the Utah Jazz. On July 6, he signed his rookie scale contract with the Jazz and joined them for the 2013 NBA Summer League. In just his 12th game for the Jazz on November 24, Gobert scored a season-high 10 points against the Oklahoma City Thunder. On December 14, he was assigned to the Bakersfield Jam of the NBA Development League. Gobert was a starter in all eight of his games in the Development League, scoring a double-double in six of those games.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: He was later recalled by the Jazz on December 21, reassigned on January 4, and recalled again on January 13. He played sparingly for the Jazz in 2013–14, making an appearance in 45 of the team's 82 regular season games.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In July 2014, Gobert re-joined the Jazz for the 2014 NBA Summer League. On October 24, 2014, the Jazz exercised their third-year team option on Gobert's rookie scale contract, extending the contract through the 2015–16 season. On January 9, 2015, he recorded a career-high seven blocked shots in a loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. On March 3, he recorded 15 points and a career-high 24 rebounds in a 93–82 win over the Memphis Grizzlies. His 24 rebounds were three short of the Jazz franchise record of 27 set twice by Truck Robinson, both in the 1977–78 season. In April 2015, he twice scored a career-high 20 points, and finished the 2014–15 season with 25 double-doubles. He went on to finish third in the NBA Most Improved Player Award voting.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On October 17, 2015, the Jazz exercised their fourth-year team option on Gobert's rookie scale contract, extending the contract through the 2016–17 season. On December 2, 2015, he was ruled out indefinitely after sustaining a sprained left MCL. He returned to action on January 7, 2016 against the Houston Rockets after missing 18 games with the injury. He was limited to just 15 minutes but chipped in six points and three rebounds. On January 16, he had a season-best game with 18 points, 18 rebounds and 5 blocks in a 109–82 win over the Los Angeles Lakers. On February 27, he recorded 12 points, a season-high 19 rebounds and six blocks in a 98–96 loss to the Brooklyn Nets.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On October 31, 2016, Gobert signed a four-year, $102 million contract extension with the Jazz, which at the time made him the best paid French athlete ever (in terms of salary per year). On December 6, 2016, he scored a career-high 22 points in a 112–105 win over the Phoenix Suns. Four days later, he had 17 points, 14 rebounds and a season-high six blocks in a 104–84 win over the Sacramento Kings. On January 10, 2017, in a win over the Cleveland Cavaliers, Gobert posted his franchise-best 25th consecutive game with 10-plus rebounds (14). On January 20, 2017, he recorded career highs of 27 points and 25 rebounds in a 112–107 overtime win over the Dallas Mavericks. The following day, he had his 31st double-double of the season with 19 points and 11 rebounds in a 109–100 win over the Indiana Pacers. His 11 rebounds marked his 30th straight game with at least 10 rebounds—only four other NBA players have had a 30-game streak of 10-rebound games since 1997–98. His streak ended at 30 after falling one rebound shy of his 31st consecutive 10-plus rebound game on January 23 against the Oklahoma City Thunder. With two blocks against New Orleans on February 8, Gobert reached 499 career blocked shots, passing Rich Kelley (498) for ninth on the franchise's all-time block list. On March 5, he had 16 points and 24 rebounds and tipped in a missed shot as time expired in overtime to lift the Jazz to a 110–109 win over the Sacramento Kings. On March 20, he had 16 points, 14 rebounds and a career-high eight blocks in a 107–100 loss to the Indiana Pacers. Two days later, he scored a career-high 35 points and grabbed 13 rebounds in a 108–101 win over the New York Knicks. Eleven of his 13 rebounds were offensive.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In Game 1 of the Jazz's first-round playoff series against the Los Angeles Clippers on April 15, Gobert suffered a hyperextension and bone bruise to his left knee; the injury occurred on the first possession of the game. Utah took Game 1 without him, but he went on to miss Games 2 and 3, as the Jazz went down 2–1 in the series. Gobert returned to the line-up for Game 4 and contributed to a 105–98 win with 15 points and 13 rebounds. The Jazz went on to eliminate the Clippers with a 104–91 victory in Game 7, closing out the first-round series 4–3 to earn the franchise's first postseason victory since 2010. However, they were swept by the Golden State Warriors in the second round to bow out of the playoffs. At the season's end, Gobert was named in the All-NBA Second Team for the first time in his career. He also earned NBA All-Defensive First Team honors.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert began the 2017–18 season with eight double-doubles while averaging a league-best 2.5 blocks per game. On November 12, 2017, he was ruled out for four-to-six weeks with a bone bruise in his right knee. He returned earlier than expected, re-joining the squad on December 4 after missing 11 games. However, after suffering a sprained posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) in his left knee and a bone bruise on December 15, he was ruled out for at least another two weeks. He returned to action on January 19, recording 23 points, 14 rebounds and three blocks in a 117–115 loss to the New York Knicks. On March 2, 2018, he scored a season-high 26 points and grabbed 16 rebounds in a 116–108 win over the Minnesota Timberwolves. In May 2018, he was named in the NBA All-Defensive First Team, becoming the third Jazz player ever to earn multiple All-Defensive First Team recognitions, alongside Karl Malone (1997, 1998 and 1999) and Mark Eaton (1985, 1986 and 1989). In June, he was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year, becoming the first Jazz player to win the award since two-time honoree Mark Eaton last won the award in 1989, the 5th international to win the award, the second French man to win the award, the first French-born to win the award, and the 12th center to win the award.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On December 25, 2018, Gobert recorded a season-high seven blocks in a 117–96 win over the Portland Trail Blazers. On December 29, he had a team-high 25 points on 10-of-12 shooting and grabbed 16 rebounds for his 31st double-double of the season in a 129–97 win over the New York Knicks. He had 24 points and 12 rebounds at half time, marking the first time that a Jazz player totaled at least 20 points and 10 rebounds in any half since Carlos Boozer did it in February 2010. On January 12, 2019, he had a career-high eight assists in a 110–102 win over the Chicago Bulls. On January 14, he tied a career high with 25 rebounds in a 100–94 win over the Detroit Pistons. On January 16, he had 23 points and 22 rebounds in a 129–109 win over the Los Angeles Clippers. On March 18, he was named Western Conference Player of the Week, marking his first career player of the week honor. On March 25, he scored a season-high 27 points and set the single-season NBA dunk record in a 125–92 win over the Phoenix Suns. With his 270th dunk of the season, he bested Dwight Howard's 269 dunks in 2007–08. He finished the regular season with a record 306 dunks. At the NBA's end-of-season awards night, Gobert was named the NBA's Defensive Player of the Year for the second season in a row.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert was named the French Player of the Year for 2019. With this he became the 10th multi time winner of the award, and the 9th ever to win back-to-back.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Through his first 45 games in the 2019–20 season, Gobert averaged 15.7 points and 14.6 rebounds per game and had become an anchor for the Jazz on offense as well as defense. On January 30, 2020, Gobert, alongside teammate Donovan Mitchell, was named a Western Conference reserve for the 2020 NBA All-Star Game.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On March 11, 2020, a game between the Utah Jazz and the Oklahoma City Thunder was postponed right before tip-off after Gobert was placed on the injury list due to illness. He was taken to a local hospital and tested positive for SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The NBA then suspended the season indefinitely. Just two days earlier, Gobert had facetiously touched every microphone and recorder at a press conference concerning the Utah Jazz's response to the virus. Gobert apologized, saying his actions were careless and exposed others to the disease and that he hopes his story serves as a warning to others to take the virus seriously. On March 27, he was cleared of the coronavirus. In April, it was reported that his relationship with Mitchell had soured following his careless behavior when infected with COVID-19 and Gobert admitted the two did not speak for some time after. Gobert has donated $500,000 to help people affected by COVID-19 including part-time employees and COVID-related services.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On December 20, 2020, Gobert signed a five-year, $205 million contract extension with the Jazz. Gobert's extension was the third largest contract in NBA history, and the largest ever for a center.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On February 23, 2021, Gobert, alongside teammate Donovan Mitchell, was once again named a Western Conference reserve for the 2021 NBA All-Star Game, marking the pair's second consecutive All-Star selection. On March 22, Gobert logged 21 points, 10 rebounds and a career-high nine blocks in 120–95 victory over the Chicago Bulls. On June 9, 2021, Gobert was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year for the third time in four years, making him the fourth player in NBA history to win the award three or more times. Gobert's win marked the first time in NBA history where four consecutive defensive player of the year awards had been won by international players. On June 11, Gobert recorded a playoff career-high 20 rebounds in a Game 2 second-round victory over the Los Angeles Clippers.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On February 3, 2022, Gobert was named a reserve for the 2022 NBA All-Star Game. He finished third in Defensive Player of the Year voting, behind winner Marcus Smart and Mikal Bridges. Gobert led the league in rebounds per game with 14.7 rebound per game and was third in blocks per game with 2.1 blocks per game, Gobert as well lead the league in FG% with 71.3% FG and shot a career high from the free throw line. On May 20th, Gobert was named to his sixth straight NBA All-Defensive First Team.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: On July 6, 2022, Gobert was traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Patrick Beverley, Malik Beasley, Jarred Vanderbilt, Leandro Bolmaro, and the draft rights to center Walker Kessler in addition to four first-round picks and a 2026 first-round pick swap. On October 20, Gobert made his Timberwolves debut, putting up 23 points and 16 rebounds in a 115–108 win over the Oklahoma City Thunder. On October 28, Gobert recorded 22 points and 21 rebounds in an 111–102 win over the Los Angeles Lakers; that was his 8th career 20/20 game and first in Minnesota.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert won the bronze medal at the 2011 FIBA Europe Under-20 Championship and the silver medal at the 2012 FIBA Europe Under-20 Championship. In the 2012 edition, Gobert was named to the All-Tournament team alongside countryman, Léo Westermann.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: Gobert was called by head coach Vincent Collet to help the senior French national team prepare for the 2012 Summer Olympics tournament. He played two friendly games, scoring 8 points. He was part of the team that won the bronze medal at the 2014 FIBA World Cup, where he averaged 4.1 points per game.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In 2015, he helped France to bronze at the EuroBasket 2015, averaging 10.4 points, 8.1 rebounds, and 2.0 blocks during the tournament, while receiving All-European Championships Second Team distinction's from the website Eurobasket.com.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: At the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Gobert played in five games for France, tallying 5.7 points, 7.2 rebounds, and 1.8 blocks per game. He also won the bronze medal with France at the 2019 FIBA World Cup, where he averaged 10.1 points, 9.1 rebounds, 1.8 assists, 0.6 steals, and 1.9 blocks per game.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Gobert guided France to a silver medal, starting each game and averaging 12.2 points and 9.3 rebounds.


