meta: The Meeting With the Goddess: Journey to the Centre of the Tardis

[lonewytch]

In which the World Tree is blatant, the Tardis is a Goddess, Clara's lessons about Death continue, the Doctor is in denial, Clara is most certainly not an android and a million other very interesting things occur.

Comments

[a_phoenixdragon]

The swimming pool and the library being so close together tickled me...

(Sorry had to mention that)

As always, you have made clear what was previously foggy. You have brought me near tears and made me wanna write furiously, even as you have already laid everything out to perfection and there is nothing more that can be said...

Thank you for this. Gods, I love your metas!!

*hugs you hard*

Edit: I must also say - as the Doctor's self fractures, as he loses his own identity as he KNOWS IT NOW while running from an ancient truth - his reality follows. He can no longer see truth from fiction. He is terrified of his Companion even as he is intrigued. It runs deeper than his name, I think. He has lost all ability to see beyond the mask he has made for himself...

There is a ficcy thought there.

[lonewytch]

I loooooved the library so much. Librarian me wend "SQUEEEEEE!!!"

Aw darlin,thank you so much and i;m so glad you enjoyed the meta!!!

Agree with you - the situation with Clara is totally reflective of his own fear about the shadows in his past and the meaning of his name. Like her shadow haunting him across past and future, so his own identity does. So he does with Clara exactly what he does with his own name - holds it close, keeps its darkness secret, is terrified to admit it. These things have a dreadful way of biting back. The fact that he is denying Clara self knowledge due to projecting his own issues troubles me deeply. This is not who he is, he's the mentor, the guide, the good wizard to the companions (or at least, should be with a new-ish companion). It's deeply selfish and all generated through fear.

[radiolaires]

It's brilliant! Very dense and wonderfully full of mythology.

I could not help thinking about you and your use of the World Tree when this luminescent beauty appeared on the screen.
What also struck me is that the tree is here a thing, creating things, so not life, eggs for things. And similarly the Library was all wood -dead trees- and death/memories of long gone people -forest of the dead indeed-, with bottles containing voices, as fossilised eggs for people. (That said I just realised maybe Clara managed to read the book because she had absorbed some of the content of the bottle...) So when are we going to have a tree that is a tree, alive and not gloomy?

About the Doctor's identity, he really is on a self-destruction path... The TARDIS was on auto destruct, her heart exploded and was fixed in stasis; he has a sliver of ice in his hearts... Could we assume he did as the TARDIS?

Also I wondered what you made of the fact the boundary protecting the centre of the TARDIS was a river/cliff.

[lonewytch]

Thank you ~happy dance~ So glad you enjoyed!

Oooh, i see your link from the tree to the Library on the ship and the bottles voices. Also, parallel to the Tardis cpnsole and Time Rotor which symbolises the Wrld Tree, and the voice from the past issuing forth from it when Bram prises it open.

Thing is the World Tree is life/death in one. I think we had the tree as a symbol of life as well as death in the Rings of Akhaten - at least at the start of the ep, when the leaf from the tree is the thing that brings two people together in love in order to create life. I'm not conveinced we will ever see the tree as an exclusive symbol of joy, as this era of Who imagery around trees is so very very much tied into the idea of afterlife, death and rebirth.

About the Doctor's identity, he really is on a self-destruction path... The TARDIS was on auto destruct, her heart exploded and was fixed in stasis; he has a sliver of ice in his hearts... Could we assume he did as the TARDIS?OOOH, yes yes yes!!That's a great mirror! It's like when he said

[radiolaires]

What I meant was a tree-tree with leaves, not falling and browning, but green and in bloom, not a thing-tree -I'm not making any sense. But, yes, we will probably have to wait a little longer in order to see a happy tree.

Yes to Clara as the melting power!

Everything you wrote about the sliver of ice and his hearts and Clara was perfect, absolutely; it's a miny meta commentary, thank you very much!

re: Sliver of Ice

[ext_1788773]

Regarding will / control (great bit about the screwdriver malfunction btw):

Clara in the Victorian Era was able to melt the snow but not the ice. Lovely sweet and heavy symbolism in that; it is part of her lesson ;)

Re: Sliver of Ice

[lonewytch]

Good point - and the step has to be taken by him (the step into the illusory chasm, the void) in order fr him to melt his own sliver of ice. Nobody can force self-accpetance onto another person, that's a path he has to walk himself. I wish he would give her a chance to accept herself by allowing her to know what he knows about her. There could be a powerful lesson in that for him, but it's too close to the core of his own issues.

[elisi]

Keep meaning to write something and then get sidetracked. So all I'll say is - I read, and I liked. The show is just too darn DENSE at the moment, it's rather like wandering through a thicket in a forest...

[lonewytch]

No worries, I know how it is, i've spend hours on LJ this morn trying to catch up with everyone on my flist whose thoughts i love, there's just so many thoughts!!!

I agree with you, it's hugely dense, fitting though as we're getting towards the apex of the core question. Plus, forest metaphor for the win!!!!

[gratiela]

I've bee reading your wonderful meta for a while now, and each time I'm too in awe to actually say anything<3
I think you manage make it clear just why I love Doctor Who so much, pointing out to so many subtle(or not so subtle:D) details and symbols that make these stories so rich, so empowering, so enlightening!
♥
Thank you!

PS: Do you mind if I friend you?
(I mean, I could just track your entries, but I feel it would be a much nicer feeling, this friending business :D)

[lonewytch]

Aw, thank you so much, it's so lovely of you to comment. It really means a lot when people stop by to tell me how much they enjoyed reading. Also, totally agree with you about Doctor Who being enlightening.

The other day at work (i'm a librarian) i found myself ending a conversation by wagging a finger at another librarian and (almost) shouting "And that is why Doctor Who is a tool for self growth!!!". When fannishness and real life collide!

Yep ,please do add me! It is much nicer business. I'll add you too!!