Hans Christian Andersen

“It is the power of thought that gives man power over nature.”

“Then he rustled his feathers, curved his slender neck, and cried joyfully, from the depths of his heart, 'I never dreamed of such happiness as this, while I was an ugly duckling.”

“Happy domestic life is like a beautiful summer's evening; the heart is filled with peace; and everything around derives a peculiar glory.”

“Life is like a beautiful melody, only the lyrics are messed up.”

“And the Top spoke no more of his old love; for that dies away when the beloved objects has lain for five years in a roof gutter and got wet through; yes, one does not know her again when one meets her in the dust box.”

“Brave soldier, never fear. Even though your death is near.”

“In the days of Moses and the prophets such a man would have been counted among the wise men of the land; in the Middle Ages he would have been burned at the stake.”

“The naive was only a part of my fairy tales; humour was the real salt in them.”

“I covet honour in the same way as a miser covets gold.”

“Some are created for beauty, and some for use; and there are some which one can do without altogether.”

“My life is a lovely story, happy and full of incident.”

“To move, to breathe, to fly, to float, To gain all while you give, To roam the roads of lands remote, To travel is to live.”

“Enjoy life. There's plenty of time to be dead.”

“It is out of reality that the most peculiar tale of all is born ... Some call me the Elder Granny, others - the Dryad, but my real name is Memory. It is I who sits on a tree that keeps on growing, and growing, it is I who reminisces and tells stories.”

“Most of the people who will walk after me will be children, so make the beat keep time with short steps.”

“Nothing is too high for a man to reach, but he must climb with care and confidence”

“But the Emperor has nothing at all on!”

“The sun shines upon good and bad alike.”

“‎"Does all the beauty of the world stop when you die?" "No," said the Old Oak; "it will last much longer - longer than I can even think of." "Well, then," said the little May-fly, "we have the same time to live; only we reckon differently.”

“Don't ask me how I am! I understand nothing more!”

“I have gone through the most terrible affair that could possibly happen; only imagine, my shadow has gone mad; I suppose such a poor, shallow brain, could not bear much; he fancies that he has become a real man, and that I am his shadow.”

“He looked at the little maiden, and she looked at him; and he felt that he was melting away, but he still managed to keep himself erect, shouldering his gun bravely. A door was suddenly opened, the draught caught the little dancer and she fluttered like a sylph, straight into the fire, to the soldier, blazed up and was gone! By this time the soldier was reduced to a mere lump, and when the maid took away the ashes next morning she found him, in the shape of a small tin heart. All that was left of the dancer was her spangle, and that was burnt as black as a coal.”

“Far away, where the swallows take refuge in winter, lived a king who had eleven sons and one daughter, Elise. The eleven brothers--they were all princes--used to go to school with stars on their breasts and swords at their sides. They wrote upon golden slates with diamond pencils, and could read just as well without a book as with one, so there was no mistake about their being princes. Their sister Elise sat upon a little footstool of looking-glass, and she has a picture-book which had cost the half of a kingdom. Oh, these children were very happy; but it was not to last thus forever.”

“She laughed and danced with the thought of death in her heart.”

“Mermaids have no tears, and so they suffer all the more.”

“But a mermaid has no tears, and therefore she suffers so much more.”

“Now, if we only had as many casks of butter as there are people here, then I would eat lots of butter!”

“There was once a merchant who was so rich that he might have paved the whole street, and a little alley besides, with silver money. But he didn't do it--he knew better how to use his money than that.”

“When the bird of the heart begins to sing, too often will reason stop up her ears.”

“My life will be the best illustration of all my work.”

“The wiser a man becomes, the more he will read, and those who are wisest read most.”

“How little do the wisest among us know of that which is so important to us all.”

“But shouldn't all of us on earth give the best we have to others and offer whatever is in our power?”

“Death walks faster than the wind and never returns what he has taken.”

“Every town, like every man, has its own countenance; they have a common likeness and yet are different; one keeps in his mind all their peculiar touches.”

“Each time I think that the song is ended ... something higher and better begins for me.”

“Well, it's not so easy to give an answer when you ask a stupid question!”

“I have shed pewter tears! It is too melancholy! Rather let me go to the wars and lose arms and legs! It would at least be a change. I cannot bear it longer! Now, I know what it is to have a visit from one's old thoughts, with what they may bring with them! I have had a visit from mine, and you may be sure it is no pleasant thing in the end; I was at last about to jump down from the drawers.”

“Well, yes: people write poems when they are in love, but a wise man will not print them.”

“Everything you look at can become a fairy tale and you can get a story from everything you touch.”

“We cannot expect to be happy always ... by experiencing evil as well as good we become wise.”

“Eighty percent of our criminals come from unsympathetic homes.”

“I only appear to be dead.”

“To travel is to live.”

“I would give gladly all the hundreds of years that I have to live, to be a human being only for one day, and to have the hope of knowing the happiness of that glorious world above the stars.”

“To be of use to the world is the only way to be happy.”

“He found whole figures which represented a written word; but he never could manage to represent just the word he wanted - that word was 'eternity', and the Snow Queen had said, "If you can discover that figure, you shall be your own master, and I will make you a present of the whole world and a pair of new skates." But he could not find it out.”

“Travelling expands the mind rarely.”

“Each soldier was the living image of the others, but there was one who was a bit different. He had only one leg, for he was the last to be cast and the tin had run out. Still, there he stood, just as steadfast on his one leg as the others on their two; and he is the tin soldier we are going to hear about.”

“Where words fail, music speaks.”