THE MALADY LINGERS ON
f 'OUNTRY DOCTOR, which occupies a rather incongruous place in 1YA’s Feminine Viewpoint, fascinates, like other soap operas, by its unbelievable obviousness. There is a sort of horrible satisfaction in anticipating the next move of each character, the next twist in the plot, the next line of dialogue even, al] the time hoping that the too plainly foreseen will not happen. But it always does. Has anybody, I wonder, ever written a soap-opera which burlesques this extraordinary genre-a soap-opera to end all soap-operas? The difficulty,, I suppose, is that no matter how absurd the plot, how banal the dialogue, how oracle-like the characters, it could hardly out-do the original type. I remember James Thurber listening to scores of soap-operas to obtain material for one of his funniest pieces. Lacking his’ courage, I catch Country Doctor only while waiting for much less mindless Feminine Viewpoint features. I had thought that, when this session began some years ago, soap-operas were a thing of the past from 1YA; but, since more substantial serials are apparently hard to find, the malady lingers on.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19540226.2.20.1
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 762, 26 February 1954, Page 10
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183THE MALADY LINGERS ON New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 762, 26 February 1954, Page 10
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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