The Doctor Who Monster Book, by Terrance Dicks

I’ve loved this book since it was handed down to me by my elder brother when I was four. It continues to be a big influence: as I write for Doctor Who Magazine or other stuff as-yet unannounced, I endeavour to kindle something of the same thrill. 

But until recently, when I began to work my way through the 236 books by Terrance Dicks in the order he wrote them, I’d never put much thought into why this book proved so potent. 

Basically, how does it work?

To understand that, I think it helps to compare The Doctor Who Monster Book with its main competition. The Doctor Who Annual 1976, published by World Distributors in September 1975 is a fancy-looking hardback which originally retailed at £1. Following the format of previous Doctor Who annuals, the cover boasts a colour photograph of the lead character with the caption, “starring Tom Baker as Doctor Who”. 

This credit at the very start is markedly different from the TV series, where the lead actors didn't get credits in the opening titles until 1996. It also declares that everything to follow is fiction.

There’s also a colour photo of the Doctor on the back of the book and a couple of colour photos inside: Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (played by Nicholas Courtney) on p. 5 and the Doctor on p. 6. Otherwise, the book is illustrated with new artwork.

The likenesses of the Doctor are drawn from photographs of Tom Baker (not all of them when in the role of the Doctor). But the artwork depicting TV companions Sarah and Harry purposefully avoids the likenesses of actors Elisabeth Sladen and Ian Marter so as not to have to pay them a fee. For the same reason, the annual does not feature any monsters from the TV series, either in illustrations or text. 

The text and comic-strip stories feature the Doctor, Brigadier, Sarah, Harry and even Warrant Officer Benton (his rank taken from dialogue in TV story Robot, not the closing credits where he is still a sergeant — see right). Yet it doesn’t feel much like TV Doctor Who. That’s not just down to the likenesses. 

The artists working on this annual seem to have been encouraged to go all-out on wildly imaginative work. It’s expressive and often emotive, with plenty of screaming or agonised faces, and it’s all extremely strange. Largely in colour but muted, earthy tones, it is much more finely detailed art than anything you’d get in a comic from the same period. Quality was part of the sell of this annual as a festive treat, therefore it was published on good paper stock, perhaps using a specialist press. That mechanical process dictated a more lavish style of artwork. 

The result is the jaw-dropping, psychedelic-horror what-the-fuckness of a book aimed at children for Christmas.

 

At the same time, these outlandish, opulent stories go hand-in-hand with dry, worthy features on real space exploration such as the “short history of the pressurised spacesuit”. This stuff might be true to life but blimey it is turgid, lacking the thrill of, say, a space station that gets attacked by Cybermen and then by giant space-moths but which — just for extra boggle — we experience in reverse order. The annual’s wholesome non-fiction seems entirely at odds with the outlandish fiction except in one way: neither feels much like Doctor Who on TV.

In marked contrast, The Doctor Who Monster Book, published on 20 November 1975, is a concise, no-nonsense guide to the series as seen on screen. It is also more accessible, being half the price of the annual at just 50p. It also delivers on its title, providing page after page of monsters as featured in Doctor Who. This follows the monster-focused approach of the Target novelisations in cover art and titles, as detailed in my previous posts.

Readers who’d lapped up such adventures as Doctor Who and the Daleks, Doctor Who and the Cybermen and Doctor Who and the Giant Robot could now feast on a whole glut of nasties. There they are on the cover, around the beaming Doctor. The art is by Chris Achilleos, using the same format he employed for the first 12 novelisations: the face surrounded by monsters on a white background. But now the Doctor is in colour, too. He’s not sombre like on the annual; this book is something more fun.

ETA Cedric Whiting on Bluesky has kindly shared this photo of the Pull-out monster Dr Who poster included with the book, revealing that the cover cropped the original artwork. Also, is it my imagination, or are the Sontaran and Cyberman smiling?

The interior of the book does not feature any newly commissioned artwork, instead repurposing cover art from novelisations (all but one piece by Achilleos), now blown up to more than double size. This includes covers of books that were as-yet to be published — Doctor Who and the Loch Ness Monster, Doctor and the Ice Warriors, Doctor Who and the Tenth Planet and Doctor Who and the Dinosaur Invasion, all published in 1976. 

The back cover of the Monster Book features a menu of 16 novelisations in colour, including three then-forthcoming ones. All the Doctors, two stories each for the Daleks and Cybermen, all big-event adventures. The good stuff, there for the taking. Where are you going to start?

It’s implicit from the interior of the book but explicit in this back page: the Monster Book is a launchpad to further reading and longer, more difficult books — some without illustrations. In that sense, it’s the first example of Terrance encouraging readers to wade a bit deeper as readers, to even take the plunge. He taught us to embrace reading and dare to try something more challenging.

As well as the artwork, the book features a wealth of photographs from the TV show. “I went in and looked up the files in the BBC production office to see what looked most interesting,” Terrance told Alistair McGown for DWM’s Referencing the Doctor special in 2017, “and then got the scripts out if I wanted to go further.” The implication is that he chose arresting images first, then wrote copy to fit. 

Many magazines take the same picture-led approach (after years of submitting stuff to Doctor Who Magazine, my first feature got commissioned when long-suffering editor Gary Gillatt explained this principle to me). That Terrance did it here may be an echo of his years as an advertising copywriter in the 1960s. They’re very well chosen — heroic portraits of the Doctors, the Daleks and Cybermen in front of London landmarks, the horror of whatever that is on p. 45.