title: Rudy Gobert

text: In 2022, he led France to silver at the EuroBasket 2022, averaging 12.8 points, 9.8 rebounds, and 1.2 blocks during the tournament, while being selected to the All-Tournament Team.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: A Dance with Dragons is the fifth novel of seven planned in the epic fantasy series "A Song of Ice and Fire" by American author George R. R. Martin. In some areas, the paperback edition was published in two parts, titled "Dreams and Dust" and "After the Feast". It was the only novel in the series to be published during the eight-season run of the HBO adaptation of the series, "Game of Thrones", and runs to 1,040 pages with a word count of almost 415,000.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: The US hardcover was officially published on July 12, 2011, and a few weeks later went to No. 1 on both "Publishers Weekly" and "USA Today" bestsellers lists. The novel has been adapted for television as the fifth season of "Game of Thrones", although elements of the book have also appeared in the series' third, fourth and sixth seasons.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Stannis Baratheon, a claimant to the Iron Throne of Westeros, occupies the Wall at the realm's northern border, having helped to repel an invasion of wildlings from the northern wilderness. Stannis executes Mance Rayder, the leader of the wildlings, for refusing to submit to him, and marches his army south to seek support in his bid for the throne.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Jon Snow, the newly elected Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, the order that defends the Wall, prepares the defense against the Others, hostile inhuman creatures from the far north. Jon negotiates with wildling leader Tormund Giantsbane to let the wildlings past the Wall in exchange for their assistance in defending it. This results in a fragile peace but creates unrest among the Night's Watch, who have considered the wildlings their enemies for centuries.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Stannis's advisor, the sorceress Melisandre, warns Jon that his half-sister, Arya Stark, is in trouble. Mance is revealed to be alive, thanks to Melisandre's magical trickery. He is sent to the Starks' ancestral castle Winterfell, now occupied by the enemy Boltons, to rescue Arya. However, the girl in Melisandre's visions turns out to be Alys Karstark, a young noblewoman fleeing to the Wall to escape her treacherous uncle. To protect Alys and aid the wildlings' integration into Westerosi society, Jon arranges for Alys to marry Sigorn of Thenn, a wildling leader.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Jon receives a taunting letter from Ramsay Bolton, who claims to have crushed Stannis's army at Winterfell. Threatening attack, Ramsay demands that Jon send him Stannis's wife, daughter, and other hostages, in addition to Arya and Jon's foster-brother Theon Greyjoy, the latter two whom Jon hasn't seen in years. Jon decides to march on Ramsay himself and asks for volunteers to accompany him. His officers view Jon's intent to march on Ramsay as a betrayal of the Watch's neutrality and he is stabbed in a mutiny.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Meanwhile, Jon's crippled half-brother Bran Stark, traveling north of the Wall, is led to the last surviving Children of the Forest, the non-human natives of Westeros. They introduce Bran and his companions to the "last greenseer", an ancient man intertwined with the roots of a weirwood tree. He helps Bran learn clairvoyant "greensight", enabling Bran to witness the past and present through the eyes of the weirwood trees that grow throughout the North.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Having killed his father Tywin, the Hand of the King, the dwarf Tyrion Lannister is smuggled out of Westeros to the city of Pentos by the spymaster Varys, where he is sheltered by the merchant Illyrio Mopatis. Tyrion is sent south with a party ostensibly to aid the exiled princess Daenerys Targaryen, who controls the only living dragons, in claiming the Iron Throne. Tyrion learns that Varys and Illyrio have hidden the presumed-dead Aegon Targaryen, son of Daenerys's late brother Prince Rhaegar, and intend to install him as king of Westeros with Daenerys's aid. Tyrion persuades Aegon to invade Westeros immediately, without waiting for Daenerys. Soon afterward, Tyrion is kidnapped by Daenerys's disgraced advisor Jorah Mormont, who intends to deliver him to Daenerys in order to regain her favor.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: In the Free City of Braavos, Arya is an acolyte of the guild of assassins known as the Faceless Men. When they temporarily afflict her with blindness, Arya develops her sense of hearing, and realizes that she can "see" through cats the same way she could with her pet direwolf, Nymeria. After her sight is restored, Arya is tasked with assassinating a corrupt merchant while magically disguised with another girl's face. After doing so, Arya is declared an apprentice of the Faceless Men, to be sent to another assassin to continue her training.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Daenerys has conquered the city of Meereen and banned slavery, but struggles to maintain peace among various factions within the city, including the Sons of the Harpy, a violent Meereenese resistance group, and with the neighboring city of Yunkai.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Daenerys' dragons have become increasingly dangerous, and she reluctantly confines them in a dungeon for the safety of her people. Drogon, the largest, evades capture and flies off. Despite her sexual relationship with the mercenary Daario Naharis, Daenerys marries the Meereenese nobleman Hizdahr zo Loraq to secure an alliance to appease the Sons of the Harpy.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Quentyn Martell, the son of the Prince of Dorne in southern Westeros, arrives in Meereen in hopes of renewing the alliance between Daenerys's family and his, but he is unable to maintain her attention. Jorah and Tyrion are shipwrecked, kidnapped, and sold to a Yunkish slave trader. They escape from the Yunkish army besieging Meereen and join the Second Sons mercenary group, with Tyrion intending to secure their support for Daenerys. Meanwhile, another Westerosi, Victarion Greyjoy, sails for Meereen, intending to marry Daenerys and use her dragons to overthrow his brother, the king of the Ironborn.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: At Hizdahr's insistence, Daenerys reopens the city's "fighting pits" for gladiatorial combat, but the noise and carnage attract Drogon. In the resulting chaos, Daenerys climbs onto Drogon to calm him but he flies away with her. Hizdahr is implicated in an attempt to poison Daenerys. Her advisor, Barristan Selmy, takes part in a plot to remove Hizdahr from power, and the Sons of the Harpy resume their killing. Barristan prepares for battle with the armies outside Meereen. Quentyn attempts to prove his worth by riding one of the remaining dragons but is killed and both dragons are released.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Drogon flies Daenerys to the Dothraki Sea, the grassland controlled by the nomadic Dothraki people. After several days, Daenerys encounters a Dothraki horde led by Khal Jhaqo.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: In the North, Roose Bolton has overthrown House Stark and assumed authority as the Warden of the North after allying with House Frey. Much of the region is occupied by Ironborn invaders. Under Jon Snow's advice, Stannis wins the support of northern mountain clans by pledging to recapture Winterfell and fighting off the Ironborn. With their support, Stannis captures Asha Greyjoy, Victarion's niece, and marches his forces toward Winterfell to attack the Boltons, but his advance is halted by heavy snowstorms.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Stannis's advisor Davos Seaworth is sent to win the support of the wealthy lord Wyman Manderly, who pretends to execute Davos to curry favor with the Lannister regime that controls the Iron Throne. In a secret meeting, Manderly tells Davos that he and other Northern vassals intend to feign submission to the Boltons and Lannisters while plotting revenge for Robb Stark's death and the restoration of Stark rule. Revealing to Davos that young Rickon Stark is in hiding on the remote island of Skagos, Manderly pledges to support Stannis if Davos can retrieve Rickon and unite the Starks' supporters around him.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Theon Greyjoy is a prisoner of the Boltons, and is mutilated and tortured by Roose's sadistic son Ramsay, who renames Theon "Reek". To cement his rule over the North, Roose has Ramsay supposedly married to Arya Stark, but the girl is actually Jeyne Poole, a friend of Arya's sister Sansa, who is forced to impersonate Arya and is physically and sexually tormented by Ramsay. A disguised Mance Rayder arrives at Winterfell and enlists Theon to help him free the false Arya. Theon and Jeyne escape, leaping from the castle wall into the snow to be captured by Stannis's forces.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Jaime Lannister, the uncle (and, secretly, father) of the young king Tommen Baratheon, negotiates the surrender of the last of the late Robb Stark's allies, nominally putting an end to the Stark–Lannister war in the Riverlands. Brienne of Tarth, whom Jaime had sent to search for Sansa Stark, finds Jaime and tells him Sansa is in danger; he follows after her.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: After Tyrion convinces Aegon to attack Westeros, Aegon and his forces capture several castles in the Stormlands with little resistance. Meanwhile, Aegon's foster father Jon Connington is secretly succumbing to greyscale, a deadly and infectious disease.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Doran Martell, the prince of Dorne, sends two of his nieces north to the capital city of King's Landing to infiltrate the Faith and the government and work in Dorne's interests.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Cersei Lannister, Tommen's mother and queen regent, has been arrested by the Faith on charges of fornication and conspiracy. To gain release from her imprisonment, she confesses to several of the lesser charges against her, but does not confess to having murdered her husband King Robert Baratheon, nor that her children are the product of incest. As a condition of her release, Cersei is forced to humiliate herself by walking naked across the city. Meanwhile, Cersei's ally, the ex-maester Qyburn, has created "Ser Robert Strong", an eight-foot-tall figure encased in armor, to be an unbeatable champion in Cersei's upcoming trial by combat.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Having taken control of the government, Cersei's uncle Kevan Lannister and the Grand Maester Pycelle attempt to undo the damage caused by Cersei's misrule. However, Varys reappears and murders both Kevan and Pycelle, revealing that he has been plotting for years for the Lannisters to destroy themselves so that Aegon Targaryen can take the throne, having been raised to be an ideal ruler. The book ends with Varys sending his child spies to finish Kevan off.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: In addition to the maps published in previous books, the book includes a new map of the previously-unmapped area of the Free Cities on the eastern continent. Like the previous four volumes in the "Ice and Fire" series, the book includes an appendix with a complete list of characters.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: The story is narrated from the point of view of 18 different characters, including two minor one-off point-of-view (POV) characters featured in the prologue and epilogue. All but two POV characters were identified before the book's release.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Chapters for several POVs, which may include Sansa Stark, Samwell Tarly, Aeron Damphair, Arianne Martell, and Brienne of Tarth were written for the book, but they will instead tentatively appear in the next book, "The Winds of Winter".


