The Chrysalids

Petra Strorm is David’s younger sister and the most powerful telepath known to exist. Petra is the first supposedly “normal” child born after two Blasphemies in the family. When she is born, days go by where nobody speaks of her until she is inspected for purity. After Petra is certified as human, six years go by in which nobody suspects there is anything different about her. This changes when she is drowning and sends out a call for help using her mind. David and the other telepaths feel it down to their bones, and David and Rosalind come quickly to Petra’s aid. After this incident, it is more than just Petra who changes; it sets off a chain of events that results in David, Rosalind, and Petra’s banishment, as well as many deaths and the near destruction of Waknuk itself. Ironically, Petra turns out to be more different than anyone with an extra toe or elongated limbs.

Petra’s emotional signals are unbearably powerful, impossible to ignore, and sometimes even painful to receive. This causes problems for the other telepaths and leaves them anxious that Petra will somehow lead to their discovery. David teaches Petra how to hone her abilities by telling her to imagine her thought shapes forming slowly, like cobwebs in a deep well. Her communications remain immensely powerful, but she gradually learns to control them. Eventually, Petra is able to communicate with a woman who lives across the world in Sealand, a key point in the plot’s resolution. Her communication with this woman is pivotal in leading David and the others away from Waknuk and to a place that understands them. The Sealand woman considers Petra to be the most important person alive and a signal that the human race is evolving once more. Petra adores being the object of attention and affection and shows no fear or doubt about leaving Waknuk with her brother to a much better place.

Rosalind Morton is the daughter of Angus Morton and David’s lifelong love and best friend. David and Rosalind are united and in love in a way that David feels “normal” people never could be due to their lifelong telepathic communication. He describes their connection as such:

A word again […] When the minds have learnt to mingle, when no thought is wholly one’s own, and each has taken too much of the other ever to be entirely himself alone; when one has reached the beginning of seeing with a single eye, loving with a single heart, enjoying with a single joy; when there can be moments of identity and nothing is separate save bodies that long for one another […] When there is that, where is the word? There is only the inadequacy of the word that exists (166).

The two are constantly in touch with one another and only meet in secret due to their parents’ feuding. This draws on the classic star-crossed lovers trope, though Wyndham subverts the Romeo and Juliet parallel by having the pair end up happy together in safety, their parents dead instead of them.

When Rosalind gets older, David describes her as having built up a shield to protect herself from the world. Rosalind intuitively knew much sooner than the others that she was up against the world and did what was necessary to survive in it: “[T]he armour had grown slowly, plate by plate” (149). This shielded version of Rosalind is brave, protective, and unfaltering. She is excellent with a bow and arrow, using it to successfully save herself, David, and Petra more than once. David remarks on the rare but beautiful “under-Rosalind” (200) that is more vulnerable, open, and emotional, “like a flower opening” (200). When Rosalind and the others arrive in Sealand, it is implied that Rosalind’s shield is disappearing as she realizes she is finally in a place where people will accept her as she is. Rosalind is also fiercely loyal, remaining by David’s side through every hardship and doing what she can to protect the other telepaths.

Uncle Axel is David’s uncle, who came to live with the family after living a sailor’s life for many years. He is wiser and more understanding than most of the elders of Waknuk but still, in many ways, the product of Waknuk’s doctrine. While he does not view David’s abilities as an abomination and even tries to protect him, he still refers to people of distant cultures as Mutants who wrongly view themselves as the true image of God. Uncle Axel believes that nobody can know the true image since not only are the Old People lost, but they may not have been the true image at all. Furthermore, since people in different places have different views of the true image, there is no real way of knowing what it is. He asserts to David, “I’m telling you that nobody, nobody really knows what is the true image. They all think they know, just as we think we know, but, for all we can prove, the Old People themselves may not have been the true image” (64).

