Excerpts from
Fairy-Tales
By Hans Christian Andersen
From The Shadow
In the hot countries the sun burns very strongly; there the people become quite
mahogny brown, and in the very hottest countries they are even burned into
negroes. But this time it was only to the hot countries that a learned man out
of the could regions had come. He thought he could roam about there just as he
had been accustomed to do at home; but he soon altered his opinion. He and all
sensible people had to remain at home, where the window-shutters and doors were
shut alle day long, and it looked as if all the inmates were asleep or had gone
out. The narrow street with the high houses in which he lived was, however,
built in such a way that the sun shone upon it from morning till evening; it
was really quite unbearable!
The learned man from the cold regions was a young
man and a clever man: it seemed to him as if he was sitting in a glowing oven
that exhausted him greatly, and he became quite thin; even his Shadow
shrivelled up and became much smaller than it had been at home; the sun even took
the Shadow away, and it did not return till the evening when the sun went down.
It was really a pleasure to see this. So soon as a light was brought into the
room the Shadow stretched itself quite up the wall, farther even than the
ceiling, so tall did it make itself; it was obliged to stretch to get strength
again. The learned man went out into the balcony to stretch himself, and so
soon as the stars came out in the beautiful clear sky, he felt himself
reviving. On all the balconies in the streets – and in the hot countries there
is a balcony to every window – young people now appeared, for one must breathe
fresh air, even if one has got used to becoming mahogany brown; then it became
lively above and below; the tinkers and tailors – by wich we mean all kinds of
people – sat below in the street; then tables and chairs were brought out, and
candles burned, yes, more than a thousand candles; one talked and then sang,
and the people walked to and fro; carriages drove past, mules trotted,
“Kling-ling-ling!” for they had bells on their harness; dead people were buried
with solemn songs; the church bells rang, and it was indeed very lively in the
street. Only in one house, just opposite to that in which the learned man
dwelt, it was quite quiet, and yet somebody lived there, for there were flowers
upon the balcony, blooming beautifully in the hot sun, and they could not have
done this if they had not been watered, so that some one must have watered
them; therefore, there must be people in that house. Towards evening the door
was half opened, but it was dark, at least in the front room; farther back in
the interior, music was heard. The strange learned man thought this music very
lovely, but it was quite possible that he only imagined this, for out there in
the hot countries he found everything requisite, if only there had been no sun.
The stranger’s landlord said that he did not know who had taken the opposite
house – one saw nobody there, and so far as the music was concerned, it seemed
very monotonous to him.
“It
was just,” he said, “as if some one sat there, always practising a piece that
he could not manage – always the same piece. He seemed to say, ‘I shall manage
it, after all;’ but he did not manage it, however long he played.”
Will
the stranger awake at night? He slept with the balcony door open: the wind
lifted up the curtain before it, and he fancied that a wonderful radiance came
from the balcony of the house opposite; all the flowers appeared like flames of
the most gorgeous colours, and in the midst, among the flowers, stood a
beautiful slender maiden: it seemed as if a radiance came from her also. His
eyes were quite dazzled; but he had only opened them too wide just when he
awoke out of his sleep. With one leap he was out of bed; quite quietly he crept
behind the curtain; but the maiden was gone, the splendour was gone, the
flowers gleamed no longer, but stood there as beautiful as ever. The door was
ajar, and from within sounded music, so lovely, so charming, that one fell into
sweet thought at the sound. It was just like magic work. But who lived there?
Where was the real entrance? For towards the street and towards the lane at the
side the whole ground floor was shop by shop, and the people could not always
run through there.
One
evening the stranger sat upon his balcony; in the room just behind him a light
was burning, and so it was quite natural that his Shadow fell upon the wall of
the opposite house; yes, it sat just among the flowers on the balcony, and when
the stranger moved his Shadow moved too.
“I
think my Shadow is the only living thing we see yonder,” said the learned man.
“Look how gracefully it sits among the flowers. The door is only ajar, but the
Shadow ought to be sensible enough to walk in and look round, and then come
back and tell me what it has seen.
“Yes,
you would thus make yourself very useful,” said he, as if in sport. “Be so good
as to slip in. Now, will you go?! And then he nobbed at the Shadow, and the
Shadow nodded back at him. “Now go, but don’t stay away altogether.” [...]
Translated by H.W. Dulcken
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