What If Your Childhood Imaginary Friend Wasn't Imaginary At All?

Venture into the realm where classic literature meets innovative storytelling as we spotlight John Wyndham's captivating science fiction novel, "Chocky." 

We explore the mysterious tale of 12-year-old Matthew and his peculiar "imaginary" friend who possesses knowledge of complex mathematics far beyond a child's understanding. The central question lingers throughout our discussion: is this friend truly imaginary, or something far more extraordinary?

Delving into Wyndham's creative context, we examine how Cold War anxieties of the 1950s and 60s shaped his writing. As residents of an island nation, British fears of invasion permeated literature of the period, resulting in thought-provoking works that still resonate today. Beyond "Chocky," we touch on Wyndham's other masterpieces including "Day of the Triffids," "The Midwich Cuckoos," and "The Kraken Wakes" – the latter being our most viewed and discussed adaptation to date.

We pull back the curtain on our creative process, revealing how Melancholy Mentor transforms these classic radio dramas through visual storytelling filmed at stunning locations like Sandbanks in Poole, Dorset – affectionately known as "Millionaires Row." Meanwhile, our Mystery Mythos channel takes a different approach with AI-generated visuals complementing science fiction audio dramas. Whether you're a longtime Wyndham enthusiast or new to classic radio plays, join us on this journey where coastal landscapes meet alien voices, and childhood imagination blurs with cosmic reality. Connect with us at melancholymentor.com to share your thoughts or learn more about bringing these timeless stories to life.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Melancholy Mentor
• 0:37 Our YouTube Channels Explained
• 1:54 Spotlight on Chocky by John Wyndham
• 4:35 Cold War Influence on Literature
• 6:38 Behind the Radio Adaptation
• 8:15 Filming Locations and Contact Info

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello everyone and welcome to Melancholy Mentor, where classic literature meets the vibrant world of radio plays. I'm Fran and I'm joined by Evan from Mystery Mythos. Together, we're your guides on this creative journey. During each episode, we'll dive into stories featured on the Melancholy Mentor channel, allowing fresh ideas to flourish, inspiring you to dream big and unlock your creative potential. Get comfy, open your mind and embrace curiosity.

Speaker 2: 0:36

Let's get started. Hello, I'm Fran and I'm Evan, and each week this podcast is highlighting an episode that we've got on the Melancholy Mentor YouTube channel, and it's for radio plays. I've got another channel for radio plays, which is Mystery Mythos. Yeah, that's where Evan comes into it, mystery Mythos, and that's predominantly science fiction, although we have a little bit of a crossover between the channels and the radio dramas. They're set up completely differently though. So on the Melancholy Mental channel, it's usually me going out and I'll film the coastline, you know, the seaside, the woodland, get permission to film in people's gardens, and so there's a video to accompany the audio of the radio drama. And on the other channel that we've got, mystery mythos, for the radio dramas it's ai generated videos. Yeah, there's a bit of a difference there. There will be more coming in the way of youtube channels, so that will either have launched or not by the time you listen to this podcast. So do look at what else we get up to.

Speaker 2: 1:48

Nearly got tangled up in my words there, evan. It's a common occurrence. This week we're highlighting Chocky, yes, chocky. So Chocky is by John Wyndham and it's a science fiction novel. So Choccy is by John Wyndham and it's a science fiction novel, john Wyndham was born in 1903 and he died in 1969. We've highlighted John Wyndham in previous podcasts and gone a little bit deeper into some information about him, but John Wyndham also wrote Day of the Triffids, yeah, which is his favourite.

Speaker 2: 2:22

Yeah amazing the Midwich Cuckoos and, of course, the crack and wakes. Yeah, now the crack and wakes we have on the melancholy mental channel as well, and it's our most listened to and most viewed episode. Yeah, and it's caused quite a certain amount of controversy as well yeah, yeah, there's a split in opinion, isn't there?

Speaker 2: 2:45

So on that one, yeah the comments kind of really varied. Everybody's been kind. However, they had certain issues with the radio drama itself and it remains our most viewed and most listened to episode and it's highlighted on the channel so you'd be able to find that if you go and have a look. The choccy was first published in shorter form in 1963 and it was later developed into a novel. So exactly what that means is maybe it was like um, a short story or one of those little novella things and then, yeah, um, made into like an actual novel after that. Um, I feel like a lot of short stories kind of. They either go into a collection of short stories or the short story itself featured maybe in a magazine or a news article and was elaborated into a book afterwards. This particular story, choccy, revolves around a 12 year old boy called Matthew and his imaginary friend, and the spoiler alert of this episode is is the friend imaginary or not? So his imaginary friend causes Matthew to ask challenging questions and he speaks about complex mathematics. So any maths, in my opinion, is complex. Yeah, I'm not too sure exactly what that means. I figure like it's like a higher level of mathematics that he wouldn't have known at his age. Yeah, in 1984, a children's six-part TV series based on the novel was broadcast on the ITV channel in the UK.

