George R.R. Martin explains why he writes his massive books on a DOS machine

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

George R.R. Martin explains why he writes his massive books on a DOS machine
(Image credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images)

It only makes sense that a man who writes about Targaryens, Westeros, and Valyrian steel would hate spell check. On Conan Tuesday night, author George R.R. Martin shared that he writes his epic tomes (A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, etc.) not on the latest iMac, but rather on a DOS machine, using WordStar 4.0. "It does everything I want a word processing program to do, and it doesn't do anything else," he said. "I don't want any help. I hate some of these modern systems where you type a lowercase letter and it becomes a capital. I don't want a capital... I know how to work the shift key!" Watch the clip below. --Catherine Garcia

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.