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What to read next

The ultimate Eurovision-inspired reading list

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Reading lists

Books for kids who are obsessed with Disney’s Frozen

Festive Tales for a Nordic Noël

A Scandinavian Christmas

Ranging from Hans Christian Anderson to Karl Ove Knausgaard, have yourself a nordic noel with the very best Scandinavian Christmas tales 
 
Have yourself a truly Scandinavian Christmas... Of visions and prophesies seen in dark, dark woods. Of toys and trees come to life. Of trolls raising chaos, and of families torn apart -- only to be brought back together by festive cheer. 
 
In this collection, classic tales from Hans Christian Andersen and Nobel Prize winner Selma Lagerlof blend with modern day stories from Karl Ove Knausgaard and Vigdis Hjorth. Each touch on the warm and wild spirit of Christmas, where the cosiness and contentment of the season can often give way to the unexpected, magical and sometimes mystical. 
 
A smorgasbord of strange literary gifts, let A Scandinavian Christmas transport you to a winter wonderland in which fantasy, the fantastic and the festive combine for your reading delight. 
 
'These evocative, atmospheric tales...capture the spirit of Christmas' Sunday Express

These evocative, atmospheric tales...capture the spirit of Christmas

Sunday Express, *Christmas Gift Guide 2021*

A strange and beguiling series of stories, penned Scandinavia's literary greats, spanning three centuries... Beautifully decorated, this is a hardback any household would be proud to have adorn their coffee table

A hygge Christmas is assured with these folksy traditional and modern stories... Best enjoyed with a steaming glass of glögg

Saga Magazine, *Christmas Gift Guide 2021*

A gorgeous collection of classic tales from everyone from Hans Christian Anderson to Karl Ove Knausgaard. Magical tales of winter wonderlands of dark woods, you'll love this smorgasbord of festive short stories!

Hans Christian Andersen (Author) Hans Christian Andersen (April 2, 1805 - August 4, 1875) was a Danish author and poet, most famous for his fairy tales. Among his best-known stories are The Snow Queen, The Little Mermaid, Thumbelina, The Little Match Girl, The Ugly Duckling and The Red Shoes. During Andersen's lifetime he was feted by royalty and acclaimed for having brought joy to children across Europe. His fairy tales have been translated into over 150 languages and continue to be published in millions of copies all over the world. Karl Ove Knausgaard (Author) Karl Ove Knausgaard's My Struggle cycle has been heralded as a masterpiece all over the world. From A Death in the Family to The End, the novels move through childhood into adulthood and, together, form an enthralling portrait of human life. Knausgaard has been awarded the Norwegian Critics Prize for Literature, the Brage Prize and the Jerusalem Prize. His work, which also includes the Seasons Quartet and the Morning Star series (The Morning Star, The Wolves of Eternity and The Third Realm) is published in thirty-five languages. Selma Lagerlöf (Author) Selma Lagerlöf (1858-1940) was a teacher in a girls' secondary school before she became a full-time writer. She is known around the world for her classic children's book The Wonderful Adventure of Nils Holgersson and she was the first female writer to win the Nobel Prize in 1909.

Ranging from Hans Christian Anderson to Karl Ove Knausgaard, have yourself a nordic noel with the very best Scandinavian Christmas tales 
 
Have yourself a truly Scandinavian Christmas... Of visions and prophesies seen in dark, dark woods. Of toys and trees come to life. Of trolls raising chaos, and of families torn apart -- only to be brought back together by festive cheer. 
 
In this collection, classic tales from Hans Christian Andersen and Nobel Prize winner Selma Lagerlof blend with modern day stories from Karl Ove Knausgaard and Vigdis Hjorth. Each touch on the warm and wild spirit of Christmas, where the cosiness and contentment of the season can often give way to the unexpected, magical and sometimes mystical. 
 
A smorgasbord of strange literary gifts, let A Scandinavian Christmas transport you to a winter wonderland in which fantasy, the fantastic and the festive combine for your reading delight. 
 
'These evocative, atmospheric tales...capture the spirit of Christmas' Sunday Express

The Tinderbox

'There sat the dog with eyes as big as mill wheels' 
 
Though criticised for their anarchic immorality when first published, Hans Christian Andersen's tales made him an international star, taken to the hearts of children and adults for their beauty, sorrow and strangeness. Included here are 'The Steadfast Tin Soldier' and 'Big Klaus and Little Klaus'. 
 
Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions. 
 
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875). Andersen's Fairy Tales is available in Penguin Classics.

The Brave Tin Soldier & Other Fairy Tales

Four classic fairy tales from Hans Christian Andersen, read by David Tennant, Anne-Marie Duff, Sir Derek Jacobi and Penelope Wilton.

Hans Christian Andersen (April 2, 1805 - August 4, 1875) was a Danish author and poet, most famous for his fairy tales. Among his best-known stories are The Snow Queen, The Little Mermaid, Thumbelina, The Little Match Girl, The Ugly Duckling and The Red Shoes. During Andersen's lifetime he was feted by royalty and acclaimed for having brought joy to children across Europe. His fairy tales have been translated into over 150 languages and continue to be published in millions of copies all over the world.