(In fact, Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon reveals that this strange-looking Guardian is actually benign; the Monster Book tackles this by also showing the real culprit in the story — an IMC mining robot masquerading as a monster.)

Designer Brian Boyle, ARCA, well deserves his credit. He gives priority and space to these alluring images. Often, he places photographs adjacent to artwork, so we get both the stolid reality and the embellished wonder at once. He also employs simple effects really well, repeating a side-on photograph of a Dalek to produce an army for the title page, or adding energy lines that radiate from the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver. 

On pp. 58-59, there’s an arresting image of the Fourth Doctor at the mercy of the Zygons, who are turned towards him and away from us. Boyle adds a front-on Zygon as an inset, so we can really enjoy / be appalled by James Acheson’s brilliant monster design. 

Care of the Black Archive site, here’s the untouched photograph:

Doctor Who being menaced by Zygons
Black Archive: Terror of the Zygons

Over the page, Boyle adds Achilleos’s illustration of the Loch Ness Monster to a perhaps less arresting photograph of Sarah and the Doctor examining a folded piece of paper; the effect is to suggest they’ve picked up a vital clue on the trail of the Zygons.

In fact, that photograph of Sarah and the Doctor isn’t from the Zygon story; it’s from the later Planet of Evil, and was taken at a photocall in Studio 6, BBC Television Centre, on 1 July 1975. That means The Doctor Who Monster Book was designed by Boyle no earlier than that date (or, he completed work on the rest of the book and then slotted in this hot-off-the-press image at the last moment). 

Sarah and the Doctor examine a clue
Black Archive: Planet of Evil

The photograph of the Doctor being stung is interesting because this alarming moment, originally to have been seen at the start of Part Four, was cut from the story as broadcast.  Indeed, the broadcast version of the story doesn’t feature any reference to the Zygons’ ability to sting people — though it does survive in Terrance’s novelisation, which I’ll address in a subsequent post.

These photographs came at some cost. The licensing is detailed on the inside back page of the Monster Book, a long list of monsters and the writers who created them, and lists of various actors. Credits seem to be warranted for photographs of actors but not illustrations using their likeness: there’s no credit for Deborah Watling as Victoria or Katy Manning as Jo Grant.

But Jamie (played by Frazer Hines) appears in cover art and a photograph on pp. 30-31, and doesn’t get a credit either. That might be because his back is turned to us in the photo so we can’t see his face — which is what would warrant permission and a fee. However, directly below the photo of Jamie is a photo of Anne Travers (Tina Packer) being menaced by a Yeti. She’s facing us, clearly recognisable, but isn’t credited either. 

It can’t be that a character needed to be a series regular to qualify for credit as another one-story character, Eckersley (Donald Gee) gets a credit for his photograph on p. 29. More likely, the publishers couldn’t track down Tina Packer to seek her permission for use of the photo — but published it anyway. That, in turn, suggests that approvals might have been done in a bit of last-minute rush. If the book was in design no earlier than July, it would have been a bit pressured to get this all signed-off and the book to print in time for Christmas.

Actors playing monsters in photographs don’t get credited either. I can understand the reasoning here with Ogrons or Davros where the actor can barely be recognised under heavy prosthetics but it seems a bit harsh on Bernard Holley as an Axon on p. 44. (Though when I worked with him years ago, he told me how much he liked signing “his” page in the book when presented tattered, loved copies by fans.)

I can see that all being a thorny issue for actors and agents, not least when The Doctor Who Monster Book sold so successfully. Alistair McGown’s piece in DWM says that even though the print-run was an ambitious 100,000, it quickly sold out — prompting a sequel from Terrance. This was advertised in trade paper the Bookseller on 30 July 1977:

“TERRANCE DICKS

The 2nd Doctor Who Monster Book


150,000 sold of No 1” (p. 425)

That’s 150% of an ambitious print run in just 18 months.

The success of the book isn’t solely down to the images; the words are also important. Terrance writes in an engaging, concise, plain style, matter-of-factly telling us what these monsters are, what they did and how the Doctor stopped them — without giving too much away to spoil the novelisations.

In addition, Terrance tells us at the start that, 

“One of the purposes of this book is to piece together the Doctor’s history from what we have learned over the years” (p. 7)

Previous histories of the series, in The Making of Doctor Who (1972) and the Radio Times 10th anniversary special (1973), presented brief synopses of every TV story. Terrance instead focuses on the big moments, the tent poles of the series. How did the Doctor first meet the Daleks and Cybermen, and then what happened in their next encounters? How did each Doctor die? Which are the best and weirdest monsters?

There are some statements made here for the first time that went on to have lasting impact. For example, there’s the opening reference to the “mysterious traveller in Time and Space known only as ‘The Doctor’” (bold as printed), a phrase repeated word-for-word at the start of Terrance’s next novelisation, Doctor Who and the Loch Ness Monster. 

Another example of the stickiness of phrases is the entry for the Silurians. Terrance surely borrowed from his friend Mac Hulke, who opened Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters from the perspective of these dinosaur people, waking from long hibernation to the horrifying discovery that their planet has been overrun by what the Monster Book describes as, “That upstart ape called man” (p. 35). 

