Fairy Tales

lore vary, but they all begin with a separation of Tom from his parents that sets
off a chain of episodes as he tries to find his way home. Andersen’s contribution
is the invention of a female protagonist and her conventional marriage with a
prince.

THE NAUGHTY BOY (DEN UARTIGE DRENG, 1835)

This tale is based on a work by Greek lyric poet Anacreon (c.582-c.485 B.C.),
who wrote short poems called monodies (lyrical verses for a single voice) that
celebrated love and wine. Andersen was probably influenced by Christian
Pram’s translation of the Anacreon poem. In contrast to Anacreon, Andersen
provides an ironic view of the power of love in this story.

THE GALOSHES OF FORTUNE (LYKKENS KALOSKER,
1838)

This story can be considered one of the first science-fiction tales in European
literature. It consists of time-travel episodes in which people come upon “lucky”
galoshes that transport them in time and compel them to consider their real
situations. The galoshes are somewhat related to the folk motif of seven-league
boots that enable people to travel great distances in a matter of seconds.
However, seven-league boots are rarely used to carry a protagonist to the past or
the future, as the galoshes do in Andersen’s tale.

THE GARDEN OF EDEN (PARADISETS HAVE, 1839)

Andersen may have first heard this tale as a child, but it is more probable that he
read or heard about Madame d‘Aulnoy’s fairy tale “Île de la Félicité” (“The
Island of Happiness”), which was incorporated in her novel Histoire d’Hypolite,
comte de Duglas (1690), translated into Danish in 1787. In this tale the prince of
Russia is transported by Zephyr, the west wind, to a paradise and spends
centuries there. He loses his love and his life when he tries to return to Russia
and forgets the warning of the princess of paradise never to descend from his
horse, otherwise Death would capture him.

THE BRONZE PIG (METALSVINET, 1842)

Andersen conceived this tale in 1833 and 1834 while visiting Florence, where he
saw the statue of the bronze boar on the Via Porta Rossa. The tale concerns the
miraculous development of a poor, oppressed boy into an artist, a motif that

appears in several of Andersen’s tales. It was first published in his travel book A
Poet’s Bazaar (1842). He may have based the story on the life of Danish painter
Wilhelm Bendz, who was born in 1804 in Odense and died in Italy in 1832.

THE ROSE ELF (ROSEN-ALFEN, 1839)

This tale, whose title is sometimes translated as “The Rose Fairy,” was based on
a story taken from Boccaccio’s Decameron.

THE PIXIE AT THE GROCER’S (NISSEN HOS
SPEKHØKEREN, 1852)

Andersen was often concerned with the conflict between materialism and art that
is mirrored in the pixie’s existential dilemma. Pixies—intermediaries between
the natural and the supernatural worlds—are important characters in Danish
folklore. They appear in Andersen’s “The Traveling Companion” and “The Hill
of the Elves,” among other works.

IB AND LITTLE CHRISTINE (IB OG LILLE CHRISTINE,
1855)

Andersen wrote this tale during a period of depression. It is a sentimental and
moralistic picture of a poor young man who is dedicated to the simple, pure life
in the country, while his childhood sweetheart, Christine, is corrupted by the
materialism of the big city.

THE ICE MAIDEN (IISJOMFRUEN, 1862)

This tale, written while Andersen was visiting Switzerland, bears a strong
resemblance to Johann Peter Hebel’s “Unverhofftes Wiedersehen” (“Unexpected
Reunion,” 1811) and E. T. A. Hoffmann’s “Die Bergwerke zu Falun” (“The
Mines at Falun,” 1819), in which a young miner is captured by a dangerous
queen of an underground realm on his wedding day. His petrified body is found
many years later by his former bride, now an old woman.

The allure of an erotic, mysterious woman, a common motif in romantic fairy
tales, was often set in opposition to a safe, bourgeois life. Andersen’s tale is less
about this dichotomy and more about the tragedy of a young man whose rise in
society is undermined by immoral forces. Even though Rudy is a good and
talented person who trusts in God, he does not succeed. As Andersen comments,
“God gives us the nuts, but he doesn’t crack them open for us.” The episode

about the eagle’s nest, Rudy’s marital test, was an actual story told to Andersen
by the Bavarian poet Koppel. Andersen was originally going to write just the
episode about the eagle’s nest but changed his mind after reading a travel book
about Switzerland, in which he came across the incident concerning the bridal
couple.

EVANGELICAL AND RELIGIOUS TALES

THE SNOW QUEEN (SNEEDRONNINGEN, 1845)

Although Andersen had already introduced the Christian quest tale in “The
Traveling Companion,” published in his second collection of tales, it was not
until “The Snow Queen” that he fully developed this motif; in this tale he uses
children as his main characters. The prologue, which concerns the origins of evil
in the world, prepares the reader for the conflict between the good-hearted
children, Kai and Gerda, and the demonic Snow Queen. It is only because of
Gerda’s purity of soul and the help of angels that she is able to rescue Kai. The
tale’s moral message is that only those who have faith in God can triumph over
the most difficult obstacles in life. This evangelical message was generally
omitted or glossed over in late-twentieth-century adaptations, especially
cinematic ones; instead the spiritual theme was transformed into a secular one
about the power of love. Andersen combined pagan beliefs with an unusual
interpretation of Christianity in this tale, but the tone and style overwhelmingly
emphasize the theme of Christian salvation.