Uncle Axel is also the one to suggest to David that his abilities may signify an evolution closer to God’s true image, as God is also able to read minds. Uncle Axel’s advice and descriptions of other places often foreshadow future events, such as when he worries that a witch hunt will ensue amid the town’s mounting paranoia. He is also correct when he tells David that his ability is a gift, not something to be ashamed of. Uncle Axel works to protect David and the other telepaths as best he can, shooting Alan, giving David advice, seeking out information from others in the community, and acting as a confidant and mentor for David in a dark time. 

When Sophie Wender is first introduced to the reader, she is a child around David’s age. David discovers her one day while exploring the outskirts of Waknuk and finds her to be kind and sweet. Sophie seems to sense that David is trustworthy because she soon exposes her extra toes, revealing that she is a Deviation. Her condition is the reason for her family’s isolation in the woods. Upon this realization, David experiences severe cognitive dissonance as he grapples between what he was taught about mutations and what he sees in Sophie. While wading together one day, Sophie and David are spotted by Alan, who notices Sophie’s footprint and is alarmed. Alan reports Sophie, and her family tries to get away but are captured and banished. It is never said what happens to Sophie’s parents, but Sophie is found alone in the Fringes years later when David escapes Waknuk. Meeting Sophie is the spark for David’s induction into a true understanding of his reality and the world.

When David meets up with Sophie again, she is a changed person. She is ragged, rough, and shameless, and she is deeply devoted to Gordon, a man much older than her. Nevertheless, Sophie never lost loyalty or affection for David and resolves to help him stay safe until the Sealand people arrive. She demonstrates bravery when she kills the man guarding Rosalind and Petra to bring them to her cave. Sophie acts suspicious and jealous toward Rosalind, as she once had the same feelings for David as Rosalind does now. Ultimately, Sophie decides to fight on the battlefield against Waknuk alongside Gordon. She is shot with an arrow and killed as David watches helplessly from above.

Michael is one of the eight children who can communicate telepathically. He is the most practical and cynical of the group, and he doesn’t trust anyone until they prove they deserve it. For example, he does not believe the Sealand woman is coming to help until she actually arrives, noting how her preaching is often condescending. When the children are still young, Michael is the only one who is sent off to attend school in a nearby district. There, he learns a great deal more about the outside world than is taught in Waknuk, including more advanced ways of doing things and different types of technology. Michael relays this information to the other telepaths, and David regularly comments on the burden of not being able to act on the wisdom he gains: “to not revealing ourselves, to not speaking when we would, to not using what we knew” (86).

Michael is also practical and is the one to tell David that he must kill Petra and Rosalind should capture be the only other option. He reminds David that living in the Fringes is worse than death. He comes up with plans to help David and the others remain safe as they are pursued by the search party, risking his life by sticking with the party and trying to delay them. Michael makes a bold and difficult decision to stay behind and save Rachel when the Sealand people come, knowing there is a chance they may never make it to Sealand but believing that they will: “The world is round, so there must be another way to get there” (198). He cannot bear the thought of leaving her alone, showing that he is noble and loyal. His resolve is unyielding, and he is fiercely protective of those he loves.

The Sealand woman, whose name is never revealed, is a woman who lives across the world in what likely used to be New Zealand. She connects with Petra after Petra learns to communicate with others and her powers extend across the globe. The Sealand woman considers Petra to be of the utmost importance and resolves to protect her at all costs. She believes Petra is an example of the next step in humanity’s evolution. She arrives in a flying machine to rescue Petra, David, and Rosalind.

The Sealand woman often comes across as condescending and acts in many ways as a “better” version of Joseph. She believes in the preservation of her own race, which she views as superior, and she sees the people of Waknuk as “primitive” and pathetic. She also sees their mass death as necessary for humanity’s advancement and expresses no grief about killing them: “For ours is a superior variant, and we are only just beginning” (196). While she believes her race is superior, she does not claim that they are cast in God’s image like the Waknuk people do: “[W]e do not mechanistically attempt to hammer ourselves into geometric patterns of society, or policy; we are not dogmatists teaching God how He should have ordered the world” (196). The Sealand woman’s intentions ultimately appear to be good, as she seems to want to improve the world and better humanity, but it remains ambiguous whether she is someone worth trusting.