A new wave of anti-feminism is taking hold of Germany. Former career women-turned-housewives are spreading the word about a "new femininity" which encourages women to stay at home and embrace motherhood.

The anonymous letter makes for heartbreaking reading. "Dragging myself from job to job, I used to feel so useless. I wanted to be special but didn't know how -- I was neither fish nor flesh." For this angst-ridden career woman, salvation finally came in the full-bellied shape of motherhood. "With my husband and daughter at my side, I'm so happy and free now," she proclaims.

What sounds like a scene out of a 1950s TV sitcom is in fact a letter written to Eva Herman, the German author of the controversial bestseller "The Eva Principle" ("Das Eva Prinzip"), sub-titled "Towards a New Femininity." The principle in question rests on a series of tenets so old-fashioned they seem almost revolutionary again: Motherhood instead of emancipation, child-rearing instead of career-climbing, devoted marriage instead of egoistic self-fulfillment.

The 262 pages behind the pink cover of "The Eva Principle" are full of anti-feminist anger. Herman feels that nothing less than the survival of the country is at stake -- Germans will "die out" if women don't change their behavior, she says. She sees herself as courageously breaking a "taboo" by criticizing women's liberation.

"Let's just say it loud," Herman writes. "We women have overburdened ourselves -- we allowed ourselves to be too easily seduced by career opportunities." She recommends women exchange the cold sphere of work for the "colorful world of children" and discover their "destiny of nurturing the home environment."

Herman, a good-looking blonde with blue eyes and a toothpaste smile, certainly makes an attractive figurehead for the new gender revolution. Her well-groomed appearance is no coincidence -- the 49-year-old used to be a newsreader and talk show host on German national television.

With the birth of her son ten years ago, the three-times divorcee transformed herself into a devoted wife and wannabe mother of the nation. Since then she's been spreading her new-found wisdom in literary oeuvres like "The Joy of Breastfeeding" (2003) or "My Child Sleeps Through The Night" (2005).

Last year Herman graduated from child-rearing to sociology with "The Eva Principle" -- and became the target of scorn from all sides of the political spectrum.

Now the über-Hausfrau has published a sequel in an attempt to rebuke her critics. "Dear Eva Herman," which came out last month, is a collection of positive readers' letters or, as she likes to put it, proof that "ordinary people" agree with her. "The fact you've been criticized as being a traitor towards women shows just what sort of femi-fascism we have to live under nowadays," writes one reader in an expression of solidarity.

Another case of career woman-turned-outspoken-housewife is Christa Müller, the wife of the left-wing former finance minister Oskar Lafontaine. Just five years ago, the economist and left-wing politician lectured the public that she was unsuited for the role of the ornamental wife. But now she, like Herman, has radically changed her mind.

As mother and homemaker, she devotes her remaining political energy to the rhetorical elevation of housewives to professionals. A book is already in the making, with the promising title of "Careful, Housewife Ahead!" ("Achtung, Hausfrau!") sub-titled "A Career with Prospects." She is also campaigning to introduce welfare payments which will compensate housewives for their domestic labor.

The country, which has the lowest reproduction rate in Europe -- the national average is 1.3 children per woman -- is urgently looking for a solution to its looming demographic crisis as the population gets older and threatens to shrink.

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