The leading Scottish writer, AL Kennedy, who has recently penned her first Doctor Who novel, has rejected the idea of a female Doctor.
The award winning author who has written The Drosten's Curse, which features the fourth Doctor, which was played by Tom Baker, said that another great sci-fi character should be created for women.
Kennedy, speaking at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, said that she could only imagine the Oscar winning actress Tilda Swinton as the time travelling hero of the hit BBC series.
Kennedy was asked by a member of the audience whether she had considered playing the Time Lord, or whether she thought a future incarnation of the Doctor should be female.
"As a heterosexual woman I have no interest in that, because he plays a big part in whom I fancy," she said.
"I am literally going out with someone like that.
"[Doctor Who] is who he is: just has a guy vibe - he has a hopeless, un-domestic, dozy, dreamy kind of guy-type of eccentricity, not a girl type of eccentricity, so I'd be surprised if he changed gender.
"It might wonderful, I don't know: build something else wonderful and iconic for women and have faith you can do that, maybe - I am not not in favour of women having wonderful parts.
"Make the companions ballsy and wonderful."
She added: "It's like 'Sherlock Holmes is wonderful, so let's make him a girl', no let's make a wonderful part for women that is designed for women.
"I get annoyed when I go to see a Shakespeare production and they've said 'Oh let's make this part for a woman'. Well then all of her lines won't work. It will create a very odd vibe."
Kennedy read from her Doctor Who book, which she said is largely for children.
In the section, a golf bunker - presumably with a creature inside it - ate a character.
"I never felt as a small person that I was robbed because the Doctor was a bloke," she said.
"Other than Tilda Swinton, because she has that strange vibe that she can do anything. He is this particularly Victorian eccentric. You'd have to do a different drama - or bring back the Time Ladies."
The Edinburgh International Book Festival has enjoyed one of its busiest opening weekends and is reporting a "record trade" in its adult and children’s bookshops.
Sales in the two bookshops, which are owned and managed by the Book Festival, topped 10,000 books in the first two days of the Festival with the top sellers being The Shed that Fed a Million Children by Magnus Macfarlane-Barrow, How to be Both by Ali Smith and Julian Clary’s first children’s book, The Bolds.
James Shaw, Head of Book Sales & Retail at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, said: “It’s a great start to what is going to be a very exciting festival.”
Nick Barley, director of the Edinburgh International Book Festival said: “These extraordinary sales figures prove that books are vibrant, exciting and inspiring.
"Stories cross borders, cross cultures and cross languages and books are the vehicle through which we can make sense of the world we live in today."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article