It’s a neat bit of sci-fi reversal — that “monster”? That’s you, that is. But Terrance gets the idea across concisely; you couldn’t express the same idea in fewer words. That brevity makes the phrase lodge in the memory, like an advertising slogan. I said previously that Terrance’s description of the Auton invasion seems to have influenced Russell T Davies in writing Rose (2005); did the upstart ape inspire the Doctor’s comments about “stupid apes” in that same year of the programme?

Sometimes, just a single word caught on. When the series began, says Terrance, the Doctor was, “a little stiff and crochety [sic], but still spry, vigorous and alert” (p. 7). “Crotchety” has often been applied to the First Doctor since, and I initially thought this was the source. In fact, the same word was used as a subheading on p. 2 of The Making of Doctor Who by Malcolm Hulke and Terrance, and on p. 3 they quote Sydney Newman saying, in developing the initial idea for the series, “Let’s make him a crotchety old man.” 

But Newman didn’t actually use the word himself. On 28 September 1971, writing to Hulke to answer his questions about the genesis of Doctor Who, the phrase Newman used was “senile old man”.  “Crotchety” is the invention of the authors of the book, a kinder term that is more accurate about the character on screen and that is a little more heroic. We seem something similar in the use of the term in the Monster Book, where Terrance follows it with more positive adjectives to underline the Doctor as hero. 

Having given us a description of his personality, we’re then told what he wears and a brief summary of his key adventures. That’s the model that follows for the next three Doctors — simple, vivid and consistent. That consistency is important because whatever their quirks of personality or style, these Doctors are all one person. Terrance doesn’t refer to them as the “First”, “Second”, “Third” and “Fourth” incarnations, capitalised or not; they are each “the Doctor”. The emphasis is on what they share not how they are different:

“But beneath this rather clownish exterior the Doctor’s brilliant mind and forceful personality were unchanged” (p. 9)

The new Doctor, he says, is a combination of traits from the first three, as if it’s all been building to this point. 

There’s a synthesis of lore gleaned from different stories. For example, there’s the account of the Second Doctor’s trial by the Times Lords (in TV story The War Games, which Terrance co-wrote, and then recounted in his novelisation Doctor Who and the Auton Invasion). In the short summary given in the Monster Book, Terrance adds to thisa small detail, that Times Lords can,  

“regenerate their own bodies when threatened by old age or illness” (p. 9)

It’s what we learn in a TV story from 1969 but with the word “regenerate” added from a story five years later.

We’re told the TARDIS is “dimensionally transcendental” (ie bigger on the inside), a phrase first used in Spearhead from Space (1970) and then in Colony in Space (1971) but not again until Pyramids of Mars (1975), broadcast just before this book was published. I wonder if Terrance took it from Spearhead (which he novelised), used it in the Monster Book and that got picked up by script editor Robert Holmes when he approved the text. Holmes wrote Spearhead so it could well have been his term, but perhaps seeing it in Terrance's book prompted him to reuse it.

If so, this only worked in one direction. The Doctor Who Monster Book does not mention the Doctor’s home planet, Gallifrey, first named in The Time Warrior (1973-4) by Holmes, and mentioned for the second time in Pyramids of Mars (largely rewritten by him), but not yet a staple piece of lore.

Some of the facts in the Monster Book aren’t quite right. The Wirrn are described as “ant-like” (p. 57) when they’re more like human-sized locusts or moths — flying creatures that develop from slug-like larvae.

We’re also told that the TARDIS’s “chameleon mechanism got stuck on the first visit to Earth” (p. 7), when it seems to break at the end of the first episode (and is a surprise to the Doctor and Susan in the next episode). It was presumably working properly in adventures we’re subsequently told about that took place before this first episode, such as when the Doctor tangled with Henry VIII or took a coat from Gilbert and Sullivan.

There are also facts of which Terrance doesn’t seem sure. In introducing the Doctor, we’re told that Susan “called him grandfather” (p. 7), as if that isn’t certain (again as per The Making of Doctor Who, p. 16). Also, this reference to Susan is the only mention of a companion in the text until we reach then-current companion Sarah, on p. 54. Yes, other companions feature in the illustrations but the absence from the text is striking. They’re not essential to the story being told.

I wonder if that’s to do with the perceived market for this book: the TV series was aimed at a mixed family audience but I suspect The Doctor Who Monster Book was aimed at young boys who, it was thought, wouldn’t be interested in girls. (Now I think about it, I’ve met some fans like that.) 

Perhaps it’s a consequence of the plot function of companions in stories, where — at the most reductive level — they serve a purpose in being relatable to the audience and asking questions on their behalf, such as “What does that mean?” and “What’s going on?” In The Doctor Who Monster Book, Terrance explains what went on in a given story and how that it is significant, making the companion redundant here. 

Or perhaps it is fairer to say that in this book Terrance takes the role of companion.

*

Thanks for reading. These posts don’t half go on a bit and they take a fair time to put together. There are also expenses in acquiring / accessing books I don’t already own. I can’t really justify continuing without support, so do please consider a donation to the noble cause. 

Next episode: Doctor Who and the Loch Ness Monster.