THE RED SHOES (DE RØDE SKO, 1845)

In his autobiography of 1847 Andersen relates that an incident from his
childhood influenced the writing of this tale. On the occasion of his confirmation
he was given a new pair of boots that squeaked when he walked on the church
floor. The squeaking drew the attention of the congregation, and Andersen was
pleased that everyone would notice that he was wearing his first pair of new
boots. At the same time, he was ashamed because his thoughts were turned away
from God. It is not clear whether Andersen specifically referenced this childhood
incident in “The Red Shoes,” but the stark Christian message is clear. Karen’s
alleged vanity is punished so mercilessly in the name of the Lord that the story
has often been criticized for its misogynism.

THE LITTLE MATCH GIRL (DEN LILLE PIGE MED
SVOVLSTIKKERNE, 1845)

Andersen wrote this tale as a commission from the magazine Dansk
Folkekalender. While traveling outside Copenhagen, he received a letter from
the publisher, asking him to address one of three pictures that he enclosed.
Andersen chose a drawing by Danish painter J. T. Lundbye that portrays a poor
little girl with a bunch of matches. As in many of his tales about poor children,
there is divine salvation at the end. Andersen may have been recalling an
incident in his mother’s childhood when she was sent out to beg; when she
returned, she was reprimanded for not obtaining any money.

THE BOG KING’S DAUGHTER (DYND-KONGENS DATTER,
1858)

Part of this complex tale, whose title is sometimes translated as “The Marsh
King’s Daughter,” was first told to one of Andersen’s friends, who related it to
Andersen. After he wrote it down, he made several drafts and added new
elements before he was satisfied with it. Though Andersen uses pagan motifs
from animal fables as well as Scandinavian folklore and legend, he creates a
religious story about the taming of the wild spirit in Helga, who becomes humble
and merciful through her encounter with the priest.

THE GIRL WHO STEPPED ON BREAD (PIGEN, SOME
TRAADTE PAA BRØDET, 1859)

The title of this narrative is also translated as “The Girl Who Trod on the Loaf.”
It is based in a tale Andersen heard in his childhood. He transformed it into a
moral tale of salvation, similar to “The Red Shoes” and with the same
misogynistic tendencies. The girl is punished for her sinful actions and is
transformed into a bird only after she learns the lesson of Christian humility. The
motif of bread turning to stone originated in medieval oral tales and may have
belonged to traditional legends of Odense.

THE BELL (KLOKKEN, 1845)

This tale, published in Maanedsskrift for Børn (Monthly Journal for Children)
and supposedly Andersen’s own invention, celebrates the divine and mysterious
qualities of nature that can be attributed only to God. The motif of the bell also
can be found in the poems of German writers Friedrich Schiller and J. L.

Heiberg.

THE THORNY PATH TO GLORY (ÆRENS TORNEVEI, 1856)

This tale was first published in Folkekalender for Danmark. All the great
protagonists depicted in the narrative have attributes similar to those of Jesus
Christ. Their lives parallel the lives of many of Andersen’s protagonists, who
must endure great suffering before becoming famous.

THE JEWISH MAID (JØDEPIGEN, 1856)

Based on a Hungarian legend, this tale was first published in Folkekalender for
Danmark. The story’s notion of Christian redemption is striking. Although Sara
does not convert to Christianity because of the vow she has made to her mother,
she is redeemed by Christianity. Several scholars believe that the story is based
on Andersen’s childhood memories of a Jewish girl named Sara Heimann.

THE STORY OLD JOHANNA TOLD (HVAD GAMLE
JOHANNE FORTALTE, 1872)

Composed between September 16 and September 24, this fairy tale was the last
Andersen ever wrote. The first English translation, with the title “The Story Old
Joan Told,” appeared in Aunt Judy’s Christmas Volume, 1873. It was based on a
tale that Andersen had heard during his youth from an old woman. Andersen had
been struck by the appearance of an old withered man, and the old woman told
him the tale about the boiling pot with a special brew that a wise woman could
use to bring a young man back from foreign lands to his sweetheart, no matter
how far he had traveled. The only difficulty was that the brew often caused the
young man to become decrepit. In Andersen’s version of the story he transforms
the young tailor, who is a man without faith in God, and it is this lack of faith
that brings about his downfall.

SHE WAS NO GOOD (HUN DUGDE IKKE, 1853)

This tale was Andersen’s endeavor to portray his mother, who was an alcoholic,
in a positive light and to transform her story into a parable of religious salvation.
Andersen’s relationship with his mother was fraught with contradictions. He
barely mentions her in his diaries and was evidently filled with shame because of
her low social status and her drinking.

THE ANTHROPOMORPHIZING OF ANIMALS AND
NATURE

THE UGLY DUCKLING (DEN GRIMME ÆLLING, 1844)

One of Andersen’s most successful tales, “The Ugly Duckling” is not only a
clear autobiographical narrative of his rise from rags to riches and a wish-
fulfillment story that captures the deepest psychological wishes of powerless
children; it is also a remarkable example of the animal fable with a clear moral.
In Andersen’s narrative the path to survival and success is ironically tied to
Darwin’s notion of the survival of the fittest. Though Andersen was opposed to
Darwin’s theories, his tale demonstrates that there are species in the animal
world that are more adapted to survival and more beautiful than others.
Andersen implies that faith in one’s true self will lead to happiness and thus
aligns himself with the philosophy of essentialism. His essential identity was
noble, and his nobility was a nobility of the soul and the true artist. Once this tale
became famous, Andersen often identified himself as the ugly duckling.

