''The Girl With The Velvet Ribbon" is a tale, with variants, that is part-horror, part-fantasy. The original author is unknown, with Washington Irving or Alexandre Dumas being strong contenders.
A boy falls for a girl, who has a ribbon around her neck. She never takes it off, and won't answer questions about it. They eventually marry, and the boy wants to know the secret. But what if the answer is horrifying?
There are multiple variants on the tale, the most recently published being "The Husband Stitch" by Carmen Maria Machado; that is in Her Body and Other Parties. Washington Irving and Alexandre Dumas both wrote early versions of the tale; for the former's interpretation, the explanation for the ribbon is that it covers up the signs of injury, which is a beheading. The first version that many children read is "The Green Ribbon," which Alvin Schwartz of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark fame included in his book for younger readers, ''In a Dark, Dark Room and Other Scary Stories."
Tropes for this story include:
- Adaptational Jerkass: Carman Maria Machado's husband is the only one who didn't marry the narrator for love. He's also more brusque when raising their kids.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Every time, the husband wants to know about the ribbon. Sometimes he goes so far as to cut it off with scissors. He gets his answer, as his wife's head falls on the floor.
- Depending on the Writer: The variants may have green, velvet, or red ribbons but what determines the outcome is the husband's character. Is he a patient man, willing to respect his wife's wishes about her secret? Or is he too curious about the ribbon and wanting the explanation?
- Downer Ending: Every version ends with the wife's head falling to the floor after the husband unties the ribbon. In some cases she is still conscious.
- Though, some versions (e.g. Alvin Schwartz's) try to mitigate this into a Bittersweet Ending by indicating the wife was already dying of natural causes after a long, happy life, and letting her husband untie the ribbon is in fact her last act of trust in him.
- Go Mad from the Revelation: The Washington Irving variant has the narrator committed because he suffers a breakdown on learning the woman he met and slept with was executed on the guillotine.
- Happily Married: In the Alvin Schwartz version from In A Dark, Dark Room, Alfred and Jenny grow old together and are happy. Alfred respects Jenny's wishes to tell him about the ribbon when she's ready.
- Love at First Sight: A good number of versions have the boy fall for the girl when seeing her.
- Riddle for the Ages: No, there is no explanation for how the girl ended up with a detachable head or the ribbon that keeps it attached to her body. That's what makes it eerier.
- That said, the earliest versions of the story were published in the wake of The French Revolution, so readers were probably expected to assume the girl was a victim of Madame la Guillotine, resurrected by one unearthly means or another.
- Wham Line: The Alvin Schwartz version has the doctor tell Jenny and Alfred that Jenny is dying, and there's nothing to be done.
