X-men vs The Chrysalids, compare and contrast: a critical discussion (SPOILERS!!

[Domino_Dare-Doll]

Ok, I canÂ’t stress this enough. GO READ THE CHRYSALIDS by John Wyndham!

Honest to god, all X-fans will love it: it’s the perfect marriage between Chris Claremont’s character/emotive introspective and John Hickman’s world-building! All in a short read of 199 pages, you’ll get through it in a day and my god will it get you.





So, spoiler alerts from here, you’ve been warned! (Because IÂ’m on mobile and I can’t format it properly!)

I think Hickman has actually borrowed a lot from Wyndham’s concepts. This isn’t a sin, of course, nothing’s new—but the attitudes displayed by the character from Sealand at the end of the book is identical to how Xavier conducts himself now. It’s ominous; a sense of piteous compassion tempered by ego. A superiority complex which David, our lead mutant, explores in a manner not unlike (classic) Scott Summers. He’s caring, but dutiful and ultimately swayed by the ideology with seemingly little question. However, it’s the recent extremes David experiences then and there that dictate how the reader might react to his reasoning—but ymmv and I digress:

The main theme of the Chrysalids seems to be community and how close one is within it in relation to their success. This is a theme I’ve seen carried over in the recent X-men and Excalibur. Wyndham, like Hickman, seems to like to delve into the concept of what makes up a society and the ideologies they thrive on—in fact, the end speech by the Sealand character at th end of the Chrysalids is, literally, what Hickman’s going for. How it’s only the like-minded that thrive together; the distance between people’s and how chaotic it is. I found, actually, that Wyndham’s writing acted as a challenge to Hickman’s (that is, from my perspective reading it) both in how it conducted itself solely from one character‘s point of view, but also in how it did a great job of illustrating what happens when people separate themselves to the extreme. “The one true image,” The right way to evolve” While David’s society was absolutely rigid in how it held this view, the Chrysalids, much like the X-Men currently might have been a bit hypocritical in how they commented to the contrary: what right did they have to dictate the ”right”way to evolve, more inclusive or not?

I suppose what both Hickman and Wyndham we’re trying to illustrate is that those faithful to their dogmas will never be swayed, so it’s best to just leave, but then, in Wyndham’s writing, we see it’s not so easy as that: every society is made up of individuals, those who question and face their own kind of punishments and persecutionÂ’s for it. Aunt Harriet was butchered for wanting to keep and protect her mutant child, while Rosalind’s mother was quick to help her escape. There’s even the friendship between David and Sophie, two completely different ‘kinds’ of mutants who are both so close and so ostracised from each other. That in itself felt like a really poignant parallel of the X-men and the morlock’s—different degrees of mutantdom and how both two people and two societies can view each other.

In fact, the Chrysalids almost read line a prequel to Krakoa. The Sealand native we met was a product of her own society; one that had it ingrained that those who weren’t telepathic automatically lived a “boring, stupid life,” a sentiment that can be easily inferred by the attitudes displayed by Apocalypse and Magneto. I actually wouldnÂ’t be surprised to find out Aocalypse founded the Chrysalid’s society! It’s that close in attitude.

So, yeah, I really do implore people to go and read the Chrysalids, if you havenÂ’t already, and come then come back and reflect on it in relation to DOX!

[Vishop]

Now you recognize me?

[Domino_Dare-Doll]

Now you recognize me?

Hello? (New phone, who dis?)

[Vishop]

Hello? (New phone, who dis?)

Lol You still haven't ? V for .........

[Domino_Dare-Doll]

Lol You still haven't ? V for .........

Hahah; no, seriously, what did ya mean?

[Vishop]

Hahah; no, seriously, what did ya mean?

C'mon! I said earlier that I used to have another account.

[Vishop]

Hahah; no, seriously, what did ya mean?

https://community.cbr.com/member.php?111022-Vishop_

[Domino_Dare-Doll]

https://community.cbr.com/member.php?111022-Vishop_

Oh! Hi then!

Did you read the Chrysalids then?

[Vishop]

Oh! Hi then!

Did you read the Chrysalids then?

No, I haven't but what you said about this novel looks interesting especially

Honest to god, all X-fans will love it: it’s the perfect marriage between Chris Claremont’s character/emotive introspective and John Hickman’s world-building! All in a short read of 199 pages, you’ll get through it in a day and my god will it get you.

I will give it a try!

[Domino_Dare-Doll]

No, I haven't but what you said about this novel looks interesting especially



I will give it a try!

Yay!!! I promise; you will not regret it!

[LordAllMIghty]

I'll try to pick it up.

[Veitha]

This thread has awoken strange memories because I'm pretty sure my mum had this book, since here where I live it was published in a sci-fi series that she had and showed me/made me read when I was a kid. I'll have to ask her to check if she has it.

[LordAllMIghty]

This thread has awoken strange memories because I'm pretty sure my mum had this book, since here where I live it was published in a sci-fi series that she had and showed me/made me read when I was a kid. I'll have to ask her to check if she has it.

I think it cool your mom was a Sci-Fi fan.

[Frobisher]

I’m pretty sure The Chysalids is not any kind of sequel to X-Men, going off publishing dates alone.

[RachelGrey]

Chrysalids is my favourite novel from my childhood, it introduced me to the fact that not all stories have happy endings.

I think there are two aspects that you can compare. The initial is the plight of the deformed mutants and the religious persecution and genocide that they experience at the hands of the humans. This is very similar to the escalating hatred of humans for mutants that has always existed in the X-Men for years. Even down to the extremes where humans start trying to purge and purify mutants.

On the other side you have the story of the new generation mutants that are telepathic, they are able to hide in society but they live under the constant fear of being discovered as mutants, because they know if they are ever discovered they will be purged along side the deformed mutants.

In point of fact the telepaths do get discovered and it causes a mass panic in the humans to root out every one of them and purge them.

I know that some want to compare Sealand to Krakoa, but the land of telepaths is established, advanced, older, and well defended. In fact they are the most advanced society on Earth quite able to defend each other from the less advanced humans in the devastated Apocalyptic wasteland of that future Earth.

Sure if Krakoa was around for a few 100 years and had become jaded about their superiority I could then compare it to Sealand, but Krakoa is too new, and they are still under siege and struggling to survive against almost insurmountable forces of hatred and oppression.

Could Krakoa become Sealand, sure that could happen if they can survive the rise of the machines and even defeat them.

But even Sealand was non-expansionist, they were content to live on their island and only venture out to rescue any powerful telepaths they detect. Other than that they just avoid humans, they don't oppress them, they don't try to rule them, they just don't value them either way, they see humans as an evolutionary dead end that will die out on their own with little or no effort by the Sealanders.

Do they disdain humans, sure!
But they don't hunt humans or deliberately try to hurt humans.
In the story the Sealanders rescue the telepaths from being killed and they treat everyone who is a non-telepath as an expendable enemy because they see no value in saving those non-telepaths. This is where their jaded nature has come in, they have had so long as a society seeing the hatred of the humans that they no longer value the humans who hate them, they see the humans as a group of people who will never overcome their base hatreds and will die out, so they only care about saving telepaths and helping telepaths.

I actually think Claremont borrowed elements of Chrysalids for X-Men when he took over. God Loves Man Kills is an excellent comparison because it represented religious hatred directed at mutants and that is the underlying theme of the Chrysalids book, the unreasoning religious hatred directed at mutants lacks compassion, lacks empathy, lacks kindness. The humans only know to direct their faith as hate at mutants and have little to know compassion for mutants. There are a small number of humans that help the characters, but they are very few compared to the overwhelming hateful majority!