When the Wind Blows

More about the book

When the Wind Blows is Raymond Briggs' stage version of his famous anti-nuclear cartoon parable, which is passionately on the side of sanity and survival. Jim and Hilda Bloggs, a retired couple who have moved to an isolated country cottage, are tidy, decent, houseproud and hopelessly behind the times. One tranquil day Jim hears on the radio that a pre-emptive strike is on the way. Armed with Government leaflets, in which he places all his faith, he constructs a refuge for them both, and gathers emergency rations. The Bloggses, who have brought to their task the solid cheerfulness of World War Two, emerge after the Bomb to find a devastated post-holocaust world. Trusting to the last in the Powers-That-Be, they wait for the arrival of the Services as their bodies suffer the effects of radiation sickness, and go gently into the dark loving each other and uttering fragments of prayers