Originally this tale was to be called “The Swan Chick,” but Andersen changed
the title so there would be an element of surprise when the so-called duckling
changes into a swan.

IN THE DUCKYARD (I ANDEGAARDEN, 1861)

This grim tale uses the proud and haughty Portuguese hen to comment on
snobbery and the survival of the fittest. It can be regarded as a counter-tale to
“The Ugly Ducking.” The story also is apparently a tale of revenge. Andersen
often used animals to satirize people he knew. In this case, the rooster and the
Portuguese hen clearly represent people he detested, but scholars have not been
able to identify them.

THE STORKS (STORKENDE, 1839)

In this tale, based on the superstitious belief that storks bring babies, Andersen
provides an ironic moral twist to criticize the cruelty of children. Several of
Andersen’s stories include the stork, his favorite bird.

THE SPRUCE TREE (GRANTRÆET, 1845)

This powerful parable, which deals with the vain pursuit of fame, may reflect
some of Andersen’s personal concerns as he desperately tried to become famous.

More than that, the tale is a perfect allegory about misguided notions of
celebrity, and its initial light tone turns cynical in the end. In addition to
attempting to expose the artificiality and superficiality of the upper classes,
Andersen tried to show how gullible people might be caught up in the false glow
of fame.

IT’S PERFECTLY TRUE! (DET ER GANSKE VIST! 1852)

This ironic tale is a delightful comic commentary on how rumors spread and
return to haunt the people who start them.

THE DUNG BEETLE (SKARNBASSEN, 1861)

This tale was inspired by a statement Charles Dickens published in his magazine
Household Words: “When the Emperor’s horse got his golden shoes, the beetle
also stretched his leg out.” Dickens recommended that Andersen write a story
based on this Arabian proverb, and this satirical tale about a pompous beetle was
the result. Andersen thought that Dickens had written the passage. However, it
was part of a series of proverbs compiled by Dickens’s co-editor Richard H.
Horne.

THE BUTTERFLY (SOMMERFUGLEN, 1861)

This tale, first published in Folkekalender for Danmark, was conceived in
Switzerland during a trip Andersen made in August 1860 and was completed in
Slagelse, Denmark, while he was staying at Basnaes Manor, in November. There
is a good deal of self-irony in this story, in which a choosy butterfly ends up as a
lonely bachelor.

THE SNOWDROP (SOMMERGÆKKEN, 1863)

This tale was first published in Folkekalender for Danmark and was written in
response to a request by Andersen’s friend Adolph Drewsen, who complained
about how traditional names were constantly being changed. Drewsen pointed
out that “sommergæk” (summer fool) had been changed to “wintergaek” (winter
fool) and that the name of the flower had thus lost its significance. As a
response, Andersen wrote a tale about teasing and flirting.

THE SUNSHINE’S STORIES (SOLSKINS-HISTORIER, 1869)

This tale, a light parody of optimistic stories, was first published in English in

The Riverside Magazine for Young People (1869); it was published later the
same year in the book Fra Nordiske Digtere (From Nordic Poets). Andersen
wrote the tale after he heard Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute, 1791).
The motif of the fortunate gift at birth is one Andersen used in several of his
tales.

THE DROP OF WATER (VANDDRAABEN, 1847)

This terse and bitter tale—dedicated to the famous Danish physicist and chemist
Hans Christian Ørsted, who wrote the book The Spirit in Nature (1850)—is an
ironic commentary on the way humans in a large city behave like animals. The
tale, part of A Christmas Greeting to My English Friends, appeared in English
before it was published in Danish. Andersen had first viewed microscopic
creatures when he visited botanist Niels Hofman-Bang in 1830. He also may
have been influenced by reading a description of creatures present in a drop of
water in Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Night and Morning (1841).

THE FLEA AND THE PROFESSOR (LOPPEN OG
PROFESSOREN, 1873)

This comic tale was published in Folkekalender for Danmark and in Scribner’s
Monthly (April 1873). The influence of Jules Verne, French author of Cinq
semaines en ballon (Five Weeks in a Balloon, 1863) whom Andersen admired, is
clear in this tale in the reference to hot-air balloons. He was also inspired by
French politician Léon Gambetta, who during the Franco-Prussian War escaped
besieged Paris in a balloon and fled to Tours. Andersen often developed real
incidents into fantastic stories that are related to science fiction.

THE SNOWMAN (SNEEMANDEN, 1861)

Andersen wrote this tale during the Christmas holidays in 1860 on a visit to
Basnaes Manor near Slagelse, where he often stayed; the setting is based on that
locale. The story, which contains a good deal of self-irony, reflects Andersen’s
concern about the transient nature of all living things.

THE HUMANIZATION OF TOYS AND OBJECTS

THE STEADFAST TIN SOLDIER (DEN STANDHAFTIGE
TINSOLDAT, 1838)

Andersen was a great admirer of E. T. A. Hoffmann and was familiar with his
“Nussknacker und Mausekönig” (The Nutcracker and the Mouse King,” 1816).
Though there is no direct parallel with Hoffmann’s tale, it is apparent that
Hoffman’s transformation of the toys and the battle to win the affection of a
young girl played a role in Andersen’s writing of ”The Steadfast Tin Soldier”
and other tales that feature talking inanimate objects. Hoffmann was among the
first writers of fairy tales to set a story in the nursery room of a middle-class
home, and Andersen followed him in doing this. Once he became famous he
would tell tales in the nursery rooms of his friends.

