The Red Woman, the first episode of the sixth season of Game of Thrones was screened in the US on Sunday. Given the difficulties that the rest of the world has in seeing this blockbuster series, perhaps, it is surprising that there are thousands of loyal devoted fans of the series in China and they have formed societies, clubs and complex websites to ensure that their show and the characters are always in their hearts.

While Americans settled down and watched the show on television at home, Chinese fans were waiting anxiously for the show to be available for downloading online. Most of them also had to wait for a Chinese subtitled version to become available.

Translating and proofreading

University student Leo is a devoted fan of the TV series and the A Song of Ice and Fire books and was involved in translating and proofreading the Chinese subtitles for season five. He is studying English and American literature at the Central South University in Changsha, Hunan Province, and will also be involved in translating season six.

He said that when the video becomes available for downloading in China, it comes with English subtitles. Four or five translators work on the Chinese versions, each completing about 100 lines of the 450 to 600 lines in a show.

"It takes us about four hours to translate everything. Overall it takes about eight hours from getting the English subtitles to producing the Chinese version if there aren't any problems," Leo said. Leo is a member of the Yigui subtitling group, a group of translators dedicated to providing the subtitles for Game of Thrones. They do this for free and only because they are all devoted fans of the series.

A replica of the Iron Throne is displayed. Photo: CFP

"Compared with other commercial subtitling groups, Yigui wins in professionalism for our translations. Sometimes Qu Chang, who translates A Song of Ice and Fire books offers suggestions. But we are slower than the other translation groups," Leo said.

Some of the subtitling groups can produce Chinese subtitles within a few hours of a new episode being released but Yigui takes another two or three hours before releasing its version.

"Translating these subtitles is piracy," Leo agreed. Downloading, he thinks, is a grey zone, or perhaps it is piracy as well. Chinese fans can only watch Game of Thrones by downloading or online through some video platforms. Downloading the show is not legal because the Chinese downloading sites don't have official authorization from HBO to screen the shows.

But in November 2015, v.qq.com, an online video site announced that it would screen Game of Thrones in China in cooperation with HBO.

Because of the popularity of the series in China, there are still several sites where the shows can be downloaded along with a variety of subtitles.

Fans of the books

Although the television series has now probably millions of fans in China, many started out, like Leo, as fans of the George R.R. Martin books.

Gao Ang is the manager of the website, A Wiki of Ice & Fire, and founder of huiji.wiki. He read A Song of Ice and Fire in 2011 and in February 2012, a friend created a Chinese site for A Song of Ice and Fire on wikia.com, a free wiki hosting service. This allowed Chinese fans to add explanations and background to the books in Chinese. As soon as it was launched, fans flocked to the site to add their own views and theories. The first contributions featured "Arya Stark" and "Sansa Stark". Within 10 days the site had attracted more than 900 contributions and Gao became one of the first editors for the site.

In March 2012, senior editors of this site began talking to the English site westeros.org, the A Song of Ice and Fire domain.

"At first, we translated a lot of the content from westeros.org. Then, westeros.org became our sister site, and they gave us a lot of support," Gao said. Later on, the fans began to add their own interpretations to the site.

Gao's influence can be seen on almost every entry and every page of the site. He is particularly interested in the geography of the books. Before the official maps of A Song of Ice and Fire were released, Gao used Photoshop to make a series of maps in Chinese for the books.

Gao Ang made maps of Westeros in Chinese. Photo: asoiaf.huiji.wiki

 After The Lands of Ice and Fire, a boxed collection of maps for A Song of Ice and Fire was published, Gao stopped producing his versions and encouraged fans to buy the official maps. To help readers understand the characters and their relationships better, Gao also created a family tree in Chinese for the site.

When The Children, the 10th episode of the fourth season of Game of Thrones was released in June 2014, the daily visits to the site reached 190,000. By August 10, 2014, fans had made over 100,000 contributions to the site.

Moving sites

In March 2015 the site moved to a Chinese server to make it easier for members to register and use. Gao and his friend quit their jobs, and developed huiji.wiki, their own wiki hosting service moving all the content developed by the fans of A Song of Ice and Fire to their own site, A Wiki of Ice & Fire.

To date, a total of 842 fans have made 204,413 edits, written 5,785 articles and uploaded 12,839 pictures on the site, making it one of the largest Chinese wiki sites.

"The site is like a Wikipedia for A Song of Ice and Fire. It explains the characters, the ruling families and concepts in the book objectively," Gao said. Each article can be edited by dozens of people and modified hundreds of times.

Huji.wiki not only hosts A Wiki of Ice & Fire, but also lets users create their own fan sites. The biggest attractions on huiji.wiki are for the video game Warcraft and Healthstone Legend. A Wiki of Ice & Fire comes third.

Gao Ang and Leo are both members of yigui juntuan, one of the biggest fan communities for Game of Thrones and A Song of Ice and Fire. Yigui is a Chinese translation for "white walkers," and juntuan means legion.

Yigui juntuan is a casual unofficial group that does not have a strict hierarchy or formal regulations. Communications and activities for members are usually project based.

Members of yigui juntuan run three different platforms: A Wiki of Ice & Fire, the Yigui subtitling group, and Black Castle, a WeChat account that discusses Western fantasy literature.

The leader of yigui juntuan is Baozhenyu (pseudonym), who, by day is a purchasing director with a Chinese State-owned business based in Beijing. As well as his job, Bao runs the Black Castle WeChat account.

"Running Black Castle is my hobby. I need to feed myself at the same time," Bao told the Global Times about his work. "But if one day I can raise venture capital for Balck Castle, I'll resign and focus on Black Castle."

In 2007 Bao read A Song of Ice and Fire in Chinese. "I don't speak English, but I want to know everything about the book and the show. So I often reply on others to discover new things," Bao said.

As well as contributing to the platforms and participating in discussions, Bao stays in touch with the supervisors of the wiki site and the subtitling group. His dedication to the cause has seen him gradually ascend to the leadership of the fan community. Bao reckons there are about 100,000 fans of the book and the series. Black Castle has about 20 active members and over 40,000 subscribers. Fans also organize dinners, board game evenings and parties.

Chinese fan Liu Jinlin buys two Game of Thrones themed pillows for his home. Photo: courtesy of the interviewee

 An authoritative platform

"Fantasy literature like A Song of Ice and Fire is part of my life. I have met a lot of friends through it. I have also met publishers. My original idea was to make Black Castle an authoritative platform for Western fantasy writing. Readers could consult us on any fantasy work, and publishers could advertise on our platform before releasing new works," Bao said.

With limited openings and a full-time job Bao is still far from realizing his dream. He hopes that through A Song of Ice and Fire Chinese readers will discover other Western fantasies. He believes that these will grow in popularity in China.

"Before Chinese people only knew The Lord of Rings. Now, many of the Western movies in Chinese cinemas are fantasy themed or science fiction," Bao said.

What the fans are looking forward to



"Although George R. R. Martin kills major characters when he wants to, I think he won't kill Jon Snow. I think Snow still has a lot to accomplish and stories to share."

Chinese fan Liu Jinlin

"I really want to know what will happen to the Dragon Mother Daenerys Targaryen, if Jon Snow is dead, and whether Sir Jorah Mormont will die of the dreadful greyscale disease, and the future of Bandon Stark."

Chinese fan Wu Huiqian

"Although the TV shows have separated from the books, I hope that the stories will develop as George R. R. Martin planned. I hope that the show doesn't feature a lot of violent and erotic scenes to get the ratings up."

Chinese fan Leo