There are few people in the world who are not familiar with the name of the great writer Hans Christian Andersen. More than one generation has grown up with the works of this master of the pen, whose works have been translated into 150 languages of the world. In almost every home, parents read fairy tales to their children before bed about the Princess and the Pea, the Spruce Tree and little Thumbelina, whom the field mouse tried to marry off to the greedy mole neighbor. Or children watch films and cartoons about the Little Mermaid or about the girl Gerda, who dreamed of rescuing Kai from the cold hands of the callous Snow Queen.
The world described by Andersen is amazing and beautiful. But along with magic and flights of fancy, his tales contain philosophical thought, because the writer dedicated his creativity to both children and adults. Many critics agree that underneath the surface of naivety and simple style Andersen's narrative contains a deep meaning, the task of which is to give the reader the necessary food for thought.
Childhood and youth
Hans Christian Andersen (common Russian spelling, Hans Christian would be more correct) was born on April 2, 1805 in the third largest city in Denmark - Odense. Some biographers claimed that Andersen was the illegitimate son of the Danish king Christian VIII, but in fact the future writer grew up and was brought up in a poor family. His father, also named Hans, worked as a shoemaker and barely made ends meet, and his mother Anna Marie Andersdatter worked as a laundress and was an illiterate woman.
The head of the family believed that his ancestry began from a noble dynasty: the paternal grandmother told her grandson that their family belonged to a privileged social class, but these speculations were not confirmed and were disputed over time. There are many rumors about Andersen’s relatives, which to this day excite the minds of readers. For example, they say that the writer’s grandfather, a carver by profession, was considered crazy in the town because he made strange figures of people with wings that looked like angels out of wood.
Hans Sr. introduced the child to literature. He read “1001 Nights” to his son - traditional Arabian tales. Therefore, every evening little Hans plunged into the magical stories of Scheherazade. Father and son also loved to take walks in the park in Odense and even visited the theater, which made an indelible impression on the boy. In 1816, the writer's father died.
The real world was a harsh test for Hans, he grew up as an emotional, nervous and sensitive child. In this state of mind Andersen is to blame for the local bully, who simply handed out blows, and the teachers, because in those troubled times, punishment with canings was commonplace, so the future writer considered school an unbearable torture.
When Andersen flatly refused to attend classes, his parents sent the young man to a charity school for poor children. Having received primary education, Hans became an apprentice weaver, then retrained as a tailor, and later worked in a cigarette factory.
Relations with Andersen’s colleagues in the shop, to put it mildly, did not work out. He was constantly embarrassed by the vulgar anecdotes and narrow-minded jokes of the workers, and once, amid general laughter, Hans's pants were pulled down to make sure whether he was a boy or a girl. And all because as a child the writer had a thin voice and often sang during his shifts. This event forced the future writer to completely withdraw into himself. The young man's only friends were wooden dolls once made by his father.
When Hans was 14 years old, in search of better life he moved to Copenhagen, which at that time was considered the "Scandinavian Paris". Anna Marie thought that Andersen would go to the capital of Denmark for a short time, so she let her beloved son go with a light heart. Hans left his father's house because he dreamed of becoming famous, wanted to learn the craft of acting and play on the theater stage in classical productions. It is worth saying that Hans was a lanky young man with a long nose and limbs, for which he received the offensive nicknames “stork” and “lamppost”.
Andersen was also teased as a child as a “play writer,” because in the boy’s house there was a toy theater with rag “actors.” An industrious young man with a funny appearance gave the impression of an ugly duckling who was accepted into the Royal Theater out of pity, and not because he had an excellent soprano voice. On the stage of the theater Hans performed minor roles. But soon his voice began to break, so his classmates, who considered Andersen primarily a poet, advised the young man to concentrate on literature.
Jonas Collin, a Danish statesman who was in charge of finances during the reign of Frederick VI, was very fond of the unlikeable young man and convinced the king to pay for the education of the young writer.
Andersen studied at the prestigious schools of Slagelse and Elsinore (where he sat at the same desk with students 6 years younger than himself) at the expense of the treasury, although he was not a zealous student: Hans never mastered literacy and made numerous spelling and punctuation errors all his life in a letter. The storyteller later recalled that student years he had nightmares, because the rector constantly criticized the young man to smithereens, and, as you know, Andersen did not like this.
Literature
During his lifetime, Hans Christian Andersen wrote poems, stories, novels and ballads. But for all readers, his name is primarily associated with fairy tales - the master of the pen has 156 works on his track record. However, Hans did not like to be called a children's writer, and stated that he wrote for both boys and girls, as well as for adults. It got to the point that Andersen ordered that there should not be a single child on his monument, although initially the monument should have been surrounded by children.
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Ugly Duckling" Hans gained recognition and fame in 1829 when he published the adventure story “A Journey on Foot from the Holmen Canal to the Eastern End of Amager.” Since then, the young writer did not leave his pen and inkwell and wrote literary works one after another, including the fairy tales that made him famous, into which he introduced the system high genres. True, novels, short stories and vaudeville were difficult for the author - at the moments of writing, as if out of spite, he suffered a creative crisis.
