Hans Christian Anderson's Fairy Tales

Among the favourites are The Red Shoes, The Mermaid, The Real Princess, The Emperor’s New Clothes, The Tinder Box and of course The Ugly Duckling. Andersen carefully crafted the narration of his tales to evoke the power of oral storytelling, yet the narrative voice is a distinctive one, not the impersonal voice of most folk tales. He perfected his stories by reading them aloud within his social circle, and many a dinner party ended with children and adults alike clamouring for a story. As Andersen's fairy tales became known and loved, he found himself much in demand as a dinner guest, and he also began to receive requests to read his work in public.