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: "A Dance with Dragons" was originally intended to be the title of the second novel in the sequence, when Martin still envisioned the series as a trilogy. Some early US editions of "A Game of Thrones" (1996) list "A Dance of Dragons" as the forthcoming second volume in the series. The 1998 anthology "Legends", which features the novella "The Hedge Knight" from the same universe, listed "A Dance of Dragons" as the third installment of a four-book series.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Due to the size of the still-unfinished manuscript for "A Feast for Crows", Martin and his publishers split the narrative into two books. Rather than divide the text in half chronologically, Martin instead split the material by character and location, resulting in "two novels taking place simultaneously" with different casts of characters. Published in 2005, "A Feast for Crows" is narrated primarily by characters in the South of the Seven Kingdoms and in the new locations of the Iron Islands and Dorne. "A Dance with Dragons" covers characters in the North and across the narrow sea, although Jaime Lannister, Cersei Lannister, Arya Stark, Areo Hotah and Victarion and Asha Greyjoy appear in both volumes.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Approximately one-third of the published "A Dance with Dragons" consists of material that had been written for the pre-split "A Feast for Crows", although much of this has been rewritten by Martin.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: In 2009, Martin confirmed that, contrary to earlier statements, Sansa Stark would not appear in "A Dance with Dragons"; Sansa chapters initially slated for the novel have instead been pushed back to "The Winds of Winter", which is planned to be the sixth book in the series. In early 2010, Martin noted that his intent for "A Dance with Dragons" was for the first 800 manuscript pages to cover the alternate characters in the same time span as "A Feast for Crows", and that "Everything that follows is post-"Feast", so that's where some of the cast from the last book start popping up again." Stating that "I wanted to resolve at least a few of the cliffhangers from "Feast"," Martin also mentioned the possibility that some of his finished chapters might get pushed to the next novel, "The Winds of Winter," depending on the length of the finished manuscript for "A Dance with Dragons".


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Martin supplied a note at the end of A Feast for Crows explaining the reason for the split and promising that A Dance with Dragons would follow with the missing POV characters 'next year'. Despite these original, optimistic predictions of possible completion in late 2006, Martin completed the novel in April 2011, nearly five years later. During this period, Martin's blog featured sporadic updates on his progress, and in January 2008 he posted an update affirming his vigilant commitment to finishing the novel. In early 2008, publisher Spectra Books stated that "A Dance with Dragons" would be released on September 30, 2008, but Martin stated this would only be possible if he finished writing by the end of June, before his trip to Spain and Portugal, a goal which he did not meet.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: On February 19, 2009, Martin posted on his website: "I am trying to finish the book by June. I think I can do that. If I do, "A Dance with Dragons" will likely be published in September or October." On June 22, 2009, the author expressed "guarded optimism" with respect to his progress on the novel, while still not confirming a publication date. When asked in a July 2009 interview with "FREE! Magazine" how the book was going, Martin stated, "It is going pretty well, actually. I am hoping to finish it by September or October; that is my goal." On October 6, 2009, Martin said that his working manuscript for "A Dance With Dragons" had just exceeded 1,100 pages of completed chapters, plus "considerably more in partials, fragments, and roughs." He noted that this made the upcoming novel longer than his earlier books "A Game of Thrones" and "A Feast for Crows", and nearly as long as "A Clash of Kings".


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: On March 2, 2010, Martin remarked that he had reached 1,311 manuscript pages, making "A Dance with Dragons" the second-longest novel in the series at that point, behind only the 1,521-page manuscript of "A Storm of Swords". On July 8, 2010, Martin spoke at a conference and confirmed the current length of the book to be 1,400 manuscript pages. He expressed his disappointment that he was unable to completely finish the novel by the conference, although he would not speculate how soon the book would be completed after his return home on July 11. At the same conference, Martin also confirmed that he has written one Sansa, one Arya, and two Arianne chapters for the planned sixth novel, "Winds of Winter", and had transferred two Cersei chapters from that book into "A Dance with Dragons". On August 7, 2010, Martin confirmed that he had completed eight POVs, excluding the prologue and epilogue.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: At the New York Comic Con on October 10, 2010, Spectra senior editor Anne Groell revealed that Martin had only five chapters remaining to finish, with sections of the chapters already completed. She stated her desire to have the manuscript completed by December. In a December 2010 interview with Bear Swarm, Martin stated that he almost had "A Dance With Dragons" completed.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: On March 3, 2011, the release of the novel, though at that point still not completed, was set for July 12. Martin claimed this July 2011 publication date was different from the previous publication dates mentioned, in that this was "real", as opposed to earlier "wishful thinking, boundless optimism, cockeyed dreams, [and] honest mistakes". By April 27, 2011, "A Dance with Dragons" was completed save for incorporating requested changes made by his book editor and her staff copy-editors, suggested final draft notes from trusted friends and a line-by-line reread done to tighten and eliminate any unnecessary "fat" remaining in the manuscript. While the unfinished manuscript exceeded 1,600 pages,<ref name="http://grrm.livejournal.com/204875.html"></ref> making it the longest volume in the series, the final draft was reduced to 1,510 pages, making "A Dance of Dragons", by narrow margin, shorter than "A Storm of Swords" and thus the series' second-longest novel.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: As scheduled, the novel was released on July 12, 2011, though on June 29, 2011, Amazon Germany mistakenly released 180 copies of the novel early. Martin requested that those who held copies not spoil the book for fans who had to wait. Several "A Song of Ice and Fire" websites put an embargo in place on their forums with the same intent.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: "The Atlantic" Rachael Brown found "A Dance with Dragons" "infinitely more satisfying than its predecessor, 2005's bleak and plodding "A Feast for Crows". The aspects of Martin's work that have endeared him to fans are abundant here – rich world building, narrative twists and turns, and gritty depictions of the human struggle for power. Characters who were sorely missed in "Feast" – Daenerys Targaryen, Tyrion Lannister, and Jon Snow – make up more than a third of the novel, and Martin is wise enough to give us at least a chapter from (almost) everyone else. Weaknesses that have plagued Martin's previous books are also present: too much repetition, unexceptional prose, and characters who use the same idioms (and have sex in exactly the same manner) no matter their ethnicity, social class, or continent. But while "A Dance with Dragons" cries out for better editing, it remains entirely engrossing. Martin has hidden so many clues and red herrings throughout his previous volumes that it is a thrill to see certain pieces fall into place."


