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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

4 Comments

  1. Aaron
    February 8, 2011 @ 2:28 pm

    I'm confused about the nature of the gap into which this story falls. You've mentioned the gap between series 1 and 2 previously, but I don't see necessarily see it.

    At the end of Reign of Terror, the crew are undressing and setting off on new adventures, leaving 18th century France behind. At the beginning of Planet of Giants, The Doctor says "…well, there we were in the late eighteenth century and I tried another frequency to sidestep the ship back into the middle of the twentieth century."

    Doesn't this imply that this story continues directly from the other?

    Reply

  2. Elizabeth Sandifer
    February 8, 2011 @ 2:43 pm

    Indeed, when I started watching Planet of Giants having written this entry, my first reaction was "Huh, the much-vaunted gap between stories here is a bit thinner than people give it credit for."

    That said, given that there are so many stories set in this gap – drwhoguide.com has a full fourteen, which is basically as big a gap as exists without changing companions – I think one almost has to lever the gap open a bit and simply assume that they returned to the 18th century somewhere – it is a big century, after all, and a big planet. And, for that matter, lots of planets have an 18th century.

    Part of this also stems from the fact that there's not a better gap for inserting Ian/Barbara/Susan stories, and they're one of the most iconic companion sets the show ever had. Susan, in particular, because she's so problematic, is also someone that writers have historically loved playing with in retrospect. And so it becomes, in part, a matter of where a better gap exists. This one is less marginal than others.

    Reply

  3. 7a1abfde-af0e-11e0-b72c-000bcdcb5194
    July 15, 2011 @ 10:21 am

    Tarzan, alas, is not in the public domain (despite debuting pre-1923). The Burroughs estate secured a legal privilege to control the name and character.

    Reply

  4. John Seavey
    February 19, 2015 @ 11:16 am

    It should be noted, if you'll forgive the comment necromancy, that the statement "a novel so strange and ambitious that BBC Books declined to publish it after commissioning it, leading Mortimore to self-publish" is not entirely correct. According to all concerned, the BBC did not commission 'Campaign' in the form that Mortimore finally delivered it; he sent them a pitch for a historical novel where the First Doctor met Alexander the Great, which bore absolutely no resemblance to the novel that crossed their desk some weeks later. Mortimore had played somewhat fast and loose with his outlines before, but this was very much a bridge too far and left the BBC with a sudden hole in their schedule (which was filled at the last minute by 'Grave Matter', with Justin Richards writing a book in something less than a month). That's the kind of behavior that will get you blackballed, even if the novel concerned was very pretty. 🙂

    Reply

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