Canon, myth, and memory in Doctor Who

For Doctor Who, issues of canonicity are more ambiguous than for other long-running science fiction series such as Star Trek and Star Wars: unlike the producers of the two American franchises, the BBC has never offered an official edict as to what constitutes canon in relation to Doctor Who. In this chapter, I explore the complex interrelationship between constructions of canon as determined by both the creators and consumers of various Doctor Who media. I examine the extent to which these attempts at imposing a single, definitive truth upon the often disparate iterations of the Doctor Who franchise draw heavily upon conceptions of myth prevalent within the wider culture. I explore the ways in which Doctor Who, its producers, and its fanbase utilize existing mythological structures and in turn use these as a method for configuring Doctor Who itself as mythology. Central to my approach is the concept of memory and how it informs ideas of both mythology and canon. I explore the ways in which communal and subjective remembering plays a part in the construction of the mythological and canon. In examining these multiple processes I draw upon my own biographical experience as a viewer of the Doctor Who television program as both a child and an adult, my identity as a fan of the show who consumes myriad kinds of spin-off material, and more lately my identity as a writer commissioned to produce Doctor Who prose material officially sanctioned by the BBC and published under license by the British company Big Finish. I argue that memory understood as something that is both embodied and emplaced can help explain the ways in which the producers and consumers of Doctor Who media use multiple approaches drawn from mythology in their efforts to imprint a single, definitive canon on Doctor Who in all its manifold guises.