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Who is Dr Who? was a two-page prose story published by World Distributors in September 1965.
It was the second short story to be published in the The Dr Who Annual 1966 and served as an introduction to the character of Dr Who; a character piece, it also gave a then-rare glimpse into his possible origins and possible future.
Summary[]
After Sir Isaac Newton came Dr Albert Einstein; after Einstein came Dr Who. Dr Who travels through Time and Space aboard a marvelous ship which defies comprehension, and acts young and energetic despite his aged appearance, as if the normal course of Time had passed him by; he looks and acts broadly like a human being, yet all that can be said for sure is that he originated on a planet in Earth's galaxy. Perhaps the Doctor himself has forgotten where he came from, or indeed what he was initially searching for when he set out for his odyssey — though he travels ever onwards, for there is the deep and always unsatisfied curiosity of the scientist in him, and an unquenchable love of all life and of its eternal struggle. Will the Doctor ever find what he's looking for?
Characters[]
Worldbuilding[]
- The Doctor travels through spatial infinity and temporal eternity, his mind uniquely able to grasp both these concepts.
- The interior of the TARDIS "does not exist in [humans'] normal world of size".
- The TARDIS's space-ship-laboratory holds many inventions which "would be scientific miracles in many of the spheres Dr Who has visited".
- After setting out on his "odyssey", the Doctor across "across infinite strands of Energy that criss-cross all Space-Time".
Notes[]
- While holding unquestioningly that Tardis (as it was then referred to) is Dr Who's invention, it acknowledged that the Doctor merely seemed human (one of the earliest explicit references to the peculiarity of the Doctor's species), and contained a veiled mention of the yet-unnamed Gallifrey with its mention that the Doctor had originated "on a planet in Earth's galaxy".
- This stood in contrast to the story immediately before this one in the Annual, which called the Doctor an Earthman.
- This feature was read in 2017 by Peter Purves in The Doctor Who Audio Annual.
Continuity[]
- The Doctor has difficulties remembering where he actually came from and quite why he started his journeys through Time and Space. (PROSE: Cold Fusion)
- The Doctor invented Tardis, an unparalleled scientific wonder. (PROSE: The Equations of Dr Who, TV: The Chase)
