Scan barcode
A review by infinitely
The Complete Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen
3.0
“She laughed and danced with the thought of death in her heart.”
―Hans Christian Andersen, The Complete Fairy Tales (The Little Mermaid)
I've always been interested in fairy tales, and I've been looking for the original versions that were supposedly darker and more twisted. I read The Little Mermaid a few years back and remembered her suffering and ultimate demise, then decided that Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales would be a good place to start. I didn't expect the experience to be this grueling, but here's my review.
I'll talk about what I disliked first - something that really got to me again and again as I read the book was Andersen's tendency to become preachy. Religion was something I did not expect to be shoved in my face as I read children's fairy tales yet there it was. Mentions of Jesus, of God, those are all good and nice, but so many of them became tedious to read and honestly, disheartening. Upon doing some research, I found out that at the time it was expected of tales to be akin to parables and teach morals, though the preachiness was still difficult to stomach. We got stories ranging from wordy descriptions of little children practically weeping for joy at discovering the story of Christ dying on the cross, to women and girls accepting depressing fates or abusive relationships because they were the "will of God", and I almost put the book down because of these.
And now we move on to what made me keep reading the book. The stories which were intended to be darker, to me, they were great. Andersen has a way of talking about events in such a matter of fact way, that, as a reader I would feel bad for the character but at the same time just accept their miserable destinies. These particular stories also came with more compelling plots - there were messages to unpack that went beyond "If you do wrong God will punish you, and if you do good, you'll go to heaven."
Andersen's writing, though, is what I enjoyed the most. For something that wasn't exactly modern English, I found it pleasantly readable. The tone he employs is similar to a friend telling you about gossip he heard this morning, and the use of certain expressions (capital!) and the enthusiastic punctuations really made a lot of the stories hearty, fun reads. I'm not quite sure if a lot of other fairy tale authors talk in the same colloquial manner (I will do my best to find out) but it really increased my enjoyment of this series of short stories.
Overall: This is good writing, and some of the stories in the collection are absolute gems. I personally think a selection of stories is really enough and maybe I just bit off more than I could chew reading a complete works edition of Andersen's fairy tales. Still, I'm listing my personal favorites below and looking forward to reading more fairy tales in the future.
3/5
My favorites from H. C. Andersen's Complete Fairy Tales
The Tinder Box
Little Claus and Big Claus
The Travelling Companion
The Little Mermaid
The Brave Tin Soldier
The Wild Swans
The Nightingale
The Shadow* (my top pick!)
The Old Grave-Stone
“There Is No Doubt About It”
Everything in Its Right Place
The Bottle Neck
Soup from a Sausage Skewer
The Old Bachelor’s Nightcap
Something
A Story from the Sand-Hills
The Ice Maiden
The Psyche
“Delaying is Not Forgetting”
The Thistle’s Experiences
Poultry Meg’s Family