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Remy Verhoeve of "The Huffington Post" said, ""A Dance with Dragons" is just a book, of course. It is not the Second Coming or anything. And I understand that the author must feel a lot of pressure concerning this one (he should). It's late and it has to repair some of the damage done by "A Feast for Crows", which frankly felt as if it was written by a ghost writer at times. Finally it is here, and some of the things we've been wondering about for more than a decade are actually revealed (not everything, but at least some things). It has the same structural problems as the previous book; it is sprawling and incoherent at times, but at least the characters are more interesting than in the previous installment. It does feel like I'm reading a bunch of separate stories within the same setting–the chapters are told through the eyes of various characters–but that doesn't really bother me as I love the setting and like to see it through various points of view. Theories that have been bandied about online for the last ten years mostly come true in this book, so in that respect the novel isn't shocking but neither is it disappointing. Martin also manages to put in a few twists, but ends the book much like he did the previous one with cliffhangers instead of wrapping things up a little better so the next long wait won't hurt so much."


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: David Orr of "The New York Times" said, ""A Dance With Dragons" comes in at roughly 9,574,622,012 pages, and smart money says the final two books in the series will make this one look like 'The Old Man and the Sea'. Such length isn't necessary, and it hurts Martin's prose and his plot mechanics. Tyrion 'waddles' at least 12 times here, and even if we suppose the unflattering word reflects Tyrion's contempt for his own awkward gait, it seems unlikely he would indulge this contempt when he's, say, fighting for his life. Similarly, when your novel's terrain stretches across hundreds of miles and your world lacks jet propulsion, as an author you face some basic problems of transportation that can result in conveyance via Rube Goldberg," but also wrote that "Still, 'A Dance With Dragons' is relentlessly entertaining."


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: "Time" James Poniewozik found a possible "weakness to the early Meereen sections [by] marking time (and making Dany uncharacteristically indecisive) to allow time for all the pieces to fall into place" and said, "All this makes for a thousand-page book that feels half as long, that moves dextrously, answers key questions and gobsmacks you with convincing feints and change-ups. As in "AFFC", there are sections that feel like they could have used an editor. In some chapters you suddenly find yourself in a strange land with a character you have little attachment to, wondering where this thread is going, as if you had stayed too long at a party after the friends you came with have left.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: "The Washington Post" Bill Sheehan said, "Filled with vividly rendered set pieces, unexpected turnings, assorted cliffhangers and moments of appalling cruelty, "A Dance With Dragons" is epic fantasy as it should be written: passionate, compelling, convincingly detailed and thoroughly imagined. Despite a number of overtly fantastic elements (dragons, seers, shape shifters and sorcerers), the book—and the series as a whole—feels grounded in the brutal reality of medieval times and has more in common with the Wars of the Roses than it does with "The Lord of the Rings". The result is a complex summer blockbuster with brains and heart, a book with rare—and potentially enormous—appeal.


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: Megan Wasson of "The Christian Science Monitor" said, ""A Dance with Dragons" may well be one of the best books in the five-book series so far. Martin's prose is concise but pithy, begging to be devoured over and over again. All the fans' favorite characters make an appearance, unlike in the last book. But what truly sets this book above some of the others in the series is Martin's ability to keep his readers on their toes and the edges of their seats. No character, no matter how likeable and seemingly important, is ever safe from Martin's pen (remember Ned Stark?), and on the other hand, no one can ever be truly pronounced dead. What you thought was going to happen after reading Books No. 1, 2, and even 3 and 4, now clearly will not happen, and that's where Martin's strength lies."


title: A Dance with Dragons

text: In April 2012, "A Dance with Dragons" was nominated for the 2012 Hugo Award for Best Novel. In May 2012, it was nominated for the 2012 Locus Award for Best Fantasy Novel and won it in June 2012. In August 2012, the novel was nominated for a World Fantasy Award for Best Novel.


title: Sandringham House

text: Sandringham House is a country house in the parish of Sandringham, Norfolk, England. It is one of the royal residences of Charles III, whose grandfather, George VI, and great-grandfather, George V, both died there. The house stands in a estate in the Norfolk Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The house is listed as Grade II* and the landscaped gardens, park and woodlands are on the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.


title: Sandringham House

text: The site has been occupied since Elizabethan times, when a large manor house was constructed. This was replaced in 1771 by a Georgian mansion for the owners, the Hoste Henleys. In 1836 Sandringham was bought by John Motteux, a London merchant, who already owned property in Norfolk and Surrey. Motteux had no direct heir, and on his death in 1843, his entire estate was left to Charles Spencer Cowper, the son of Motteux's close friend Emily Temple, Viscountess Palmerston. Cowper sold the Norfolk and the Surrey estates and embarked on rebuilding at Sandringham. He led an extravagant life, and by the early 1860s, the estate was mortgaged and he and his wife spent most of their time on the Continent.


title: Sandringham House

text: In 1862 Sandringham and just under 8,000 acres of land were purchased for £220,000 for Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, later Edward VII, as a country home for him and his future wife, Princess Alexandra of Denmark. Between 1870 and 1900, the house was almost completely rebuilt in a style described by Pevsner as "frenetic Jacobean". Albert Edward also developed the estate, creating one of the finest shoots in England. Following his death in 1910, the estate passed to Edward's son and heir, George V, who described the house as "dear old Sandringham, the place I love better than anywhere else in the world". It was the setting for the first Christmas broadcast in 1932. George died at the house on 20 January 1936. The estate passed to his son Edward VIII and, at his abdication, as the private property of the monarch, it was purchased by Edward's brother, George VI. George was as devoted to the house as his father, writing to his mother Queen Mary, "I have always been so happy here and I love the place". He died at Sandringham on 6 February 1952.


title: Sandringham House

text: On the King's death, Sandringham passed to his daughter Elizabeth II. The Queen spent about two months each winter on the Sandringham Estate, including the anniversary of her father's death and of her own accession in early February. In 1957, she broadcast her first televised Christmas message from Sandringham. In the 1960s, plans were drawn up to demolish the house and replace it with a modern building, but these were not carried out. In 1977, to mark her Silver Jubilee, the Queen opened the house and grounds to the public for the first time. Unlike the royal palaces owned by the Crown, such as Buckingham Palace, Holyrood Palace and Windsor Castle, Sandringham (along with Balmoral Castle in Scotland) is owned personally by the monarch. In 2022, following the Queen's death, Sandringham passed to her son Charles III.


title: Sandringham House

text: Sandringham is recorded in the Domesday Book as "sant-Dersingham" (the sandy part of Dersingham) and the land was awarded to a Norman knight, Robert Fitz-Corbun after the Conquest. The local antiquarian Claude Messent, in his study "The Architecture on the Royal Estate of Sandringham", records the discovery of evidence of the pavements of a Roman villa near Appleton farm. In the 15th century it was held by Anthony Woodville, Lord Scales, brother-in-law to Edward IV. In the Elizabethan era a manor was built on the site of the present house, which, by the 18th century, came into the possession of the Hoste Henley family, descendants of Dutch refugees. In 1771 Cornish Henley cleared the site to build a Georgian mansion, Sandringham Hall. In 1834, Henry Hoste Henley died without issue, and the estate was bought at auction by John Motteux, a London merchant. Motteux was also without heirs and bequeathed Sandringham, together with another Norfolk estate and a property in Surrey, to the third son of his close friend, Emily Lamb, the wife of Lord Palmerston. At the time of his inheritance in 1843, Charles Spencer Cowper was a bachelor diplomat, resident in Paris. On succeeding to Motteux's estates, he sold the other properties and based himself at Sandringham. He undertook extensions to the hall, employing Samuel Sanders Teulon to add an elaborate porch and conservatory. Cowper's style of living was extravagant—he and his wife spent much of their time on the Continent—and within 10 years the estate was mortgaged for £89,000. The death of their only child, Mary Harriette, from cholera in 1854 led the couple to spend even more time abroad, mainly in Paris, and by the early 1860s Cowper was keen to sell the estate.


title: Sandringham House

text: In 1861 Queen Victoria's eldest son and heir, Albert Edward, was approaching his twentieth birthday. Edward's dissipated lifestyle had been disappointing to his parents, and his father, Prince Albert, thought that marriage and the purchase of a suitable establishment were necessary to ground the prince in country life and pursuits and lessen the influence of the "Marlborough House set" with which he was involved. Albert had his staff investigate 18 possible country estates that might be suitable, including Newstead Abbey in Nottinghamshire and Houghton Hall in Norfolk. The need to act quickly was reinforced by the Nellie Clifden affair, when Edward's fellow officers smuggled the actress into his quarters. The possibility of a scandal was deeply concerning to his parents. Sandringham Hall was on the list of the estates considered, and a personal recommendation to the Prince Consort from the prime minister Lord Palmerston, stepfather to the owner, swayed Prince Albert. Negotiations were only slightly delayed by Albert's death in December 1861—his widow declared, "His wishes – his plans – about everything are to be my law". Edward visited in February 1862, and a sale was agreed for the house and just under 8,000 acres of land, which was finalised that October. Queen Victoria only twice visited the house she had paid for. Over the course of the next forty years, and with considerable expenditure, Edward was to create a house and country estate that his friend Charles Carington called "the most comfortable in England".


