Mr. Martin said he misses the scene because it adds texture and helps establish early on the characters of and relationship between the sisters. Though not in the show, the scene was used as part of the successful auditions for Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa, and Maisie Williams, who is Arya.

Mr. Martin, who first published his short stories in science-fiction magazines in the 1970s, has always seen himself as a fiction writer first, and the world of books has wreathed him in honors, including the Hugo, Nebula, Stoker and World Fantasy Awards. “I am more of a solitary than a collaborator,” he said.

Though he certainly collaborated when he worked in television, as a story editor for “The Twilight Zone” on CBS in 1986, and a writer and producer with “Beauty and the Beast,” which debuted on CBS in 1987. But “there was some frustration,” he said. As a writer, he’s more concerned with: “How do I make it better, stronger? What’s the right word here? I want final say. I got tired of fighting that secondary fight, the Hollywood power equation.”

He added: “If I don’t like one of Anne’s suggestions” — that would be his editor at Bantam Books, Anne Groell — “I just don’t take it. In TV, you have the network, the studio over your head like Zeus on high.”

So he turned his back on TV and re-embraced the novel, starting his “Ice and Fire” saga in 1991, determined to let the story lead him where it would, to journey back to his first creative passions.

Mr. Martin, who’s 65, grew up in Bayonne, N.J., the son of a longshoreman. Early on, he became smitten with fantasy, science fiction and comic books. His youthful favorites included Robert Heinlein, Jack Vance, J. R. R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and Marvel Comics. In Fantastic Four No. 20, from 1963, there’s even a fan letter from a certain George R. Martin — apparently he hadn’t yet grown into that Tolkienesque second “R” — about F.F. No. 17, in which Mr. Fantastic, the Thing and company battled Dr. Doom. Even back then, Mr. Martin was concerned with the ratio of action and page count.