John Wyndham and Triffids in London

 

Piccadilly Circus, London, England

Recently, I watched the 1962 film "The Day of the Triffids." In this post-apocalyptic tale, most of Earth's population turn out to watch a dazzling light show caused by a meteor shower. The next morning, everyone who watched the light show is blind. The meteorites bring spores, from which plants sprout and grow. Unlike terrestrial plants, these tall plants rove about, killing people and threatening the Human race with extinction.

Impressed by the movie, I read the 1951 novel upon which it was based. In John Wyndham's novel, the Triffids have terrestrial origins. Russians bioengineered these plants--that can move under their own power, and injure or kill Humans--for industrial applications. When a plane carrying seeds was shot down, winds carried the seeds all over the world. Despite the danger the plants pose, corporations have built Triffids into an industry that grows and invigorates the economy. 

Likewise, the dazzling lightshow in the sky has terrestrial roots in Wyndham's novel. Whether one country initiates the conflict, or the calamity is driven by malfunction, all the orbital satellites activate. The explosions create terrific green flashes in the atmosphere that burn out a person's optic nerve. As nearly everyone goes out to view what the media terms a once-in-a-lifetime event, this results in a world in which ninety-nine percent of the world goes blind.

The Houses of Parliament, London, England

Prior to the light show, Bill Mason was injured while working on a Triffid farm. Even wearing protective gear, the plants' poison and stinger caused significant eye injury. He has lain in bed for days, recovering from an operation to restore his sight. When no one comes to remove his bandages, or bring him his breakfast, or assist him in anyway, he pulls off his bandages, and finds everyone else in the hospital is blind. 

He stumbles onto the streets of London, and finds society in chaos.

With most of the Human race blinded, and unable to secure food, or otherwise take care of themselves properly, many fall prey to disease. Meanwhile, the Triffids break loose from their confines. Bill knows that civilization has fallen, and the world has been changed forever. 

Other view the situation more optimistically. They believe that by working together, the sighted can save the blind, and build a new society from the ashes of the old. But the methods they choose seem harsh to many, and unworkable to Bill.

Trafalgar Square, London, England

While the protagonists in the film soon leave the chaos of England to see how people fare in other countries, more than half of Wyndham's novel takes place in London, and all of it occurs in England. So as I read Wyndham's story, I watched Bill battle and evade the Triffids in locations I visited in 2011 and 2013. I knew these places. I loved these places. I wanted to visit them again.

Yet Triffids were killing people there. The way people ordered their lives, and the way society functioned there, was gone. John Wyndham's novel offers a sobering look at how Humans tolerate, and sometimes even cultivate, the things that can harm them most.

Dragon Dave