Feminism, Disability, and a Dragon: Transcending Classification in Marlen Haushofer’s Die Mansarde

This article analyzes Marlen Haushofer’s final novel, Die Mansarde (1969), through the critical lenses of disability studies and ecocriticism. Using these combined methods of analysis, the article uncovers a critique of species-specific bodily norms. Additionally, the article follows the protagonist’s evolution from outsider to resilient woman as she increasingly questions and eventually rejects these norms in favour of self-love and an appreciation for her own embodiment. Channelling centuries of woman-reptilian relationships, Die Mansarde sees its protagonist awaken her imaginative powers and extricate herself from the oppressive valuations tied to species-centered norms through the creation and recognition of a dragon figure; one of the protagonist’s final acts is to envision and sketch a dragon. For the protagonist, the dragon embodies defiance and resilience as a valuable, deviant, and monstrous being. She recognizes herself in this dragon as an outsider not easily classified or fit into normative categories. As the protagonist learns to accept her differences, she begins to understand herself as imperfect but valuable nonetheless, and she finally recognizes the limitations of a traditional, ableist, monological science. This article argues that in contrast to Die Wand, a cornerstone text for German ecocriticism that offers an abrupt utopic/dystopic destruction of humanity and a reconstruction of human relationships with Nature and animals, Die Mansarde offers a much subtler and slow-growing solution: that of self-love rooted in a critical understanding of species-based norms and their inherent oppression of deviant bodyminds.