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The first sentence of a creative work, known in Latin as the incipit, sets the tone and grabs the interest of the audience. The Day of the Triffids starts its first chapter, titled The End Begins, with “When a day that you happen to know is Wednesday starts off by sounding like Sunday, there is something seriously wrong somewhere.”

The chapter title evokes Churchill’s famous speech of November 1942, “this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Wyndham, writing in 1951 in London, picks up on these recent war memories to ask how a collapse could happen, the beginning of the end.

Starting off with ‘something seriously wrong somewhere’ introduces a gradually deepening sense of mystery and anxiety. It turns out that almost everyone is blind, except for the lucky few who by chance did not witness a spectacular bright green meteor shower the night before. Our narrator, Bill Masen, had his eyes bandaged after being nearly blinded by a triffid attack, and so has retained his sight. Bill tells us “the odds were that it was I who was wrong” about why the world has gone silent. Such comments set the scientific outlook for the book, as an account of amazing experiences, somewhat in the genre of HG Wells War of the Worlds.

We don’t encounter the triffids in the first chapter, which is devoted to the catastrophic general loss of sight. As an imaginative model of how fragile our world is to unforeseen disruption, this is a great story line, a bit like a zombie apocalypse or a Martian invasion. If we think of Earth as a glistening orb hanging in space, it is easy to imagine that the high complexity of our world civilization is extremely sensitive to shock, more so than we easily recognise, and it could so easily collapse under some similar pressure, such as climate change happening faster than we expect, or a pandemic genetically engineered to be even worse than Covid and released by accident.

Post apocalyptic dystopia is a major fictional genre, and Day of the Triffids is one of its classics. The weirdness of a sudden total absence of traffic in a busy city, a hospital where no staff appear on what is meant to be a busy work day, no birds sing, and the only sounds are occasional cries and the humming of electricity wires in the wind. The nasty empty terror created by this situation leads Bill to try to rationalise how it could be possible. After a week of blindness with heavy bandages he wants to rely on the doctors to help him but they just don’t show up. Ringing the bell was no use.

Then, “From the street below rose a scream, wildly distraught and contagiously terrifying. It came three times, and when it had died away it seemed still to tingle in the air.” This curdling chill will become the new normal.

The opening of a story is essential to set the tone and atmosphere. Our narrator describes a “nasty, empty feeling” of horror as he comes to grips with the blinding of the world. As no one responds to his calls he feels the sweat prickle his forehead under the bandages. Something fearful and horrible was happening. His isolation and helplessness leads his thoughts to churn, given the risk of taking his head bandages off by himself.

The night before he had missed out on seeing the most remarkable celestial spectacle on record as the Earth passed through a cloud of comet debris, the greatest free firework display ever. This world wide phenomenon of brilliant green meteors, almost as light as day, was seen by everyone who could.

Thankfully when he takes off his bandages he can see perfectly. Looking around, he finds that his lifetime perceptions of order have been destroyed. The whole organisation of society has ended. He finds blind men in another ward and flees from them. He reaches the hospital foyer which reminds him of Dore’s pictures of sinners in hell, a groaning blind mass of people sobbing with murmurous moaning and the occasional forlorn cry.

The moral dilemma that suffuses The Day of the Triffids is what the tiny number of sighted individuals should do about the vast mass of blind people. Our narrator is weighed down by the appalling situation and goes to a bar, where he finds a totally drunk blind man explaining that there is now nothing to live for. He confirms that everyone who saw the bright green meteors is now totally blind.

Robert Tulip wrote: ↑Thu Aug 03, 2023 10:09 pm Starting off with ‘something seriously wrong somewhere’ introduces a gradually deepening sense of mystery and anxiety. It turns out that almost everyone is blind, except for the lucky few who by chance did not witness a spectacular bright green meteor shower the night before. Our narrator, Bill Masen, had his eyes bandaged after being nearly blinded by a triffid attack, and so has retained his sight.

Wyndham does a nice job setting up the story. Initially we don't know why Bill's eyes are bandaged, and since this story is supposed to be about triffids, I was surprised to read about this mysterious meteor shower because it seems at first to be completely unconnected to triffids.

But, as it turns out, there is a connection of sorts. The reason Bill is in the hospital is because he was attacked by a triffid, a mysterious new plant species that has spread across the planet and, amazingly, can walk. This triffid attack, which hospitalizes Bill (with eyes bandaged), ironically has protected him from the widespread blindness caused by the meteor shower.

I look forward to see how Wyndham fleshes this story out. So far we know that Triffids are far more dangerous than first perceived by humans. As Bill learns from a colleague, Walter Lucknor, the creatures may possess a kind of intelligence. They seem to be "talking" to each other. And when they attack a human they always go for the head, often depriving their victims of their vision.

It was . . . quite a while before anyone drew attention to the uncanny accuracy with which they [triffids] aimed their stings, and that they almost invariably struck for the head. Nor did anyone at first take notice of their habit of lurking near their fallen victims. The reason for that became clear only when it was shown that they fed upon flesh as well as upon insects.

At this stage of the novel, it seems improbable that blindness can be the outcome of both the meteor shower and the mysterious arrival of an ambulatory plant species that seems to “know” to go for the eyes. We shall see.

It’s also interesting that humans in this dystopian future are as capitalistic as ever. The arrival of the triffids is quickly exploited by humans who profit by harvesting the plants’ oil. And possibly this is what sets the stage for the coming conflict between humans and triffids. And now that most people have been blinded, triffids might have a better shot. The playing field has been leveled.

