The Day of the Triffids
First edition hardback cover
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| Author | John Wyndham |
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| Country | England |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Science fiction, Post-apocalyptic science fiction |
| Publisher | Michael Joseph |
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Publication date
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December 1951 |
| Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
| Pages | 304 (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | (first edition, hardback) |
| OCLC | 152201380 |
| Preceded by | Planet Plane |
| Followed by | The Kraken Wakes |
The Day of the Triffids is a 1951 post-apocalyptic novel by the English science fiction author John Wyndham. It is about a plague of blindness that befalls the entire world, allowing the rise of an aggressive species of plant. Although Wyndham had already published other novels using other pen name combinations drawn from his real name, this was the first novel published as "John Wyndham". It established him as an important writer and remains his best known novel.
The story has been made into the 1962 feature film of the same name, three radio drama series (in 1957, 1968, and 2008), and two TV series (in 1981 and 2009). It was nominated for the International Fantasy Award in 1952, and in 2003 the novel was listed on the BBC's survey The Big Read.
The protagonist is Bill Masen, a biologist who has made his living working with triffids – tall, venomous carnivorous plants capable of locomotion and communication, whose extracts are superior to fish or vegetable oils. Due to his background, Masen suspects they were bioengineered in the USSR and accidentally released into the wild. The result is worldwide cultivation of triffids. The narrative begins with Bill Masen in hospital, his eyes bandaged after having been splashed with triffid poison. During his convalescence he is told of an unexpected green meteor shower. The next morning, he learns that the light from the unusual display has rendered any who watched it completely blind (later in the book, Masen speculates that the "meteor shower" may have been orbiting weapons, triggered accidentally). After unbandaging his eyes he wanders through an anarchic London full of blind inhabitants and later becomes enamored of wealthy novelist Josella Playton, forcibly used as a guide by a blind man. Intrigued by a single light on top of Senate House in an otherwise darkened city, Bill and Josella discover a group of sighted survivors led by a man named Beadley, who plans to establish a colony in the countryside, and decide to join the group.
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Wikipedia