Hans Christian Andersen

Christian and Noemi are two youths from markedly different social backgrounds (Christian deeply impoverished, Noemi from a wealthy Jewish family), yet both are driven by a fierce ambition and the pursuit of an “extraordinary life.” A dramatic episode from their childhood—the fire and destruction of Noemi’s home—also shatters a tender friendship and irreparably sunders the lives of the two youths. The wondrous garden where they first met is no more: childhood happiness has dissolved. In the first part, the most evocative also for its depiction of Danish rural culture, we follow Christian’s journey: the awakening of his vocation as a violinist, his father’s flight, a new family and solitude, life at sea, and his upbringing within another household. A tragic undertone prevails, yet the boy confronts misfortune with an enduring hope for the future. Particularly striking is the portrayal of the human and natural milieu that develops around a spring whose waters are believed to cure ailments. The relationship with nature takes on magical, animistic, and fairy-tale dimensions, placing animals—birds in particular—on a plane of intimate communion with human beings. How distant Andersen’s society is from our own, and how clear the transition from a rural to an industrial world! Even in the first part, the motif of the South emerges as one of the book’s fundamental touchstones: the migrations of storks and other birds are precisely the bridge between Northern and Southern Europe—a South dreamt of and experienced as a land of sun, warmth, and culture. The final part of the book focuses on Noemi, now a beautiful young woman, first enamored of a jockey and later wed to a wealthy French aristocrat. Vienna, Rome, and Paris provide the settings for Noemi’s life, while Christian remains in Denmark to dream and live in penury. The lives of the two youths diverge markedly, yet their conclusion is dramatically alike. Christian dies weary and disillusioned; Noemi returns to Denmark, wealthy and elegant, yet equally conscious of having fulfilled none of the aspirations of her youth. Was it worth it? Would it not have been better for the two youths to accept a quiet, routine life from the outset; or was there an alternative rooted in feelings far deeper than the quest for something wondrous? Andersen’s moral remains obscure: perhaps the book’s underlying thread is the struggle for survival and self-advancement, in which only the strongest prevails. The stork that was Christian’s companion is killed by its fellow migrants because it is no longer capable of making the long journey South. The narrative pace is highly effective in the first part of the book, only to unravel and become cumbersome and tedious.