Skip to main content

What are the themes in The Day of the Triffids, written by John Wyndham? Also, what makes the characters relevant regardless of which era you read...

The Day of the Triffids abounds with many themes: catastrophe, natural selection and evolution, the human need for survival, the threat of invasion and human extinction, the collapse of moral values in a dystopian society, the importance of hope, etc. However, I would like to focus on the two of the most important themes: the survival and reestablishment of the human race and the importance of science.


This novel presents us with a dystopian world, in which we are faced with a pessimistic view of humanity. When our protagonist, Bill Masen, awaits the doctors to take off the bandages which covered his eyes, he soon realizes that the world has gone blind as a result of an unexpected green meteor shower which people enjoyed looking at the day before. All of a sudden, the world is thrown into chaos; humans are no longer the most powerful species on the planet because their ability to see has been taken away from them. They cannot cope without being able to see, unlike a triffid, a type of carnivorous plant, engineered and cultivated by humans for its useful oil. Triffids can thrive without their ability to see, unlike humans, and they can kill humans. Upon learning what has happened, Bill joins a few sighted humans in London in order to find some kind of solution. As he gets into contact with some people and communities that try to survive, he learns that the only way humans can attempt to survive is if they rely on rationalism and science as opposed to religious and feudal ideas represented by Miss Denning and others. The end of the novel supports this, as Bill, together with others of the Isle of Wight community, plans to take control of the world again through research, which could help humans defeat the triffids.


The second theme, the importance of science, is also worth being discussed. The novel implies that humans are to blame for their tragedy because they carelessly manufactured this dangerous type of plant. So, the consequences that ensued were due to human mistakes. In this regard, science is viewed as extremely perilous if used for the wrong purposes. However, science also proves to be the necessary factor if humans are to restore order on the planet. Bill, with the Beadley community, plans to conduct scientific research which could enable humans to regain power. In this way, science offers hope.


As for the characters in the novel, their actions and ideas are relevant regardless of when we read this novel because they reveal how humans could deal with or react to some sort of catastrophe or disaster that might strike our planet.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more