I've not done any memes in a little while, so (thanks to the_marquis) here is:

( The Colour Code Test )

Adding together the play counts for the versions on Fairport Live Convention and Nine, the mid-1970s incarnation of Fairport Convention's Polly on the Shore has a claim to be one of the most-played songs on my computer.. As sung by Trevor Lucas, it's a saga of lost hopes and constrainment, and though 'empressed' in this case probably simply means recruitment the listener is encouraged to think of the narrator as kidnapped by the privateer captain and forced to fight and rob other ships while hoping to return to his Polly on the shore, though he can’t be sure whether she is faithful.

As an aside, Lucas sings ‘galliant ship’ – ‘galliant’ merging ‘gallant’ and ‘valiant’ while echoing ‘galleon’, a suitable allusion for a song which is probably set on the Spanish Main. In the repertoire of the present-day Fairport, Simon Nicol sings ‘gallant ship’. It’s more correct, but it loses something.

I’ve thought of Kate Rusby’s Polly as an answer to Polly on the Shore. In this, Polly meets and falls in love with a sailor who promises to marry her, but he then goes to sea and she stays faithful throughout seven years of war, despite ardent courtship from a strange man. She rebuffs his wish to take her away and banish her tears, but of course he turns out to be “your young sailor, who’s come home from the sea.” While this says little for Polly’s memory, we’ve already been assured that she is “kind… pretty and she is fine,” and her lack of observation probably means that she has been fixated on her heart, given that there is no mention that her suitor has been disfigured. There are no shades of Martin Guerre in the lyrics, either. The narrator of Fairport’s Polly on the Shore is the crewman of an unscrupulous privateer vessel, but in other versions – such as those recorded by Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick on Prince Heathen, and Trees on On the Shore - he’s on a man of war, and so could be Polly’s sailor, who is presumably in the Royal Navy. I’ve long imagined that the narrator of Polly on the Shore recovered from bleeding on the deck, and came home to find that Polly’s eye hadn’t roved after all.

This being said, Rusby’s Polly’s sailor declares that he wants to dance with her on their wedding day – a public affirmation of love – while Fairport’s Polly…’s sailor thinks of being alone with her. This is suggestive of sexual longing, though again we have a traditional contrast of male and female aspirations here.

Alternatively, this could open the door to another Polly on the Shore, found on the internet, and written by Lester Simpson. I’ve not heard this yet, but this Polly is a survivor in a brutal world. It’s conceivable (despite the implication that we are in a different time period through the mention of Yokohama) that this is the girl the narrator of the traditional Polly on the Shore is dreaming of, and that her roving eye is the ruthless opportunism of a woman who has been brought up to expect nothing else.

This is almost a taut piece of action television. Unfortunately there are very, very many problems with it. There is too much dialogue at times: it's not an original observation, but lots of Resurrection of the Daleks could work just as well, if not better, on radio. Eric Saward's characters have a tendency to be verbose about their strengths and failings, as if in talking about themselves they were compensating for something. This is a valid device but it's a little overused.

The story isn't all that interested in two of the regulars. Tegan is sidelined for much of her leaving story, concussed while wearing decorative clothes; though not quite as extremely as departing companions were marginalised when Innes Lloyd was producer in 1966/67. Turlough is banished to the Dalek ship early on, and wanders around corridors. As calliope85 observed, he's good at sneaking; and PlayerKing theorised that it must be his tie that enables him to hide in plain sight so well. [This of course points up the absurdity of Turlough clinging to his school uniform, when he so hated the school.] Tegan and Turlough spend most of their time as witnesses to events, and are left to become more passive than was normal; like a lot in the series around this time, there's a sense of misremembered folk memory of the first Doctor's era, the idea that the Doctor and friends were observers of events, which was never really true in the way that happens here.

It's a story of ill-fitting headpieces. The green hats worn by the space station staff seem most fitting to a tacky Robin Hood themed restaurant. The upper sections of several of the Daleks have been adjusted - probably so they could be opened - and no longer join on to the grilles properly. The Dalek skirt-based helmets worn by Lytton (generally regarded as the character Eric Saward is most interested by, and with good reason) and his men don't look threatening or dignified. A mention, though, for the Supreme Dalek, who has a witty line in bureaucratic dialogue: everything is 'in due course' or 'when the opportunity presents itself'.

