51 pages • 1 hour read
Marie McSwigan, Illustr. Mary ReardonSnow Treasure
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 1942A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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BetaSymbols & Motifs
The Cleng Peerson
Victor Lundstrom’s boat, the Cleng Peerson, is symbolic of Victor’s adventurous nature, as well as of Norwegian bravery and wanderlust more broadly. Peter Lundstrom admires Uncle Victor’s exciting and adventurous lifestyle, for Victor “led a life of adventure in contrast with Peter’s father, a banker” (4) Additionally, Peter admires his uncle’s success as a fisherman, his possession of a fleet of boats, and his freedom to sail wherever he wishes to go. The Cleng Peerson thus becomes an embodiment of Victor’s fascinating stories and his daring and adventurous life, for in Peter’s eyes, it is the boat itself that bears Victor away in search of far-off adventures, thus epitomizing the very essence of such a courageous life.
To emphasize this philosophical connection, the name of the boat connects Victor to a line of daring Norse sailors, for according to Peter, “Cleng Peerson was the Norseman who went to America and who, because of his bravery in the face of hardships, was called the Norwegian Daniel Boone” (110). Through its name, the ship is connected to a proud history of Norwegian exploration. It is especially symbolic that Cleng Peerson was the first Norwegian to sail to America, as this is where Victor will eventually sail the Norwegian gold to safety. This connection further links Victor and his ship to ancestral Norwegian explorers and their legendary adventures over the waves. Through Victor’s exploits, the citizens of Riswyk themselves gain a personal connection to the proud history of Norse bravery and exploration, for it is through their boldness and endurance that the gold-smuggling scheme is successful.
The Snowmen
Like the children of Riswyk playing on their sleds, the snowmen are overlooked by the Nazi soldiers as childlike and innocuous. The apparently innocent snowmen on the Snake fiord beach mirror the gold-smuggling scheme more broadly; the Nazi soldiers do not expect children to conspire against them, and they do not expect snowmen to be concealing anything relevant to the invasion. Although Peter’s father initially objects to the children’s involvement, saying, “[T]his is no boys’ game” (12), the very success of the scheme rests on its childish appearance, allowing the children to smuggle 20,000 kroner from the cave in the woods to the site next to where Victor’s Cleng Peerson is moored. Within this context, the snowmen therefore represent the disguise of a dangerous and ingenious plot under the camouflage of children’s play. Snowmen, as well as snowballs and sleds, are originally symbolic of carefree childhood fun, but later in the story, they become symbolically connected with the resistance movement.
This connection is fully elucidated in the novel’s final climactic scene, during which the German Commandant viciously attacks Lovisa Lundstrom’s snowman and indulges in a fierce tirade, shouting at the snowman, “Down you go. […]Just the way all the people go who stand in our Fuehrer’s way” (141). In this scene, it becomes clear that Commandant is using the snowman to symbolize the Nazis’ annexation of Europe and the destruction of Germany’s enemies. In an instance of dramatic irony, the snowman, with its undiscovered gold beneath, actually symbolizes the theme of Ingenuity and Resistance; unbeknownst to the Commandant, the snowmen allow the citizens of Riswyk to protect their gold from falling into German hands.
The Blizzard
The unseasonal blizzard that engulfs the town in snow symbolizes the collusion of the natural world with the citizens of Riswyk and signals the recurring theme, Environment as Ally. Fearfully, Peter and the other citizens of Riswyk watch as rain starts to fall. Peter reflects that the rain “would spoil everything. The children couldn’t go down to the Snake with their bricks of gold if the rain melted to snow and spoiled their sled track” (69). Fortunately, the rain soon turns to snow: “[T]he next morning the world was a raging white fury” (72).
In contrast to the citizens of Riswyk, who feel thankful and well prepared for the storm, the Germans struggle in the weather, for “their buildings were erected hurriedly and without the many inventive devices the Norwegians used to secure their own homes against the cold” (73). Peter tells his friends, as they pass the German barracks after the blizzard, that “the storm did them more damage than we know” (80). The same weather pattern that allows the Riswyk citizens to continue with their scheme to safeguard the Norwegian wealth harries the German encampment and leaves the occupiers feeling discouraged and intimidated. This pattern illustrates the ways in which the environment, which is personified as a helpful ally of Riswyk, tends to aid the Norwegian cause whilst rebuffing the occupiers’ attempts to settle and gain control of the area.
