The Changeling

The Changeling was written by Selma Lagerlöf. In the short story collection one of the stories, The Changeling, is built on traditional Swedish folk tales. Superstition says that sometimes a non-human creature takes a child’s place, and by magic, they look the same. If one is to get one’s child back, one has to expose the betrayal by harming the changeling, upon which the real child would be given back.

In the story by Selma Lagerlöf a married couple receives a changeling, but the wife is unable to maltreat the child. One day the husband throws the child into a burning house, but the wife gets it back out. The husband gives his wife a choice: He or the changeling. Even though it is hard, she chooses the changeling. The man leaves his wife and starts walking through the woods, in which he meets a boy.

It is revealed that the boy is his son and that the spell is broken because the wife has sacrificed something more valuable to her than her own life.

The book was translated to English by Susanna Stevens under the title of The Changeling. The original title in Swedish was Troll och människor.

Source: Wikipedia, http://www.wikipedia.org/, 

25.11.2010, http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bortbyting