Signs, portents, types

On Saturday, I was at the launch for Rob Shearman's "Love Songs for the Shy and Cynical", with a whole bunch of mates. The venue is also used for comedy, and I admired the cheery signs:




On Sunday there was curry with the folks and thence my first go on a Wii, at which I played table tennis and cheated at fencing. Here is my wii-persona, which the Dr designed herself. Note the beard where I'd not shaved for a few days:


On Monday I did writing while ice fell from the sky. Was meant to meet chums for a Christmas drinkie but there were no trains into town. Apparently the Dr and Codename Moose were barefoot in the pub, socked socks and boots on the radiator. I sulked on a drizzly platform for over an hour while the information board just said "Delayed". Gave up and had fish and chips and mushy peas.

Glad I'm not traveling this Christmas, and really sorry for the younger brother who was meant to be in Hungary by now.

Yesterday, me and Codename Moose recorded a thing for something as-yet unannounced, and then went to the pub. Hatched plans and discussed projects before I stumbled home.

Up late today full of cold, and schlepped out across the ice to the postal depot to collect some parcels. I've received copies of both The Panda Book of Horror - in which I've got a short story - and the Blake's 7 CD I wrote, which sounds all splendid.

Am also in receipt of Fluid Web Typography - A Guide by my chum Jason Cranford Teague, which the Dr has already pinched. It looks very fine indeed, and my beloved Gill Sans gets a mention. Though there's no mention I can see of Divide By Zero - Tom Murphy's splendid free fonts, which include my favourites "Tom's New Roman" and "Douglas Adams' Hand". I've stuck this post in Trebuchet.

Digital Spy continues to post videos of me and other fine fellows discussing David Tennant's Top 10 moments as Doctor Who - I'll update that original blogpost with links to each one. I'm also among the luminaries looking back to Christmas Eve 1999 for Paul Cornell's blog.

Noises off

There's now a trailer for my Blake's 7 CD, and my casting notes are blogged on the Blake's 7 website.

Busy on some other stuff, none of which can be spoken of yet. So I'll just shut up.

Surfacing again

Swansea was great fun. Met some old mates and made some new ones, and pleased to have finally have met Leslie after we've corresponded so long. Queued up for Derek Jacobi's autograph and explained I'd bought the Dr I, Claudius as a Valentine's present. Jacobi twinkled, "Did it work?"

On Monday, the Dr took me out to Mumbles - two clumps of rock at the end of Swansea bay that get their name from the French word for boobies. We also clambered up to the rather fine Oystermouth Castle and had an ice-cream as we walked back into town.

All along the pathway were open-air exercise things: hurdles and balance bars and weights. They stood ignored by the walkers and cyclists, the traffic hurtling by.

On Tuesday we nosed round the Egypt Centre at Swansea University, where volunteers pounded from every corner to offer help and insight. Lots of cool objects - divided into Death and Life - and the signage included stuff written by the volunteers themselves.

There was plenty of information for all levels of interest, and dressing up clothes and activities for kids. It probably also helps that the Egypt Centre is one part of a general arts and activities centre. The Dr took studious notes.

Then we were back on the train to London, where I got a whole bunch of writing done. Am steeped in writing right this second, and deliver something big by the end of the month. Also got a speech, a play, and an audition piece to write, plus some filming to organise and prep.

Have caught up on Derren Brown and on Last Chance to See, and was enthralled by Wounded last night, a documentary about the rehab of two soldiers who lost limbs in Afghanistan. Can't imagine anyone but the BBC making such a programme and showing it at prime time. Glorious.

And I am also reading, slowly, Scott of the Antarctic and The Ancestor's Tale. They're both heavy tomes full of top facts and telling detail. Will try to write something about them.

Right. Back to the grindstone...

Surfacing

Just raising my head from an ocean of exciting, unannounced work things to say hello. Hello.

Also, I'll be in Swansea this weekend for the Regenerations convention, where I'm on the same bill as Sir Derek Jacobi. Mostly, I'll be in the dealers room flogging copies of the Inside Story of Bernice Summerfield (a book which features more than a third of the convention's guests, as it happens). I'll also be in the bar. Do come say "Hi", "I read your blog," and "What would you like to drink?"

Oh, and on 29 September I'll be speaking on the use and abuse of science in Doctor Who at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. If you're coming along, please don't throw things.

Frock vs Gun

More details on the day I’m doing in Manchester on 11 October about Doctor Who novels, for which tickets are now available:

“The event will explore the genesis of the range, the rise and fall of the New Adventures and their indelible impact on Nu-Who, the transition to in-house publishing and the future of the range now the programme is back on the air.

Weighty topics we will be debating include ‘guns v frocks’, ‘BBC v Virgin’, ‘past Doctors - what's the point?’, ‘roots of the TV revival - begged, borrowed and stolen?’, ‘bigger and broader - are the books the real home of Doctor Who?’ and ‘a question on canonicity - was it all a dream?’ Guests confirmed to date include Paul Magrs, Mark Morris, Mark Michalowski, Steve Lyons, Paul Dale-Smith, Andrew Cartmel, Daniel Blythe, Simon Guerrier, Martin Day, Trevor Baxendale, Paul Cornell and Gary Russell.”

It will be hosted by my new chum John Cooper, and David A. McIntee has just been added to the line-up. You might want to bring copies of the Bernice Summerfield Inside Story to get them signed by these luminaries…

Also of excitement is that you can now get a selection of Big Finish Doctor Who stories for a fiver, plus there’s a free download of a brand new Doctor Who story and some special offers in this month’s Doctor Who Magazine, and a free CD featuring the fifth Doctor and Daleks with this week’s Doctor Who Adventures (and also an inflatable TARDIS!).

