Doctor Who in Print: Target sets its sights...

I was watching 'On Target - Terrance Dicks' on the Doctor Who The Monster of Peladon DVD this morning and something Paul Cornell said really made me think.

I've recently been revisiting some of the early books in the Target range, including their re-prints of the three mid-1960s books originally published by Frederick Muller: Doctor Who and The Daleks by David Whittaker, Doctor Who and The Zarbi by Bill Strutton and Doctor Who and The Crusaders again by David Whittaker.

When discussing how the Target books came into being Paul Cornell said that these three re-print titles came from an earlier, much more basic age of children's story telling - the inference being that the newer TV adaptations that Terrance and others were embarking on was more developed and progressive.

I disagree with this entirely.

What marks these three titles out as extra special in my view is how bold, challenging and 'adult' they are in so many respects. They come from a different era, when roles, values and standards were different - but then the TV shows they were based on did too, and to us now in the (cough, erm) enlightened 21st Century many of the 1970s and 80s Target books display outmoded views and opinions that need contextualising as well.

To pick a few examples from these pioneering 60s novelisations, the way David Whittaker develops the romantic relationship between Ian and Barbara across both his books is never patronising or simple, and none of the later Target books dared to treat any of the companions in the same way. By the end of The Crusaders I was bemoaning the fact that more stories hadn't been written and published at the time - at least The Chase to finish off Ian and Barbara's story.
Bill Strutton doesn't follow Whittaker's romantic ideals, but he extertly manages to show how the Menoptra aren't naturally friendly and trusting towards our stranded heroes - this has to be built through mutual struggle towards the same ends. It's an alien world with alien cultures and alien values. The Menoptra and Optera are anthropomorphised, but there is little reason for them to trust to TARDIS crew and not look upon them as another obstacle to them reclaiming their planet. We the reader know otherwise, but in an age where the TV Doctor and his companions are very easily accepted almost everywhere they go in order to keep the stories moving at pace it is refreshing to be reminded of the differences that may prevent groups of well-meaning species to automatically bond.

Both authors are far more cavalier with their source material than the Target books would quickly become as they were churned out, factory style. Strutton makes one wonder how heavily his TV scripts were edited by Dennis Spooner, since the controlling intelligence here is no longer called The Animus and the Menoptra device isn't an 'isoptope', amongst other alterations. They don't change the story, but they're telling in their differences. Whittaker had already script-edited The Daleks for TV and adapted it for the cinema, so it's no wonder he takes a different approach to the novelisation and at the same time chooses to bring the 'crew' together in a different way - subtely different to, yet also similar to, the TV version from the previous story An Unearthly Child. It works for the narrative style, but Barbara loses out as a character - we never really get to know her, unfortunately. This is rectified in The Crusaders, told in a more standard third-person style and where much of the peril and action involves Barbara and her struggle with El-Akir - a violent and potentially sexual struggle that the narrative doesn't shy away from. It's a lyrical and often powerful TV drama. As a novel this is heightened many fold.

These early novelisations are not constrained by a low page count, but at the same time they're not overly long - they feel like they're allowed to be as long and in-depth as they need to be. This, at least was carried over into the early original Target books too, as were the wonderful illustrations. The Daleks, being the longest TV story of the three, is economical by telling the story completely from Ian Chesterton's viewpoint - an experiment never again attempted in the range. The Crusaders, on the other hand, takes the opportunity to develop its story and action in ways that the TV series could never have allowed at the time.

There is little sense of cosiness about any of these three books, and in my opinion little sense of them being written for children at all - intelligent teenagers, perhaps, or young adults. But whereas I recall loving The Auton Invasion and Day of The Daleks from the early Target books as a child, for example, I missed a lot of the subtlety of The Daleks in my quest for spectacle, and I couldn't get engaged by The Zarbi or The Crusaders at all. Reading them now I'm not surprised. I think the very opposite of what Paul Cornell claims is true: if these books were written for children they were written in such a way as not to conceal or heavily sugarcoat any of the harsh and emotional realities of life, not to patronise and very firmly to trust the reader. You didn't have to have watched the TV show first to enjoy these books. Yes the lead character is often referred to as 'Doctor Who', just like in the annuals and comic strips of the time - but then Target allowed Gerry Davis to do this in his Tomb of The Cybermen novelisation out of nowhere in 1978, so there was clearly no hard and fast rule on the subject. It's not enough to convince me to dismiss these books as unsophisticated. I believe these are three of the most powerful and well-written books in the whole Doctor Who range.