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Wild Swans" Andersen drew inspiration from everyday life. In his opinion, everything in this world is beautiful: a flower petal, a small bug, and a spool of thread. Indeed, if we recall the works of the creator, then even every galosh or pea from a pod has amazing biography. Hans was based both on his own imagination and on the motifs of the folk epic, thanks to which he wrote “Flint”, “Wild Swans”, “The Swineherd” and other stories published in the collection “Fairy Tales Told to Children” (1837).
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" Andersen loved to make protagonists characters who are looking for a place in society. This includes Thumbelina, the Little Mermaid, and The ugly duckling. Such heroes evoke the author's sympathy. All Andersen's stories are imbued with philosophical meaning from cover to cover. It is worth remembering the fairy tale “The King’s New Clothes,” where the emperor asks two rogues to sew him an expensive robe. However, the outfit turned out to be complex and consisted entirely of “invisible threads.” The scammers assured the customer that only fools would not see the extremely thin fabric. Thus, the king parades around the palace in an indecent appearance.
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "Thumbelina" He and his courtiers do not notice the intricate dress, but are afraid to make themselves look like fools if they admit that the ruler walks around in what his mother gave birth to. This tale began to be interpreted as a parable, and the phrase “And the king is naked!” included in the list of popular expressions. It is noteworthy that not all Andersen’s fairy tales are imbued with luck; not all of the writer’s manuscripts contain the “deusexmachina” technique, when a random coincidence of circumstances that saves the main character (for example, the prince kisses the poisoned Snow White), as if by God’s will, appears out of nowhere.
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale "The Princess and the Pea" Hans is loved by adult readers because he does not paint a utopian world where everyone lives happily ever after, but, for example, without a twinge of conscience he sends a steadfast tin soldier into a burning fireplace, dooming a lonely man to death. In 1840, the master of the pen tried his hand at the genre of miniature novellas and published the collection “A Book with Pictures without Pictures,” and in 1849 he wrote the novel “Two Baronesses.” Four years later, the book “To Be or Not to Be” was published, but all of Andersen’s attempts to establish himself as a novelist were in vain.
Personal life
The personal life of the failed actor, but eminent writer Andersen is a mystery shrouded in darkness. They say that throughout its existence great writer remained in the dark about intimacy with women or men. There is an assumption that great storyteller was a latent homosexual (as evidenced by the epistolary legacy), he had close friendly relations with his friends Edward Collin, the hereditary Duke of Weimar, and with the dancer Harald Schraff. Although there were three women in Hans’s life, things did not go beyond fleeting sympathy, not to mention marriage.
Andersen's first chosen one was the sister of his schoolmate Riborg Voigt. But the indecisive young man never dared to talk to the object of his desire. Louise Collin, the writer's next potential bride, suppressed any attempts at courtship and ignored the fiery stream of love letters. The 18-year-old girl chose a wealthy lawyer over Andersen.
In 1846, Hans fell in love with the opera singer Jenny Lind, who was nicknamed the “Swedish nightingale” because of her sonorous soprano. Andersen watched over Jenny behind the scenes and presented the beauty with poems and generous gifts. But the charming girl was in no hurry to reciprocate the storyteller’s sympathy, but treated him like a brother. When Andersen found out that the singer had married British composer Otto Goldschmidt, Hans became depressed. Cold at heart Jenny Lind became the prototype of the Snow Queen from the writer's fairy tale of the same name.
Illustration for Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale Snow Queen" Andersen was unlucky in love. Therefore, it is not surprising that the storyteller visited the red light districts upon his arrival in Paris. True, instead of debauching the night away with frivolous young ladies, Hans talked with them, sharing the details of his unhappy life. When one of Andersen’s acquaintances hinted to him that he was visiting brothels for other purposes, the writer was surprised and looked at his interlocutor with obvious disgust.
It is also known that Andersen was a devoted fan; the talented writers met at a literary meeting hosted by Countess Blessington in her salon. After this meeting, Hans wrote in his diary:
“We went out onto the veranda, I was happy to talk with the living writer of England, whom I love best.”
Ten years later, the storyteller returned to England and came as an uninvited guest to Dickens's house, to the detriment of his family. Over time, Charles stopped corresponding with Andersen, and the Dane sincerely did not understand why all his letters remained unanswered.
Death
In the spring of 1872, Andersen fell out of bed, hitting the floor hard, as a result of which he received multiple injuries from which he never recovered.
Later, the writer was diagnosed with liver cancer. On August 4, 1875, Hans died. The great writer is buried in Assistance Cemetery in Copenhagen.
