THE SNOW QUEEN
The snow queen
is like a snow flake. How long has she lived
in a blue fairy tale? Who is she and why is she there? The
snow queen is neither pale nor fake. She is as white as a
winter lake. A Christmas tree is lit beside a lamp shade. A
pine tree is as green as jade. She's a queen on a winter's
sledge. She would melt being a soft snow lace. She would
be a snowdrop or something else. The snow will melt to
bubble a river's face. The fable will end on its last page. The
queen would be kept by emptiness on a legend stage. The
queen would touch nothing though she was sage.
in a blue fairy tale? Who is she and why is she there? The
snow queen is neither pale nor fake. She is as white as a
winter lake. A Christmas tree is lit beside a lamp shade. A
pine tree is as green as jade. She's a queen on a winter's
sledge. She would melt being a soft snow lace. She would
be a snowdrop or something else. The snow will melt to
bubble a river's face. The fable will end on its last page. The
queen would be kept by emptiness on a legend stage. The
queen would touch nothing though she was sage.
Hans Christian Andersen met, and fell in love with, Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind in 1840, but she rejected his advances. He wrote, "No book or personality whatever has exerted a more ennobling influence on me, as a poet, than Jenny Lind. For me she opened the sanctuary of art." They became friends, and she was the inspiration for at least three of his fairy tales, "Beneath the Pillar," "The Angel," and "The Nightingale." In addition, reflecting the complicated nature of their relationship, she may have also been the model of the icy-hearted Snow Queen (Snedronningen) in his 1844 tale. She ruled the snowflakes (or "snow bees") from her palace in the land of the permafrost (specifically the far northern Norwegian city Spitsbergen, as Svalbard was then called) but traveled everywhere with the snow. The plot was set in motion when the Troll (Trolden) made an evil mirror that distorted reality by failing to reflect the good and beautiful aspects of things while magnifying their bad and ugly aspects, making even the loveliest landscape look like "boiled spinach." He tried to smuggle it into Heaven, but it slipped from his grasp and fell to the Earth, shattering into tiny pieces that were blown around the world by the wind, freezing their hearts like blocks of ice and making their eyes see only the worst aspects of existence. One of these fragments thus infected young Kai, who was taken captive by the Snow Queen. Kai's friend Gerda followed them to the palace but was halted by the snowflake guards. Reciting a prayer caused Gerta's breath to take the shape of angels, who resisted the snowflakes and allowed Gerda to enter the palace. On the site of the Snow Queen's throne, a frozen lake known as the Mirror of Reason, Gerta found Kai engaged in a task given him by the Snow Queen: if he can use pieces of ice to form the word "eternity" she will release him from her power. Gerda joyously kissed him, and her warm tears burned away the splinter lodged in his heart. Kai in turn burst into tears, dislodging the splinter from his eye. Then they danced together so energetically that the pieces of ice he had been working with were tossed around until they fell into the "eternity" pattern.
ReplyDelete