erlking

plural erlkings · alternative Erlking · alternative erl-king

1. EuropeanartsIn German literature and modern folklore, a malicious elf or spirit who preys on children.

   So easy for one young son to be swallowed up in a world teeming with Erlkings, real and imagined.

   2010, Rachel Billington, The Missing Boy, Hachette, →ISBN

   3 more examples

   This line, and indeed the whole passage (lines 653-664), allude to the well-known poem by Goethe about the erlking, hoary enchanter of the elf-haunted alderwood, who falls in love with the delicate little boy of a belated traveler.

   1962, Charles Kinbote [pseudonym; Vladimir Nabokov], Pale Fire, New York, N.Y.: Berkley Books, published November 1985, →ISBN

   He was in the forest looking to see the trees / But none were there / He found a girl / She found the erlking

   2012, ミラクルミュージカル, “Murders”, in Hawaii: Part II

   By now, he seems less a cartoon character than some contemporary Erlking, the malicious spirit made famous by Goethe (and Schubert) but found originally in a Danish ballad.

   2018 October 22, Carol Rumens, “Poem of the week: Three Poetesses by Kristín Ómarsdóttir”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

plural Erlkings

1. Alternative letter-case form of erlking.