The Snake. A Novel

"The Snake" is the debut novel of Swedish writer Stig Dagerman about the unbearable wait for the unknown in a wartime setting.
The action takes place in Sweden, which maintained neutrality during World War II. Eight soldiers tell each other stories in an attempt to escape the insomnia caused by fear.
Mixing the metaphorical and the literal, Dagerman explores the nature of despair and creates a narrative about anxious souls, inflamed consciousness, and an irrational horror living in the body.
Fear, both individual and collective, resists concretization. It is concentrated in the recurring image of the snake, a symbol that unites the heroes of the novel in the anticipation of the inevitable.