THE SHEPHERDESS AND THE CHIMNEY SWEEP
(HYRDINDEN OG SKORSTEENSFEIEREN, 1845)

As with “The Steadfast Tin Soldier,” this tale shows the influence of E. T. A.
Hoffmann’s work, especially “The Nutcracker and the Mouse King” (1816).
Andersen’s story served as the basis for one of the most brilliant animated films
in the twentieth century, Paul Grimault’s La Bergère et le ramoneur (The
Curious Adventures of Mr. Wonderbird, 1959), which was revised and
reproduced in 1979 as Le Roi et l’oiseau (The King and the Bird).

THE DARNING NEEDLE (STOPPENAALEN, 1845)

Andersen was probably inspired by the Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen to
write this tale, which was first published in the magazine Gaea.

THE OLD HOUSE (DET GAMLE HUUS, 1847)

Andersen based this tale on his memories of visits to homes of his friends in
Germany and Denmark. He was given a tin soldier by the son of German poet
Julius Mosen in 1847. The two-year-old daughter of Danish composer Johan
Hartmann, who danced to the singing of her brothers and sisters, served as the
model for the laughing child.

THE RAGS (LASERNE, 1869)

Andersen wrote this tale, composed some eight or ten years before its
publication in Folkekalender, as a satire on young Norwegian writers who were
criticizing better-established Danish writers. It was originally based on his
observations at a paper factory, where he saw large piles of rags that were
eventually made into paper. As Norwegian writers gained a higher profile,

Andersen thought that the satire no longer held true. Nevertheless, the comic
situation retained its appeal. Andersen had earlier used the contrast between
Norwegians and Danes in “The Hill of the Elves.”

LEGENDS

HOLGER THE DANE (HOLGER DANSKE, 1845)

This tale, based on a piece of Danish folklore about a legendary king who will
rise to save Denmark, is similar to the German legend of the twelfth-century
German king and Holy Roman Empire Fredrick Barbarossa, who is said to be
buried in Kyffhauser Mountain and will return one day to bring glory to
Germany. Andersen based the old man in this tale on his grandfather and on the
father of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen, who were both wood carvers.
During the nineteenth century there were numerous adaptations of Christian
Pedersen’s adaptation of a French medieval romance, Ogier le Danois, which
was related to the legend. While Andersen knew the legend from his school
days, a new edition of Pedersen’s work was published in 1842. Andersen also
would have known Just Mathias Thiele’s poem about Holger the Dane (1830).

BIRD PHOENIX (FUGL PHØNIX, 1850)

This symbolical tale about the rise of poetry was first published in Den Nye
Børneven, an illustrated magazine for children. Beginning in the medieval
period, in European literature the phoenix was a common figure representing
resurrection and immortality. The origin of the myth is considered to be Oriental
and Egyptian. The Egyptians believed that the bird lived about 500 years and
toward the end of its life built a nest of spice branches and set it on fire, dying in
the flames. From the ashes, a new phoenix would arise and fly to the city of the
sun.

THE FAMILY OF HEN-GRETHE (HØNSE-GRETHES
FAMILIE, 1869)

This tale was first published in English in The Riverside Magazine for Young
People. Andersen based the story on a newspaper article about Marie Grubbe, a
young aristocrat, who had been married three times, first to the half-brother of
Christian V, Ulrich Frederick Gyldenløve, then to a nobleman from Jutland, and
later to a seaman. Andersen uses the history of a castle as his frame for telling a

fascinating legend about Marie Grubbe; he transforms her into a proud and
willful woman, and has the famous Danish writer Ludvig Holberg meet her
while he was escaping a plague that had spread to Copenhagen.

EVERYTHING IN ITS PROPER PLACE (ALT PAA SIN
RETTE, 1853)

This inventive tale by Andersen demonstrates his ability to create his own
“original” legends. Inspired by the poet Just Mathias Thiele, it is a satirical
representation of class conflict in Denmark. A common motif in European
folklore, the magical flute is generally used to expose lies and hypocrisy.

Inspired by Andersen’s

Fairy Tales

LITERATURE

Hans Christian Andersen is a unique figure in the history of the fairy tale. As a
young boy, he was influenced by the wondrous tales of the Brothers Grimm, E.
T. A. Hoffmann, and other German Romantic writers, as well as by Danish
folklore, and his tales cannot be fully appreciated without understanding his
interest in these works. But Andersen went his own way: He was the first
European writer to appeal both to children and to adults with stunning and
provocative tales. Indeed, he developed an inimitable style and tone that
transformed fairy tales into passionate and ironic stories that recorded the bitter
struggles of artists and marginalized people to discover a modicum of joy in their
lives. Throughout his life Andersen experimented with idiomatic language and
popular art forms, endowing the fairy tale with novel motifs and characters that
anticipated modernism. Andersen was always on a quest for something new. He
traveled widely in Europe and based his tales on his personal experiences and
encounters with the leading European artists of his time.

