Hans Christian Andersen: The Journey of His Life

by Heinz Janisch, Maja Kastelic (Illustrator)

Overview

“If you like, I’ll tell you the story of a boy who learned to fly.”

Through an enchanted conversation with a young girl in a horse-drawn coach, Hans Christian Andersen shares his life’s struggles, dreams, and triumphs—whose threads can be found woven into his greatest stories. He tells her about the “fairy tale of his life” and how the son of a shoemaker became a celebrated writer.

Heinz Janisch paints a sensitive portrait of Andersen and his literary work. Maja Kastelic has developed a well-suited illustration concept for this story that combines sumptuous art of a picture book with elements of a graphic novel. Thus, for the first time, H. C. Andersen’s life and work become a fascinating collage in picture book form.

A moving, inventive story about the life of Hans Christian Andersen.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780735843882
Publisher:	NorthSouth Books
Publication date:	09/01/2020
Pages:	56
Product dimensions:	8.70(w) x 11.10(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	4 - 8 Years

About the Author

Heinz Janisch was born in Güssing, Austria. He studied German and journalism in Vienna. He has worked for Austrian radio since 1982 and is editor of the series Menschenbilder [Human Images]. He has published countless books for children of all ages and has been awarded many prizes, including the Austrian Prize for Books for Children and Young Adults, and the Bologna Ragazzi Award. He has also been nominated for the German Prize for Children’s Literature. Heinz now lives in Vienna and in Burgenland, Austria.

Maja Kastelic was born in Slovenia, where she studied painting, philosophy, and visual art theory. For several years she worked as a fresco restorer before devoting herself to illustrating children’s books. Prizes include the White Ravens Award, and her work has been displayed at the Illustrators’ Exhibition in Bologna. Her last book for NorthSouth was Hans Christian Andersen -The Journey of His Life.

Editorial Reviews

10/26/2020

This fanciful picture biography by Janisch opens as a girl in a coach headed for Copenhagen puts a startling question to the passenger sitting across from her: “Are you old?” Kindly Hans Christian Andersen is happy to answer this question and more: “I’m always pleased to meet inquisitive children.” He traces, as if telling one of his own stories, the arc from his family’s poverty and his father’s illness (“All night long the family could hear him coughing and talking feverishly”) to fame and success (“The son of the poor cobbler was now being invited to the homes of lords and princes”). He speaks of the power of fairy tales to “hold a mirror out in front of other people without them realizing it.” With a featherlight touch, Kastelic paints Andersen’s earlier life in somber sepias and switches to full-color, bright spreads as his fame grows. Readers will smile over scenes from Andersen’s tales: swans reflected on lakes, courtiers in doublets and parti-colored leggings, swallows darting to and fro. Janisch’s story reads like a fairy tale, and, more gratifyingly, it ends like one, too. Ages 4–8. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

For those who want a short tour through Andersen’s life, they can have it with this illustrated picture book detailing the struggles, dreams and triumphs of the inimitable storyteller. Inspiring for children and adults alike.

Book Riot

The sumptuous illustrations use graphic novel elements to tell the story. In the illustrations, there are references to well-known authors of children’s books and some famous children’s book characters, like The Little Prince, Pinocchio, and more. An author’s note tells more about Hans Christian Andersen’s life.

Omnilibros

Aside from the stories themselves, this lyrical outing offers younger audiences the best insight into Andersen’s life and gifts since Jane Yolen’s The Perfect Wizard (2005).

Booklist - John Peters

There’s something truly magical happening in Hans Christian Andersen: The Journey of His Life. It’s not just the context, although there’s plenty of magic to be found there. It’s in everything, really: the story, the illustrations, the colors, the compositions. If there’s a perfect picture book, in my opinion, I’d say this gets damn close to being it.

OnlyPictureBooks.com - John Herzog

In her art, Kastelic melds the text layers, shifting among soft watercolors of the coach ride, sepia-toned memories of Andersen’s childhood, and vividly hued compositions recalling vintage fairy tale illustration for references to Andersen’s stories.

Bulletin of the Center For Children's books

★ 09/01/2020

Gr 1–4—Hans Christian Andersen's stories are such a prevalent part of children's literature that readers sometimes forget they were written in the 1800s. Traveling by stagecoach in 1800s Denmark, a seven-year-old girl named Elsa and her mother meet an older gentleman who offers to tell the child a fairy tale to pass the time. The book's design uses many graphic novel elements. Some pages are divided into panels with rounded edges; others are full-bleed illustrations. Instead of using speech bubbles, the book places text within the image panel or outside the frame. Kastelic presents the narrative and Andersen's fairy tales in soft but vibrant watercolors, while the retelling of Andersen's own past is rendered in a sepia palette. Poetic language conveys the magical qualities of Andersen's life and the hardships he faced, while the illustrations depict enchanting, unexpected scenes. As Andersen talks to Elsa, he describes many of his stories, such as "The Ugly Duckling," "The Snow Queen," and "Thumbelina." A brief note above the copyright information reveals that references to familiar authors of children's literature and famous children's book characters "crept" into the illustrations. VERDICT This lovely book should be savored. The pages should be studied for every detail, then read alongside Andersen's stories for a wholly immersive experience.—Lucinda Snyder Whitehurst, St. Christopher's Sch., Richmond, VA

School Library Journal

★ 2020-05-17
Traveling by coach across Denmark, an elderly Hans Christian Andersen recounts the story of his life to an inquisitive child, couching it as a fairy tale in which he learns to fly and inherits “the kingdom of letters.”

In this smoothly translated blend of biography and storytelling, Janisch uses Andersen’s own metaphor: The Danish writer called his memoir The Fairy Tale of My Life. Without weighting his story with specific detail (available in the author’s note), the author conveys a compelling sense of the man whose stories have been loved around the world and across centuries. Kastelic uses a variety of palettes and page designs to give this tale its wings. Both the journey and Andersen’s narrative are depicted mostly in panels—the present of the journey in light colors, the past in sepia tones. But the tales Andersen’s father reads to him as a boy and the stories the adult Andersen tells are brighter and shown in full pages. Repeated images of flight suggest that the writer-to-be escaped from a difficult childhood by immersing himself in the imagined world. In one striking spread the colors of the imagined world slightly bleed into young Hans’ arrival in Copenhagen. In another, storybook characters and even an elderly Andersen appear in a crowd scene of “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” Early on, readers see the shadow of Andersen’s wings, and, in a surprise conclusion, he shows he can still make his audience fly.

“A very special fairy story,” indeed. (Picture book/biography. 4-8)

Kirkus Reviews