Given my patchy reading past, you’ll be surprised to hear that this isn’t my first Wyndham. I’ve read The Chrysalids* and Chocky**. I have not read The Day of the Triffids (there’s that patchy reading again), but I can now tick The Midwich Cuckoos off my list of classic SF novels that I never got around to.

My initial thought is that it’s a very strange novel. I don’t mean the plot (which is odd but not surprising or unexpected given the book’s story is embedded in popular culture), but how Wyndham structures The Midwich Cuckoos. It’s all tell, no show. Nearly every event that transpires, whether it’s the Dayout (where the populace of Midwich falls unconscious across 24 hours), the pregnancy of every woman of childbearing age, or the frightening telepathic abilities of the Children, are described to us second or third hand. Our narrator, Richard Gayford—I bet you all forgot his name—plays a mostly passive role, reporting what he’s been told. He does experience a couple of critical events, including the shooting of one of the Children, but even the novel’s climax happens off-screen. 

It’s a fascinating approach. One that shouldn’t work because of how arm’s length we are from the action, yet it suits the novel perfectly. It’s partly because Wyndham cheats, such as the extraordinary scene where the Children generate intense fear in the mind of the Chief Constable. Gayford wasn’t present, but Colonel Westcott (who was there) gives a detailed account of the disturbing moment. It also helps that in Gordon Zellaby, Gayford has a subject who loves to talk and talk, delivering exposition in prosaic chunks. But, I still found it interesting that several pivotal moments, including the bit where the town tries to burn down the Grange, which the film makes a big deal of, are told rather than shown. It’s as if Wyndham is protecting us from the visceral effects of the Children and the fear they instil.

Expect he’s not protecting us at all. The Midwich Cuckoos is scary because we never get the complete picture of what’s happening. It’s telling that the first time a Child speaks is more than two-thirds of the way into the novel. Otherwise, they are this inexplicable presence, gradually forcing their will on the people of Midwich. The great irony of the book is that for a story about telepathic children who can compel a person to blow their brains out, we’re never privy to a person’s thoughts. Yes, Gaylord opines from time to time, but everything is exterior; there’s next to no interiority in this novel. And it works. Like magic.

It’s not just the structure that makes The Midwich Cuckoos such a fascinating novel. It’s a book steeped in moral ambiguity that shows the limits of compassion and compromise and prizes the quick decision-making of an authoritarian society. Is this Wyndham’s response to the War, or did he have a bleak view of humanity? Given the novels he wrote, I’m going with the latter. But I’m sure someone will skool me. Whatever the deal, I’m certainly going to read more Wyndham. 

*I read it as a kid and wasn’t keen, but I feel my view would change if I picked it up now.

**Which I loved.