In his extensive travels Andersen made the acquaintance of many eminent
writers, including Ludwig Tieck, Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, the Brothers
Grimm, Honoré de Balzac, Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo, Henry James,
Heinrich Heine, and Charles Dickens (to whom Andersen dedicated A Poet’s
Day Dreams, 1853). Andersen was also a close friend of poets Robert and
Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Once, when visiting the Brownings in Rome, he
read aloud “The Ugly Duckling” as Robert Browning clownishly acted it out for
a group of children. Elizabeth Browning dedicated her final poem— “North and
South”—to Andersen; in it “North” refers to Andersen’s native Denmark, while
the city of Rome, a popular vacation spot, is the “South.” The poem’s final
stanza reads:

The North sent therefore a man of men

As a grace to the South;
And thus to Rome came Andersen.
—“Alas, but must you take him again?”
Said the South to the North.

Andersen influenced and was influenced by numerous writers during his
lifetime, but it was after his death that his works became significant referential
points for many European and American writers of fairy tales, short stories, and
novels. In England, the fairy tales of Oscar Wilde and Andrew Lang were
marked by Andersen. At the beginning of the twentieth century Franz Kafka and
Thomas Mann noted that they were influenced by Andersen’s tales when they
were young. Indeed, throughout the twentieth century, writers of fairy tales
around the world, along with illustrators, demonstrated time and again in their
works that the fairy tale as a genre had to reckon with Andersen’s presence.

FILM

Between the 1930s and the 1950s the Walt Disney Company distinguished itself
as the most enterprising animation studio and produced a string of critically
acclaimed feature-length cartoons, including Snow White (1937) and Bambi
(1942). But as the cost of producing animation rose, Disney’s commitment to
major animation efforts waned, and after releasing Sleeping Beauty (1959), the
company failed to produce a remarkable animated picture for nearly thirty years.
In 1989 The Little Mermaid, based on Andersen’s fairy tale, put Disney back on
the map. Written and directed by John Musker and Ron Clements, The Little
Mermaid showcases bright, fluid animation in a palette based on the sea—coral
colors like fuchsia and butter yellow alongside shades of aquamarine. The film is
buoyed by the witty songwriting of Howard Ashman and Alan Menken (Little
Shop of Horrors).

What makes The Little Mermaid a classic equal to the movies of Disney’s
golden age is the clever, rebellious, and winsome character Ariel. The crux of the
story is Ariel’s defiance of her father, King Triton, ruler of the sea, who forbids
her from venturing above water into the human realm. But when she falls in love
with a handsome prince and swaps her trademark voice (supplied by Jodi
Benson) for a pair of human legs with the help of Ursula, a cunning sea-witch
octopus, Ariel must rely on her friends Flounder and Sebastian, a calypso crab.
Together the three wend their way toward romantic happiness and a state of

harmony among creatures of the land and sea—in a departure from Andersen’s
original, in which the main character is transmuted into sea-foam.

The trend of using computer-generated imagery to supplement animation
began, albeit to a limited degree, with The Little Mermaid. The Oscar category
Best Animated Picture was not instituted until the 2001 Academy Awards, well
into the age of CGI animation. Nonetheless, The Little Mermaid held its own at
the 1990 Oscars. Menken and Ashman were nominated for their song “Kiss the
Girl,” which was beat out by another, even catchier number from the film:
Sebastian’s “Under the Sea.” Alan Menken earned an award for his score.

After regaining its status as an animator with a spate of releases during the
1990s, Disney again turned to Andersen as source material for The Emperor’s
New Groove (2000). Written by David Reynolds and directed by Mark Dindal,
the film takes Andersen’s “The Emperor’s New Clothes” as a loose premise and
plays upon it most creatively. The result is a fun-filled romp, with the Peruvian
emperor Kuzco, played with sarcastic relish by David Spade, changed into a
Ilama by his embittered adviser Yzma (Eartha Kitt). The Emperor’s New Groove
is an episodic journey filled with gags and spectacle, plus musical offerings such
as the occasional buddy song sung by Kuzco and John Goodman’s Pacha (a
peasant whom Kuzco had earlier threatened to banish) and Tom Jones’s crooning
contribution, “Perfect World.” The Emperor’s New Groove earned an Academy
Award nomination for Best Song, for “My Funny Friend and Me,” composed by
Sting and David Hartley, and performed by Sting.

Disney is not the only film studio to have produced remarkable films based on
Andersen’s fairy tales. Paul Grimault and Jacques Prévert produced one of the
finest animation films, Le Roi et l’Osieau (The King and the Bird, 1979), based
on “The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep.” In addition, film studios in
Russia, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Czechoslovakia, Germany, and Canada
have produced more than thirty films based on such popular tales as “The
Princess on the Pea,” “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” and “The Little Mermaid.”

Music

It is fitting that many composers have paid tribute to Andersen with their music,
as his remarkable singing voice inspired the childhood nickname “Nightingale”
and he later became an accomplished librettist. He counted among his friends
composers Robert Schumann, Felix Mendelssohn, Richard Wagner, Franz Liszt,
and many others.

Charting Andersen’s influence in Scandinavia alone, Danish author Gustav

Hetsch, in H. C. Andersen and Music (1930), listed twenty-nine Nordic
composers who had set music to Andersen’s tales and poems or who had written
music inspired by Andersen’s life. Christoph Weyse, a Danish composer who
was known mainly for his sacred music and songs, and in 1819 was appointed
court composer, became Andersen’s first benefactor. Along with Danish poet and
dramatist Adam Oehlenschläger, Andersen wrote five cantatas (singspiels) and
one light opera for Weyse. And Andersen wrote operatic libretti to two works by
Sir Walter Scott, both produced in 1832: Weyse’s Kenilworth and I. Bredal’s The
Bride of Lammermoor. Andersen’s close friend Schumann based his “Five
Songs” (1840) on five pieces from Andersen’s oeuvre of more than a thousand
poems. For another collaborator, J. P. E. Hartmann, Andersen wrote the libretto
to Little Kirsten (1846), which remains one of the most popular Danish operas.