Bibliography
- 1829 – “Journey on foot from the Holmen canal to the eastern cape of the island of Amager”
- 1829 – “Love on the Nicholas Tower”
- 1834 – “Agnetha and Vodyanoy”
- 1835 – “Improviser” (Russian translation – in 1844)
- 1837 – “Only the violinist”
- 1835–1837 – “Fairy Tales Told for Children”
- 1838 – “The Steadfast” tin soldier»
- 1840 – “Picture Book Without Pictures”
- 1843 – “The Nightingale”
- 1843 – “The Ugly Duckling”
- 1844 – “The Snow Queen”
- 1845 – “The Little Match Girl”
- 1847 – “Shadow”
- 1849 – “Two Baronesses”
- 1857 – “To be or not to be”
Christmas card with G.-H. Andersen. Illustrator Klaus Becker - Olsen
The biography of Hans Christian Andersen is the story of a boy from a poor family who, thanks to his talent, became famous throughout the world, was friends with princesses and kings, but remained lonely, scared and touchy all his life.
One of humanity's greatest storytellers was offended even by being called a “children's writer.” He argued that his works were addressed to everyone and considered himself a respectable, “adult” writer and playwright.
On April 2, 1805, the only son, Hans Christian Andersen, was born into the family of shoemaker Hans Andersen and washerwoman Anna Marie Andersdatter in the city of Odense, located on one of the Danish islands of Funen.
Andersen's grandfather, Anders Hansen, a woodcarver, was considered crazy in the city. He carved strange figures of half-humans, half-animals with wings.
Andersen Sr.’s grandmother told him about their ancestors’ belonging to “ high society" Researchers have not found evidence of this story in the storyteller's genealogy.
Perhaps Hans Christian fell in love with fairy tales thanks to his father. Unlike his wife, he knew how to read and write, and read various magical stories aloud to his son, including “A Thousand and One Nights.”
There is also a legend about the royal origin of Hans Christian Andersen. He was allegedly the illegitimate son of King Christian VIII.
In his early autobiography, the storyteller himself wrote about how, as a child, he played with Prince Frits, the future King Frederick VII, the son of Christian VIII. Hans Christian, according to his version, had no friends among the street boys - only the prince.
Andersen's friendship with Frits, the storyteller claimed, continued into adulthood, until the king's death. The writer said that he was the only person, with the exception of relatives, who was allowed to visit the coffin of the deceased.
Hans Christian's father died when he was 11 years old. The boy was sent to study at a school for poor children, which he attended from time to time. He worked as an apprentice for a weaver, then for a tailor.
From childhood, Andersen was in love with the theater and often acted out puppet shows at home.
Twisted in one's own fairy worlds, he grew up as a sensitive, vulnerable boy, his studies were difficult for him, and his less spectacular appearance left almost no chance for theatrical success.
At the age of 14, Andersen went to Copenhagen to become famous, and over time he succeeded!
However, success was preceded by years of failure and even greater poverty than the one in which he lived in Odense.
Young Hans Christian had a wonderful soprano voice. Thanks to him, he was accepted into the boys' choir. Soon his voice began to change and he was fired.
He tried to become a ballet dancer, but also did not succeed. Lanky, awkward and poorly coordinated, Hans Christian turned out to be a useless dancer.
He tried to study physical labor- again without much success.
In 1822, seventeen-year-old Andersen finally got lucky: he met Jonas Collin, director of the Royal Danish Theater (De Kongelige Teater). Hans Christian at that time had already tried his hand at writing; he wrote, however, mostly poetry.
Jonas Collin was familiar with Andersen's work. In his opinion, young man had the makings of a great writer. He was able to convince King Frederick VI of this. He agreed to partially pay for Hans Christian's education.
For the next five years, the young man studied at schools in Slagelse and Helsingør. Both are located near Copenhagen. Helsingør Castle is world famous as a place
Hans Christian Andersen was not an outstanding student. In addition, he was older than his classmates, they teased him, and the teachers laughed at the son of an illiterate washerwoman from Odense, who was going to become a writer.
In addition, modern researchers suggest that Hans Christian most likely had dyslexia. It was probably because of her that he studied poorly and wrote Danish with errors for the rest of his life.
Andersen called his years of study the most bitter time of his life. What it was like for him is perfectly described in the fairy tale “The Ugly Duckling.”
In 1827, due to constant bullying, Jonas Collin removed Hans Christian from school in Helsingør and transferred him to home schooling in Copenhagen.
In 1828, Andersen passed an exam indicating his completion of secondary education and allowing him to continue his studies at the University of Copenhagen.
A year later to to a young writer The first success came after the publication of a story, a comedy and several poems.
In 1833, Hans Christian Andersen received a royal grant that allowed him to travel. He spent the next 16 months traveling through Germany, Switzerland, Italy and France.
The Danish writer especially loved Italy. The first journey was followed by others. In total, throughout his life he went on long trips abroad about 30 times.
In total, he spent about 15 years traveling.
Many have heard the phrase “to travel is to live.” Not everyone knows that this is a quote from Andersen.
In 1835, Andersen's first novel, The Improviser, was published, which became popular immediately after publication. In the same year, a collection of fairy tales was published, which also earned praise from the reading public.
The four fairy tales included in the book were written for a little girl named Ide Thiele, the daughter of the secretary of the Academy of Arts. In total, Hans Christian Andersen published about 160 fairy tales - despite the fact that he himself was not married, did not have, and did not particularly like children.
