Fairy Tale King City. Andersen

Long ago on the foggy island of Funen, where the smell of heather is intertwined with the creaking of pines, a boy was born in the small town of Odense. He was not very handsome—a long nose, small eyes, and a surprisingly sad expression—as if he knew something about life that no one else knew. His parents – people who are not rich – could not give anything to the baby, except for their boundless love and surname with an ending in “sen”, indicating a low origin. “Of those whose name ends in ‘sen’, nothing will ever come out worthwhile,” said the fat sums. Could anyone have known that this boy would be king? A great and unsurpassed king of fairy tales!

Hans Christian Andersen often traveled from the capital to his hometown - first by stagecoach, then by train: Copenhagen, Roskilde, Sore, Slagels, Corseur. Then by boat through the Great Belt to Nyborg, then by horses to Odense.

Three hours separate Copenhagen from Odense.

On Hansiensenstrade Street in the center of Odense stands a tiny house with a high tiled roof, where Andersen was born in 1805.

This curved street is preserved as it was more than 150 years ago. The narrow sidewalks. The cobblestone pavement is made to believe that we were in Odense of the last century, as if Andersen himself would appear from around the corner in an elegant coat with a rose in the loop and cylinder.

We will enter the memorial museum in a spacious lobby, from it to large bright rooms. Here are collected unique documents, manuscripts, old editions of books, engravings of contemporaries, touching drawings of Andersen himself and silhouettes, masterfully carved by him from colored paper.

The walls of the dome hall are painted with frescoes on the themes of Andersen’s biography. In a large repository there are long rows of glass cabinets containing everything that was published from the Andersen heritage, in many languages: fairy tales, novels, poems, travel essays, dramas, diaries, epistolary heritage ...

And only a few rooms of the museum - tiny, with low ceilings and small windows - this is the old house in which Andersen was born. Everything else was built in 1970.

Despite his acute suspicion, poor health and eternal toothaches, which sometimes drove him to despair, Andersen almost every year left far and long, making often risky trips.

The museum exhibits his road set: two solid leather suitcases, a bag, a leather cylinder case, an umbrella, a cane and a thick long rope.

Andersen was madly afraid of fires and believed that, if misfortune happened, the rope would help him escape through the window. Wherever he went, he was always with him.

In one of the rooms, you can sit down, put a tube to your ear, press the appropriate button - and you will hear your chosen Andersen fairy tale in the language available to you.

Walking through the old streets of Odense, we will try to imagine what the city looked like on that joyful day, when Andersen was proclaimed an honorary citizen of Odense.

All houses were decorated with national flags, children were released from school, orchestras played melodies to the poems of Andersen “Denmark is my native country” and “Valdemar’s Castle”, on the streets crowded elegantly dressed citizens. Everyone shouted “Hurrah!” and Hans Christian Andersen cried with gratitude and happiness.