Novels That Shaped Our World

TV programmes about novels feel a bit like knitted raincoats: they might be a great fit and look like they’ve just come from the town’s finest tailor, but you can’t help the feeling that they’ll unravel if anyone goes so far as to wear one in public. Take the BBC’s NovelsThat Shaped Our World, a series of three programmes examining the Anglophone novel from the perspectives of gender, race and class. It was all very worthy, and I enjoyed watching the series, but I’m not sure I learned anything about the novels – the ones that I’ve read or the ones that I haven’t.

How do you convey a novel on TV? I’m not talking about the problems of adaptation: there are many problems with adaptation, but it’s always possible to enjoy a new text without knowing about the old text: Ten Things I Hate About You can be enjoyed (or not) without any knowledge of Taming of the Shrew. A TV programme that doesn’t show something isn’t really doing its job, but how can you show a novel? Clips of actors reading a passage from the novel in an appropriate setting seem to be as close as we can get.

It isn’t very close though, really. It’s an approach that can convey an idea of what the novel sounds like, and along with a summary, perhaps a vague indication of what its like to read it, and the director’s idea of the setting the novel might evoke. But, this approach is never really going to do much more than scratch the surface of the warp and weft of the language, plot and ideas that make reading an immersive experience. I know people who complain if the actor playing a particular character doesn’t look like the character in their imagination. That’s never bothered me, but the actors reading the PG Wodehouse extracts in this programme rankled: it’s just not how I imagine Jeeves and Wooster to look.

On the other hand, perhaps I’m wrong. The novel is, as we all know, dead or dying. TV might not be far behind it. I read on the bus to and from work every day, but almost every other passenger I see is either listening to music, surfing the web or both. There are more of them than there are of me, and for the most part they are young: the future is, to state the obvious, theirs.

Perhaps a TV programme tells us everything we need to know about a novel, without anyone (apart from the programme makers) having to read it. The programme’s main take is that the novel, as a form, tells us what it’s like to be someone else – which seems reasonable insofar as it goes –  but why waste a week of your life reading Trainspotting when you can spend an hour watching a TV programme that covers everything about class and the novel? Another 2 hours, or so, watching the film and you’d probably know as much as you need to know about being an Edinburgh heroin addict, short of actually becoming one (which isn’t something I’d recommend).

As I said at the start of the blog, I enjoyed all three programmes, which might be as much as I’m entitled to expect.

Line of Duty

For the past 6 Wednesdays I have been watching the second series of BBC2's Line of Duty, a drama series focussing on a police anti-corruption unit AC12.  I was slightly disappointed with the first series, which starred Lennie James as the corrupt DCI Gates.  I admire much of the work of the writer Jed Mercurio, but found it lacked the intensity of, for example, his medical drama Bodies.  

The second series proved to be much stronger.  Whereas in the first series, we knew Gates was corrupt and the journey was simply watching how the officers of AC12 pinned it on him, the second the took a more interesting approach.  From the outset suspicion falls on another DCI, Lindsay Denton (Keeley Hawkes).  Denton is a more intriguing character than Gates.  An honest, and rather rule-bound officer, and something of a loner, she stands in stark contrast to the smooth, sociable and patently untrustworthy Gates.  From the outset there seems to be little doubt about her guilt; the question is why?

Except, it turns out there is a lot of doubt about her guilt.  The hypothesis the anti-corruption officers construct becomes increasingly rickety in the face of evidence - evidence seen by them and evidence seen only by the viewer.  Denton, meanwhile, blames superior officer and former lover DCC Mike Dryden.  While this initially looks like a desperate attempt to escape justice, the viewer, seeing her treatment on remand has to think again.  The officers, too, are convinced and Dryden is arrested.  This, of course, isn't the end, and by the final episode bets were back on again and everything was set up for the grand finale.

The grand finale, sadly, didn't materialise.  The hour-long episode unfurled, much like Jane Austen's 'tell-tale compression of the pages', but leaving more loose ends and less time to tie them up.  At around the forty minute mark, we were given an extended flashback that tied up several strands in a rather unsatisfying fashion.

To an extent, I think the exigencies of TV drama must take some of the blame: it is doubtless agonisingly difficult to plot six episodes to a set length, each containing its own dramatic arc, while contributing to the overall arc of the series.  Having seen and read a few of Mercurio's series and novels, I confess to being generally let down by the endings: it seems he is very good at creating characters and putting them into unusual positions, but he just isn't that good at resolving everything.

Line of Duty is still a great series.  There are enough loose ends, in particular the newly-revealed details of DS 'Dot' Cotton's nefariousness.  The moral ambivalence of the characters and the darkness of the dramatic world will make a third series welcome.  I just hope the ending's better next time.

A popularity contest

I am perhaps unusual – at least amongst people who don’t work for the BBC – in harbouring no serious objections to the TV licence fee. I don’t relish paying it; I don’t relish paying for anything. I do, however, think that at a little under £3 a week – per household, not even per person – it represents excellent value. I think that the principle of funding a public service broadcaster in this way is fine and admirable. And I think that because of the way it is funded, the BBC has produced innovative and envied television.

