Bill Masen and Josella Platon, exhausted survivors of vicious triffids, mutant plants with a taste for human flesh and blood, are stranded in a ruined landscape of Southampton. Wistfully, they are waiting to escape to Isle of Wight, a new Eden, which has been cleared of triffids, mutant plants with a taste for human flesh and blood.
Their picnic is a moment of relaxation during unrelenting turmoil, but it’s bare-bones and without food. “We went on a picnic in the sunshine,” writes Masen. “with a good stretch of shingle behind us over which no triffid could approach unheard.” Josella is pleased, and she says, “We must do more of this while we can,’ Josella noted.”
Windham’s mix of catastrophe and the Cold War has made this a cult novel spawned three film adaptations (all without a picnic).
Featured Image: Wyndham’s image, The Reader’s Guide to The Day of the Triffids, hhtp:/triffids.guidesite
See John Wyndham. The Day of the Triffids. London: Michael Joseph1951; Freddie Francis, Steve Sekely. The Day of the Triffids (1963), Screenplay by Bernard Gordon and Philip Yordan, based on Wyndham’s novel, is a very loose adaptation, without a picnic; Ken Hannam. The Day of the Triffids (1981). Screenplay by Douglas Livingstone based on Wyndham’s novel; Nick Copus. The Day of the Triffids (2009), Screenplay by Patrick Harbison, based on Wyndham’s novel
*John Wyndham is the pen of John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris.