The Lake of the Dead
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Average rating3.5
A 1942 classic that has been voted Norway's all-time best thriller, a brilliant mix of mystery and the supernatural Deep in the darkest part of the Norwegian woods stands Dead Man's Cabin, where 110 years ago a madman slew his sister and her lover, throwing their decapitated corpses in a nearby lake before drowning himself to join them in death. Ever since, the cabin has been cursed, and anyone who spends the night there is possessed by the killer's spirit and infected with his madness. Bjørn Werner, a young scholar from Oslo, ignored the old superstitions and bought the cabin as a place to read and work in quiet. Now he has disappeared, and the evidence suggests he threw himself in the lake in a fit of insanity. The police write it off as a suicide, but those who knew him are not so sure. Could the curse actually be real? Bjørn's sister and five of his friends travel to the cabin to look into his death, but not all of them will return alive from their stay at the Lake of the Dead ... André Bjerke's The Lake of the Dead (1942) was voted the all-time best Norwegian thriller, and its atmospheric 1958 film adaptation is regarded as one of Norway's best films. This new translation is the first-ever American publication of Bjerke's classic, which features an unusual mixture of murder mystery and supernatural horror that will keep readers guessing until the thrilling conclusion.
Series
Featured Series
1 primary bookKai Bugge
Kai Bugge is a 1-book series first released in 1942 with contributions by André Bjerke.
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A Norwegian classic. I have been living in Norway for over 10 years now, but I have read an embarrassingly small amount of Norwegian literature (largely just Jo Nesbø and Asbjørnsen & Møe). The Lake of the Dead is probably the most well known Norwegian horror novel (Norway really doesn't have much in the way of a literary horror scene), but other than a very limited printing in the UK close to when it was first published has largely unavailable in English (and that early translation suffered from a degree of anglicization of names and idioms). This new English translation is a good chance to explore this Scandi classic, so my partner picked me up a copy.
First things first, this is very much a novel of its times. There is a general dismissiveness towards women through large parts of the novel, but that is a feature of many novels from this period. In many ways, this one is better than most, allowing one of the heroic characters to be a woman. The novel leans heavily on psychoanalysis, which gets a bit dry at times, but allows for an intriguing level of ambiguity. The story focusses on a myth around a cabin which is apparently haunted by the ghost of a murderer. The main protagonists are largely dismissive of this idea, but the possibility of supernatural influences is increasingly opened up as the story progresses.
The novel crosses over into the realm of crime novel in many places, but its ambiguity towards the supernatural separates it from the more standard crime fair of the time. Andre Bjerke is obviously well read and makes strong allusions to other literary works throughout the novel. An intriguing read, which if read with it historical context in mind is worth a gander
