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"Take away our vision, and [our] superiority is gone."

The Day of the Triffids is almost certainly John Wyndham's most famous novel. Its original publication in 1951 (serialised in the magazine Collier's Weekly) established Wyndham's reputation and it has since been filmed (Freddie Francis and Steve Sekely directed a 1962 adaptation starring Howard Keel) and adapted for television. The word triffid itself has entered the English language as shorthand for any rapacious, unwanted plant growth. It brought a new science-fiction genre, the cosy catastrophe, to a mainstream audience for the first time. As befits its' celebrated status, the novel demonstrates Wyndham's usual themes and techniques better than any other of his books.

Synopsis

Wyndham's narrator is Bill Masen, another of his well-educated but nondescript lead characters. Masen works for a company that farms triffids for their oil - triffids being mobile plants with a lethal sting, originally developed by the Russians but having spread worldwide as a result of a disastrous attempt at industrial espionage.

In a memorable opening chapter Masen awakes in hospital, eyes heavily bandaged after being stung at work. The previous night the rest of the world was captivated by a display of flashing green lights in the night sky, popularly attributed to 'comet debris'. But now all around him is silence, no voices, no traffic noise, nothing...

Masen removes his bandages and leaves hospital to discover that everyone who saw the green lights - the vast majority of the population - has gone totally blind. Mobs of these unfortunates are roaming London, often attempting to exploit any sighted person they encounter. Masen rescues a young woman, Josella, from such a situation, and on taking her back to her home realises that all across the city, captive triffids are breaking loose.

That night Masen and Josella see a searchlight shining from the tower of the University of London. Investigating the next day they meet a small group of the sighted who are planning to leave the city and start a new community in the countryside, to conserve the best of pre-apocalypse civilisation. They also encounter Coker, a demagogic agitator who believes the sighted have a moral duty to stay and help the blinded as best they can.

Before the group can evacuate, Coker manages to kidnap many of them, including Masen and Josella. Each of them is put in the service of a large group of the blind with instructions to provide them with whatever they ask for until help arrives. Masen initially succeeds at this despite triffid attacks and skirmishes with other similar gangs, but a mysterious and deadly plague breaks out amongst the survivors and his group breaks up in panic.

Masen begins to search for Josella, joining up with Coker to do so. Coker now realises the University group had the wiser plan, and, believing Josella to be with them, they leave London in pursuit.

They encounter a religious community and a quasi-survivalist group, both of whom are struggling in their own way to deal with the situation. Eventually Coker gives up the search and chooses to try to help organise those they've already encountered. Masen perseveres and after recalling a chance remark of Josella's concerning a farmhouse on the South Downs heads in that direction.

Adopting a young girl named Susan en route, Masen is eventually reunited with Josella but by the time they can leave the farm to rejoin Coker's group it has already apparently been destroyed by the plague. They have no choice but to make their home at the farm but over the years the triffid population around the perimeter builds up until they are in a permanent state of siege. After six years they finally make contact with the University group, now based on the Isle of Wight (which has been cleared of triffids completely). They are invited to join the community, but before they leave soldiers from a totalitarian feudal regime based in Brighton visit the farm and announce it is subject to their authority. Masen and his family are forced to abandon the farm and begin the journey to the Isle of Wight, still hopeful that they will one day reclaim the mainland from the triffids.