By this time, Andersen was seen as a literary giant and a national hero. At the
relatively young age of forty-five, he completed an epic homage to his
homeland, In Denmark I Was Born, that was rendered into music by Henrik
Rung (1850); in 1926 Poul Schierbeck premiered his own version, which pays
tribute to Andersen and Rung. In 1865 Andersen met Norway’s preeminent
composer, Edvard Grieg, in Copenhagen. Their resulting friendship led to
Grieg’s collection “The Heart’s Melodies,” which features songs inspired by
Andersen, including two for piano and soprano: the teasing, playful “Two Brown
Eyes” and “I Love You,” which sounds like a cross between a jazz ballad and a
Danish show tune.

After Andersen’s death, musical compositions inspired by his writings
multiplied and today show no sign of abating. A list of these, by no means
comprehensive, includes Johan Bartoldy’s operetta The Swineherd (1886); Igor
Stravinsky’s brief opera The Nightingale (1914); Finn Høffding’s It’s Perfectly
True (1943); Frank Loesser’s musical film Hans Christian Andersen (1952); the
symphonic works The Most Incredible Thing (1997), by Sven Erik Werner, and
The Woman with the Eggs (1998), by the Danish composer known only as
Fuzzy; and Svend Hvidtfelt Nielsen’s chamber opera The Little Mermaid (1999-
2000).

Comments

Questions

In this section, we aim to provide the reader with an array of perspectives on the
texts, as well as questions that challenge those perspectives. The commentary
has been culled from sources as diverse as reviews contemporaneous with the
works, letters written by the author, literary criticism of later generations, and
appreciations written throughout the works’ history. Following the commentary,
a series of questions seeks to filter Hans Christian Andersen’s Fairy Tales
through a variety of points of view and bring about a richer understanding of
these enduring works.

COMMENTS

Søren Kierkegaard [H. C. Andersen] cannot separate the poetic from himself,
because, so to speak, he cannot get rid of it, but as soon as a poetic mood has
acquired freedom to act, this is immediately overwhelmed, with or without his
will, by the prosaic—precisely therefore it is impossible to obtain a total
impression.... Andersen totally lacks a life-view.
—as translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong, from From the Papers of
One Still Living: Published Against His Will (1838)

Charles Dickens

Whatever you do, do not stop writing, because we cannot bear to lose a single
one of your thoughts. They are too true and simply beautiful to be kept safe only
in your own head.
—from an undated letter (most likely 1847)

L. Frank Baum

The winged fairies of Grimm and Andersen have brought more happiness to
childish hearts than all other human creations.

—from his introduction to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900)

Hilaire Belloc

What a great thing it is in this perplexed, confused, and, if not unhappy at least
unrestful time, to come across a thing which is cleanly itself! What a pleasure it
is amid our entwining controversies to find straightness, and among our
confused noises a chord. Hans Christian Andersen is a good type of that
simplicity; and his own generation recognised him at once; now, when those
contemporaries who knew him best are for the most part dead, their recognition
is justified. Of men for whom so much and more is said by their contemporaries,
how many can stand the test which his good work now stands, and stands with a
sort of sober triumph? Contemporary praise has a way of gathering dross. We all
know why. There is the fear of this, the respect for that; there is the genuine
unconscious attachment to a hundred unworthy and ephemeral things; there is
the chance philosophy of the moment overweighing the praise-giver. In a word,
perhaps not half a dozen of the great men who wrote in the generation before our
own would properly stand this test of a neat and unfringed tradition....

Andersen could not only tell the truth but tell it in twenty different ways, and
of a hundred different things. Now this character has been much exaggerated
among literary men in importance, because literary men, perceiving it to be the
differentiation which marks out the great writer from the little, think it to be the
main criterion of letters. It is not the main criterion; but it is a permanent
necessity in great writing. There is no great writing without this multiplicity,
which is sometimes called imagination, sometimes experience, and sometimes
judgment, but which is in its essence a proper survey of the innumerable world.
This quality it is which makes the great writers create what are called
“characters”; and whether we recognise those “characters” as portraits drawn
from the real world (they are such in Balzac), or as figments (they are such in
Dickens), or as heroines and heroes (they are such in Shakespeare and in Homer,
if you will excuse me), yet that they exist and live in the pages of the writer
means that he had in him that quality of contemplation which corresponds in our
limited human nature to the creative power.

—from On Anything (1910)

William Dean Howells

Never has a beautiful talent needed an introduction less than Hans Christian
Andersen from the sort of glibness which is asked to officiate in that way at
lectures and public meetings and in the forefront of books. Every one knows
who this gentle Dane was, and almost every one knows what he did.... I suppose
there never were stories with so little harm in them, so much good. Each of them
has a moral, but so neatly tucked away that it does not stick out at the end as
morals usually do, particularly in stories meant for children, but [it] is mostly
imparted with the sort of gay wisdom which a friendly grown-up uses with the
children when they do not know whether he is funning or not. The great beauty
of them is the homely tenderness which they are full of, the kind of hospitality
which welcomes all sorts and conditions of children to the same intimacy. They
are of a simplicity always so refined that there is no touch of coarseness in them;
with their perfect naturalness they are of a delicate artistry which will take the
young children unaware of its perfection, and will only steal into their
consciousness perhaps when they are very old children. Some may never live to
feel the art, but they will feel the naturalness at once.

