The Library of Alexandria by: Simon Guerrier directed by: Lisa Bowerman: Destruction of Knowledge on a Global Scale

The Library of Alexandria is performed by William Russell as Ian Chesterton with Susan Franklyn as Hypatia.  It was written by Simon Guerrier, directed by Lisa Bowerman, and was released in April 2013 by Big Finish Productions.

 

The biggest problem with the finale to the first season of The Early Adventures, An Ordinary Life, Big Finish’s replacement for the Companion Chronicles, had was that it didn’t have too much with the twist halfway through changing it from a pure historical story to a pseudo historical story.  The Library of Alexandria however by the nature of only having half the running time is able to execute this twist much better than An Ordinary Life for this reason.  The Library of Alexandria also does it a bit better as it surrounds around the idea of a library that was destroyed.  The titular library is a historic library in Alexandria, Egypt which mysteriously was burned to the ground with yes many different accounts are told of how it was possibly destroyed.  Some say it was Julius Caesar, some say it was Muslim invaders destroying it in an act of jihad, one saying it was done by decree of Coptic Pope Theophilius of Alexandria, and one saying a sea monster destroyed it.  This being Doctor Who, the sea monster attack is the one that Simon Guerrier goes for when it comes to how the Library was destroyed.

 

The first half of the story is a straight historical story that serves to flesh out the characters of Ian Chesterton and Hypatia.  The story is that the Doctor, Ian, Barbara, and Susan arrive at the Library and Ian, being the science teacher of the group, works in the Library to pay for their ability to take a vacation in Alexandria.  The Doctor does the things he did in The Aztecs about not being able to rewrite history and not to give away anything from the future in this portion of the story, but really this is the story for Ian and Hypatia.  The problem with a lot of the first half of the story is that there really isn’t much plot, and it’s all a lot of scientific explanation which is really engaging if you’re somebody like me who really likes science, but if you’re in the story for the adventure this half really isn’t for you.  The cliffhanger of the first however I do have a problem with the execution as to be honest it just sort of comes out of nowhere and it is revealed that the Mim are invading Earth.  The second half of the story is just a traditional alien invasion story where many people die in the pillaging of the Library of Alexandria.  The Mim are doing their same plot from Shadow from the Past but Guerrier really doesn’t do as much in this story to make them interesting.  Here the Mim are really just the stock villains for the story.

 

The final few scenes of the story which include Ian and Hypatia teaching children and the reveal that the Rosetta stone survived the pillaging.  It makes the story end on the hopeful note that some of the knowledge kept in the Library has survived the burnings from the Mim.  William Russell while not recording any sort of interviews for this release and the extras are a nine minute music suite which emulates a very Arabic style of music in a minor key.  Russell is excellent as Ian Chesterton as he always is and it is Susan Franklyn as Hypatia who is a more interesting character.  Hypatia is someone who knows quite a bit on how the world works but because of the knowledge of her time she still believes in things like the geocentric model for the Solar System and that the Earth is flat.  Her interactions with Ian are extremely interesting to listen to as Hypatia isn’t portrayed as ignorant, it’s just there is a lack in a breakthrough in knowledge that enlightened most of the world.  There is also much made in the way of how language has changed over time including the word scientist originally meaning teacher or someone who studies math, not someone who studies what we know as science today.

 

To summarize, The Library of Alexandria is a story that will polarize some with the extremely different stylings of the two halves of the story.  The two performances of the story from William Russell and Susan Franklyn are excellent, but there really isn’t much in the way of changing an established plot structure.  Simon Guerrier writes a pretty engaging plot but the Mim really don’t make any difference than their initial impression.  80/100.