title: Sandringham House

text: The price paid for Sandringham, £220,000, has been described as "exorbitant". This is questioned by Helen Walch, author of the estate's recent (2012) history, who shows the detailed analysis undertaken by the Prince Consort's advisers and suggests that the cost was reasonable. However, the house was soon found to be too small to accommodate the Prince of Wales's establishment following his marriage in March 1863 and the many guests he wished to entertain. In 1865, two years after moving in, the prince commissioned A. J. Humbert to raze the original hall and create a much larger building. Humbert was an architect favoured by the royal family—"for no good reason", according to the architectural historian Mark Girouard—and had previously undertaken work for Queen Victoria at Osborne House and at Frogmore House. The new red-brick house was complete by late 1870; the only element of the original house of the Henley Hostes and the Cowpers that was retained was the elaborate conservatory designed by Teulon in the 1830s. Edward had this room converted into a billiard room. A plaque in the entrance hall records that "This house was built by Albert Edward Prince of Wales and Alexandra his wife in the year of our Lord 1870". The building was entered through a large porte-cochère straight into the main living room (the saloon), an arrangement that was subsequently found to be inconvenient. The house provided living and sleeping accommodation over three storeys, with attics and a basement. The Norfolk countryside surrounding the house appealed to Alexandra, as it reminded her of her native Denmark.


title: Sandringham House

text: Within a decade, the house was again found to be too small, and in 1883 a new extension, the Bachelors' Wing, was constructed to the designs of a Norfolk architect, Colonel R. W. Edis. Edis also built a new billiard room and converted the old conservatory into a bowling alley. The Prince of Wales had been impressed by one he had seen at Trentham Hall, and the alley at Sandringham was modelled on an example from Rumpenheim Castle, Germany. In 1891, during preparations for Edward's fiftieth birthday, a serious fire broke out when maids lit all the fires in the second-floor bedrooms to warm them in advance of the prince's arrival. Edis was recalled to undertake rebuilding and further construction. As he had with the Bachelors' Wing, Edis tried to harmonise these additions with Humbert's house by following the original Jacobethan style, and by using matching brickwork and Ketton stone.


title: Sandringham House

text: The house was up to date in its facilities, the modern kitchens and lighting running on gas from the estate's own plant and water being supplied from the Appleton Water Tower, constructed at the highest point on the estate. The tower was designed in an Italianate style by Robert Rawlinson, and Alexandra laid the foundation stone in 1877. The Prince's efforts as a country gentleman were approved by the press of the day; a contemporary newspaper expressed a wish to ""Sandringhamize" Marlborough House—as a landlord, agriculturist and country gentleman, the Prince sets an example which might be followed with advantage".


title: Sandringham House

text: The royal couple's developments at Sandringham were not confined to the house; over the course of their occupation, the wider estate was also transformed. Ornamental and kitchen gardens were established, employing over 100 gardeners at their peak. Many estate buildings were constructed, including cottages for staff, kennels, a school, a rectory and a staff clubhouse, the Babingley. Edward also made Sandringham one of the best sporting estates in England to provide a setting for the elaborate weekend shooting parties that became Sandringham's defining rationale. To increase the amount of daylight available during the shooting season, which ran from October to February, the prince introduced the tradition of Sandringham Time, whereby all the clocks on the estate were set half an hour ahead of GMT. This tradition was maintained until 1936. Edward's entertaining was legendary, and the scale of the slaughter of game birds, predominantly pheasants and partridges, was colossal. The meticulously maintained game books recorded annual bags of between 6,000 and 8,000 birds in the 1870s, rising to bags of over 20,000 a year by 1900. The game larder, constructed for the storage of the carcasses, was inspired by that at Holkham Hall and was the largest in Europe.


title: Sandringham House

text: Guests for Sandringham house parties generally arrived at Wolferton railway station, 2.5 miles from the house, travelling in royal trains that ran from St Pancras Station to King's Lynn and then on to Wolferton. The station served the house from 1862 until its closure in 1969. Thereafter, the Queen and others staying at the house have generally travelled by car from King's Lynn. Edward VII established the Sandringham stud in 1897, achieving considerable success with the racehorses Persimmon and Diamond Jubilee. Neither his son nor his grandsons evinced as much interest in horses, although the stud was maintained; but his great-granddaughter, Elizabeth II, tried to match Edward's equestrian achievements and bred several winners at the Sandringham Stud.


title: Sandringham House

text: On 14 January 1892, Edward's eldest son and heir, Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, died of pneumonia at the house. He is commemorated in the clock tower, which bears an inscription in Latin that translates as "the hours perish and will be charged to our account".


title: Sandringham House

text: In his will Edward VII left his widow £200,000 and a lifetime interest in the Sandringham estate. Queen Alexandra's continued occupancy of the "big house" compelled George V, his wife, Queen Mary, and their expanding family to remain at York Cottage in the grounds, in rather "cramped" conditions. Suggestions from courtiers that Queen Alexandra might move out were firmly rebuffed by the King; "It is my mother's house, my father built it for her". The King also lacked the sociability of his father, and the shortage of space at York Cottage enabled him to limit the entertaining he undertook, with the small rooms reportedly reminding him of the onboard cabins of his naval career.


title: Sandringham House

text: The new King's primary interests, aside from his constitutional duties, were shooting and stamp collecting. He was considered one of the best shots in England, and his collections of shotguns and stamps were among the finest in the world. Deeply conservative by nature, George sought to maintain the traditions of Sandringham estate life established by his father, and life at York Cottage provided respite from the constitutional and political struggles that overshadowed the early years of George's reign. Even greater upheaval was occasioned by the outbreak of the First World War, a dynastic struggle that involved many of his relatives, including the German Kaiser and the Russian Emperor, both of whom had previously been guests at Sandringham. The estate and village of Sandringham suffered a major loss when all but two members of the King's Own Sandringham Company, a territorial unit of the Fifth Battalion of the Royal Norfolk Regiment, were killed at Suvla Bay during the Gallipoli Campaign. The story of the battalion was the subject of a BBC drama, "All the King's Men". A memorial to the dead was raised on the estate; the names of those killed in the Second World War were added subsequently.


title: Sandringham House

text: Following Queen Alexandra's death at Sandringham on 20 November 1925, the King and his family moved to the main house. In 1932, George V gave the first of the royal Christmas messages from a studio erected at Sandringham. The speech, written by Rudyard Kipling, began, "I speak now from my home and from my heart to you all". George V died in his bedroom at Sandringham at 11:55 p.m. on 20 January 1936, his death hastened by injections of morphine and cocaine, to maintain the King's dignity and to enable the announcement of his death to be made in the following day's "Times". The King's body was moved to St Mary Magdalene's Church, a scene described by the late King's assistant private secretary, "Tommy" Lascelles. "Next evening we took him over to the little church at the end of the garden. We saw the lych-gate brilliantly lit [and] the guardsmen slung the coffin on their shoulders and laid it before the altar. After a brief service, we left it, to be watched over by the men of the Sandringham Estate." Two days later, George's body was transported by train from Wolferton to London, and to its lying in state at Westminster Hall.


title: Sandringham House

text: On the night of his father's death, Edward VIII summarily ordered that the clocks at Sandringham be returned to Greenwich Mean Time, ending the tradition of Sandringham time begun by his grandfather over 50 years earlier. Edward had rarely enjoyed his visits to Sandringham, either in his father's time or that of his grandfather. He described a typical dinner at the house in a letter to his then mistress Freda Dudley Ward, dated 26 December 1919; "it's too dull and boring for words. Christ how any human beings can ever have got themselves into this pompous secluded and monotonous groove I just can't imagine". In another letter, evenings at the "big house"—Edward stayed at York Cottage with his father—were recorded as "sordidly dull and boring". His antipathy to the house was unlikely to have been lessened by his late father's will, which was read to the family in the saloon at the house. His brothers were each left £750,000 while Edward was bequeathed no monetary assets beyond the revenues from the Duchy of Cornwall. A codicil also prevented him from selling the late King's personal possessions; Lascelles described the inheritance as "the Kingship without the cash".


title: Sandringham House

text: Edward's concerns regarding his income led him immediately to focus on the expense associated with running his late father's private homes. Sandringham he described as a "voracious white elephant", and he asked his brother, the Duke of York to undertake a review of the management of the estate, which had been costing his father £50,000 annually in subsidies at the time of his death. The review recommended significant retrenchments, and its partial implementation caused considerable resentment among the dismissed staff. Edward spent a single night of his reign at the house, bringing Wallis Simpson for a shooting party in October 1936. The party was interrupted by a request to meet with prime minister Stanley Baldwin, and having arrived on a Sunday, the King returned to Fort Belvedere the next day. He never returned to Sandringham; and, his attention diverted by the impending crisis arising from his attachment to Simpson, within two months of his only visit to the house as King, he had abdicated. On his abdication, as Sandringham and Balmoral Castle were the private property of the monarch, it was necessary for King George VI to purchase both properties. The price paid, £300,000, was a cause of friction between the new King and his brother.


title: Sandringham House

text: George VI had been born at Sandringham on 14 December 1895. A keen follower of country pursuits, he was as devoted to the estate as his father, writing to his mother, Queen Mary, "I have always been so happy here". The deep retrenchment he had proposed when commissioned by his brother to review the estate was not enacted, but economies were still made. His mother was at church at Sandringham on Sunday 3 September 1939, when the outbreak of the Second World War was declared. The house was shut up during the war, but occasional visits were made to the estate, with the family staying at outlying cottages. After the war the King made improvements to the gardens surrounding the house but, as traditionalist as his father, he made few other changes. December 1945 saw the first celebration of Christmas at the house since 1938. Lady Airlie recorded her impressions at dinner: "I sat next to the King. His face was tired and strained and he ate practically nothing. Looking at him I felt the cold fear of the probability of another short reign".