The Doctor's influence in this story involves reawakening the human personality buried under the programming of a Dalek duplicate (their conversations about duplication kept calling to mind the idea of Daleks operating photocopiers) and then recanting what is presented as a lost opportunity to destroy the Daleks at birth back in Genesis of the Daleks. The Doctor seems determined to kill Davros, but lets Davros talk a lot beforehand and is then distracted by conflict outside, allowing a door to seal and close the opportunity off. This comes across as a rehash of the Genesis "Do I have the right?" scene, but seems to send a less optimistic message. Nonetheless, I'm reluctant to jump on the bandwagon that dismisses Eric Saward as a glorifier of violence; it's just that, as people have been saying since 1984, Stein stands for a good deal of the audience when he cries "I can't stand the confusion in my mind!" Yet the body count will have pleased those boys whose idea of a good computer game is one where their army slaughters another army on the first level, and then is slaughtered itself by automatic weaponry on the second level.

( McCarthyism, the launch of ITV, Robin Hood, and Bruno from The West Wing. )

( Doctor Who XXII.6: Revelation of the Daleks )

( Doctor Who XXV.1: Remembrance of the Daleks )

I mentioned in conversation this evening that one former London Underground station, Marlborough Road on the Metropolitan, is now a Chinese restaurant. The Wikipedia page shows one picture of it; there are some more recent ones on Wikipedia Commons, like this one. There's lots of information about it at Abandoned Stations, and a page at Subterranea Britannica too.

There are lots of explorations of London's disused transport infrastructure which I haven't made yet; there's the Parkland Walk, for example, which covers much of the Great Northern Railway/LNER route from Finsbury Park to Highgate, which was closed after the 'Northern Heights' plan to incorporate it into the Northern Line was shelved (though Highgate to High Barnet and Mill Hill East was successfully converted).

This moth, about 5-6cm wide, settled on my doorstep a couple of nights ago. I mistook it for a twig and leaves at first, suggesting that its camouflage is effective. I have a couple of blurred photographs from the first day, and while I can't be certain it looks as if it has filled out a bit and its wings have grown fuller and lighter.

( Here be the moth! )

Surely the Doctor Who convention to surpass all Doctor Who conventions! Tachyon TV present Osterhagen on Ice.

Apologies to non-Who fans, but this had to be shared...

Have a story... not the usual fare for this journal, but one needs to surprise oneself and one's readers occasionally.

Title:  Rose Cottage
Characters/Pairing: the tenth Doctor, the tenth Doctor, Rose, Donna
Rating: G
Spoilers: Not for those who haven't seen Journey's End.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

( After watching the episode with my mother and sister... )

( Well... )

I'm not usually one for link-only posts, but Recyclingwatch is always worth looking at, and this week is no exception.

( Not a full review at all, but still potentially spoilery )

( Not for those wishing to remain innocent, as this is what is known as 'Spoilery Speculation' )

I'm not reviewing this episode as such for LJ, because I've promised to write a review of the two-part finale for a fanzine. Instead, I thought I'd attempt a liveblog - but don't expect long or even coherent sentences...

"Take cover! The Daleks are back, in Doctor Who!" says the announcer over the closing credits of After You've Gone...

"The biggest adventure yet.."

( Under cut )

( A little reflection )

( One more ETA )

Day two, and WHSmith in Oxford have replenished their stocks of DWM, revealing a healthy batch of Doctor Who - Dragonfire, one of the two titles on offer which I don't have, the other being Doctor Who - The Time Meddler.

nhw linked to this; just as well, as I don't call in to Alison Bechdel's site as much as I used to. There's a lot in the strip which is very, very familiar...

On arriving in Oxford this lunchtime I went in search of the latest Doctor Who Magazine. It's a bagged issue, all the better to give readers a copy of one of the still-extensive overstocks of Doctor Who novelizations from mid-1980s and early-1990s reprintings. All WHSmith had were copies with Doctor Who and the Green Death; and while this is one of the best novelizations of one of the best third Doctor stories, I have three copies already, and decided that this wasn't worth a fourth. As a result of a diversion to Borders, I had a slightly wider selection: the aforementioned Green Death, plus Doctor Who - Mission to Magnus (based on a script from the first version of season 23, abandoned when Michael Grade wielded his axe in February 1985) and Doctor Who - Delta and the Bannermen. I went for the latter even though I already have it, as the version I have is the 1988 first impression (with Bannerman instead of Bannermen on the spine).

