What is it like to be in love with a Victorian man who is transported to modern London? Kaliane Bradley had to find out

I’ve never been in love with a Victorian Arctic explorer. The thought simply never occurred to me, mainly due to lack of exposure: outside of the (very good) TV series The terror, To be honest, I’ve never had much time to think about them, or the many ways they can be charming. However, Kaliane Bradley has done just that – and she’s written an entire book that just might convince you to fall in love with one too.

The Ministry of Time, Bradley’s debut novel, follows an unnamed protagonist working for the British government on a top-secret time travel project. In an experiment to test the limits of their technology, the eponymous Ministry has plucked a number of ‘expats’ throughout history and paired them with handlers called ‘bridges’ to effectively be their roommates, and report on how well the expats adapt to modernity. The protagonist’s assigned expatriate is Lieutenant Graham Gore, an Arctic explorer previously assigned to the HMS Erebus (a sister ship of The terror), and ultimately a man she will fall in love with extremely difficult.

However, Bradley has a lot more in store than a fish-out-of-water comedy or a star-crossed romance. The Ministry of Time is a twisty, compelling read that takes its (very funny) premise and combines it with a bit of a spy novel, a paranoid thriller, a commentary on identity, and a rumination on the inherited trauma that can come with mixed-race heritage.

The book is an early one critical hit for the summer season, and it is already slated for a BBC adaptation by Alice Birch (Prime Videos Dead Ringers and Hulu’s adaptation of Normal people), produced by A24, no less. Recently, Polygon spoke with Bradley about what inspired her to write The Ministry of Time (the pandemic) and the many, many things she was thinking about while writing it.

Polygon: As I understand it, The Ministry of Time started as a joke during a pandemic lockdown, yes?

Kaliane Bradley: Yes. So it started as a joke, a gift to these friends that I made online, because I became really interested in historical polar exploration – which, you know, is one of those normal things that happens during lockdown. You become deeply interested in something like – I see you nodding, did you become deeply interested in something that was slightly crazy?

Promotional videos from theme parks and old TV setups.

Then you know! Like it, Well, maybe my brain is just doing this now! (laughs) I’ve just been thinking very intensely about polar research, especially this one expedition, which luckily a lot of people are interested in – it could have been a more obscure expedition that no one wants to talk about!

I never intended for this to be a book, just a fun story to make (friends) laugh. And while I was writing, I just did it. The development of the storyline came largely from confronting what it would really be like to live with a British imperialist who truly believed in the British Empire. So the more serious themes were always present, but the love story, the fish-out-of-water comedy and the tragic comedy of bureaucracy were always at the heart of it.

What I appreciate about the fish-out-of-water comedy here is that Graham Gore isn’t a bumbling clown, right? I feel like you see a lot of stories like this and they push into the fish-out-of-water stuff a little too hard.

Yes, they really want you to laugh at this unhappy person. Panicking at the traffic light.

Precisely.

All these people – in the book they are called expats – brought from the past, they are all people and even if you come from a different time, a different culture, a different country… people are not crazy. They will find ways to adapt.

True, but then there is also the humor and cunning of Graham Gore.

(Laughs) It was just me Real interested in this historical figure about whom virtually no archival material exists. If you want to have a conversation with a loved one who is dead, you have to write! I wanted to hang out with this guy, but the only way I could do that was to write an entire conversation.

I also think the book makes it quite clear that Graham’s relationship with the narrator is going to take a romantic turn.

Absolute. I Certainly didn’t try to hide that!

You waited just now long enough before they finally make contact. Although I love his frustration at the narrator’s ignorance when he says, “So was I.” to court You!”

Like it, What are you talking about? You haven’t squeezed my ass even once! (Laughs)

What’s interesting to me about this collision of history and romance is that both are about grappling with the fundamental unknowability of people. There are many tragic things about the narrator in this book, but one of the biggest is that she has studied Graham Gore so much that she forgets that he is a person.

I think there is a dangerous idea that you can intellectualize knowing someone, or that someone can become a product of research, so that you can finally be the ultimate expert in knowing someone. By the way, I really love the fundamental unknowability in romance and in history, that’s so good. And now that you’ve put it into words, I feel like this is the illuminating factor in the book.

Would you say this extends to the main character and how she views her background? She seems to have happily intellectualized her mixed heritage as if it were on the shelf for her.

Absolute. So she’s just like me: British-Cambodian, mixed race and white passing. And she absolutely does not want to deal in an emotional way with the hereditary trauma that Cambodian life brings. She doesn’t want to deal with all that, she doesn’t want to have to admit that she lives with a hereditary trauma, because it only makes things like power, control and ambition even more difficult. So she definitely feels like she’s just put her identity on a shelf, and she can remove it if it’s useful. And if not, she can just put it away. You can’t do that to yourself. They just thinks she can. And that will take her on a terribly complicated journey.

Seeing her fall for Graham is in stark contrast to how dissatisfied she otherwise is as a bureaucrat. I read it with amazement Do I see how she falls under the state or was she already at the beginning?

The very first draft of this book that I wrote, she was very passive. There wasn’t that much ambition. She was someone who liked to let things happen to her, because she did not want to take on too much responsibility. But of course, that didn’t feel quite right for someone who holds this pretty well-paid, high-powered job. So I do think she had to become an ambitious person. And she had to give up pieces of herself to be immersed in the state.

Maybe this is just me, but I sometimes think that extreme ambition or an extreme desire for control tends to result in a kind of sublimation of the self into the desire to be on top. There isn’t even really any sense of anyone controlling other people, or your relationships with other people. It’s just this empty concept of power. I think having a lot of money makes people a little crazy. I think a lot of power makes people a little crazy. It smooths out part of their frontal lobe.

It’s so funny talking to you about this book because of course I want to be drawn to the big meaty ideas, but it sounds more serious than the experience of reading it!

I’m always like, yes, it’s about imperialism! And generational trauma! And how terrible is the nation of England! But it’s also about trying to get the Victorian man to give someone a kiss.

The Ministry of Time is now available wherever books are sold.