The Chrysalids By John Wyndham: An Analysis

The Chrysalids by John Wyndham is a science fiction novel which takes place in the future, but the society of Waknuk resembles the beginning of the eighteenth century. Years after a nuclear war, radiation still contaminates large areas of the world outside of Waknuk. Waknuk is a community that follows a very rigid code of morality and religious beliefs based on The Bible and another book called Nicholson’s Repentances. The story focuses on the lives of a group of kids who can communicate telepathically. One night, David Strorm, Petra Strorm, and Rosalind were forced to escape Waknuk due to the community finding out about what they believe are satanic abilities. They escape to The Fringes, home of the deviations, where they meet and are rescued

Despite the fact that he and Emily are aware that their innocent baby niece will be thrown into The Fringes to survive on her own, they refuse to help her all due to one small impurity. Harriet later takes her own life, due to the determinal lifestyle of Waknuk. If Joseph and Emily were not so close-minded Harriet would have still been alive. The reason that their own children run away is because of their unethical mindset. Although the people of Zealand were not raised with any better morals. They too discriminate against people who do not meet their expectations of the true image; which is communicating telepathically. Anyone who does not have telepathic abilities is looked upon as weak and inferior: “ ‘She says that everybody wants to make them, and people who can’t do it much work hard to get better at it.’ ” (145). The woman from Zealand explains to Petra that people who do not obtain telepathic abilities train their hardest to resemble the true image. If the citizens of Zealand showed more acceptance towards change, then the people who are seen as different would not feel a tremendous amount of pressure to fit the norm. The community of Zealand also looks bad upon the people of Waknuk because they believe they are not civilized and due to their lacking abilities of telepathy are also inferiors. They need to realize that resembling the true image does not

During David, Petra and Rosalind’s escape from Waknuk, they communicate with a woman from Zealand. She claims that she wants to help them escape to Zealand, but we later find out she is only helping them out of her own greed. Her act of kindness towards David and Rosalind was spurious; she was using them to get to young, naive Petra. Not only did the women from Zealand deceive David and Rosalind but is also manipulating Petra. Her intentions are to breed Petra so she can produce strong telepathic babies: “ ‘She says I’ll get better still if I work at it, and then when I grow up I must have babies who can make strong think-pictures, too.’ “ (145). The women from Zealand uses kind and motherly words with Petra as a strategy to convince her that what they are doing is for the better. Petra is only seven years old, yet, they are planning to breed her with a strong male telepathic, this is purely for their own desire to see Zealand possess societies ways of thinking. They wish for the future generation of Zealand to have superior telepathic powers. They do not show any culpability towards their behaviour of exploiting Petra. This kind of behavior is also shown throughout the novel with Alan Ervin when he marries Rachel, one of the telepathic communicators. Alan is known for being a strict law abiding man, which is worrying for Rachel due