The well-kept surprise is the cover of the magazine when it is removed from the bag. All the straplines and the magazine logo have been printed on the bag, so that the cover itself displays (almost) only words familiar to anyone who saw the end of last Saturday's episode. A great gesture which shows how bound up with the progamme the magazine is prepared to be.

( Finally, the review )

I was told yesterday by thanatos_kalos that my proposed paper for Whoniversal Appeal in Cardiff this November has been accepted. Registration hasn't yet opened, but the plan is to have a draft schedule online by the end of the month. I'll be talking about Doctor Who fandom's attitude to the programme's depiction of human history, and its relation to what we know of the intentions of the relevant production teams.

A link to one of Laurie Pink's 'Paul and Mike' cartoons, It's All About the Word Count.

( Allons-y! )

( Back to be hugged by Donna )

Doctor Who viewers not wanting to know who or what is the villain the Doctor will meet at the end of the series, and whose identity and appearance have been kept fiendishly secret by the production team, should not follow this link.

For those who do follow this link and do not know the character, Wikipedia explains all.

David Davis has resigned as MP for Haltemprice and Howden in order to fight a single-issue by-election campaign on the issue of 42-day detention without trial, without seeking the permission of David Cameron or the Conservative Party. He's been replaced as Shadow Home Secretary by Dominic Grieve. There's an undercurrent of suggestion that Davis didn't think the Conservatives fought the 42-day detention battle last night in a sufficiently principled fashion. David Cameron has described David Davis's decision as 'courageous', with everything that entails.

This looks like the sort of independent-minded and dramatic politics which I like, and which we see little of in this age. Davis is running against his leadership. The Liberal Democrats will not field a candidate against David Davis, and someone from Labour - Denis MacShane - is now suggesting they won't either and make Davis look stupid. Denis MacShane has said that David Davis's action strikes a blow against parliamentary sovereignty, but it would have been understood in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Country and radical whig circles, where MPs were considered entirely responsible to their constituents, and where it was considered right for MPs to seek new mandates when their ideas or circumstances changed, though in practice this only followed when an MP accepted an office of profit under the Crown. Imagine if there had to be a raft of by-elections every time there was a ministerial reshuffle - this used to happen until about a century ago...

An interesting review, with a few insights from areas of cultural theory, by Frank Collins at Behind the Sofa here.

( It was going to be called River's Run, you know )

( I'm all right too. )

Lance Parkin is interviewed about his writing for the eighth Doctor in book form at Infinity SF. He seems to have had definite, if finite, plans for Fitz, so beware, Kreiner-lovers. Otherwise the fizzling-out of the EDAs and PDAs during 2005 is explained as a consequence of BBC Books hedging their bets regarding the success of the Christopher Eccleston television series.

( Briefer notes than usual )

...I've found Thomas Carte's (I assume) transcription of what he thinks is Gildas but which actually seems to be 'Nennius':

In illis diebus Saxones in valescebant et crescebant non modice in Britanniâ. Mortuo auten Henegisto, ochta filius ejus transivit de sinistrali parte Britannie ad Regem Cantuariorum et de ipso orti sunt Reges illius Patre. Arthur pugnabat contrà illos in illos diebus (videlicet Saxones, cum Regibus Brittonum: sed ipse Dux erat Bellorum)

The list of Arthur's battles then follows, Catt Cott Celidore (the latter usually transcribed Celidon) and all.

In the margin is written (also a transcription from an earlier MS, I expect) "Arthur et de ses gestes."

(Bod MS Carte 113 fo 62)

ETA:No, I admit my Latin isn't good enough to translate it, but I know it's the passage about the Saxons increasing in number in Britain, Octha succeeding Hengist as king of the Saxons in Kent, and then Arthur fighting against them in those days alongside the kings of the Britons, though he was their leader in battles.