In the early 1840s, the writer began to gain fame outside Denmark. When he came to Germany in 1846, and the following year to England, he was received there as a foreign celebrity.
In Great Britain, the son of a shoemaker and a washerwoman was invited to high society receptions. At one of them he met Charles Dickens.
Shortly before Hans Christian Andersen's death, he was recognized in England as the greatest living writer.
Meanwhile, during the Victorian era, his works were published in Great Britain not in translations, but in “retellings”. IN original fairy tales The Danish writer has a lot of sadness, violence, cruelty and even death.
They did not correspond to the ideas of the British of the second half of the 19th century century about children's literature. Therefore, before publishing on English the most “unchildish” fragments were removed from the works of Hans Christian Andersen.
To this day, in the UK, the books of the Danish writer are published in two very different versions - in classic “retellings” victorian era and in more modern translations that correspond to the original texts.
Andersen was tall, thin and stooped. He loved to visit and never refused a treat (perhaps this was due to his hungry childhood).
However, he himself was generous, treated friends and acquaintances, came to their rescue and tried not to refuse help even to strangers.
The storyteller’s character was very bad and alarming: he was afraid of robberies, dogs, losing his passport; I was afraid of dying in a fire, so I always carried a rope with me so that during a fire I could get out through the window.
Hans Christian Andersen suffered from toothache all his life, and seriously believed that his fertility as an author depended on the number of teeth in his mouth.
The storyteller was afraid of poisoning - when Scandinavian children chipped in for a gift for their favorite writer and sent him the world's largest box chocolates, he refused the gift in horror and sent it to his nieces (we have already mentioned that he did not particularly like children).
In the mid-1860s, Hans Christian Andersen became the owner of the autograph of the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin.
While traveling around Switzerland, in August 1862 he met the daughters of the Russian general Karl Manderstern. In his diary, he described frequent meetings with young women, during which they talked a lot about literature and art.
In a letter dated August 28, 1868, Andersen wrote: “I am glad to know that my works are read in the great, mighty Russia, whose flourishing literature I partially know, from Karamzin to Pushkin and right up to modern times.”
The eldest of the Manderstern sisters, Elizaveta Karlovna, promised the Danish writer to get Pushkin’s autograph for his collection of manuscripts.
She was able to fulfill her promise three years later.
Thanks to her, the Danish writer became the owner of a page from a notebook, into which in 1825, while preparing his first collection of poems for publication, Alexander Pushkin rewrote several works he had selected.
Pushkin's autograph, now in the collection of Andersen's manuscripts in the Copenhagen Royal Library, is all that has survived from the 1825 notebook.
Among Hans Christian Andersen's friends were royalty. It is known for sure that he was patronized by the Danish princess Dagmar, the future Empress Maria Feodorovna, the latter’s mother Russian Emperor Nicholas II.
The princess was very kind to the elderly writer. They talked for a long time while walking along the embankment.
Hans Christian Andersen was among those Danes who accompanied her to Russia. After parting with the young princess, he wrote in his diary: “Poor child! Almighty, be merciful and merciful to her. Her fate is terrible."
The storyteller's prediction came true. Maria Feodorovna was destined to outlive the dead terrible death husband, children and grandchildren.
In 1919 she managed to leave the engulfed civil war Russia. She died in Denmark in 1928.
Researchers in the biography of Hans Christian Andersen do not have a clear answer to the question of his sexual orientation. He undoubtedly wanted to please women. However, it is known that he fell in love with girls with whom he could not have a relationship.
In addition, he was very shy and awkward, especially in the presence of women. The writer knew about this, which only increased his awkwardness when communicating with the opposite sex.
In 1840, in Copenhagen, he met a girl named Jenny Lind. On September 20, 1843, he wrote in his diary “I love!” He dedicated poems to her and wrote fairy tales for her. She addressed him exclusively as “brother” or “child,” although he was nearly 40 and she was only 26 years old. In 1852 Jenny Lind married young pianist Otto Goldschmidt.
In 2014, Denmark announced that previously unknown letters from Hans Christian Andersen had been found.
In them, the writer confessed to his longtime friend Christian Voight that several poems he wrote after Riborg’s marriage were inspired by his feelings for the girl whom he called the love of his life.
Judging by the fact that he carried a letter from Riborg in a pouch around his neck until his death, Andersen really loved the girl throughout his life.
Other famous personal letters from the storyteller suggest that he may have had a connection with the Danish ballet dancer Harald Scharff. There are also known comments from contemporaries about their alleged relationship.
However, there is no evidence that Hans Christian Andersen was bisexual - and it is unlikely that there will ever be any.
The writer to this day remains a mystery, a unique personality, whose thoughts and feelings were and remain shrouded in mystery.
Andersen did not want to have his own home, he was especially afraid of furniture, and of furniture, most of all, beds. The writer feared that the bed would become the place of his death. His fears were partly justified. At the age of 67, he fell out of bed and received severe injuries, which he treated for another three years, until his death.
