''Shadow'' ( da, Skyggen) is a literary fairy tale by Danish poet and author Hans Christian Andersen. The tale was first published in 1847.

Plot summary

A learned man's shadow becomes self-aware and takes on a life of its own. The shadow gains insight into the dark side of human behaviour, then returns to the man and enslaves him. Fearful of being discovered, the shadow has the man killed.Jacqueline Banerjee, The Impact of Hans Christian Andersen on Victorian Fiction
The Victorian Web, 12 December 2008.

Analysis

Jacqueline Banerjee suggested that Andersen wrote the story as a form of indirect revenge against Edvard Collin, the son of Anderson's

patron Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...

, who had rejected him. Literary critic Jack Zipes took the story to represent the Hegelian dynamic of master and slave.

Publication

"The Shadow" was first published 6 April 1847 as a part of ''New Fairy Tales. Second Volume. First Collection. 1847.'' (''Nye Eventyr. Andet Bind. Første Samling. 1847.''). The work was re-published December 1847 as a part of ''A Christmas Greeting to my English Friends'', again 18 December 1849 as a part of ''Fairy Tales. 1850.'' (''Eventyr. 1850.''), and 30 March 1863 as a part of ''Fairy Tales and Stories. Second Volume. 1863.'' (''Eventyr og Historier. Andet Bind. 1863.'').

Precedent

In 1814, three decades before the publication of "The Shadow",

Adelbert von Chamisso Adelbert von Chamisso (; 30 January 178121 August 1838) was a German poet and botanist, author of ''Peter Schlemihl'', a famous story about a man who sold his shadow. He was commonly known in French as Adelbert de Chamisso (or Chamissot) de Bonc ...

had published " Peter Schlemihl's Miraculous Story", a story about a man who sells his shadow to the

devil A devil is the personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and religious traditions. It is seen as the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. Jeffrey Burton Russell states that the different conceptions of ...

in exchange for a bottomless wallet. Andersen's story was prompted by Chamisso's, and he refers to it in "The Shadow":

He was very annoyed, not so much because the shadow had disappeared, but because he knew there was a story; well-known to everybody at home in the cold countries, about a man without a shadow; and if he went back now and told them his own story, they would be sure to say that he was just an imitator, and that was the last thing he wanted.

Andersen's story in turn appears to have influenced Oscar Wilde's "

The Fisherman and His Soul ''A House of Pomegranates'' is a collection of fairy tales, written by Oscar Wilde, that was published in 1891 as a second collection for '' The Happy Prince and Other Tales'' (1888). Wilde once said that this collection was "intended nei ...

Adaptations

''The Shadow'' became the first text of some considerable length to be published in Esperanto. It was contained in the 1888 '' Dua Libro'' (''Second Book'') by the creator of that language,

L. L. Zamenhof L. L. Zamenhof (15 December 185914 April 1917) was an ophthalmologist who lived for most of his life in Warsaw. He is best known as the creator of Esperanto, the most widely used constructed international auxiliary language. Zamenhof first dev ...

(the first book had contained only single bible verses, short poems and the like). Evgeny Shvarts has explicitly based his ''Tyen'' (''The Shadow'') play on Andersen's tale, introducing additional characters and plot lines and a different ending. This play was the subject of two film adaptations, in 1971 and in 1991. In 1945 the story was adapted as an episode of the syndicated radio program ''

The Weird Circle ''The Weird Circle'' was a syndicated radio drama series produced in New York and originally broadcast between 1943 and 1945. Production background The series was a Ziv Production, produced at RCA's New York studios and licensed by the Mutual ...

''. In 1994

Frederik Magle Frederik Reesen Magle (; born 17 April 1977) is a Danish composer, concert organist, and pianist. He writes contemporary classical music as well as fusion of classical music and other genres. His compositions include orchestral works, cantatas, ...

, Thomas Eje,

Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen (, 27 May 1946 – 19 April 2005), also known by his abbreviated nickname NHØP, was a Danish jazz double bassist. Biography Pedersen was born in Osted, near Roskilde, on the Danish island of Zealand, the son of ...

and others released the album ''The Song Is a Fairytale'' with songs based on Hans Christian Andersen's fairytales. "The Shadow" is one of the songs. ''Skuggaleikur'' (''Shadow Play'') is an opera by Icelandic composer Karólína Eiríksdóttir with libretto by

Sjón 260px, Sjón at LiteratureXchange Festival ín Aarhus (Denmark 2019) Sigurjón Birgir Sigurðsson (born 27 August 1962), known as Sjón ( ; ; meaning "sight" and being an abbreviation of his first name), is an Icelandic poet, novelist, lyricis ...

. Premiered in November 2006. In 2003, the

Carolina Ballet Carolina Ballet is one of America’s premier arts organizations, programming traditional ballets by legendary masters and new works by contemporary choreographers. The Ballet was launched as a professional company in 1998 under the direction of F ...

premiered a ballet version of ''The Shadow'' with choreography by artistic director Robert Weiss, set to the music of Khachaturian, Kabalevsky, Gyorgy Ligeti, Fauré and Rachmaninoff. The ballet features a sequence in which the poet contemplates his shadow in the mirror. The image, which at first copies his movements in complete synchrony, seamlessly emerges from the mirror frame (through changes in lighting) as another dancer in a gray full body stocking.

References

External links

"The Shadow"
Jean Hersholt's English translation
''Skyggen''
Original Danish text
English translation (full text) from "Andersen's Fairy Tales"
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shadow, The 1847 short stories Short stories by Hans Christian Andersen Danish fairy tales