Reines Licht: Blindness, Religion, and Morality in Selected Early Grimms’ Kinder- und Hausmärchen

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper undertakes a disability studies reading of blindness in selected early Grimms Kinder- und Hausmärchen (KHM). I argue for the use of the religious model of disability as a methodology for this reading and develop a new model known as the moral model: as I demonstrate, the religious model locates disability in the individual. In contrast, the moral model — which is often conflated with the religious model — should be a symbiotic methodological approach that locates the disability in the moral fabric of the tales rather than in the individual. My analysis shows that blindness equals damnation in the KHM. Evil characters are punished with it due to sin and a lack of morality, whereas good characters are saved from such a punishment. This salvation often takes the form of miraculous healing, often by God.