Hans Christian Andersen

Hans Christian Andersen (1805–1875) was born in Odense, Denmark, the son of a poor shoemaker and a washerwoman. At fourteen, he traveled alone to Copenhagen to seek his fortune in the theater, enduring years of poverty and humiliation before finding his true medium in the fairy tale. Beginning in 1835, he published his stories in small pamphlets that quickly became beloved across Europe, making him one of the most famous writers of the nineteenth century during his own lifetime. This author hub collects 1 work in the Canon Compass ranking, led by Fairy Tales and Stories.