Speaker 2: 4:36

Wyndham's writing often explored the threat of war. Yeah, so Cold War anxiety was prevalent in the UK during the 1950s Not just the UK, but you know, speaking specifically about the UK around the 1950s and it sort of leaked into the 60s as well. So Cold War is described as a state of political hostility between countries, and at this time it's kind of United States and Soviet Union. Yeah, time it's kind of united states and soviet union. Yeah, the uk fears invasion, as I'm sure most countries do, but it fears invasion probably due to actually being a collection of islands.

Speaker 2: 5:15

Yeah, yeah, so we're on the largest island, so the british isles is the collection of islands. So we're on the mainland island, so we're based in England, which is on the south coast, and then you can go all the way up to Scotland, yeah, yeah, and then there's lots of other islands around the actual main island. So obviously the threat is quite big. So it can come from, you know, from the seas, and there's a lot of angles as to which. So a lot of the coastline is actually, especially during the um, I presume, the second world war, but it was heavily fortified with um those little pillar pill boxes.

Speaker 2: 5:57

Those places and, yeah, some of which have actually, due to coastal erosion, have actually fallen onto the beach. Now, yeah, there's an island called mersey island, um, and it's kind of joined to the uk anyway because it's got a causeway, so it's kind of a little island and a causeway was built out to it, and off the coast of mersey island, um, there's actually those forts, like little fortified areas that have crumbled and off the coastline and they're on the beach so you can find like lots of rubble and things like that when you're on the beach of Mersey um. So, the actual radio drama that we've got on the channel. You've got some more information about that, haven't you, evan?

Speaker 3: 6:40

Yeah, I do, yeah, so this was adapted for the radio by John Constable, um, actually for BBC Radio 4, um, and it was just um broadcast as a single 90 minute episode. So that was it, um. It was first broadcast on the 18th of March 1998, um. The music was by Paul Gargill.

Speaker 2: 7:07

There's a name gargoyle.

Speaker 3: 7:09

Yeah, did you want to say gargoyle a little bit yeah um, then it was repeated on bbc radio 7, bbc radio for extra several times since november 2007, so it's obviously been popular. And then they just keep showing it.

Speaker 2: 7:29

Uh, the video to go with it that we filmed was actually filmed in sandbanks in paul okay, so sandbanks is also called millionaires row um, I've got quite a few videos along sandbanks because I'm quite near to Sandbanks and it's in Pauline Dorset. It's a beautiful stretch of coastline that stretches all the way along, so from Sandbanks you can actually look across and see Bournemouth, so you can see the pier of Bournemouth, and it stretches right. The way along goes past Southbourne, hengsbury Head and and around and continues on. But you can actually walk a lot of that coastline as well yeah, it's lovely yeah, really nice, um, so that's it for this week.

Speaker 2: 8:16

So if there's any fact checking to be done, any information that you'd like to tell us about you know whether you've, whether you've heard of this story or if you want to supply us with any more information, you're more than welcome to email us not spam us, but email us at info at melancholymentorcom. So that's for just finding out more about what we do and giving us some information, because maybe you know more about this stuff than we do, and giving us some information because maybe you know more about this stuff than we do, because we're literally just looking this up and bringing these highlights to you, and to explore your creativity and inspire you. Yeah, we do not welcome spam. Thank you very much. No, no, we don't welcome spam.

Speaker 2: 9:02

So, for a little bit of context, I'm a neurolinguistic programming coach and I like to focus on creativity and planning. Um, you know, action planning, yeah, stuff like that within my coaching. I'm also a business strategist and evans evan does the tech, I do the tech side. I am a tech repellent. You are a natural tech repellent. I'm not a tech fave. I'm a tech repellent and not a tech foe. I'm a tech repellent. So, anyway, thank you for listening. Thank you, bye bye.

Speaker 1: 9:34

Thank you for tuning in. Contact us, melancholymentorcom. Until next time, get your minds open and stay curious.