It is believed that in old age Andersen became even more extravagant: spending a lot of time in brothels, he did not touch the girls who worked there, but simply talked to them.
Although almost a century and a half has passed since the death of the storyteller, previously unknown documents telling about his life, letters from Hans Christian Andersen are still found from time to time in his homeland
In 2012, a previously unknown fairy tale called “The Tallow Candle” was discovered in Denmark.
"This sensational discovery. On the one hand, because this is most likely Andersen’s very first fairy tale, on the other hand, it shows that he was interested in fairy tales at a young age, before he became a writer,” Einar, a specialist in Andersen’s work, said about the find Stig Askgaard from the Odense City Museum.
He also suggested that the discovered manuscript “Tallow Candle” was created by the storyteller while still at school - around 1822.
The project for the first monument to Hans Christian Andersen began to be discussed during his lifetime.
In December 1874, in connection with the approaching seventieth birthday of the storyteller, plans were announced to install a sculptural image of him in the Royal Garden of Rosenborg Castle, where he loved to walk.
A commission was assembled and a competition of projects was announced. 10 participants proposed a total of 16 works.
The winner was the project by August Sobue. The sculptor depicted the storyteller sitting in a chair surrounded by children. The project outraged Hans Christian.
“I couldn’t say a word in such an atmosphere,” said writer Augusto Sobue. The sculptor removed the children, and Hans Christian was left alone - with only one book in his hands.
Hans Christian Andersen died on August 4, 1875 from liver cancer. The day of Andersen's funeral was declared a day of mourning in Denmark.
Members of the royal family attended the farewell ceremony.
Located in the Assistance Cemetery in Copenhagen.
The biography of Hans Christian Andersen is the topic of this article. The years of life of this great writer are 1805-1875. Hans was born in Odense, a Danish city located on the island of Funen. Photo of Andersen Hans Christian is presented below.
His father was a shoemaker and a dreamer; most of all he loved to make various toys. He was in poor health and died when Hans was 9 years old. Maria, the boy's mother, worked as a laundress. The need that arose after the death of her husband forced this woman to send her son to a cloth factory as a worker, and then to a tobacco factory, but here he mainly entertained the workers by singing, and also acted out scenes from Golberg and Shakespeare.
First appearance on stage
As a teenager, Hans Christian read a lot, put up posters and was interested in the theater. In the summer of 1918, actors from the city of Copenhagen toured in Odense. For crowd scenes Everyone was invited. This is how Andersen got on stage. His diligence was noted, which gave the boy incredible dreams and great hopes.
The photo below shows the house in Odense where the future writer lived during his childhood.
Andersen sets off to conquer Copenhagen, patronage of Sibony
The biography of Hans Christian Andersen continued in Copenhagen. A 14-year-old theatergoer decided to go here and appear before the ballerina Schall, the prima of the local theater. He sang and danced in front of her. Prima thought he was a crazy tramp. A visit to the director also yielded nothing. He found Andersen too thin and lacking the appearance necessary for an actor (the fairy tale “The Ugly Duckling” he wrote in the future was already outlined). Then Hans went to the singer Sibony, whom he managed to conquer with his singing. A subscription was organized in favor of Andersen. Sibony began giving him singing and music lessons. However, Andersen lost his voice six months later, and the singer invited him to return home.
New patrons and first debut
Hans had incredible tenacity. He was able to find new patrons - the poet Guldberg, whose brother he knew from Odense, and the dancer Dalen. The latter taught the boy dancing, and the poet taught German and Danish. Hans Christian soon made his debut on the stage of the local royal theater, in the ballet "Armide", performing a minor role of the 7th troll, of which there were only 8. He also sometimes sang in the choir of warriors and shepherds.
Hans, having made friends with the librarian, began to spend most of his time among books, and also began to compose poems himself (decorating them without much embarrassment with stanzas from famous poets), after which - tragedies ("Alfsol", "Robbers in Wissenberg"). Its first editor and reader was the poet Guldberg.
Studying at the Latin school and at the university, first works
The theater directorate eventually managed to secure a royal scholarship for the aspiring playwright. He also received the right to study for free at a Latin school, where he spent 5 years. In 1828, Andersel passed the entrance exams to the University of Copenhagen. By this time he was the author of two poems that were published - “The Dying Child” and “Evening”.
A year later, from his pen, the work “Journey on Foot...” appears, full of humor and imagination. At the same time, Andersen's vaudeville "Love on St. Nicholas Tower" was staged on the stage of the Copenhagen Theatre. The audience greeted this production favorably. In 1830, Andersen published a collection of poetry, which included the fairy tale “The Dead Man” as an appendix.
First love
At the same time, the writer Hans Christian Andersen falls in love. The sister of one of his university friends becomes the cause of Andersen's insomnia at night. This girl came from a burgher family with moderate ideals, in which wealth was valued above all else. The parents did not like the poor writer at all. In addition, his mother was in an almshouse. The fact is that Maria, after the death of her second husband, lost a lot. She started drinking, and the neighbors decided to place the woman in a nursing home.
