Hans Christian Andersen - Second Birth Centenary Year

2nd April 2005 was the Second Birth Centenary of that world-famous Dane, Hans Christian Andersen.

He was born in Odense on 2 April 1805 in a very poor family. His father, Hans Andersen (also called Hans Hansen Piper for being a Piper in the Odense Civic Guards 3rd Company) was a Shoemaker by profession; he was also an educated man, with improbable if harmless pretensions towards an aristocratic lineage. Andersen's mother, Anne Marie Andersdatter, was an illiterate, superstitious washerwoman. His parents did not live together until Andersen was 9 months old. They had a precarious hand-to-mouth existence and did not even have a definite home until 1807, when they moved into a house in Munkemøllestræde.

As a young child, life seemed very difficult to Hans Christian Andersen - aside from the family poverty, he was a strange, gawky kid, overly emotional and nervous of temperament, and did not fit in at all with his peers.

He began to turn into himself for company and consolation and got into the habit of weaving fantasies that were so much better than the grim reality of his life and helped him to cope. His parents, knowingly or unknowingly, encouraged this bent. His mother opened for him the world of folk-lore and his father introduced him to the world of literature and the Theater. The latter provided a very definite glimmer of hope to the young boy. Suddenly he was in a magical world where anything was possible. The experience was to change his life.

It was also the year of changes on the European Continent - the Napoleonic War had began and Andersen's father joined the army. He returned from war a seriously ill man and died shortly afterwards in 1816. Andersen's mother remarried in 1818.

Andersen, who had had a scanty school education so far, had to go to work now. He was apprenticed to a weaver and to a tailor, and also worked for a time in a Tobacco Factory. They were all deeply unhappy experiences, where he was again made the butt of insults and abuse. The new home situation was scarcely better, and in 1819, the fourteen year old Andersen ran away to Copenhagen.

He had a beautiful soprano voice and managed to get himself hired at the Royal Theater. He worked here for the next three years, trying his hand at singing, dancing, and acting. He was not very successful and lived in extremely straitened circumstances. But, unlike in Odense, he managed to make many friends at the Royal Theater, and some of the influential ones liked him enough to take him under their wing and make it possible for him to continue his education.

Since he was getting nowhere on stage, Andersen next attempted to make a career backstage. He had been writing for a while now and he came up with two completed plays in 1822. Unfortunately they were not very good either and were rejected. His kind Theater friends however were still looking out for him. The Royal Theater Manager and Financial Deputy, Jonas Collins, became his Guardian and had him enrolled into a Slagelse boarding school.

Andersen's Slagelse experience was scarcely better than all his school experiences so far. His relationship with Simon Meisling, the school principal, was far from pleasant - the fact that it inspired a poem called 'The Dying Child' should give you an idea - Meisling had no patience with over-sensitive types and tried his best to tone down that feature in Andersen.

When he wasn't writing poems, Andersen was complaining about his treatment to Collins. Finally, tiring of it, Collins brought him back to Copenhagen in 1827 and appointed a private tutor for him. Andersen, in happier spirits now, cheered up further when several of his poems, including the Meisling inspired one, were published in the Kjøbenhavns flyvende Post. This was a Big Deal indeed, as it was the top-flight magazine of the time on literary matters and was dually published in both the German and Danish languages.

In 1829, a year after Andersen had completed his education, he made a second successful foray into the literary world. His Travel Sketch 'Fodrejse Fra Holmens Kanal Til Østpynten Af Amager' and his Play 'Kjærlighed paa Nicolai Taarn' both proved popular with the public.

These successes were followed, in 1831, by a Collection of Poems and a Travel account 'Skyggebilleder', which was about his German trip and his meeting with two famous German poets, Ludwig Tieck and Adalbert von Chamisso, in Dresden and Berlin respectively.

Back in Copenhagen, Andersen got involved in the Theater, writing Librettos and even an entire Opera. He also wrote an autobiography (his very first one), but - from modesty? - didn't attempt to get it published. It wasn't to surface until 1926.

In 1833-34, Andersen took advantage of receiving a scholarship and traveled around Europe. He went to Germany, France, and then to Italy. At the Artist Colony in Rome, where he lived for a time, he met Bertel Thorvaldsen, a well-known sculptor.

Andersen's novel 'Improvisatoren', which was the first he ever wrote, was published in 1835. This was also the year that saw other two firsts in the publication of his Fairy Tale Booklets - 'Eventyr, fortalte for Børn'. Several plays and the novels 'Kun en Spillemand' and 'O. T.' were to soon follow and be published in several languages.

In 1837, making his very first Swedish visit, Andersen trip met the Swedish writer, Frederika Bremer. This same year he also came in contact with the French writer Xavier Marmier, who was sufficiently impressed with him to write a Revue de Paris article on him 'Vie d'un poete' . This article, which was translated in different languages and reprinted all over Europe, catapulted Andersen into literary fame.

As expected, fame brought the first wave of serious criticism. Andersen got his bitter medicine from none other than Søren Kierkegaard in 1838. To off-set this misery, came the award of a royal scholarship for literature, which, for the first time in his life, made him financially stable.

'Mulatten', a new play, debuted successfully in 1840. After this, Andersen, who had gotten bitten well and truly by the travel bug, took off again - this time to the mysterious Orient via Europe. It was on the trip that he got to know Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and also met Franz Liszt. Andersen wrote about these meetings in a travel account called 'En Digters Bazar'. This account was published in 1842. The following year, Andersen published more Fairy Tales and became enamored with Jenny Lind, a famous singer from Sweden.

In the next few years, the English, German, and French editions of Andersen's works were published. Andersen now also made the acquaintances of well-known public figures like the Grand Duke Carl Alexander von Sachsen-Weimar and Charles Dickens. This last he met on his travels to the British Isles. He also made another trip to Sweden, which was celebrated with yet another published travel account 'I Sverrig' (1851). His first collection of Fairy Tales was published in 1852 as 'Historier' and the collected Fairy Tales appeared as Samlede Skrifter in 1853. Mit Livs Eventyr his revised take on his life, appeared in 1855. In 1857, he returned to England again, this time as the month long house guest of Charles Dickens.

In the years from 1862 to 1866, Andersen traveled in Spain and Portugal and wrote the travel accounts 'I Spanien' and 'Et Besøg i Portugal', which came out respectively in 1863 and in 1868.

In 1867, Andersen was honored with two honorary titles - 'Councillor of State' and 'Citizen of Odense'. It was in this same year that the World Exposition took place in Paris and Andersen's story based upon it 'The Dryad' was published the following year.

Lykke-Peer, which was to be Andersen'slast novel, was published in 1870, and he celebrated by traveling the following year to Norway.

His final volume of fairy tales was published in 1872 and was given the high, now obsolete Danish title of 'Konferensrad' in 1874.

In his final years, beset with ill health, Andersen lived with the family of Melchoir, a Jewish Merchant, at their country home 'Rolighed'. He died on 4 August 1875.