Hans Christian Andersen

Life itself is the most wonderful fairy tale.

— Hans Christian Andersen

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

— Hans Christian Andersen

Every man's life is a fairy tale written by God's fingers.

— Hans Christian Andersen

Every man's life is a fairy tale written by God's fingers.

— Hans Christian Andersen

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

— Hans Christian Andersen

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

— Hans Christian Andersen

They could see she was a real Princess and no question about it, now that she had felt one pea all the way through twenty mattresses and twenty more feather beds. Nobody but a Princess could be so delicate.

— Hans Christian Andersen

Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as crystal, it is very, very deep; so deep, indeed, that no cable could fathom it: many church steeples, piled one upon another, would not reach from the ground beneath to the surface of the water above. There dwell the Sea King and his subjects.

— Hans Christian Andersen

His own image; no longer a dark, gray bird, ugly and disagreeable to look at, but a graceful and beautiful swan. To be born in a duck's nest, in a farmyard, is of no consequence to a bird, if it is hatched from a swan's egg.

— Hans Christian Andersen

Every time a good child dies, an angel of God comes down to earth. He takes the child in his arms, spreads out his great white wings, and flies with it all over the places the child loved on earth. The angel plucks a large handful of flowers, and they carry it with them up to God, where the flowers bloom more brightly than they ever did on earth.

— Hans Christian Andersen

Under each arm he carries an umbrella; one of them, with pictures on the inside, he spreads over the good children, and then they dream the most beautiful stories the whole night. But the other umbrella has no pictures, and this he holds over the naughty children so that they sleep heavily, and wake in the morning without having dreamed at all.

— Hans Christian Andersen

I can give her no greater power than she has already," said the woman; "don't you see how strong that is? How men and animals are obliged to serve her, and how well she has got through the world, barefooted as she is. She cannot receive any power from me greater than she now has, which consists in her own purity and innocence of heart. If she cannot herself obtain access to the Snow Queen, and remove the glass fragments from little Kay, we can do nothing to help her.

— Hans Christian Andersen

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

— Hans Christian Andersen

I have now learnt to despise you," he said. "You refused an honest prince; you did not appreciate the rose and the nightingale; but you did not mind kissing a swineherd for his toys; you have no one but yourself to blame!

— Hans Christian Andersen

Just living is not enough... one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.

— Hans Christian Andersen