Conrad Aiken’s Silent Snow, Secret Snow is a psychological horror fantasy. It begins with a twelve-year-old boy (Paul) imagining overnight snowfalls. This leads to a growing fascination with snow, the thought of which provides relief from the mundane routine of his daily life, the ugliness of the world around him, parent-child conflicts, and awakening sexuality. As the imagined snowfalls increase, Paul begins to lose touch with reality. In the disturbing climax, his boy’s “snow voices” come alive and he completely withdraws into himself as they tell him a story. Major themes: mental illness, concealment, detachment and alienation.
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