Chapter Two, The Coming Of The Triffids, expands the narrative setting, placing the book as a memoir written in the future to explain how civilization collapsed and so much has vanished forever. Normal life from before the triffids has been destroyed in the post-apocalyptic dystopia. Bill Masen’s father worked in the tax office in London and enjoyed gardening. The appearance of the triffids had provided Bill with a comfortable job, managing a triffid oil farm, then nearly killed him with a sting that ironically saved him from blindness from the comet debris.

Speculation on the sudden occurrence of the triffids was quite similar to the debates about the origin of Covid 19. They were not spontaneously generated or a visitation of a supernatural divine wrath. Nor did their seeds float to us through space. Bill’s opinion is that they were the outcome of a series of ingenious biological meddlings - and very likely accidental. There was no well-documented ancestry or authoritative statement ever published, much as Xi Jin Ping has not enabled the world to get a clear story of Covid origins. The political conditions then prevailing meant travel to most of the world involved little trouble, except for Russia.

Robert Tulip wrote: ↑Sat Aug 12, 2023 5:40 pm
Speculation on the sudden occurrence of the triffids was quite similar to the debates about the origin of Covid 19.

It is one of the mysteries of the story. Where did triffids come from? But the appearance of the blinding comets strikes me as much greater mystery, especially since the blindness renders the masses so much more vulnerable to a triffid invasion. Indeed, after being attacked by some triffids (and seeing several deaths), Bill does wonder about this connection, remembering what his friend Walter had said some months before.

. . . it seemed a bit uncanny now…. “Take away our sight,” he had said, “and our superiority to them is gone.” Of course coincidences are happening all the time—but it’s just now and then you happen to notice them….

Regarding the origins of Covid, there isn't really a consensus. Many still insist it was a naturally-occurring virus that spread from a bat to humans. Others believe it may have been leaked from a lab. The lab-leak theory certainly is plausible, especially considering the fact that scientists were actually conducting coronavirus research in Wuhan, the possible epicenter of the Covid pandemic.

So many coincidences . . . perhaps a case of life imitating art.

Triffids aside, Wyndham's novel is about survival in a post-apocalyptic future. In that sense, The Day of the Triffids is similar to The Road by Cormac McCarthy or the movie, A Quiet Place (starring John Krasinski and Emily Blunt), or pretty much any zombie movie. The real struggle in these kinds of stories is how to survive in a harsh new world, where most social norms no longer apply, and where other people are frequently as dangerous, if not more, than the actual monsters. How do you survive this kind of world and remain human?

The characters ruminate on this breakdown of society, how quickly it happens, and how quickly people turn on one another. At one point, Bill tells himself he has to become hardened to other people's misery or just stay drunk all the time.

There’s nothing else but the alcoholic funk hole. If you don’t fight to live your own life in spite of it, there won’t be any survival…. Only those who can make their minds tough enough to stick it are going to get through….”

There's some truth to Bill's train of thought here. But I would argue if Bill becomes too callous and too unsympathetic to the plight of others, he will cease to become a sympathetic character. And, so far, he seems perilously close to this point. I hope he will prevail with humanity intact. Same with Josella . . .

geo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2023 3:21 pm It is one of the mysteries of the story. Where did triffids come from?

The origin of the triffids came from the need for genetic engineering to increase food supply. Amidst political debate about satellites designed to conduct biological warfare, nations conducted secret research on improved vegetable oils. Russia had developed a super oil, and agents conspired to covertly export its seeds. Bill speculates that when the secret agent tried to fly out of Russia with triffid seeds he was downed by Russian planes, and the rocket that hit him broke open the container of seeds which floated like gossamer on the wind, and very soon these dangerous walking stinging intelligent engineered accidental Frankenstein plants were found in almost every part of the world.

The Covid lab-leak theory certainly is plausible, especially considering the fact that scientists were actually conducting coronavirus research in Wuhan, the possible epicenter of the Covid pandemic.

The triffid cautionary fable is like how the COVID lab leak theory holds that the academic interest of virologists in gain of function research to increase the virulence of disease through genetic engineering led them to hubristically over-estimate their ability to manage and control such a dangerous product, even in such a dysfunctional country as China. The ability of linear thinking to ignore confounding factors and risks of chaotic systems is very high.

Bill was a boy when he first saw a triffid growing as a weed in his parent’s garden. His father inspected it, as it was so strange and foreign in appearance. There had been no alarm about triffids before they first saw it. No one had seen one fully grown. It had a straight stem, a woody bole, and three small, bare sticks which grew straight up beside the stem, with short sprays of leathery green leaves. A curious, funnel-like formation at the top of the stem had a tightly wrapped whorl within, like the close-rolled frond of a fern, emerging a couple of inches from a sticky mess in the base of the cup, with flies and other small insects struggling in it. The young plant was four feet high. No news of this new noxious weed percolated to the general public, so thousands continued to grow in neglected spots all over the world. When the first one picked up its roots and walked, reports of walking plants were pouring in from equatorial regions, but we are told they “were reported with that blend of cautiously defensive frivolity which the press habitually employed to cover themselves in matters regarding sea serpents, flying saucers, thought transference, and other irregular phenomena.”

This account provides a good illustration of the psychosocial syndrome of popular indifference to bizarre events. People have an impenetrable mental carapace that blocks news of anything considered impossible. Walking plants generate such cognitive dissonance that the natural initial reaction to such stories is total disbelief. Only when proof is incontrovertible do people tend to admit the possibility of things previously considered impossible.

This is a useful parable for responses to climate change. For example, most people regard sea level rise as frankly impossible, just because the sea has always remained at the same level throughout known history so this possibility challenges our experience. When I commented in a letter to a newspaper that there is serious risk of several metres of sea level rise this century, something seen as reasonable by experts, there was extensive mockery.