Symbolism in Literature – The Snake

Brittanica.com

Across the world of fiction and world literature you can find the snake. It has probably more symbolic references than almost any other creature, from representing an insidious threat (the "snake in the grass"), to the idea of fertility or a creative life force. As snakes shed their skin through sloughing, they have becomes symbols of rebirth and transformation, even immortality. They're associated with the underworld and the abode of the dead because they spend so much time in pits or hiding under rocks – or in the UK under corrugated iron laid down for that purpose.

Ouroborus 

Two of the most known. symbols ares the ouroboros and the caduceus. 

In ancient myth, a snake devouring its own tail, known as Ouroboros, was a symbol of eternity. The snake’s ability to slough or shed its own skin 

The Rod of Aclepious

The caduceus, the staff of the messenger Hermes in classical Greek myth has two intertwined serpents. This staff was carried by Hermes (or his Roman counterpart, Mercury): the messenger of the gods. The two staffs are often confused, but the herald’s staff borne by Hermes/Mercury had two serpents, rather than one, with their heads facing each other. This  has been wrongly used as a medical symbol for a little over one hundred years. It has often been mistaken for the Rod of Asclepius, a visually similar symbol belonging to the god of healing and medicine.

The Caduceus

The caduceus only has one winding snake. while the Asclepius has two.

In stories the world over, as well as in modern literature, the snake often raises its head.

In the Epic of Gilgamesh, a 4,000-year-old story which also features a flood narrative, Gilgamesh attempts to seize a plant that might confer immortality, only for a snake to steal the plant away. This feels similar to the biblical  story although the creature who confronted Eve was only ever described as a serpent in Genesis – it is Milton, in Paradise Lost who first uses the term 'snake' to denote the evil of Satan. After he has tempted Eve  God punishes him by making him crawl in the dust.

 Fold above fold a surging Maze his Head            

 Crested aloft, and Carbuncle his Eyes;

With burnisht Neck of verdant Gold, erect 

Amidst his circling Spires.

In Good Omens, by  Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, we meet  Crawley the satanic snake hilariously transformed into a burned-out rock star tasked with ushering in the apocalypse. Except Crawly—or Crowley, as he rechristens himself—isn't so keen on putting an end to his favorite earthly delights just yet. 

One of my favourite poems, D. H. Lawrence's ‘Snake’, was written while he was living on the island of Sicily, in the beautiful resort, Taormina, on the east side of the island:

The voice of my education said to me

He must be killed,

For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous.

And voices in me said, if you were a man

You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off...

Lawrence stages a masculine battle,  two males facing off against one another. He ruminates on killing  the snake so that he will be safe, while accepting its power and individuality. This creates an inner drama.You can read the entire poem here

One of the most famous snakes in fiction has to be Kaa, the Indian python from Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book. In he 1967 Disney film  Kaa is a villain, while in Kipling’s original book he defeats the Bandar-log monkeys and frees Mowgli, so showing that ambiguous symbolism, being both saviour and danger.

In The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver, zealous Baptist Nathan Price takes his family to the Belgian Congo where he works as a missionary. Snakes appear, seemingly mysteriously, in gardens, and one morning the family find a curled-up green mamba and, as it slithers off, hear a shriek from Ruth May, the youngest of the four Price sisters. She has been bitten on the shoulder and dies as they watch. Read more of my thoughts on this fabulously rich novel here 

American poet Emily Dickinson (1830-86) wrote with passion about the snake; 

A narrow Fellow in the Grass                            

Occasionally rides –

You may have met him – did you not

His notice sudden is –

The Grass divides as with a Comb –

A spotted shaft is seen –

And then it closes at your feet

And opens further on –

I use snake symbology strongly in my second Shaman Mystery, On the Gallows. Sabbie first encounters an anaconda in a journey she takes for one client. But she meets this spiritual snake in an ice house, a long way from its home:

'Time and place can change. Home may change.'

I frowned. I didn’t want to forget a single word of what Anaconda was saying; I was sure it had meanings only Drea would understand. 

'Do homes change for the better?' I asked.

'Duty and purpose can change.'

'What is your duty and purpose?'

'First; do no harm. Next; protect your kin. Last; keep your secret.'

'What is your secret?'

Anaconda didn’t like this. He clearly felt I’d been presumptive to ask. For the first time I saw malevolence flicker in the small eyes. I heard the girl give a trembling sigh, as if even her breath shivered with cold. I tried to dodge past Anaconda, but he intercepted my move and I collided with him. His scales felt dry on my bare arms. My feet slid from under me and I fell on the ice, hard as concrete but much colder. It burned through my dress.

His tongue flicked. His head lunged at me. The razor-sharp points of his tongue plunged into my belly. I heard my throat scream in the world of my therapy room. My hands covered my stomach. There was no blood. This was a spirit wound from a serpent without a poisonous bite. Anacondas, I remembered, crushed their prey. I tried to slide away from him, wriggling like a snake does, struggling to gain a grip, but I was shivering so much my hands and feet refused to co-operate. I could hardly feel my body now. The bite wasn’t poisonous, but it had sent me spiralling into hypothermia.

The snake theme continues through the On the Gallows (Unraveled Visions in the US). Towards the climax, I make use of a reference to another fictional snake, the Mara, from Dr Who, when Sabbie interviews the woman who discovered a body on the cooling station at Hinkley Point Power Station;

The Mara, as it manifested itself in Kinda

...' I was cold, very cold and frightened and mad with myself for being so utterly stupid. I could hardly dial. I think I sort of lost it. Because behind me was a dead girl on the gallows and in front of me was the power station. I know I was screaming by then, on and on. Got myself right freaked out until I couldn’t move at all, like we did as kids, imagining Hinkley Point was the Dark Places of the Inside, where the Mara lived; we loved to scare each other with that Dr Who stuff, say the power station could transmit telepathically, and that the Mara was manifesting as one of us, we’d point to one of the gang and run screaming from them, the pure hatred and greed of Mara and that. It all came back to me. I was stuck there remembering that the Mara manifested into its snake form and could destroy me. Like her. I’d got it in my head that was what had happened to her.'     She stopped, and wiped her mouth. 'Madness. How your mind plays tricks.'

    'What did you say?'

    'That I went quite mad, really. Screamed so hard, I couldn’t use my voice for days, after–'

     'No – not that. The thing about Hinkley. What did you say about a snake?'

    'Oh, I was just frantic, totally back to when we were kids. We loved scaring each other. We knew about nuclear power, but we didn’t if you get me. We made things up. Even the signs are scary…DO NOT ENTER…to us, that mean, enter at your peril. It was Rick who started saying the power station was the Dark Places of the Inside. Said he could hear purring, but it wasn’t a cat, it was the Mara, who was, I dunno, this snake; a representation of all evil from another planet. It was what was on Dr Who at the time.'

    'The power station is…'

    'I’d half lost my mind, Sabbie, be fair.'

    'Yeah, I understand.'

     I did not understand at all.  Like I’d explained to Rey, the spirit world is full of twists and tangles...

Perhaps you have used snakes as symbols in your own writing. Or have been particularly affected by their reference in your reading. Do tell me about your experiences with snakes, by posting a comment below.

You can listen to Paradise Lost on BBC Radio 4 right now, with the great Ian McKellan as Milton, and Simon Russell Beale as the snake (Satan). It's live on Sunday afternoons and available on Sounds; click here to find out more

To read more blogposts about symbolism in literature, click here