3. Reading, Task 3 - Wonders of storytelling

Task 3 (8 points)
Read the text below and choose the correct answer that best fits each of the questions.
The task begins with an example (0).
 

 

 

Al Kennedy, author of the Doctor Who novels, explains in a recent interview how precious storytelling is. She tells how, despite 20 years’ experience, stepping into the world she has loved since childhood presented an unnerving but exhilarating challenge.

 

  

I am, by now, relatively used to writing books – I’ve been doing it for more than 20 years. I always hope I can still be surprised by the process and do try to arrange that for myself, but I probably didn’t expect quite the level of ‘surprisingness’ I encountered when I wrote a Doctor Who book. It was a very different experience to writing my usual kind of book. The publishing party was the most entertaining and relaxed I’ve ever attended. Readings involved a very gentle breed of fan, very keen, very young people. 

 

The editorial process was smooth, understanding and enthusiastic. The only downside I’ve experienced has involved the realisation that, if writing a Doctor Who book means you’re cool and all your copies disappear in a week, you must previously have been uncool and had books no one was that bothered about. And very young people now attend readings for my adult work which means I have to change some words which can be a challenge, although it is also a lot of fun.

 

Being self-employed and being a writer are not always enjoyable. It’s not that I don’t have fun when I’m writing. I do. I try to make it feel as exciting as sitting on my backside in an orthopaedic chair moving my fingers ever can. But writing for Doctor Who, it seemed appropriate to end each day’s work with an apparently insoluble problem and then wake up in the morning and see which character had solved it overnight – that kind of risk would give me an aneurysm if I were writing a novel completely from scratch.  

 

I take care about everything I write especially my characters. For example, I carefully work over the descriptions of the physical appearance of all my characters. Equally important are the features they possess – intelligence, kindness and bravery or greed, cruelty and cowardice. But dealing with a hugely loved character and 50 years of his world – that felt different. I made a lot of effort to keep the spirit of the TV character. It was stressful and wonderful at the same time. As I re-watched DVDs of episodes I’d only ever seen once in the days before box sets and DVDs, I stepped into a world that I adored as a child. I realised that I remember details, moments, words – that was rather lovely

 

About writing sci-fi
 

I normally produce fiction for adults. I think adults need fiction. I believe there’s an important place in any balanced life for vigorously fictional fictions. They’re proof of our imagination’s power. That’s what puts you into the mind and life and body of someone other than yourself – it makes other members of our species less strange and makes us practise empathy in a way that feels entrancing, entertaining and so forth. None of that is dispensable if you want to live in a stable and humane society. And sci-fi, which I’ve loved all my life, is no more fictional than work set right now in places we happen to recognise and involving people like those we often meet. The clue’s in the title; fiction is fiction. Sci-fi gives us a chance to step beyond our own culture, time, place and humanity and to reflect upon them. I, of course, care about that. Delivering that experience for a child, who’s just entering the wonderful world of reading – that’s a horrifying privilege and a lesson.

 

The project reminded me how precious storytelling is. It can shape a whole life for the better and always be there, making a good time better and a bad one bearable. I like trying to be part of that in general. I hugely enjoyed returning to one of the roots of my creativity and building something my smaller self would have liked. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5. What was unique about writing the Doctor Who book? 

 

 

• The story should be relevant to childhood experiences.
• The story must include a lesson to teach children.
• The story has to exceed their expectations.
• The story might shape their attitude to reading.