The Day of the Triffids

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTIONJohn Wyndham Parkes Lucas Beynon Harris (1903–1969)—who used the pen name John Wyndham—was born in the village of Dorridge near Knowle, Warwickshire (now West Midlands), England. He was the son of George Beynon Harris, a barrister, and Gertrude Parkes, the daughter of a Birmingham ironmaster.

He moved around England frequently as a child following his parents’ separation when he was 8 years old. His father attempted to sue the Parkes family for “the custody, control and society” of his wife and family in an unusual and high-profile court case, which he lost. Following this, Gertrude Parkes left Birmingham to live in a series of boarding houses and spa hotels. He and his younger brother, the writer Vivian Beynon Harris, spent the rest of their childhoods at a number of English preparatory and public schools, including Blundell’s School in Tiverton, Devon, during the First World War. His longest and final stay was at Bedales School, near Petersfield in Hampshire (1918–21), which he left at the age of 18.

Like most authors, he tried many different careers before settling in to write, including farming, law, commercial art, and advertising. He first started writing short stories intended for sale in 1925. From 1930 till 1939 he wrote stories of various kinds under different names, including “John Beynon,” almost exclusively for American publications, and he achieved some commercial success.

During World War II, he was in the Civil Service and afterwards in the Army. In 1946 he returned to writing, still using the pen name John Beynon. Inspired by the success of his younger brother Vivian Beynon Harris, who had four novels published starting in 1948, he altered his writing style and, by 1951, using the “John Wyndham” pen name for the first time, he wrote the novel The Day of the Triffids. His pre-war writing career was not mentioned in the book’s publicity, and people were allowed to assume that this was a first novel from a previously unknown writer. The book had an enormous success and established Wyndham as an important exponent of science fiction. He went on to write six more novels under John Wyndham name and used that name professionally from 1951 onwards. His novel The Outward Urge (1959) was credited to John Wyndham and Lucas Parkes, even though Lucas Parkes was another pseudonym for Wyndham himself. Two story collections were published in the 1950s under Wyndham’s name, but included several stories originally published as by John Beynon before 1951.

Most of the John Wyndham books featured world-wrecking disasters, with elements of mainstream thrillers mixed in—a formula that clearly worked, since most of his novels are considered classics of science fiction today.

He died in 1969, aged 65, at his home in Petersfield. He was survived by his wife and his brother.

—Karl Wurf

Rockville, Maryland