title: Sandringham House

text: George was a heavy smoker throughout his life and had an operation to remove part of his lung in September 1951. He was never fully well again and died at Sandringham during the early morning of 6 February 1952. He had gone out after hares on 5 February, "shooting conspicuously well", and had planned the next day's shoot before retiring at 10.30 p.m. He was discovered at 7.30 a.m. in his bedroom by his valet, having died of a coronary thrombosis at the age of 56. His body was placed in the Church of St Mary Magdalene, before being taken to Wolferton Station and transported by train to London, to lie in state at Westminster Hall.


title: Sandringham House

text: As with her predecessors, the house remained one of the two homes owned by the Sovereign in her private capacity, rather than as head of state, the other being Balmoral Castle. Following King George VI's death, Queen Elizabeth II's custom was to spend the anniversary of that and of her own accession privately with her family at Sandringham House, and, more recently, to use it as her official base from Christmas until February. In celebrating Christmas at Sandringham, the Queen followed the tradition of her last three predecessors, whereas her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria, held her celebrations at Windsor Castle. The taxation arrangements of the monarch meant that no inheritance tax was paid on the Sandringham or Balmoral estates when they passed to the Queen, at a time when it was having a deleterious effect on other country estates. On her accession, the Queen asked her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, to take on the responsibility for the management of the estate. The Duke worked to move towards self-sufficiency, generating additional income streams, taking more of the land in hand, and amalgamating many of the smaller tenant farms.


title: Sandringham House

text: In January 1957 the Queen received the resignation of the Prime Minister Anthony Eden at the house. Eden's wife, Clarissa, recorded the event in her diary, "8 January – Anthony has to go through a Cabinet and listening to Harold prosing for half an hour. Then by train to Sandringham. Many photographers. We arrive into the hall where everyone is looking at the television." At the end of that year, the Queen made her first televised Christmas broadcast from Sandringham. In the 1960s, plans were initiated to demolish the house and replace it with a modern residence by David Roberts, an architect who worked mainly at the University of Cambridge. The plans were not taken forward, but modernisation of the interior of the house and the removal of a range of ancillary buildings were carried out by Hugh Casson, who also decorated the Royal Yacht, "Britannia". In 1977, for her silver jubilee, the Queen opened the house to the public.


title: Sandringham House

text: Sandringham continued to operate as a sporting estate. Pheasants and partridge are no longer reared for this purpose, and Sandringham is now one of the few wild shoots in England. Along with her equestrian interest in the Sandringham Stud, where she bred several winning horses, the Queen developed a successful gun dog breeding programme at Sandringham. Following the tradition of a kennels at Sandringham established by her great grandfather, when Queen Alexandra kept over 100 dogs on the estate, the Queen preferred black labrador retrievers, over the yellow type favoured by her father, and the terriers bred by her earlier predecessors.


title: Sandringham House

text: From his retirement from official duties in August 2017 until his death in April 2021, the Duke of Edinburgh spent much of his time at Wood Farm, a large farmhouse on the Sandringham Estate used by the Duke and the Queen when not hosting guests at the main house. In February 2022 the Queen celebrated the 70th anniversary of her accession at Sandringham. The Queen made her last visit to Sandringham in early July 2022, for five days after completing her Platinum Jubilee celebrations.


title: Sandringham House

text: On the death of his mother, the Sandringham estate passed to King Charles. In November 2022, Buckingham Palace confirmed that the King planned to spend Christmas at Sandringham, reestablishing the tradition followed by Elizabeth II until 2020.


title: Sandringham House

text: The house is mainly constructed of red brick with limestone dressings; Norfolk Carrstone is also prevalent, particularly in Edis's additions. The tiled roof contains nine separate clusters of chimneystacks. The style is Jacobethan, with inspiration drawn principally from nearby Blickling Hall. Construction was undertaken by Goggs Brothers of Swaffham. The principal rooms of the house are the saloon, the drawing room, the dining room and the ballroom, together with rooms devoted to sports, such as the gun room, or leisure, such as the bowling alley, now a library, and the billiard room. The walls of the corridors connecting the principal rooms display a collection of Oriental and Indian arms and armour, gathered by Edward VII on his tour of the East in 1875–1876. Decoration of the house and the provision of furniture and fittings was undertaken by Holland and Sons in the 1870 rebuilding.


title: Sandringham House

text: The largest room in the house, the saloon is used as the main reception room. The arrangement of entry under the porte-cochère direct into the saloon proved problematic, with no ante-room in which guests could remove their hats and coats. Jenkins describes the decorative style, here and elsewhere in the house, as "Osbert Lancaster's Curzon Street Baroque". The room contains portraits of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert by their favourite artist Franz Xaver Winterhalter. The saloon functioned as a venue for dances, until the construction of the new ballroom by Edis, and has a minstrels' gallery to accommodate musicians. The room contains a weighing machine; Edward VII was in the habit of requiring his guests to be weighed on their arrival, and again on their departure, to establish that his lavish hospitality had caused them to put on weight.


title: Sandringham House

text: The drawing room is described by Jenkins as "the nearest Sandringham gets to pomp". On one of her two visits to the house, Victoria recorded in her journal that, after dinner, the party adjourned to "the very long and handsome drawing room with painted ceiling and two fireplaces". The room contains portraits of Queen Alexandra and her daughters, Princess Louise, Princess Victoria, and Princess Maud of Wales, by Edward Hughes. White marble statues complete what has been described as a "tour de force of fashionable late-Victorian decoration".


title: Sandringham House

text: The ballroom was added by Edis in 1884, to overcome the inconvenience of having only the saloon as the major room for entertaining. As this was also the main family living room, it had previously been necessary to remove the furniture when the saloon was required for dances and large entertainments. Alexandra recorded her delight at the result, "Our new ballroom is beautiful I think & a great success & avoids pulling the hall to pieces each time there is a ball or anything". At the time of Queen Victoria's visit in 1889, the room was used for a theatrical performance given by Sir Henry Irving and Ellen Terry. Queen Elizabeth II used the room for entertainments and as a cinema.


title: Sandringham House

text: The walls of the dining room are decorated with Spanish tapestries including some by Goya which were a gift from Alfonso XII of Spain. The walls are panelled in oak, painted light green for Queen Mary who had been inspired by a visit to a Scottish castle. Jill Franklin's study of the planning of Victorian country houses includes a photograph of the dining room at Sandringham with the table laid for dinner for twenty-four, a "very usual" number to seat for dinner in a major country house of the time.


title: Sandringham House

text: Sandringham House has not been admired by critics. Its chief fault is the lack of harmony between Humbert's original building and Edis's extensions, "a contrast between the northern and southern halves of the house (that) has been much criticised ever since". The architectural historian John Martin Robinson wrote in 1982, "Sandringham, the latest in date of the houses of the British monarchy, is the least distinguished architecturally". In his biography of Queen Mary, James Pope-Hennessy compared the house unfavourably to "a golf-hotel at St Andrews or a station-hotel at Strathpeffer". Simon Jenkins considered Sandringham "unattractive", with a "grim, institutional appearance". Pevsner described the architectural style as "frenetic"; Girouard expressed himself perplexed as to the preference shown by the royal family for A. J. Humbert, a patronage the writer Adrian Tinniswood described as "the Victorian Royal Family's knack for choosing second-rate architects". An article on the house in the June 1902 edition of "Country Life" opined, "of mere splendour there is not much, but of substantial comfort a good deal". The writer Clive Aslet suggests that the sporting opportunities offered by the estate were the main attraction for its royal owners, rather than "the house itself, which even after rebuilding was never beguiling".


title: Sandringham House

text: The fittings and furnishings were also criticised; the biographer of George V, Kenneth Rose, wrote that, "except for some tapestries given by Alfonso XII, Sandringham had not a single good picture, piece of furniture or other work of art". Neither Edward VII nor his heir were noted for their artistic appreciation; writing of the redevelopments at Buckingham Palace undertaken by George V, and previously by Edward VII, John Martin Robinson wrote that, "the King had no more aesthetic sensibility than his father and expressed impatience with his wife's keen interest in furniture and decoration". In the series of articles on the house and estate published in 1902 by "Country Life" to celebrate Edward VII's accession, the author noted the royal family's "set policy of preferring those pictures that have "associations" to those which have merely artistic merit". Exceptions came to include works from the collection of mainly 20th-century English art assembled by the Queen Mother, including pieces by Edward Seago and John Piper, who produced a view of Sandringham.


title: Sandringham House

text: Although not highly regarded as architecture, Sandringham is a rare extant example of a full-scale Victorian country house, described in the magazine "Country Life" as "lived in and beautifully maintained, complete with its original contents, gardens and dependent estate buildings". The house, the landscaped gardens, park and woodlands are listed Grade II* on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens, Grade II* being the second-highest listing, reserved for "particularly important buildings of more than special interest".


title: Sandringham House

text: The gardens and country park comprise of the estate with the gardens extending to . They were predominantly laid out from the 1860s, with later alterations and simplifications. Edward VII sought advice from William Broderick Thomas and Ferdinand de Rothschild, a friend and adviser to the King throughout his life. The original lake was filled and replaced with the elaborate parterres fashionable at the time. These have since been removed. Two new lakes were dug further from the house, and bordered by rockeries constructed of Pulhamite stone. A summerhouse, called "The Nest", stands above the Upper Lake, a gift in 1913 to Queen Alexandra from the comptroller of her household, General Sir Dighton Probyn. The gardens to the north of the house, which are overlooked by the suite of rooms used by George VI, were remodelled and simplified by Geoffrey Jellicoe for the King and his wife after the Second World War. A statue of Father Time, dating from the 18th century, was purchased by the Queen Mother and installed in 1951. Further areas of the gardens were remodelled by Sir Eric Savill in the 1960s for Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip. The extensive kitchen gardens, which in Edward VII's time included carriage drives to allow guests to view the "highly ornamental" arrangements, were also laid to lawn during Queen Elizabeth II's reign, having proved uneconomic to maintain.


title: Sandringham House

text: The 20,000 acre (8,100 ha) Sandringham estate has some of the finest shoots in England, and is used for royal shooting parties. Covering seven villages, the estate's other main activities, aside from tourism, are arable crops and forestry. The grounds provided room for Queen Alexandra's menagerie of horses, dogs, cats, and other animals. In 1886 a racing pigeon loft was constructed for birds given to the Duke of York by King Leopold II of Belgium and one or more lofts for pigeons have been maintained ever since. The Norwich Gates, designed by Thomas Jeckyll and made by the local firm of Barnard, Bishop and Barnard, were a wedding present for Edward and Alexandra from "the gentry of Norfolk".


title: Sandringham House

text: In 2007 Sandringham House and its grounds were designated a protected site under Section 128 of the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005. This makes it a criminal offence to trespass in the house or its grounds. The Sandringham estate has a museum in the former coach house with displays of royal life and estate history. The museum also houses an extensive collection of royal motor vehicles including a 1900 Daimler owned by Edward VII and a 1939 Merryweather & Sons fire engine, made for the Sandringham fire brigade which was founded in 1865 and operated independently on the estate until 1968. The coach house stables and garaging were designed by A. J. Humbert at the same time as his construction of the main house. The estate contains several houses with close links to the royal family.


title: Sandringham House

text: Anmer Hall is a Georgian house on the grounds, purchased by the Prince of Wales in 1896. Formerly occupied by the Duke of Kent, it was the main country home of the Prince and Princess of Wales, until their move to Adelaide Cottage at Windsor.


title: Sandringham House

text: When Prince Carl of Denmark (later King Haakon VII of Norway) and Princess Maud were married in July 1896, Appleton House was a wedding gift to them from the bride's parents, the Prince and Princess of Wales. Queen Maud became fond of Appleton, "our little house is a perfect paradise", and their son, Prince Alexander (the future King Olav V of Norway), was born at the house in 1903. After Queen Maud died in 1938, King Haakon returned the property. The last inhabitants were King George VI and Queen Elizabeth who stayed there during a visit to Norfolk during World War II, when Sandringham was closed. Lascelles considered it "an ugly villa, but not uncomfortable". The house was demolished in 1984.


title: Sandringham House

text: Constructed by Edward VII, Park House has been owned by the royal family for many years. The birthplace of Diana, Princess of Wales, when the house was let to her father, it was subsequently run as a hotel managed by the Leonard Cheshire charity. In 2019, the charity developed plans for a £2.3m refurbishment programme, which were deferred because of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. The charity has since decided to discontinue the redevelopment and work with the Sandringham Estate to exit the lease.


title: Sandringham House

text: Wood Farm has been part of the Sandringham Estate since the time of Edward VII. In the early 20th century, it was home to Prince John, the youngest of the six children of King George V and Queen Mary. Born in 1905, the Prince was epileptic, and spent much of his short life in relative seclusion at Sandringham. He died at Wood Farm, his home for the last two years of his life, on 18 January 1919. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, lived at Wood Farm after retiring from royal duties.


title: Sandringham House

text: York Cottage, originally known as Bachelors' Cottage, was built by Edward, Prince of Wales, soon after he acquired Sandringham to provide further accommodation for guests. It was home to George V from 1893 until his mother's death enabled him to move into the main house in 1925. Edward VIII, by then Duke of Windsor, told his father's biographer Harold Nicolson, "Until you have seen York Cottage you will never understand my father". The cottage was no more highly regarded architecturally than the main house; James Pope-Hennessy, the official biographer of Queen Mary, called it, "tremendously vulgar and emphatically, almost defiantly hideous". Nicolson described it as a "glum little villa (with) rooms indistinguishable from those of any Surbiton or Upper Norwood home". He was particularly dismissive of the royal bathing arrangements: "Oh my God! what a place. The King's and Queen's baths had lids that shut down so that when not in use they could be used as tables". "It is almost incredible that the heir to so vast a heritage lived in this horrible little house." Nicolson's strictures did not appear in his official biography of the King. York Cottage is currently the estate office for the Sandringham Estate.


