The Danish Girl is a novel by American writer David Ebershoff, published in 2000 by the Viking Press in the United States and Allen & Unwin in Australia.

The novel is a fictionalized account of the life of Lili Elbe, one of the first transgender women to undergo sex reassignment surgery.

Lili Elbe (then presenting as male and using her birth name) is happily married to her wife, Gerda Wegener.

Gerda eventually moved to Denmark and first met Lili at the Royal Academy before unfortunately separating due to World War I.

Gerda, needing to have the painting finished as soon as possible, requests Lili to model in Anna's place.

During the ball, Lili meets a man named Henrik Sandahl, and the two start a short-lived relationship, which Gerda discourages, fearing that if Lili does not tell Henrik of her marriage and her assigned birth gender, she would be hurting him by deceiving him.

[citation needed] In The New York Times Book Review, novelist and critic John Burnham Schwartz called the novel "arresting": "I hope people will read The Danish Girl.

"[1] Critic Richard Bernstein wrote in The New York Times, "Mr. Ebershoff is telling us that love does involve a small dark space.

The novel was adapted into a feature film directed by Tom Hooper, and starring Eddie Redmayne as Lili Elbe, Alicia Vikander as Gerda Wegener, Matthias Schoenaerts as Hans Axgil, Ben Whishaw as Henrik, Sebastian Koch as Dr. Kurt Warnekros and Amber Heard as Ulla Poulsen.