Traveling through Germany and creative crisis
Andersen's beloved refused him, preferring the pharmacist's son. In order to cure Hans of love, Collin, his wealthy patron, sent him on a trip to Germany. Andersen brought from there the book “Shadow Pictures” (year of creation - 1831), which he wrote under the influence of Heine’s work “Travel Pictures”. In this work Hans is still timid, but fairy-tale motifs have already begun to sound.
Let us continue to describe the life and work of Hans Christian Andersen. Lack of money and a creative crisis forced him to begin compiling a libretto based on the works of W. Scott, which critics really did not like. They began to remind him more and more often that he was the son of a shoemaker and should not be arrogant. Andersen eventually managed to present the King of Denmark with his second book of poems, Fantasies and Sketches. He accompanied his gift with a request for assistance for a trip abroad. The request was granted, and the writer went to Italy and France in 1833. During this journey, his mother died in an almshouse. Strange hands covered her eyes.
Meeting with Heine
Andersen met with Heine, his idol, in Paris. The acquaintance, however, was limited to a few walks along the boulevards of Paris. Andersen admired this man as a poet, but was wary of him as an atheist and freethinker. In Paris, Hans began to write a drama in verse, Agneta and the Vodyanoy, completed in Italy.
Novel "The Improviser"
Italy served as the setting for the 1935 novel The Improviser. It was translated in 1844 in Russia and received a review by V. Belinsky himself. True, only the Italian landscapes, brilliantly painted by Andersen, received praise. The Russian critic, one might say, saw through the main character, without suspecting how biographical he was. After all, it was not the “enthusiastic Italian”, but Hans Christian himself who suffered from dependence on patrons of the arts, and it was he who broke up “due to a misunderstanding” with his first lover.
Second love
With the second girl who touched Andersen’s heart, the daughter of Collin, his patron, nothing but brotherly love also happened. Collin himself patronized him willingly, but did not at all want to get the poet as his son-in-law. After all, Hans Christian Andersen, whose work and position were of interest only to art connoisseurs, was a man with a very unstable future. Therefore, a caring father chose a lawyer for his daughter.
Last attempt to get married
Another woman whom the Italian poet from the work “The Improviser” decided to marry also appeared in the fate of its author. This is Jenny Lind, the singer who was called the "Swedish nightingale." They met in 1843, in which the fairy tale “The Nightingale” was born.
This acquaintance took place during the singer’s tour in Denmark. The word “love” flashed again in Andersen’s diary, but the matter did not come to verbal explanations. At the farewell banquet, Ienny made a toast in honor of the writer, inviting him to become her “brother.” This is where Hans Christian Andersen, whose work and biography interests us, ended his attempts to get married. Apparently, he was afraid that Madonna would punish him for his “secular path of life.” The personal life of Hans Christian Andersen, unfortunately, did not work out.
First fairy tales
Another novel was published after The Improviser - Only the Violinist (in 1837). Between the two novels, 2 issues of “Fairy Tales Told to Children” appeared. No one paid attention at that time to these works that Hans Christian Andersen created. A biography for children and adults of the writer we are interested in, however, should not miss this important point. Soon the third issue was published. The collections include classic fairy tales: “The Little Mermaid”, “The Princess and the Pea”, “Flint”, “The King’s New Clothes” and others.
Creative flourishing
The late 30s and 40s saw Andersen's creative heyday. Such masterpieces of his appeared as “The Steadfast Tin Soldier” (written in 1838), “The Ugly Duckling” and “The Nightingale” (in 1843), “The Snow Queen” (in 1844), and the next one - “The Little Match Girl”, then - "Shadow" (1847) and others.
Andersen at this time again visited Paris (in 1843), where he again met with Heine. He greeted him as an equal and was delighted with Andersen’s fairy tales. Hans became a European celebrity. Since then, he began to call the collections of his works “New Fairy Tales,” thereby emphasizing the fact that they are addressed to both children and adults.
In 1846, Hans Christian Andersen wrote an autobiography called The Tale of My Life. The biography for children and adults is written sincerely and frankly. Andersen spoke about himself very touchingly in the third person, as if creating another fairy tale. And indeed, fame came to this writer in a fabulous, unforeseen way.
Two interesting episodes from Andersen's life
The biography of Hans Christian Andersen is marked by one funny incident. It happened in 1847, during Hans's trip to England. The writer, having examined ancient castle, decided to leave his autograph in the visitors' book. Suddenly, the gatekeeper turned to his companion, an important elderly banker, believing that it was Andersen. Upon learning that he was mistaken, the gatekeeper exclaimed: “So young? And I thought that writers only become famous in old age.”
England gave another pleasant meeting to the Danish storyteller. Here he met Dickens, the author of The Cricket on the Stove and Oliver Twist, whom he loved very much. It turned out that Dickens loved fairy tales and stories by Hans Christian Andersen. Since the writers did not know each other's languages, they communicated using gestures. Touched, Dickens waved his handkerchief to Andersen from the pier for a long time.
