Ганс Андерсен - Fairy Tales

Alison Lurie

Mutual romantic love is very rare in Andersen’s tales. Again and again, his protagonists are rejected by those they court—and in this they share the unhappy experience of their author. All his life, Andersen continually fell in love with upper-class or titled persons, both male and female. Though he made many acquaintances, he had almost no romantic success: these people liked having him come to their houses, tell stories to their children, and sign books, but their attitude always remained one of friendly, slightly distant patronage.

—from Boys and Girls Forever: Children’s Classics from Cinderella to Harry Potter (2003)

QUESTIONS1. Is there a philosophy, theory, thesis, morality, or conception of human life that holds these tales together?2. What do these tales reveal to us about Andersen’s understanding or feeling about the relations between the sexes?3. Money certainly holds a prominent place in Andersen’s tales. Can you think of anything in the tales that has greater value?4. If you were told you had to invent a tale of the sort Andersen wrote, what, in brief, would it be about? Compose a paragraph-length synopsis of your plot.

For Further Reading

TRANSLATIONS OF ANDERSEN’S WORKS IN ENGLISH

Andersen, H. C. Author’s Edition [Andersen’s Works]. 10 vols. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1869-1908.

The Andersen-Scudder Letters. Edited and translated by Waldemar Westergaard; introduction by Jean Hersholt; interpretative essay by Helge Topsøe-Jensen. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1949. Andersen’s correspondence with American editor, publisher, and writer Horace Elisha Scudder.

Brothers, Very Far Away and Other Poems. Edited by Sven Rossel. Seattle, WA: Mermaid Press, 1991.

The Diaries of Hans Christian Andersen. Edited and translated by Patricia Conroy and Sven Rossel. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1990.

The Fairy Tale of My Life. Translated by W. Glyn Jones. New York: British Book Centre, 1954.

The Fairy Tale of My Life. Translated by Horace Scudder. New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1871.

Hans Christian Andersen’s Correspondence with the Late Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, Charles Dickens, etc. etc. Edited by Frederick Crawford. London: Dean and Son, 1891.

The Improvisatore; or, Life in Italy. Translated by Mary Howitt. 2 vols. London: Richard Bentley, 1845.

In Spain. Translated by Mrs. Bushby. London: Richard Bentley, 1864.

In Spain, and A Visit to Portugal. New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1870.

Lucky Peer. Translated by Horace E. Scudder. Scribner’s Monthly (January, February, March, and April 1871).

Only a Fiddler! and O. T.; or, Life in Denmark. 3 vols. Translated by Mary Howitt. London: Richard Bentley, 1845.

Pictures of Sweden. Translated by I. Svering. London: Richard Bentley, 1851.

Pictures of Travel in Sweden, among the Hartz Mountains, and in Switzerland, with a Visit at Charles Dickens’s House, etc. New York: Hurd and Houghton, 1871.

A Poet’s Bazaar. 3 vols. Translated by Charles Beckwith Lohmeyer. London: Richard Bentley, 1846.

Rambles in the Romantic Regions of the Hartz Mountains. Translated by Charles Beckwith Lohmeyer. London: Richard Bentley, 1848.

Seven Poems — Syv digte. Translated by R. P. Keigwin. Odense: Hans Christian Andersen’s House, 1955.

The Story of My Life. Translated by Horace E. Scudder. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1871.

To Be, or Not to Be? Translated by Mrs. Bushby. London: Richard Bentley, 1857.

The True Story of My Life. Translated by Mary Howitt. London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1847.

The Two Baronesses. 2 vols. Translated by Charles Beckwith Lohmeyer. London: Richard Bentley, 1848.

A Visit to Portugal 1866. Translated and edited by Grace Thornton. London: Peter Owen, 1972.

A Visit to Spain and North Africa. Translated and edited by Grace Thornton. London: Peter Owen, 1975.

CRITICAL WORKS

Andersen, Jens. Hans Christian Andersen: A New Life. Translated by Tiina Nunnally. Woodstock: Overlook Press, 2006.

Atkins, A. M. “The Triumph of Criticism: Levels of Meaning in Hans Christian Andersen’s The Steadfast Tin Soldier.” Scholia Satyrica 1 (1975), pp. 25-28.

Bain, R. Nisbet. Hans Christian Andersen: A Biography. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1895.

Bell, Elizabeth, Lynda Haas, and Laura Sells, eds. From Mouse to Mermaid: The Politics of Film, Gender, and Culture. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.

Book, Fredrik. Hans Christian Andersen: A Biography. Translated by G. Schoolfield. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1962.

Born, Ann. “Hans Christian Andersen: An Infectious Genius.” Anderseniana 2 (1976), pp. 248-260.

Brandes, Georg. “Hans Christian Andersen.” In Eminent Authors of the Nineteenth Century. Translated by R. B. Anderson. New York: Crowell, 1886.

Braude, L. Y “Hans Christian Andersen and Russia.” Scandinavica 14 (1975), pp. 1-15.

Bredsdorff, Elias. Hans Andersen and Charles Dickens: A Friendship and Its Dissolution. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1956.

—. Hans Christian Andersen: The Story of His Life and Work, 1805-75. London: Phaidon, 1975.

Bredsforff, Thomas. Deconstructing Hans Christian Andersen: Some of His Fairy Tales in the Light of Literary Theory — and Vice versa. Minneapolis: Center for Nordic Studies, University of Minnesota, 1993.

Browning, George. A Few Personal Recollections of Hans Christian Andersen. London: Unwin, 1875.

Burnett, Constance B. The Shoemaker’s Son: The Life of Hans Christian Andersen. New York: Random House, 1941.

Dahlerup, Pil. “Splash! Six Views of “The Little Mermaid.” Scandinavian Studies 63:2 (1991), pp. 141-163.

Dal, Erik. “Hans Christian Andersen’s Tales and America.” Scandinavian Studies 40 (1968), pp. 1-25.

Duffy, Maureen. “The Brothers Grimm and Sister Andersen.” In The Erotic World of Faery. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1972, pp. 263-284.

Frank, Diane Crone, and Jeffrey Frank. “A Melancholy Dane.” The New Yorker (January 8, 2001), pp. 78-84.

. “The Real Hans Christian Andersen.” In The Stories of Hans Christian Andersen, translated by Diane Crone Frank and Jeffrey Frank. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003, pp. 1-36.

Godden, Rumer. Hans Christian Andersen: A Great Life in Brief. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1954.

Grønbech, Bo. Hans Christian Andersen. Boston: Twayne, 1980.

Haugaard, Erik C. “Hans Christian Andersen: A Twentieth-Century View.” Scandinavian Review 14 (1975), pp. 1-15.

Hees, Annelies van. “The Little Mermaid.” In H. C. Andersen: Old Problems and New Readings, edited by Steven Sondrup. Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 2004, pp. 259-270.

Heltoft, Kjeld. Hans Christian Andersen as an Artist. Translated by Reginald Spink. Copenhagen: Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1977.

Holbek, Bengt. “Hans Christian Andersen’s Use of Folktales.” In A Companion to the Fairy Tale, edited by Hilda Ellis David-son and Anna Chaudri. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2003, pp. 149-158.

Houe, Poul. “Going Places: Hans Christian Andersen, the Great European Traveler.” In Hans Christian Andersen: Danish Writer and Citizen of the World, edited by Sven Rossel. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996, pp. 123-175.