How wholesome, how good, how true, how lovely! That is what I think, when
I think of any of Andersen’s stories, but perhaps I think it most when I read “The
Ugly Ducking,” which is the allegory of his own life, finding its way to fame
and honor through many kinds of difficulty and discouragement from others and
from the consequences of his own defects and foibles. Nobody could have
written those benignant fables, those loving parables, who had not suffered from
impatience and misunderstanding such as Andersen exaggerates in his
autobiography and travesties in that story; and his rise to good will above the
snubs and hurts which he somewhat too plaintively records is as touching a thing
as I know in literary history. His sole revenge takes in that sweet satire, and it is
no great excess after owning himself an ugly duckling if he comes at last to see
himself a swan. He was indeed a swan as compared with most ducklings that
grow up to ordinary proportions of ducks from their humble origin, but I do not
care if in his own nature and evolution he did not always get beyond a goose.
There are many ducklings who do not get as far as being geese, and I mean what
I say for high praise of our poet. Swans are magnificent birds, and as long as
they keep in the water or the sky they are superbly graceful, with necks that
curve beyond anything, but they are of no more use in the world than eagles;

they have very bad tempers, and they bite abominably, and strike with their
wings with force to break a man’s bones, so that I would have ugly ducklings
mostly stop short of becoming swans.

But here I am, trying to put a moral in the poet’s mouth, not reflecting that a
moral is the last thing he means in his fairy tales and wonder stories. They are of
a witchery far beyond sermoning, in that quaint humor, that subtle suggestion,
that fidelity to what we know of ourselves, of our small passions and vanities
and follies as young children and our full-sized faults as old ones. You might go
through them all with no more sense of instruction, if you pleased, than you
would feel in walking out in a pleasant country, with here and there a friendly
homestead, flocks grazing, and boys and girls playing. But perhaps such a scene,
such a mild experience, makes one think as well as a direct appeal to one’s
reason or conscience. The children, however, need not be afraid. I think I could
safely assure the worst of them (and how much better the worst of them are than
the best of us!) that they can get back to themselves from this book, for the
present at least, with no more trouble of spirit, if they choose, than if they had
been reading the Arabian Nights. Long afterward it may be that, when they have
forgotten many Arabian Nights, something will come to them out of a dim
memory of these fairy tales and wonder stories, and they will realize that our
dear Hans Christian Andersen meant so and so for their souls’ good when he
seemed to be merely amusing them. I hope so.

—from his Introduction to

Hans Andersen’s Fairy Tales and Wonder Stories (1914)

W. H. Auden

Hans Andersen, so far as I know, was the first man to take the fairy tale as a
literary form and invent new ones deliberately. Some of his stories are, like those
of Perrault, a reworking of folk material—“The Wild Swans,” for example, is
based on two stories in the Grimm collection, “The Six Swans,” and “The
Twelve Brothers”—but his best tales, like “The Snow Queen,” or “The Hardy
Tin Soldier,” or “The Ice Maiden” are not only new in material but as
unmistakeably Andersen’s as if they were modern novels.

—from his introduction to Tales of Grimm and Andersen (1952)

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)

QUESTIONS

1. 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.

. “Andersen in Time and Place—Time and Place in Andersen.” In Hans
Christian Andersen: A Poet in Time, edited by Johan de Mylius, Aage Jørgensen,
and Viggo Hjørnager Pedersen. Odense: Odense University Press, 1999, pp. 87-
108.

Johnson, Spencer. The Value of Fantasy: The Story of Hans Christian Andersen.
La Jolla, CA: Value Communications, 1979.

Jones, W. Glyn. Denmark. New York: Praeger, 1970.

. “Andersen and Those of Other Faiths.” In Hans Christian Andersen: A Poet in
Time, edited by Johan de Mylius, Aage Jørgensen, and Viggo Hjørnager
Pedersen. Odense: Odense University Press, 1999, pp. 259-270.

Jørgensen, Aage. Hans Christian Andersen Through the European Looking
Glass. Odense: Odense University Press, 1998.

Koelb, Clayton. “The Rhetoric of Ethical Engagement.” In his Inventions of
Reading: Rhetoric and the Literary Imagination. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University
Press, 1988, pp. 202-219.

Kofoed, Niels. “Hans Christian Andersen and the European Literary Tradition.”
In Hans Christian Andersen: Danish Writer and Citizen of the World, edited by
Sven Rossel. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996, pp. 209-356.

Lederer, Wolfgang. The Kiss of the Snow Queen: Hans Christian Andersen and
Man ’s Redemption by Women. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986.

Manning-Sanders, Ruth. Swan of Denmark: The Story of Hans Christian
Andersen. London: Heinemann, 1949.

Marker, Frederick. Hans Christian Andersen and the Romantic Theatre: A Study
of Stage Practices in the Prenaturalistic Scandinavian Theatre. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1971.

Massengale, James. “The Miracle and A Miracle in the Life of a Mermaid.” In
Hans Christian Andersen: A Poet in Time, edited by Johan de Mylius, Aage
Jørgensen, and Viggo Hjørager Pedersen. Odense: Odense University Press,
1999, pp. 555-576.