Here are four of Hans Christian Andersen's best-loved short stories, specially adapted for young children and read by some of Britain's most well-known actors.   In 'The Brave Tin Soldier', read by David Tennant, a one-legged toy soldier falls in love with a paper ballerina.   In 'Thumbelina', read by Anne-Marie Duff, a tiny but beautiful girl grows from a barleycorn which has been enchanted by a witch.   In 'The Nightingale', read by Sir Derek Jacobi, an emperor prefers a sparkling mechanical bird to the song of a real nightingale.   And in 'The Ugly Duckling', read by Penelope Wilton, a little bird is called ugly by others until he matures into a beautiful swan.

Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales

Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense, Denmark, in 1805. At the age of 14 he went to Copenhagen to become an actor. He failed and instead went back to school, where he was very unhappy. He published his first book, an account of a walking trip, in 1829. From then on he wrote many books, finding his true voice in his original fairy stories, which often had their basis in his life. He died in 1875.

Download eight timeless audio tales from a magical storyteller 
 
This enchanting collection, retold by writer and critic Naomi Lewis, contains eight of Hans Christian Andersen's magnificent fairy tales. It includes Thumbelina, a little girl no more than a thumb-joint high, The Emperor's New Clothes, the tale of a man who cares only for his appearance and The Little Mermaid, who longs to one day marry a human prince. 
 
Unabridged and read by Juliet Stevenson, Andrew Sachs, Alan Cumming, and Nigel Davenport.

Fairy Tales

Hans Christian Andersen (1805&ndash;1875) wrote more than 150 haunting tales. Many were based on folktales and many were his own original creations. 
 
 
Tiina Nunnally is an award-winning translator of Scandinavian fiction, including Sigrid Undset&rsquo;s Kristin Lavransdatter. 
 
Jackie Wullschlager&rsquo;s books include a critically acclaimed biography of Hans Christian Andersen. She is the chief art correspondent for Financial Times.

Hans Christian Andersen was the profoundly imaginative writer and storyteller who revolutionized literature for children. He gave us the now standard versions of some traditional fairy tales&mdash;with an anarchic twist&mdash;but many of his most famous tales sprang directly from his imagination. 
 
The thirty stories here range from exuberant early works such as &quot;The Tinderbox&quot; and &quot;The Emperor's New Clothes&quot; through poignant masterpieces such as &quot;The Little Mermaid&quot; and &quot;The Ugly Duckling,&quot; to more subversive later tales such as &quot;The Ice maiden&quot; and &quot;The Wood Nymph.&quot;

The Black Classics edition of our glorious new translation and selection of 30 tales to mark the 200 year anniversary of Andersen's birth in 2005

Containing an enchanting mix of familiar favourites and hidden gems, the Penguin Classics edition of Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales is translated by Tiina Nunnally and edited with an introduction by Jackie Wullschlager. 
 
The first writer to create timeless, universal fairy tales from his own imagination, Hans Christian Andersen conjured up a world of icy queens, match girls and tin soldiers, rewarded virtue and unfulfilled desire. Rich with popular tales such as 'The Emperor's New Clothes' and 'The Ugly Duckling', this revelatory new collection contains many later, darker and rarely collected stories, such as 'Auntie Toothache' and 'The Shadow', in which a man's shadow slyly takes over his life. 
 
This sparkling new translation captures the eccentric charm of Andersen's original, colloquial Danish style as never before. The introduction vividly describes his changing style and there are notes on every tale. 
 
'Truly scrumptious, a proper treasury ... Read on with eyes as big as teacups' 
Guardian 
 
'This translation gives me, for the first time, a real sense of the range and variety of Andersen's style' 
A.S. Byatt 
 
'There have been some capable versions in English, but Tiina Nunnally's seems to me the best. Jackie Wullschlager's introduction will be of enormous value' 
Harold Bloom

Jackie Wullschlanger is a literary critic and European Arts Correspondent of the Financial Times. Her biography of Andersen (2000) was published to critical acclaim and great popular success and is now considered the standard life of the writer. Tina Nunnally is known for her many award-winning translations of Nordic fiction, including the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize and the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2003. 
 
 
Jackie Wullschlanger is a literary critic and European Arts Correspondent of the Financial Times. Her biography of Andersen (2000) was published to critical acclaim and great popular success and is now considered the standard life of the writer. Tina Nunnally is known for her many award-winning translations of Nordic fiction, including the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize and the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2003.

With this new translation and selection, the unique inventiveness of Andersen's genius is revealed. At a time when children's stories were formal, moral and didactic, Hans Christian Andersen revolutionized the genre, giving an anarchic twist to traditional folklore and creating a huge number of utterly original stories that sprang directly from his imagination. From the exuberant early stories such as The Emperor's New Clothes, through poignant masterpieces such as The Little Mermaid and The Ugly Duckling, to the darker, more subversive later tales written for adults, the stories included here are endlessly experimental, both humorous and irreverent, sorrowful and strange.

Hans Christian Andersen

Naomi Lewis

Jan Pienkowski

Retold by Naomi Lewis

Rediscover the Puffin Classics collection and bring the best-loved classics to a new generation - including this charming edition of Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales. 
 
This enchanting collection, retold by writer and critic Naomi Lewis, contains twelve of Hans Christian Andersen's magnificent stories. It includes Thumbelina, a little girl no more than a thumb-joint high, The Emperor's New Clothes, the tale of a man who cares only for his appearance and The Little Mermaid, who longs to one day marry a human prince.

Hans Christian Andersen

Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales

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