Andersen's Fairy Tales
Written by James Baldwin and Hans Christian Andersen
Narrated by Robin Field
4/5
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About this audiobook
James Baldwin
James Baldwin (1841-1925) was an American textbook editor and author who had enormous influence in the publication of grammar and history textbooks at the beginning of the twentieth century. Born into a Quaker family in rural Indiana, he was largely self-educated. After publishing his first work, The Story of Siegfried (1882) he wrote more than fifty books, including Old Greek Stories (1895) and Fifty Famous Stories Retold (1895).
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Reviews for Andersen's Fairy Tales
179 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Note: The version I read is on DailyLit.com, so this review is for that edition.This is a classic set of short stories by Hans Christian Andersen. While I was vaguely familiar with some of the tales in this set, most were entirely new to me. Thanks to Disney, we tend to think of fairy tales as having “happily ever after” endings, and that is most definitely not the case with Andersen’s stories. A few do, but plenty also end with death or loss. While most are short stories, “The Shoes of Fortune” and “The Snow Queen” are both longer pieces. “Shoes” involves a pair of boots that transports the wearer to wherever and whenever they want to be, including whomever they wish to be. One character visits the moon, another becomes a bird, and another goes back to the Middle Ages. This was easily my favorite story of the whole set.Andersen keeps a playful tone in most of the stories, even the darker ones. In one story, he mentions people reading “a new poem by H. C. Andersen.” I love when authors unabashedly insert themselves into a story. If you’re interested in fairy tales, you should check out this book.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Children's fairy tales but not what has been watered down and added with cutesy animals. Not as graphic as some versions of the old tales, but a good collection of the tales from this master storyteller.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Rated: B+Wonderful tales told with a child-like perspective. Many of Disney's classics owe a debt to Andersen.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tales are world renowned. Endlessly inventive and quirky, they've sparked countless adaptations and retellings, from Disney animated films to stage plays to choral works to short stories. Some of the tales are better known than others, like "The Little Mermaid," "The Emperor's New Clothes," "The Little Match Girl," and "The Steadfast Tin Soldier." Others are less well known (and some understandably so!), like "The Marsh King's Daughter," "The Wood Nymph," "The Red Shoes," and "The Shadow," to name a few.I was struck by the harshness of some of the stories. I knew going in that Andersen's imagination was informed by a culture very different from our sanitized, politically correct world, back when children knew all about life's grimmer realities. But it's still a bit of a shock. Most of the stories don't end on an entirely happy note. Beyond "Thumbelina" I'm hard pressed to remember any that do, actually.Many of the stories deal with the theme of not being content with your position in life, like the pine tree that wasn't happy in the forest and then had one night of splendor as a Christmas tree before being tossed away to die, or the nymph who traded her natural lifespan for a day as a human. Mortality lurks everywhere in these stories, bittersweet around the edges. The china shepherdess and her china chimney-sweep lover are faithful to one another "until they break." In one story, a man's shadow eventually breaks free of him and arranges his execution... chilling. Always death is peering around the corner; always the good things are tinged with a sense of impermanence.But despite the dark themes, there is a pervasive humor throughout the stories that I found entirely engaging. Much of it comes from personifying household items, like a kitchen pot or gentleman's necktie and poking fun at the absurdity of human vanity. Relationships come in for their fair share of gentle mockery, too — Stork Father and Stork Mother have some amusing insights on one another, and Andersen isn't above wry observations in the narrative.As a Christian, I found the theological aspect of the stories fascinating. Sometimes Andersen gets it right and it's biblical and beautiful — and other times (well, most of the time) his conception of a works-based salvation ruins everything. "The Little Mermaid" was particularly bad in this regard; she's told she can gain an immortal soul if she does good deeds for three hundred years. The three hundred years' span just seemed so arbitrary, I laughed out loud. Maybe this conception of earned salvation is another reason why most of the stories end so sadly...I listened to this on audiobook from Listening Library and was familiar with the readers, Kate Reading and Robert Whitfield, from other audio productions. Both performed these stories admirably (even the tedious ones), alternating back and forth between tales. Though some of the stories dragged out, others were delightful, and I found the unpredictability an enjoyable listening experience. I've read that Tina Nunnally's translation from the Danish is the most accurate to date, and though I can't speak to that, the stories certainly do possess a distinctive tone that one hopes is Andersen's. I'm glad I picked this up, even if just to know these iconic stories as they were originally imagined.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Six-word review, nth reread of 1923 edition:Beloved childhood treasure still enchants me.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I love fairy tales and these are some of the best and are great classics.