None of the stories on offer are by me, so I shall add this cheeky plug for The Drowned World, which is out this month, too. Oh, and here’s a glowing review of the Iris Wildthyme boxset, of which “the highlight” is the “simple surreal jollity” of my story, The Two Irises. Hooray!

Meanwhile, I’m still all tied up in other stuff that cannot be spoken of yet – real life stuff as well as the writing. Got a thing to finish by the end of next week and then should be blogging more regularly. Have read a whole load of books and seen a whole load of telly with which to bore you at length…

But in the meantime, I’m fascinated by George Orwell’s blog at the moment, as he alternates between listing wild flowers spotted and chicken’s eggs laid, and the lead-up to world war. (In September, the outbreak of war will coincide with Pepys’s account of the fire of London.)

Long playing

So. Turned 33 on Wednesday: the same age as Jesus when the Romans killed him, and (if my sums are right) the age of David Tennant when he was cast as Doctor Who.

(Of no interest to anyone, but Peter Davison became a former Doctor Who a month before turning 33. So I'm now older than two Doctors, as old as one, with another eight still to catch up.)

Derren Brown's Enigma show was superb. I have some theories about how some of his tricks might have worked, and also about the imagery and associations he uses. But I'll hold off until I've read his Tricks of the Mind, which a kind person got me for my birthday.

Did splendidly well for loot, too: all of The Wire, The Deadly Assassin (I concede all Mr Gillatt says in his recent DWM review, and yet I still love this story), Party Animals, Vonnegut's A Man Without A Country, a duvet, some pants, a long-sleeved tee-shirt, various London bus maps from different years in the last century and a cheesecake.

But mostly I have been working on things as-yet unannounced. One thing Paul Cornell speaks of should get an official announcement next week, and I've pretty much finished my bits of it. Then there's rewrites today, and a script to be written for the CBBC competition which closes on Wednesday. And rewrites on another spec script, thanks to the kind diligence of L. And I'm awaiting notes on something else. And a “go” on a couple of other big things, too...

In the meantime, Danny Stack has set up an official site and trailer for Origin, the short film he wrote and directed on which I was a runner and associate producer. It stars Lee Ross (Kenny in Press Gang) and Katy Carmichael (Twist in Spaced) – both of whom I served murky tea.

Oh, and my Primeval novel has also just had a glowing 9 out of 10 review:

“Author Simon Guerrier manages to stuff 231 pages with way more action, adventure and twists than I thought possible ... He writes short, punchy chapters which flip between the characters so quickly - with an endless supply of cliff-hangers - that you are constantly on the edge of your seat as the twists and turns are thrown at you ... This could be the most enjoyable book you purchase this year.”

Nick Smithson, Book Review – Primeval: Fire and Water, Sci-fi-Online.

(I seem to have lost a point for using the new team at the ARC.)

Red eye, yellow eye

It’s all been a bit hectic here, but the two mountains of work are in (I just need to finish an index – something I’ve not written before). Was up till 2 am Wednesday getting through a draft of something, but I’m really rather pleased with how it’s come out. Announcements in due course.

But cor, blimey I am tired. Taking the weekend off to go to a party in Cardiff.

And then yesterday I spent the afternoon in A&E waiting to have my eye looked at. Something got into my left eyeball on Wednesday, and no amount of blinking, blubbing or washing would shift it. Knackered by all the typing, it meant I then couldn’t sleep. And yesterday my eye was all bloodshot.

So I sat in a hot, noisy hospital waiting room, hoping I wouldn’t miss the shout of my name. Read my way through some very exciting paperwork relating to a possible new bit of work, and then 50 pages of China Mieville’s new book, The City and The City.

Only half-way through but it’s an extraordinary book. A police procedural set in eastern Europe in two co-existing cities. Think the two spaceships blended together in the Doctor Who story Nightmare on Eden, only without the Muppets. Only citizens in either city must not notice their counterparts on fear of invoking Breach.

Mieville’s writing is punchy and vivid, making this mad idea chillingly real. It also reads like it’s a translation, and all kinds of little details – the proximity of Budapest, mentions of films and books, the bafflement of visiting Canadians – helps give it a ring of truth. The Wire as written by Borges, so far.

(I must get round to writing up notes on other good recent reads: gobsmack-o-wowed by David Kynaston’s Austerity Britain, loved the first two-thirds of Jon Courtenay Grimwood’s Arabesk trilogy, and, despite reservations about the terrible jokes, John O’Farrell’s Utterly Impartial History of Britain is fun, too.

And speaking of recommendations, have loved the first season of 30 Rock and am slowly getting through the first season of the Twilight Zone, the Up series and The Monocled Mutineer.)

Anyway. Eventually a nice doctor prodded and poked my eye, using brown-orange dye to spot the problem. Think it’s sorted now, though it isn’t half still blinking sore. And I spent the rest of yesterday looking like half of me was off to a disco.

Plenty of typing still awaits my attention the far side of Cardiff, so might not be here all that much.

Oh, and hooray for the BBC Archive, who have been loading up yet more goodies in the last few weeks. Today they’re marking the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11 landing on the Moon with a whole load of marvellous moon porn, including some exclusive interviews with three Apollo astronauts.

