Close Reading of "Allal"

In the short story “Allal”, the main character, Allal, is an outcast in the town. He was known as the “son of sin” because his mother abandoned him after giving birth to him at the hotel she worked at. He was put to work at the hotel by the owner as soon as he was able to move around. When he became older, he decided to leave the hotel and move into town to find a job that paid him. After he moved into town, he ran into an old guy who carried two snakes around with him. He brought the old guy to his small house after the people of the town were yelling at him to get the old man out of town. While the old man was at Allal’s house, he let out his two snakes. Allal took notice of the red and gold one and instantly became fascinated with it. He decided he wanted it and when the old man fell asleep, Allal used milk paste and a sack made out of a blanket to catch the snake and hide it. When the old man left his house, Allal brings the snake out of its hiding place and starts to summon it out of the sack. One night after taking some kif, Allal fell asleep with the snake laying on him. When he woke up, he realized him and the snake had switched bodies.

The paragraph I thought was most important in this story is when the old man tells Allal that “Snakes are like people. You have to get to know them. Then you can be their friends,” (page 228). This line stood out because it points to the issue that something is going to happen with Allal and the snakes. It also compares snakes and people together. A snake is the biblical symbol of sin. The old man could have also been comparing them together because people commit sin and by the end of the story, the people of the town commit the worse of all sins by murdering Allal, which was the snake by then. Also, Allal spent months trying to get to know the snake. He tries to summon it by telling it to “come here”. After the snake finally responds to Allal’s command and they “get to know” each other, Allal ends up becoming the snake and not really its friend.