Blogspiration (6) - Doctor Who and Memory

Blogspiration is a weekly meme hosted by GrowingUpYA and Saz101. The meme was created to help spark inspiration among bloggers, readers and writers alike. An inspirational quote/picture/video is posted weekly, on the day of the author's choosing, so that it may inspire creativity, conversation or just a little SOMETHING.

My last Who-related Blogspiration isn’t with a quote from the show, but a quote that got me thinking about the theme that seems to pervade the last three seasons - the importance of memory and remembering. So this is sort of an idea that I’ve had about the series - Whovians would likely only relate to this.  Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game has one of my favorite quotes: “I am only what I remember.” And with the Doctor it seems like he is only what others remember of him. They say the companions are the the way the viewers relate to the story, and we see him as they see him.  Or as he wants them to see him. Amy Pond brought him back with her memories. And now he is trying to erase the memory or history of himself from the universe.  And with the question that will be asked at the fall of the eleventh, the answer must be not what others remember of him or think of him or his legend, but who the Doctor really is. What are his memories and his stories since the whole series is someone else’s story about the great Doctor. Is the question Doctor Who? really just his name?  Will it reveal some deep dark memory of why he ran away?  At least that is my cobbled together theory about what Steven Moffat might be doing and why memory seems to be so important in each series. Probably totally wrong!

I am fascinated by memory, and how it can be so powerful and yet so easily distorted.  About the quote, I take from it that you can make of yourself whatever you want, because you can choose what you want to remember.  Your memories make up who you are as a person, and hopefully you can focus on the good memories.