It shouldn’t be surprising then that I view Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt’s suggestion that the fee could be reduced with suspicion. His reference to the “very constrained financial situation” is an attempt to link it with wider austerity measures that is disingenuous if not outright deceitful. The finances of the BBC are in no way linked to the budget deficit the government is so desperate to cut. If Mr Hunt believes that the BBC should suffer simply because other people and other bodies are, shouldn’t he suggest some sort of pay cap across the whole of the economy?

The true motives behind this lie, I suspect, lies in the unpopularity of the licence fee. I may be unusual in not objecting to it, but I am certainly not unusual in failing to enjoy paying. This government is acutely aware that it is heading for deep unpopularity with some of its decisions. Ultimately, I suspect that in suggesting the licence fee be reduced they are attempting to offset the effects of massive spending cuts across the board.

Nick Hornby, Melvyn Bragg and James Joyce

Over the last fifteen years or so, I have enjoyed an occasional relationship with The South Bank Show. I have caught it from time-to-time simply looking around for something to watch on a Sunday night. As show times vary I have sometimes come in at the beginning of something I've enjoyed very much; frustratingly I've also come in at the end of something I'd have made a point of seeing had I have known it was on - most galling was catching the final five minutes of a programme on Elvis Costello.

Recently, particularly as I've matured into my thirties, I've learned how to use a TV guide, and can now look for shows I think will be interesting. The show's broad coverage means that I frequently find myself skipping episodes, particularly when I want to see Match of The Day 2. As it seems that the present series will be the last, I've been determined to find something to watch before it goes for good.

Yesterday's travesty at Anfield meant I was happy to miss the football last night; fortuitously, this coincided with a show about Nick Hornby. I had been planning to watch the show anyway. I'm generally happy enough to watch documentaries about writers, whether I like their stuff or not - Jeffrey Archer being the one dishonourable exception. As it happens, I've read Hornby's first three novels and enjoyed them.

He's published two more since the last time I read him, the most recent was released last month. I haven't got round to reading either, but possibly will at some point. The show didn't inspire me to rush out and buy the books I haven't read, not least because of a comment Hornby made himself. He says that he occasionally meets people who tell him they've read High Fidelity ten or fifteen times; he longs, he says, to tell them to stop: "there are other things you could be reading". It's a fair point, and sums up my own feelings: Nick, if you're reading this, I've enjoyed what I've read so far, but the rest of your oeuvre will have to wait until I've finished Finnegans Wake.

Lewis's Secret?

The BBC 1 programme, The Narnia Code, broadcast on Thursday 16th April contains, apparently startling claims of a hidden code contained within CS Lewis's Narnia Chronicles.

I will admit to being fascinated by the programme, literary studies being my thing and all. The gist of the theory is that each of the seven books parallels one of the seven planets in the medieval view of the cosmos. Dr Michael Ward, the first proponent of the theory makes a sound case, based partly on his study of Lewis's own study of medieval literature.

As I watched, I found I had to put my own lit-crit, mentality - with fully functioning intentional fallacy - on hold. Surely, if there is a hidden code, Lewis must have put it there. Later on, I thought about it a bit more. Why does it have to be a code? Perhaps it is easier to think of it as a series of correspondences. There would be no need for Lewis to have put them there, or even not to have put them there.

There seems to be an element of sensationalism about literary hostory. I'm tempted to blame Dan Brown, for obvious reasons, but actually this sort of thing has always been around: was Shakespeare gay? Was Marlowe Shakespeare? No doubt many famous (and not famous) authors have had their secrets, but they probably wanted to keep them secret. The contents of their work are usually much more mundane.

Still Shameless

Channel 4's Shameless is part-way through its sixth (I think) series. It is increasingly being suggested that it is someway past its best. I have to confess to mixed feelings.

As with every show I manage to catch from the beginning, as soon as it strays into a third series, I get irate: why can't they be more like Fawlty Towers? This is largely snobbery - I can't stand the idea of more people liking the stuff I do - but also because I genuinely believe that it is easy for a show to lose its brilliance over time. Shameless, itself has lost a lot of its edge as Paul Abbott has become less involved with the writing.

On the other hand, the latest series of Shameless has now begun to dig some dark seams indeed. In the earlier series, the stories involving Paddy's drug addiction, and Mandy and Joe's violent relationship would have been resolved in a single episode. Now, as an established series, there is the freedom to explore them in more depth.

What is interesting about the addiction storyline is that it poetic justice for a thuggish character, yet the viewer is rooting for him to overcome the addiction. There is still the possibility that the show will become an embarrassing parody, and I do hope it ends before that happens, but its evolution beyond the original concept definitely not something to lament just yet.

Innovative new comedy?

I have heard that the day after The Office was first broadcast, co-creator Stephen Merchant overheard two women talking about it on the train. One woman thought that this new documentary was the funniest thing she'd ever seen, until her friend pointed out that it was meant to be a comedy: "Well it's not very funny", she said.

The creators of BBC 1's Bonekickers may have experienced the opposite effect. If it is a comedy, it is an effort of real genius. It satirises rightwing fundamentalism, archaeology and British low-budget TV drama. The highlight was the scene in which two of the fundamentalists - both some kind of Neo Knights Templar - perish if a blaze of burning crosses.

Sadly, if this programme is meant to be a serious drama, or even just a bit of peaktime fluff, it fails miserably.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bonekickers/