Sex, Lies, and Mermaids: Queer Nature and Deviant Sexuality in Fairytales by German Women

The folkloric tradition linking women to water spirits is well attested among the work of German women writers of the long 19th century. Their characterizations challenge conventional stock portrayals in tales made famous by the Brothers Grimm and they critique patriarchal structures that assert dominance over feminized nature. The mermaid-like figures in Ricarda Huch’s “Lügenmärchen” (1896) and Charlotte von Ahlefeld’s “Die Nymphe des Rheins” (1812) mobilize dishonesty as a discursive tool that I read as queer to negotiate patriarchal life on land. Whether as recipients or tellers of falsehoods, these protagonists thrive in a world in which their male interlocutors brandish untruths to suppress and control nature. These depictions of transgressive bodies inextricably linked to the natural world challenge conventional notions of sex, identity, and biology to pose a uniquely queer potential. Drawing on queer and feminist ecocritical theories, this paper proposes a queer ecocritical framework that examines these figures as feminized harbingers of the natural world. From the celebration of identity to the denial of heterosexual marriage as a happy ending, these figures transgress bodily and sociocultural norms to resist patriarchal suppression and control.