Completion of life's journey
Last of all, as often happens, recognition for this writer came in his homeland. The sculptor showed him the project: Andersen, surrounded by children on all sides. However, Hans stated that his fairy tales are addressed to adults, and not just children. The project has been redone.
Hans Christian's photo of Andersen, dated July 1860, is shown below.
In 1875, on August 4, a few months after the anniversary celebrations, the great storyteller passed away in his sleep. This event ended the biography of Hans Christian Andersen. However, his tales and his memory continue to live to this day.
The article is devoted to a short biography of Hans Christian Andersen, a great writer and poet from Denmark. Andersen became world famous primarily as an author of fairy tales, but his literary heritage includes many other works.
Biography of Andersen: childhood years
Andersen was born in 1805 in the small town of Odense. His parents were ordinary people. Since childhood, the boy had a rich imagination and a penchant for fantasizing. One of his fantasies was that his parents were royalty. His favorite game was puppet theater. When Andersen was only 11 years old, his father dies. The future writer becomes an apprentice weaver in order to be able to support his family.
At the age of 14, Andersen comes to Copenhagen with the goal of getting a job at the Royal Theater. After a year of fruitless attempts, he is finally hired as a supporting actor. However, the young man's voice soon begins to break and he is fired. During this time, Andersen wrote his first play, which he is trying to publish. Trying to sell a play to a theater so that a performance can be staged based on it does not bring success.
Andersen even writes a letter to the king asking for the publication of his play. Colleagues at the theater, seeing the hopelessness of his situation, also turn to His Majesty, but with a different request. They describe the fate of a poor teenager and ask that he be allowed to study at the expense of the treasury. The request was granted and until 1827 Andersen studied at the gymnasium. The future great writer recalled with heavy feelings his years of study, which, apparently. didn't go to waste. Until the end of his life he wrote with errors. However, he was paid a stipend, which allowed him to make ends meet. During his years of study, Andersen was even able to publish his first book, “Youthful Experiences.”
Brief biography of Andersen: recognition and success
In 1828 Andersen entered the university. Upon completion of his studies, he becomes a candidate of philosophy.
Andersen's first success came in 1833, when his short fantasy story was published. He gets monetary reward from the king, which can make a long-awaited trip abroad. Andersen visited Germany, France, Italy, and England. Traveling was not an empty pastime. The writer gets acquainted with famous cultural figures (writers, sculptors), without ceasing to write new works.
In general, Andersen was a very prolific writer. In his literary heritage includes about 400 fairy tales, large number plays and other works. However, he often repeats what has already been written several times.
In 1835, Andersen published the novel “The Improviser,” which brought him European fame. It was followed by a number of novels that increased the writer's fame.
In 1835, collections of Andersen's fairy tales began to be published. In this genre he finds his true calling. Regular publication of new collections under the same titles “Fairy Tales” begins. He makes a few more attempts at writing dramatic works, but they do not bring him success.
More and more new fairy tales come from the writer’s pen. increasing his glory. This leads to the author's claims that he hates fairy tales. Andersen is known as a children's storyteller, but again, according to him, he never directly addressed children in his fairy tales. Andersen has been criticized for the lack of educational goals in his fairy tales. At the same time, they were considered too simple for adults. This unique combination reveals the genius of Andersen's fairy tales. Despite the ever-present motifs of sadness and loss, they are filled with boundless love and selflessness. The heroes of his fairy tales are often poor and unhappy, but they always have hope and faith in a happy outcome. This probably reflects the author's own childhood.
Hans Christian Andersen died in 1875. Numerous fairy tales from his pen entered the golden fund of world literature. The best recognition of the writer’s merits can be considered the words of A. Strindberg, who said that when talking about Andersen it is enough to name one last name, because it is already clear who exactly we are talking about.
(1805 - 1875)
Danish writer. Hans Christian Andersen was born on April 2, 1805 in the city of Odense on the island of Funen (in some sources the island is called Fionia), in the family of a shoemaker and a washerwoman. Andersen heard his first fairy tales from his father, who read him stories from One Thousand and One Nights; Along with fairy tales, my father loved to sing songs and make toys. From his mother, who dreamed of Hans Christian becoming a tailor, he learned to cut and sew. As a child, the future storyteller often had to communicate with patients in the hospital for the mentally ill, where his maternal grandmother worked. The boy listened to their stories with enthusiasm and later wrote that he “was made the writer of his father’s songs and the speeches of the mad.” Andersen began writing small plays as a child: the first play for his own " puppet theater", consisting of a performance box made by his father and wooden puppets for which Hans Christian sewed costumes, took him three months to compose. The first attempt to educate their son was unsuccessful: his parents sent him to study with the widow of a glover, but after the first spanking, Hans Christian took his primer and proudly left. He learned to read and write only when he was 10 years old. At the age of 12, Andersen was sent as an apprentice to a cloth factory, and then to a tobacco factory, since after the death of his father the family could barely make ends meet. Soon the mind happened to perform on the stage of a real theater. A theater troupe came from Copenhagen. An extra was required for the performance and Hans Christian received the wordless role of the coachman. From that moment on, the boy decided that theater was his calling.
