The Serious Game
The Serious Game (Swedish: Den allvarsamma leken) is a 1912 novel by Hjalmar Söderberg. It tells the story of Arvid and Lydia, two Swedes who fall in love as young people but end up marrying others. They remain drawn to each other, yet they never truly come together, and their efforts to rekindle their romance lead to bitter, tragic results. The book is set in Sweden around the turn of the century.
Background: Söderberg based the story on his own past relationship with Maria von Platen. He had begun the idea as a play, Gertrud, in 1906 and started a novel in 1908, but that version was unfinished. He returned to the subject in 1912, writing the novel in the summer and autumn and publishing it in November.
Reception: When first published, reviews were mixed. Some praised the clear, elegant prose, while others were harsh. Today The Serious Game is considered a Swedish literary classic, often called the best romance in Swedish literature. It has many editions and has been translated into at least fourteen languages.
Critique and style: A 2002 Publishers Weekly review highlights the vivid Stockholm settings and the precise, sensory detail. It notes that the book centers on Arvid’s inner moral struggles and that women have little voice in his world, with a hint of psychological suspense similar to Dostoyevski.
Film adaptations: There have been three Swedish film versions of the story: Den allvarsamma leken (1945), Games of Love and Loneliness (1977), and A Serious Game (2016), directed by Pernilla August.
Popular culture: The novel is even referenced in the HBO series True Blood, where a character reads it in a scene.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 01:18 (CET).