Meynell, Esther. The Story of Hans Andersen. New York: Henry Schuman, 1950.

Mishler, William, “H. C. Andersen’s ‘Tin Soldier’ in a Freudian Perspective.”
Scandinavian Studies 50 (1978), pp. 389-395.

Mitchell, P. M. A History of Danish Literature. Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1957,
pp. 150-160.

Mortensen, Finn Hauberg. A Tale of Tales: Hans Christian Andersen and Danish
Children’s Literature. Four parts in 2 vols. Minneapolis: Center for Nordic
Studies, University of Minnesota, 1989.

Mouritsen, Flemming. “Children’s Literature.” In A History of Danish
Literature, edited by Sven Rossel. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992,
pp. 609-631.

Mudrick, Marvin. “The Ugly Duck.” Scandinavian Review 68 (1980), pp. 34-48.

Mylius, Johan de. The Voice of Nature in Hans Christian Andersen’s Fairy Tales.
Odense: Odense University Press, 1989.

. “Hans Christian Andersen and the Music World.” In Hans Christian Andersen:
Danish Writer and Citizen of the World, edited by Sven Rossel. Amsterdam:
Rodopi, 1996, pp. 176-208.

Mylius, Johan de, Aage Jørgensen, and Viggo Hjørnager Pedersen, eds. Hans
Christian Andersen: A Poet in Time. Odense: Odense University Press, 1999.

Nielsen, Erling. Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875): The Writer Everybody
Reads and Loves, and Nobody Knows. Copenhagen: Royal Danish Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, 1983.

Pedersen, Viggo Hjørnager. Ugly Ducklings? Studies in the English Translations
of Hans Christian Andersen’s Tales and Stories. Odense: University Press of
Southern Denmark, 2004.

Prince, Alison. Hans Christian Andersen: The Fan Dancer. London: Allison and
Busby, 1998.

Reumert, Elith. Hans Christian Andersen the Man. Translated by Jessie
Bröchner. London: Methuen, 1927.

Robb, N. A. “Hans Christian Andersen.” In Four in Exile. 1948. Port
Washington, NY: Kennikat Press, 1968, pp. 120-151.

Rossel, Sven, ed. A History of Danish Literature. Lincoln: University of
Nebraska Press, 1992.

, ed. Hans Christian Andersen: Danish Writer and Citizen of the World.
Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1996.

Rubow, Paul V. “Idea and Form in Hans Christian Andersen’s Fairy Tales.” In A
Book on the Danish Writer Hans Christian Andersen: His Life and Work.
Copenhagen: Committee for Danish Cultural Activities Abroad, 1955, pp. 97-
135.

Sells, Laura. “‘Where Do the Mermaids Stand?’ Voice and Body in The Little
Mermaid.” In From Mouse to Mermaid: The Politics of Film, Gender, and
Culture, edited by Elizabeth Bell, Lynda Haas, and Laura Sells. Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 1995, pp. 175-192.

Sondrup, Steven, ed. H. C. Andersen: Old Problems and New Readings. Provo,
UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2004.

Spink, Reginald. Hans Christian Andersen and His World. London : Thames and
Hudson, 1972.

Stirling, Monica. The Wild Swan: The Life and Times of Hans Christian
Andersen. London: Collins, 1965.

Toksvig, Signe. The Life of Hans Christian Andersen. London: Macmillan, 1933.

Trites, Roberta. “Disney’s Sub/version of The Little Mermaid.” Journal of
Popular Television and Film 18 (1990/1991), pp. 145-159.

Wullschläger, Jackie. Hans Christian Andersen: The Life of a Storyteller.
London: Allen Lane, 2000.

Zipes, Jack. Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion: The Classical Genre for
Children and the Process of Civilization. London: Heinemann, 1983.

. Hans Christian Andersen: The Misunderstood Storyteller. New York:
Routledge, 2005.

Alphabetical Index of the Tales

Auntie Toothache
Bell, The

Bird Phoenix
Bog King’s Daughter, The Bronze Pig, The
Butterfly, The

Clod Hans
Cripple, The

Darning Needle, The Drop of Water, The Dung Beetle, The

Emperor’s New Clothes, The Everything in its Proper Place Family of Hen-
Grethe, The Flea and the Professor, The Flying Trunk, The Galoshes of Fortune,
The Garden of Eden, The Gardener and the Gentry, The Girl Who Stepped on
Bread, The Hill of the Elves, The Holger the Dane

Ib and Little Christine Ice Maiden, The

In the Duckyard
It’s Perfectly True!

Jewish Maid, The

Little Claus and Big Claus Little Match Girl, The Little Mermaid, The Most
Incredible Thing, The Mother Elderberry Naughty Boy, The

Nightingale, The

Old House, The

Pixie and the Gardener’s Wife, The Pixie at the Grocer’s, The Princess on the
Pea, The Puppeteer, The

Rags, The
Red Shoes, The
Rose Elf, The

Shadow,The

She Was No Good
Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep, The Snow Queen, The
Snowdrop, The
Snowman, The
“Something”49
Spruce Tree, The
Steadfast Tin Soldier, The Storks, The
Story Old Johanna Told, The Sunshine’s Stories, The Swineherd, The

Thorny Path to Glory, The Thumbelina
Tinderbox, The
Traveling Companion, The Ugly Duckling, The What Father Does Is Always
Right What One Can Think Up Wild Swans, The
Will-o’-the-Wisps Are in Town, The