In 1819, having earned some money and bought his first boots, Hans Christian Andersen went to Copenhagen. Patrons appeared, thanks to whom he was able to study literature, Danish, German and Latin, and attend classes at a ballet school. After one of the capital’s actors said that Andersen would not make an actor, he had to give up his dream of the stage. Desperate and living from hand to mouth, Hans Christian decides to write a play. After the publication of the first act of “The Robbers in Wissenberg” in the Harp newspaper, he received his first literary fee. His works attracted the attention of the director capital theater J. Collin, thanks to whom Andersen received a royal scholarship and in 1822 went to Slagelse. In Slagels, the seventeen-year-old writer was enrolled in the second grade of the Latin gymnasium. In 1826-1827, Andersen’s first poems (“Evening”, “The Dying Child”) were published, receiving positive reviews from critics.
In 1828, Hans Christian Andersen entered the University of Copenhagen and upon graduation passed two exams for the title of Candidate of Philosophy. In 1831, Andersen went on his first trip to Germany. In 1833, he presented King Frederick with a cycle of poems about Denmark, as a reward for which he received a small allowance for traveling around Europe, thanks to which he visited Paris, London, Rome, Florence, Naples, and Venice. In France he met Heinrich Heine, Victor Hugo, Honore de Balzac, Alexandre Dumas, in England - with Charles Dickens, in Italy - with the sculptor Thorvaldsen. He lived very poorly, since literary earnings were the only source of income, and works were not accepted immediately; critics pointed out spelling errors, were dissatisfied with the unusual style, the use of elements of colloquial language, and said that his fairy tales were not interesting to either adults or children. The heyday of Hans Christian Andersen's work occurred in the second half of the 1830s and 1840s; During this period, most of the fairy tales were written, which later brought him world fame.
Hans Christian Andersen lived his entire life as a bachelor, never waiting for the long-awaited “harmony of souls.” The last one was love for the famous opera singer Jenny Lind, who arrived in Copenhagen in the fall of 1843.
Two months before his death, the writer learned in one of the English newspapers that his fairy tales were among the most read throughout the world. Hans Christian Andersen died on August 4, 1875 in Copenhagen.
The heroine of Andersen's fairy tale "The Little Mermaid", to whom a monument was erected in Copenhagen, has become a symbol of the capital of Denmark. Since 1967, by decision of the International Children's Book Council (IBC), April 2, the birthday of the great storyteller Hans Christian Andersen, has been celebrated as International Children's Book Day (ICBD). In connection with the 200th anniversary of his birth, 2005 was declared by UNESCO as the Year of Andersen.
Bibliography
Works of Hans Christian Andersen
Among the works of Hans Christian Andersen are novels, stories, plays, short stories, short stories, philosophical essays, essays, poems, and more than 400 fairy tales. Poems were set to music: romances were written by Schumann and Mendelssohn. In Russia, Andersen's fairy tales were first published in 1844 ("The Bronze Boar"), and in 1894-1895 the first collected works of Andersen were published in 4 volumes.
- "Robbers in Wissenberg" (1819; tragedy)
- "Alfsol" (1819; tragedy)
- "Evening" (1826; poem)
- "The Dying Child" (1826; poem)
- “A Journey on Foot from the Holmen Canal to the Eastern Cape of the Island of Amager” (1829; first prose work)
- "Love on the Nicholas Tower" (1829; vaudeville)
- "Shadow Pictures" (1831; essay written after a trip to Germany)
- "Agnetha and Vodyanoy" (1834)
- “The Improviser” (1835, Russian translation - in 1844; novel)
- "Only the Violinist" (1837; novel)
- “Fairy tales told for children” (Everi, fortalte for born; 1835-1837; collection of fairy tales; in May and December 1835 - the first two collections, in April 1837 - the third collection)
- "The Steadfast Tin Soldier" (1838; fairy tale)
- “The Book of Pictures without Pictures” (1840; collection of short stories)
- "The Mulatto" (1840; a play against racial inequality)
- “The Poet’s Bazaar” (1842; collection of travel essays - the first version of the autobiography)
- "The Nightingale" (1843; fairy tale)
- "The Ugly Duckling" (1843; fairy tale)
- "The Snow Queen" (1844; fairy tale)
- "The Little Match Girl" (1845; fairy tale)
- “The Tale of My Life” (Mit livs eventir; 1846, Russian translation - in 1851, 1889; autobiography)
- "Shadow" (1847; fairy tale)
- "Mother" (1848; fairy tale)
- "Two Baronesses" (1849; novel in 3 volumes)
- "To be or not to be" (1857; novel)
- "Firstborn" (comedy)
- “More expensive than pearls and gold” (fairy tale play)
- “Elderberry Mother” (fairy tale play)
- “Ole-Lukoje” (fairy tale play)