Today we have an exclusive extract from the wonderful "Behind the Sofa: Celebrity Memories of Dr Who - Edited by Steve Berry." (Out now and published by Gollancz with all proceeds going to Alzheimer’s Research UK.)
The book is a wonderful addition to any Whovian's collection and with this weekend (23rd November 2013) seeing the 50th Anniversary Special Edition (The Day of the Doctor.) We couldn't think of anything better to feature to help prepare you for the weekend.
Songwriter, founder of US indie band, Throwing Muses
"Wanted to be touched by a Weeping Angel
The Doctor was my dad. Or my dad was the Doctor, I’m not sure which. They looked alike and people called Dad “Doctor” for what seemed to me to be flimsy reasons. So I figured those were our home movies with the monsters made out of stuff we found in the back of the garage and the cheap lasers. I knew we were poor and couldn’t afford the expensive lasers rich kids’ dads shot bubble wrap and mop-head monsters with.
My father had to use science to outwit evil garbage cans ’cos his weapons and spaceships were so crappy. But that made him cooler than the rich dads, cooler than the rich TV stars, cooler than real doctors who only seemed interested in listening to heartbeats. Peering into your life through a keyhole positioned on the outside is a striking thing to do. Science measures everything; it can’t help it. It measures your heartbeats — which’re pretty goddamn repetitive and therefore boring, no matter what gross love songs tell you — and it measures your wild adventures. The Doctor’s adventures are yours through this universal keyhole and you know it, whether you’re sitting on your couch or racing around, all tense and terrified. Weirdness is everywhere and it’s always about to kick in. It’s probably sitting in the back of your garage right now, waiting to strike: cool.
One little shift in your parameters like this, one little shift in your perception (like: right next to the shop on the corner is eternity and eternity is homemade!) means that our adventures only start with our heartbeats. Then they ooze into surrounding tissues and crawl out of our ears onto the couch, eventually body-slamming us within inches of our lives and sanity. And what saves you from facing your mortality? Morality, of course! Every time… that and a cheap old two-bit laser you taped together yesterday afternoon. Now we know the micro and the macro, the small picture and the big one. We’re all visible through the same keyhole, those of us with pounding hearts."