Perspectives on the human condition - for kids!

Dashed away from working full pelt on two as-yet-unannounced mountains of work to attend the BBC Writersroom's Q&A with new head of CBBC Drama Steven Andrew and writer Ellie Brewer. There's a competition to write a new drama script for 8-12s with a deadline of 1 July. Hope to get something in there once I'm past my two current mountains.

Sat with a good throng of other wannabes in the Royal Court Theatre. There were clips of MI High, Roman Mysteries and Sarah Jane - the latter from an episode by one Joseph Lidster. I wonder whatever became of him?

Kids' telly is a simple brief: expanding the imagination with unmissable storytelling, offering new perspectives on life and vivid sensations the kids will remember for ever.

While kids' drama needs to be be from the perspective of kids, they also can't be in every scene because of the restrictions on child actors. So you need adults, and also adults-only scenes, and enough kids to vary up schedules. Kids also can tend to have more days off sick than adults, so you need some flexibility for last-minute re-writes.

Keep kids' dialogue short, too: the actors need to remember it, and they need to be able to say it. In fact many of the clips we saw had very little dialogue - several minutes of material all told entirely visually.

But most of my notes are about specific things in the idea I've already got. So I'm not going to share those here, at least not now.

Didn't stay long after, but said hello to Jason Arnopp, then dashed home to the waiting mountains. Missed the storm by a whisker.

ETA: Transcript of the talk here.

Prints of Persia

Spent the weekend typing things as-yet unannounced (two of which I’ve now delivered), then yesterday afternoon saw some sunshine and the Shah ‘Abbas exhibition at the British Museum (until 14 June).

It’s the latest in the BM’s shows on ‘great rulers’ – following on from China’s first Emperor and Hadrian, with Moctezuma to come in the autumn. This seems a less block-busting show than those last two; it was certainly pretty empty yesterday, which meant I could actually get a look at all the exhibits and didn’t have to queue to read any captions. Out of the sunshine and crowds, the dark reading room gave the exhibition a reverent air. A visitor just ahead of me respectfully bowed before each beautifully bound Qu’ran on display; I tried not to make any sound as I followed in my vulgar shorts and flip-flops.

Perhaps the quiet is because the shah or Iran are not such a draw, or it’s because the show lacks any must-see exhibits. There were a lot of faded old rugs and examples of calligraphy, plus examples of Iranian trade: coins and silks from Europe, illustrations from India, crockery from China. Though these were interesting in themselves, there was nothing with particular wow factor. (The Dr also noted that comparatively few of the exhibits came from the museum’s own collections.)

That said, where (as I blogged in December), the BM’s Babylon exhibition,

“struggle[d] to convey the scale of the Biblical city, squeezed as it is into the upstairs of the old Reading Room,”

there’s a much better sense here of the world these artefacts come from. At the centre of the exhibition were projected huge photos the mosque of Shaykh Lutfullah in his capital, Isfahan, and the shrine of Imam Riza in Mashhad. As so often, I was stunned by the Arabic script worked so beautifully into the plaster – a sign that the workmen were literate.

Shah ‘Abbas promoted Mashhad as a rival place of pilgrimage to Mecca (he expanded Iran’s borders during his reign, but not quite that far). The exhibition was good at explaining the political context of the shah’s reign, too. He established Shi’a Islam as the country’s state religion – which it remains to this day. Yet his reign, says the exhibition guide, was also,

“notable as a period of religious tolerance in Iran – a privilege extended to Armenian Christians, Jews and others.”

It nicely dovetailed the context with English history, as an early caption explained:

“Shah ‘Abbas, like his contemporary Elizabeth I, inherited an unstable country that had recently redefined its religion and was surrounded by powerful enemies.”

Known in English as “the Sophy”, Shah ‘Abbas is mentioned in Twelfth Night and the Merchant of Venice. Reigning from 1587 to 1629, he overlapped with the first two Stewart kings. Yet the Iranian monarchy had very different ideas about the succession – the English monarchs might have bumped off various rivals to the throne, but they didn’t murder their own off-spring.

There’s a small amount on science towards the end of the exhibition. As the caption says,

“The books that Shah ‘Abbas gave the shrine of Iman Riza included an early text from the 1200s on medicinal plants by the ancient Greek scientist Dioscorides. Translated from Syriac into Arabic, his text was one of the foundation stones of medieval Islamic medicine.”

Beside this was a page from book four of Dioscorides’ De Materia Medica, with a picture of something I thought might be a radish, whose seeds it recommends,

“as a purgative, for bruises and itchy skin, and, when, chewed for toothache and painful gums.”

Oddly the illustration doesn’t give the name of the plant – only the picture, which I can see leading to wrong prescriptions. The caption guesses stavesacre (Delphinium staphisagria), though Wikipedia warns that “all parts of this plant are highly toxic and should not be ingested in any quantity.”

Perhaps the most interesting item in the whole exhibition, though, is one small, innocuous image of the shah with a caption that doesn’t quite spell-out what it seems to be showing. We know it’s the shah from his tell-tale huge moustache (he apparently set a fashion). The image, painted by Muhammad Qasim in 1627 and on loan from the Louvre, has the shah sitting rather close to a long-sideburned page boy. The caption translates the Arabic text: it’s a romantic poem.

