On the 9th March 1997 the Welsh screenwriter and novelist Terry Nation died. He was remembered with fondness and affection as a stalwart of British television, and the pioneering force behind television classics like “Doctor Who” and “Blake’s 7”. He was a tour de force in British broadcasting for many decades, and his example remains unmatched. He wasn’t just respected by his contemporaries in broadcasting, he was also immensely popular with audiences.
However it is sad to reflect that imaginative, challenging television does not exist anymore, and it is less likely to be commissioned by a staid and declining art form. He was the heir to science fiction and folk horror innovators like Nigel Kneale. Kneale’s numerous films and programmes were disturbing reflections of a rapidly changing nation.
He chronicled the difficulties of living in twentieth century Britain, exploring its uneasy relationship with the rest of the globe and vice versa. He observed how tradition jarred with modernity and how superstition conflicted with reason. He had a profound insight into the sensibility of a nation wrestling with the new whilst continuously clinging to the past. He had more of an understanding than the glut of metropolitan commissioners and producers that inhabited the echelons of British broadcasting, as he came from the Isle of Man.
His output on the small screen exemplified the problems when modern, universalist notions were imposed on well established communities with enduring local traditions. Many will inevitably resist such an imposition, and cling to their old ways as these are more familiar to them. Our ancestors viewed themselves as an integral part of the natural world, as opposed to the modern belief that we are separate from it. There was no attempt to battle with the forces of nature, or to dominate and subdue them. This was simply unthinkable.
The future was unfamiliar and strange. Such an intangible notion would have seemed an artifice, yet Kneale’s characters stand on the threshold between the past and the future. They are gazing into an abyss. They are standing on the precipice looking down on an open chasm of unfamiliarity, confusion and disorientation. In “Quatermass and the Pit”, an archaeological dig at a defunct Tube station recovers the remains of a Martian spaceship. This one discovery challenges the preconceptions and prejudices surrounding what actually constitutes humanity, and even material reality itself.
It is later revealed that these Martians interbred with proto-human hominids to maintain their survival on Earth. Clearly alien and human are merely social constructs, and the distinction between them is purely arbitrary. In the final serial of “Quatermass” a new generation of Planet People yearn to escape into another cosmic dimension. Amidst the malcontent, armed street gangs tour the barricaded streets.
This is Kneale’s bleakest vision of the future. There is no hope left in the shell of this urban wasteland, only the ghosts of a past that no-one remembers. Alien and human are disconnected, and atomised. All that remains is the overwhelming desire for annihilation, and the vain belief that they will ultimately regenerate in another manifestation in a faraway solar system.
Time travel, and alien beings were a popular combination of subjects for prime time television. It was this interesting juxtaposition of themes that inspired the work of Terry Nation. Nation was originally a comedy writer, but branched out into science fiction when he realised the immense commercial potential. In 1963 he conceived “The Daleks” for the second series of Doctor Who. These were alien creatures created after a nuclear bomb, and who survive purely on the radiation in the atmosphere. They are war like, and in constant battle with their pacifist foes the Thals. The Doctor’s nemesis is Davros, the progenitor of the Daleks.
Terry Nation continued to contribute to Doctor Who until 1979. He was also commissioned to write “Survivors” in 1975. This was a television series that imagined the last human lives on a planet devastated by a deadly plague. Three years later he was responsible for the science fiction series “Blake’s 7”. This followed a group of criminals and political prisoners escaping from the evil “Terran Federation” on a spaceship of an unknown origin.
Blakes 7 ended in 1981, and Nation sought new creative opportunities in Los Angeles. He was a scriptwriter for “Macgyver” and “A Fine Romance”. He was also the author of numerous works of fiction. Nation’s creations have left an indelible mark on generations of British people, and they have even shaped our consciousness and our very identity. It is hard to imagine what our psychology would have been like without his stellar work, and we will continue to celebrate him.
Ponderings 