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Hans Christian Andersen’s tales are so famous that they’re part of our collective memory; who doesn’t know “The Ugly Duckling”, “The Little Mermaid”, or “The Emperor’s New Clothes?”. They have always been reinvented, and new versions skip the bittersweet endings like in “The Little Mtach Girl” and “The Little Mermaid”. But forget about the edited versions and read the original tales: they are absolutely beautiful!
Andersen invented a new way of telling tales: he addressed the reader, used a lot of ‘and’ to create a sense of immediacy, and he animated all kinds of objects (from rags to lamps).
Andersen surprises us with stunning imagery like the descriptions in “The Snow Queen”; and he also presents dramas of intense suffering and beauty such as “The Ice Maiden”. Andersen is also a master of ‘zooming in’; he takes us from a general description into a very beautiful detailed one like in this fragment from the “Hardy Tin Soldier”:
On the table on which they had been placed stood many other playthings, but the toy that attracted most attention was a neat castle of cardboard. Through the little windows one could see straight into the hall. Before the castle some little trees were placed round a little looking glass, which was to represent a clear lake. Waxen swans swam on this lake, and were mirrored in it.
Notice how wonderfully he takes us from ‘a table’ to the little swans reflected in the mirror! He takes us from a general view of the toys to looking into the windows of the castle, but he makes us stop in front of the castle and look at a little mirror that represents a lake, a lake with swans swimming in it!
If you’d like to be moved by stunning imagery, bittersweet endings, and incredible characters read Andersen’s original tales.
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