This, we’re told, is from a picture album for the shah’s own private enjoyment. It includes the impression of a royal seal, suggesting it’s not propaganda. The Hadrian exhibition had a whole section on pretty boy Antinous – though left him out its family guide. Whatever the purpose or origin of the image here, and though the exhibition frames the picture with a discussion of the succession, it's odd the reference to the Shah's sexuality is only implicit.

Something something eggs

I seem to keep saying this: it's all been a bit manic of late. Sort of finished a big thing as-yet unnannounced on Friday and sent it round the houses for corrections and approval. Then sped up to Victoria to get more material for the very thing I'd just finished. Had a beer with P. in the grotty pub in the station, where we swapped gossip and discussed Government policy.

Then home for fish, chips and mushy peas in front of Quantum of Solace. Much more intelligible and splendid second time round; perhaps the smaller screen size helps, perhaps it's 'cos I already know where it's heading. But the edit is still so frenetic it's an effort to keep up.

On Saturday, with the typing done, I dismantled my office in preparation for the new floor. This took pretty much all day, and ripped two holes in my trousers. I unscrewed and delegged the fitted, too-low desk but it wouldn't come away from the wall. It seemed to have been fitted with a combination of glue and magick. Decided I'd wait for the expert: at least if the builder should pull the whole wall down, I won't be the one feeling silly.

The Dr arrived back from a day's teaching to marvel at my efforts. We then schlepped round to M. and N.'s house for a nice fish tea. Some excitement at the mussels still being alive when we arrived. I imagined them shrieking "Help me!" like that bit at the end of The Fly.

Having done the shifting chores on Saturday, earned an unusual lie-in on Sunday. The Dr even brought me tea and Jaffa Cakes in bed, where I idly glanced through the paper. Margaret Drabble thinks writing a spell against depression, and workaholicism and alcoholism go often hand-in-hand. I suspect there's something in that; not sure it's something good.

Then up, and amid the mess of office furniture and files now heaped around our living room, I laptopped a rewrite of a pitch and did some general edits on Friday's writing. Still a few bits to add and tweak, but the end is nearly in sight. Then perhaps there might be an announcement.

Will also be able to announce something else next week, the first in a new foray for me. How exciting this mystery must make my tawdry existence sound.

Then to St John's in Smith Square to hear the Exmoor Singers do Bach's St Matthew's Passion. (The apostrophication like Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, but with less monsters and more singing.) My chum (+ neighbour + boss) G. was one of the singers, and even got a line of his own. We saved our whooping for the final applause.

Psychonomy was also in attendance, and without a programme for the first half was making up his own words. Apparently they featured Nick Griffin and something perhaps about eggs. In part two, he could follow the words in German and clunkily translated English. He didn't think much of the arias, but otherwise thought it Good.

Me and the Dr have been to a few versions of the thing; for my own future reference, the Dr would like the aria after Peter's denial to be playing when she snuffs it.

Erbarme dich, mein Gott,
um meiner Zähren willen!
Schaue hier, Herz und Auge
weint vor dir bitterlich.
Erbarme dich, mein Gott.

(Touch my willy, God,
Or I will cry!
See here, My heart and eyes
Want to drink buttermilk.
Touch my willy, God.)

Passion According to Saint Matthew, BWV 244 (1727)
Translation S. Guerrier (2009)

Beers after, and then home to thick slabs of cheese on toast. I left the Dr watching EastEnders and No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency and fell to bed about half-midnight.

Up this morning to wash and shave in time for the arrival of S. the builder. He sussed the issue of the desk in five seconds, and undrilled some screws I'd not even noticed. With a clunk the desk was severed from its moorings. We'll need to replaster and paint, but we should have a wooden floor down by the time I get back tonight. Then I'll need to source a new desk. One that might actually fit me.

Life is manic and also a bit expensive. So you'll have to wait for the apoplectic rant about Clive Staples ****ing Lewis. Consider it a blessing.

Gallifrey and nine

Gallifrey was exhausting and brilliant and silly. Saw a whole bundle of old chums and made a great glutch of new ones. Flogged product and drank one or two ales. I said at the closing ceremony (where you have to say something) that I wished it could be Gallifrey every day. Which would be fun, but I wouldn’t long survive.

James Moran has made a number of very serious allegations about me, but surely there’d be pictures. And if there were pictures, surely there’d be evidence of Photoshop in them. I deny all accusations.

Didn’t sleep a wink on the flight home, and my entertainment system wasn’t working either. So I sat in the darkness and thought Thoughts that may one day become things I can brag about. Slowly the hours ticked by.

Eventually we plonked down in Heathrow. Turns out we shared our flight home with the Hoff, and dared each other to ask for pictures with him while we waited for our baggage. Don’t think we actually did – but by then my brain was drooling out my eyes. Out through customs to fall into me and M.’s waiting taxi. We slalomed through west and south London and then finally we were home.

Slept. And slept and slept. And woke up not knowing what day it was or where I’d left my head. Confused and stupid (no, more than usual) have got myself back into work. There’s been quick rewrites on a thing as-yet-unannounced and rewrites requested on something else. Went to the Post Office and the bank and fell through two splendid episodes of Being Human and nearly 300 emails. And then started sneezing; think I picked up a cold on the plane home. Dammit.

The Dr is, of course, delighted by the state I’m in. The whole point of jetting off across the pond without her was to come home relaxed, refreshed and skippy. Not snuffling and stupid and snoring. But I’m taking her out tonight for a posh tea, so she can’t complain.