title: Sandringham House

text: The country park and the visitors' centre are normally open throughout the year. The house, gardens and museum were usually opened annually from the end of March until the end of October, but COVID-19 led to the closure of much of the estate. Staged re-opening took place from February 2022. Following the death of Elizabeth II, Sandringham was closed for a period of official mourning.. Following that, the country park has reopened but the house and gardens are closed to the public until April 2023.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is a 2013 epic high fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson from a screenplay by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Jackson, and Guillermo del Toro, based on the 1937 novel "The Hobbit" by J. R. R. Tolkien. The sequel to 2012's "", it is the second instalment in "The Hobbit" trilogy, acting as a prequel to Jackson's "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The film follows the titular character Bilbo Baggins as he continues to accompany Thorin Oakenshield and his fellow dwarves on a quest to reclaim the Lonely Mountain from the dragon Smaug. Pursuing them are the vengeful orcs Azog the Defiler and his son Bolg, while Gandalf the Grey investigates the return of a long-forgotten evil force in the ruins of Dol Guldur. The ensemble cast includes Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Benedict Cumberbatch, Evangeline Lilly, Lee Pace, Luke Evans, Ken Stott, James Nesbitt, and Orlando Bloom.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The films were shot simultaneously in 3D at a projection rate of 48 frames per second, with principal photography taking place around New Zealand and at Pinewood Studios. Additional filming took place throughout May 2013.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: "The Desolation of Smaug" premiered in Los Angeles on 2 December 2013, and was then released on 12 December in New Zealand and on 13 December in the United States, by Warner Bros. Pictures. The film received mostly positive reviews and grossed over $959 million at the worldwide box office, making it the fourth highest-grossing film of 2013. The film received numerous accolades; at the 86th Academy Awards, it was nominated for Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing, and Best Visual Effects.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Gandalf and Thorin Oakenshield meet at the Prancing Pony, and Gandalf convinces Thorin to take back Erebor and the Lonely Mountain. Twelve months later, Thorin and his company are being pursued by Azog and his Orc party. They are ushered along by Gandalf to the nearby home of Beorn, a skin-changer who can take the form of a bear. That night, Azog is summoned to Dol Guldur by the Necromancer, who commands him to marshal his forces for war. Azog then delegates the hunt for Thorin to his son Bolg. The following day, Beorn escorts the company to the borders of Mirkwood, where Gandalf discovers Black Speech imprinted on an old ruin. This, and a prior request by Galadriel, urge him to investigate the tombs of the Nazgûl. He warns the company to remain on the path and leaves them. Upon entering the forest they lose their way and are ensnared by giant spiders. Bilbo then sets about freeing the dwarves with the help of his recently acquired invisibility ring. He subsequently drops the ring and first begins to understand its dark influence after he brutally kills a creature to retrieve it.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The remaining spiders are fended off by the Wood-elves led by Tauriel and Legolas. They also capture the Dwarves and bring Thorin before their king Thranduil. Thorin confronts the Elvenking about his neglect of the Dwarves of Erebor following Smaug's attack 60 years earlier and is consequently imprisoned with the other Dwarves. Bilbo, having avoided capture, arranges an escape using empty wine barrels that are sent downstream. While being pursued by the Wood-elves, they are ambushed by Bolg and his Orc party, and Kíli is wounded with a Morgul shaft. They engage in a running three-way battle down the river, but ultimately the Dwarves are able to escape both groups of pursuers. Thranduil then seals off his kingdom when an Orc captive reveals an evil entity has returned and is amassing an army in the south, but Tauriel decides to leave and assist the Dwarves; Legolas goes after her. Meanwhile, Gandalf and Radagast go to investigate the tombs of the Nazgûl, which they find to be empty.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The company is smuggled into Esgaroth by a bargeman called Bard. Thorin promises the Master and the people of Laketown a share of the mountain's treasure. It is then revealed that Bard is a descendant of the last ruler of Dale, and possesses the last black arrow capable of killing Smaug. Kíli is forced to remain behind, tended to by Fíli, Óin, and Bofur, as the remaining company receives a grand farewell. Meanwhile, Gandalf travels south to the ruins of Dol Guldur, while Radagast leaves to warn Galadriel of their discovery at the tombs of the Nazgûl. Gandalf finds the ruins infested with Orcs and is ambushed by Azog. The Necromancer overpowers and defeats Gandalf and reveals himself as Sauron.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Thorin and his remaining company reach the Lonely Mountain, where Bilbo discovers the hidden entrance. He is sent in to retrieve the Arkenstone, and while doing so, he accidentally awakens Smaug. While conversing with Bilbo, Smaug reveals his knowledge of both the dwarves' plot to retake the gold and the return of Sauron. Back in Laketown, Bard attempts to bring the black arrow to the town's launcher, as he fears what may happen when the Dwarves enter the mountain. However, he is arrested by the Master and his conniving servant, Alfrid, in the process and leaves his son to hide the arrow. Bolg and his Orc party then infiltrate the town and attack the four Dwarves, but are quickly dispatched following the arrival of Tauriel and Legolas; Tauriel then tends to Kíli. While Kíli is recovering, he openly admires Tauriel's beauty and wonders if she loves him. Legolas leaves in pursuit of Bolg. Meanwhile, Gandalf watches helplessly as Azog and an Orc army march from Dol Guldur towards the Lonely Mountain.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Back inside the mountain, during a long chase, Bilbo and the Dwarves rekindle the mountain's forge using Smaug's flames to create and melt a large golden statue, hoping to bury Smaug alive in the molten gold. They do so, but Smaug emerges from the gold, stumbles out of the mountain and flies off to destroy Laketown as Bilbo watches in despair.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Additionally, Peter Jackson makes a cameo appearance in the film, reprising his role as the man eating a carrot in Bree, his daughter Katie portrays Barliman Butterbur's wife Betsy, Philippa Boyens's daughter Phoebe and scale double Kiran Shah appear as a waitress and a Hobbit in the Prancing Pony, James Nesbitt's daughters Peggy and Mary portray Sigrid and Tilda, the daughters of Bard, Stephen Colbert and his family along with WingNut Films' assistant Norman Kali and producer Zane Weiner appear as Lake-town spies, and editor Jabez Olssen appears as a fishmonger. Brian Sergent (who portrayed the Hobbit Ted Sandyman in the extended edition of Fellowship of the Ring) and Peter Vere-Jones (a frequent voice actor collaborator of Jackson's) provide the voices of the spiders in Mirkwood. This was the final performance of Vere-Jones before his death in January 2021.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Most of the filming was finished during 2012, ending in July 2012. During May 2013, additional shooting for the film and "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies" began in New Zealand, lasting 10 weeks. Unmanned aerial vehicles or drones were used for some shots in the film.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The musical score for "The Desolation of Smaug" was composed and conducted by Howard Shore in association with local New Zealand writing teams. It was performed by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. The original motion picture soundtrack album was released on 10 December 2013. It received positive reviews, especially for its new themes.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: English singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran wrote and recorded "I See Fire", which plays during the end credits.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Peter Jackson provided the first details about the second film in the series at a live event held on 24 March 2013. The access code was attached to the DVD editions of "". The live-broadcast event revealed some plot details; Jackson said that the role of Tauriel, acted by Evangeline Lilly, is a part of the elven guard and a bodyguard of the Elvenking, Thranduil. In addition, he revealed a scene from the film in which Gandalf and Radagast the Brown search for the Necromancer fortress and discover that the Ringwraiths have been released from their graves. The first trailer for the film was released on 11 June 2013. On 4 November 2013, an extra long three-minute trailer/sneak peek was released and revealed new footage and major plot points.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: On 4 November 2013, a special Desolation of Smaug live online fan event, hosted by Anderson Cooper in New York, was held across eleven different cities with participants including Peter Jackson, Jed Brophy, Evangeline Lilly, Lee Pace, Orlando Bloom, Luke Evans, Andy Serkis and Richard Armitage.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Benedict Cumberbatch, Luke Evans, Evangeline Lilly, Peter Jackson and, to a lesser extent, Orlando Bloom and Ian McKellen, took part in the press tour, appearing on talk shows and giving interviews before the film's release.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: The film premiered in Los Angeles at the Dolby Theatre on 2 December 2013, and was released internationally on 11 December 2013 and in the United Kingdom and United States on 13 December 2013.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: An extended edition of the film had a limited re-release on 7 October 2015, accompanied by a special greeting from Peter Jackson.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" was released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D on 7 April 2014 in the United Kingdom and on 8 April 2014 in the United States. Three different versions were released: a Limited Collector's Edition Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D, DVD, and digital download combo pack; a Blu-ray 3D combo pack; a Blu-ray combo pack, and a two-disc DVD special edition. Extras include three making-of featurettes, 4 production web videos, and a music video for "I See Fire" by Ed Sheeran.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: An extended edition of "The Desolation of Smaug" was released digitally on 21 October 2014, and was released on DVD, Blu-ray and 3D Blu-ray 3 November 2014 in the United Kingdom, and 4 November 2014 in the United States, with 25 minutes of new material and original music.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: "The Desolation of Smaug" was released in Ultra HD Blu-ray on 30 November 2020 in the United Kingdom and on 1 December 2020 in the United States, along with the other films of the trilogy, including both the theatrical and the extended editions of the films.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" grossed $258.4 million in North America and $700.6 million in other countries for a worldwide total of $959 million. Calculating in all expenses, "Deadline Hollywood" estimated that the film made a profit of $134.1 million. It is the fourth highest-grossing 2013 film, and grossed $209 million worldwide on its opening weekend.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: In North America, "The Desolation of Smaug" earned $8.8 million during its midnight opening, making it the second-highest December showing ever, behind only the first instalment. The film topped the box office on its opening day with $31.2 million. It remained in first place throughout its opening weekend, grossing $73,645,197, a 13% drop from its . "The Desolation of Smaug" was in first place at the box office for three consecutive weekends.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Outside North America, "The Desolation of Smaug" was released internationally on 16,405 screens. The film earned $135.4 million in its opening weekend. Its largest openings occurred in China ($33.0 million), Germany ($19.0 million) and the United Kingdom, Ireland and Malta ($15.2 million). It topped the box office outside North America on four consecutive weekends and five in total. It is the highest-grossing film of 2013 in many European countries, as well as in New Zealand and Fiji.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Following the Los Angeles premiere, "Metro" noted that early critical reaction was "glowing", with critics describing it as a "spectacle", while "The Guardian" reported that it was receiving "much stronger early reviews". However, before the film's theatrical release, E! reported that reviews had been "mixed", but stated they were still "much better" than the previous film. After the film's international release, MTV reported that the film has garnered a "positive" critical reaction, while the "Los Angeles Times" stated the consensus is that the film "reinvigorates" the series, putting it "back on course". On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes the film has 74% approval rating with an average rating of 6.80/10 based on 251 reviews. The website's consensus reads, "While still slightly hamstrung by "middle chapter" narrative problems and its formidable length, "The Desolation of Smaug" represents a more confident, exciting second chapter for the Hobbit series." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 66 out of 100 based on 44 reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore, during the opening weekend, gave it an average grade of "A−" on a scale from A+ to F, down from the first film which scored an "A" grade.


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Nick de Semlyen of "Empire" awarded the film five stars out of five and wrote that "Middle-earth's got its mojo back. A huge improvement on the previous instalment, this takes our adventurers into uncharted territory and delivers spectacle by the ton", while Richard Corliss of "TIME" declared it one of the top ten films of 2013, and wrote "In all, this is a splendid achievement, close to the grandeur of Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films." Justin Chang of "Variety" wrote that "After a bumpy beginning with "An Unexpected Journey", Peter Jackson's 'Hobbit' trilogy finds its footing in this much more exciting and purposeful second chapter." Todd McCarthy of "Hollywood Reporter" wrote that "Nearly everything... represents an improvement over the first instalment of Peter Jackson's three-part adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's beloved creation." He also praised the High Frame Rate of "The Desolation of Smaug" as being better than that of "An Unexpected Journey". Mark Hughes, who reviewed the film for "Forbes", was highly enthusiastic, and felt ""The Desolation of Smaug" is another grand entry in the Tolkien saga, raising the emotional and physical stakes while revealing more of the sinister forces," before concluding "It’s pleasing to see a filmmaker this in love with storytelling, this committed to creating entire worlds... that’s a rare thing indeed, and for it to turn out so well is even more rare. It’s a sight to behold, and you won’t be sorry you did."


title: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

text: Peter Bradshaw of "The Guardian" scored the film four stars out of five, writing, "It's mysterious and strange, and yet Jackson also effortlessly conjures up that genial quality that distinguishes 'The Hobbit' from the more solemn 'Rings' stories." Total Film also scored the film four stars out of five, but reviewer Matt Maytum noted that, in his opinion, the film suffered "from middle-act wobbles." Despite this, he praised the "rousing action... incredible visuals... and one stupendous dragon", and concluded his review saying "There’s a lot to admire in "The Desolation of Smaug"." Jim Vejvoda, who reviewed the film for IGN, awarded it 8.5 out of 10, and felt "It's a breathlessly told, action-packed crowd-pleaser that restores the luster of the saga for those underwhelmed by its predecessor and leaves you excited for the final chapter in the trilogy."