Hans Christian Andersens Fairy Tales..., Hans Christian Andersen
Hans Christian Andersens Fairy Tales..., Hans Christian Andersen
List: $15.00 | Sale: $10.50
Club: $7.50

Synopsis

Brought to life by Academy Award®-winning actor F. Murray Abraham and an ensemble cast of narrators, and featuring original music by Michael Bacon, this collection contains Hans Christian Andersen’s most beloved fairy tales, as well as a selection of lesser-known favorites.
 
Unlike the Brothers Grimm, who collected and retold folklore and fairy tales, Hans Christian Andersen adopted the most ancient literary forms and distilled them into a genre that was uniquely his own. His fairy tales are remarkable for their sense of fantasy, power of description, and vivid imagination. They are like no others written before or since. 

Recognizing the literary merit of Andersen's own simple colloquial language, Erik Haugaard has remained faithful to the original text in the translation from Danish to English. Listeners will rediscover Hans Christian Andersen's best-known fairy tales, and find new favorites.
 
Stories:
 
The Princess and the Pea
Thumbelina
The Emperor's New Clothes
The Steadfast Tin Soldier
The Ugly Duckling
The Little Mermaid
The Little Match Girl
The Wild Swans
The Nightingale
The Snow Queen
"The Will-o'-the-Wisps are in Town," said the Bog Witch
The Rags
The Adventures of a Thistle
Luck Can Be Found in a Stick
The Days of the Week
 
Cast:
 
F. Murray Abraham
Edoardo Ballerini
Marisa Calin
Cynthia Darlow
Ari Fliakos
Dion Graham
January LaVoy
Jennifer Lim
Euan Morton
Robert Petkoff
Rebecca Soler
Marc Thompson

About The Author

Hans Christian Andersen (1805-75) was born in Odense, Denmark, the son of a poor shoemaker and a washerwoman. He once said that ideas for stories 'lie in my mind like seeds and only need the kiss of a sunbeam or a drop of malice to flower'. Hans Andersen's stories began to be translated into English as early as 1846. Since then, numerous editions, and more recently Hollywood songs and a Disney cartoon, have helped to ensure the continuing popularity of the stories in the English-speaking world.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Bionic Jean on December 08, 2024

Hans Christian Andersen once said, "Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale." And his life certainly was an extraordinary rags to riches story. In all Hans Christian Andersen wrote 156 fairy tales, of which forty are in this luxury, large format edition, to represent the cream of the crop. It i......more

Goodreads review by Mike (the Paladin) on April 04, 2016

There are some good stories here, and some that scarred my childhood. Between dead match girls and trashed fir trees not to mention frightening Snow Queens the Thumblinias were sometimes needed. Still they last. Excuse me I didn't get much sleep last night, there was something poking my back under m......more

Goodreads review by Brendan on September 15, 2018

This is an absolutely fantastic collection of Hans Christian Andersen's best work. The translation, by Tiina Nunnally, is sublime and her notes on past translations of Andersen's stories makes it clear just how sublime it is. If you wanted to read a version closer to H.C. Andersen's original, you'd......more


Quotes

The Puffin Classics series is a perfect marriage of the old and the new. Enjoy some of the best books from the past and find out why and how they inspired some of the best writers of the present—Julia Eccleshare, LoveReading4Kids