Because nine years ago this evening I stumbled over to the Dr to tell her she was lovely. And dammit, she still is. The lesson is, my young padawans, that if you fancy someone, tell them.

Snow, shelves, Sherwood

Snowed in. There are no trains running so I can't get to work. It's like being back in Chicago. Only here we're all taking a duvet day. Means I've a chance to catch up on the hundred things I'm racing to finish. The Dr mutters darkly about how this time next week I'll be San Francisco.

I don't tell her I might be in Vegas.

The inclement weather has scuppered the plan to have new shelves built today; the Man can't hope to reach us. Which is a bother 'cos the Dr and R. spent all yesterday clearing the old shelves out of the way. There are books stacked all over everywhere now, and the old shelves themselves were gone within minutes of being put up on Freecycle. So we have a strange and echoing living room, a good foot wider to the right.

We sat in the tinny-sounding space last night to watch Attenborough's programme on Darwin and the Tree of Life, and then Being Human. Bah! that both shows were on at the same time. Bah! that it took an hour for Being Human to be up on iPlayer. But woo! for such splendid telly. And Moses Jones tonight.

Nimbos and the Dr are thinking of venturing out to take photos and build snowpersons later. I have work to get on with. Spent the weekend finishing something as-yet unannounced. But something I can now speak of is Robin Hood: The Siege. It's a talking book read by the apparently quite dishy Richard Armitage – the Dr has made known her approval of this assignment. The story is set during the BBC TV show's forthcoming third series. Release dates will depend on when that's shown...

Right. Plenty to get on with. But I'm going to go back to bed.

Stones of London

While everyone else in the world was watching events in Washington yesterday, I was in a posh hotel room working on something that’s as-yet unannounced. From room 641 you get a nice view of BBC Broadcasting House. I love it when work gets me through doors and to see stuff I’d never normally be allowed.

The Victorian magnificence of the Langham hotel is being refurbished in even grander style; our cabs were much confused by having to drop off / pick up from the makeshift entrance round the south. The place has a fascinating history, though I’m most excited by its time as extended offices for the BBC.

“The ballroom became the BBC record library and programs [sic] such as The Goon Show were recorded there.”

Wikipedia, Langham Hotel, London, as of 21 January 2009.

It’s also where those first early meetings were held to create some silly old TV show.

Portland Place, on which these two buildings stand, gets its name from the white stone from Jurassic-era Dorset that’s so prevalent in London’s buildings. The subject of my efforts yesterday was impressed I knew why it’s so prevalent.

“In the years following the Industrial Revolution, the acid rain, resulting from the heavy burning of coal in cities had the effect of continuously (slightly) dissolving the surface of Portland stone ashlar on buildings. This had the interesting effect of keeping exposed and rain-washed surfaces white as opposed to other (non calcareous) stones which quickly discoloured to black in the smoky atmospheres. This self-cleaning property also helped to enhance the popularity of Portland stone in London.”

Mark Godden, “Portland's Quarries and its Stone”, Mark Godden’s Little Bit of Cyberspace Mk II, 2007.

Well, I say “impressed”; he didn’t run out of the room screaming.

New postal service

Printed on a letter* today, this charming offer:

www.royalmail.com/safebox
Sending diagnostic specimens?
Use Safe Box
from Royal Mail

What, like goo and secretions and stuff? (One day, I'll post my hilario-comedic Adventure of Giving Rude Specimens.)

I can see that sending man-juice and snot through the post might be something some people might have to do. But is there really such a demand for such service that you advertise it on everyone's letters? Or perhaps this a response to it being quite common, and there being too many icky leaks.

(Me on the decline of the postal monopoly.)

* the letter itself was a contract for something exciting and as yet unannounced. Woo!

I know, I'll take you to B-

Hello from grey, rainy Blackpool. I know, what a turn-up, I can hardly believe it myself. Last night, with the rain bashing the Velux windows like someone outside brewing popcorn, I tried to remember a time I've been in Lancashire where the sky wasn't falling. I lived for three years as a student in Preston, and one time the rain was so hard it bruised...

(In the south, of course, it never rains. It's specks of liquid sunshine.)

Finished a few bits of chore yesterday morning - including several days' washing up since the Dr's been away in Aberdeen. Have, excitingly, now been commissioned for two things which I'm really buzzing about which cannot be announced. And on Thursday night, met with a bloke who explained clever stuff at a level I could understand(!), who is going to be very useful for something else I'm working on. No, I can't tell you about that yet, either.

Bundled up to Euston to find that the ticket the Dr had bought me was for a nice seat in first class. Apparently, she'd told me this in one of my more attentive moments. But what a nice surprise! Virgin threw in free egg sandwiches and orange juice and wine, and I sat comfy and content. I've finished The Envoy, which I will blog on in due course, and am now mesmerised by Nick Davies' Flat Earth News, a fascinating, damning and thorough exploration of the collapse of journalistic standards in the last decade or so. Again, it'll get a post of its own sometime.

The in-laws took me for fish and chips and then we drank whisky and watched TV. I realise that, before I went freelance, I was Jen from the IT Crowd. Which is odd, because after I went freelance, I did a couple of days' work with Chris O'Dowd. But yes, I once wowed the execs with a speech about the weightlessness of the internet. It is made of dreams.