Happy Birthday Hans! Andersen's 200th celebrated world-wide Hans Christian Andersen's 200th birthday, April 2, was greeted with considerable media attention, an international, celebrity filled Copenhagen extravaganza staged in a soccer stadium and a cheery celebration at Solvang's HCA Museum located upstairs above The Book Loft.

The worldwide commemoration of the great Danish storyteller's bicentennial will continue throughout the year and will include a new opera in China, a new amusement park in Japan, a multitude of events in Denmark and several in Solvang as well.

Andersen will be the focus and theme for this year's Danish Days celebration September 16-18, which will include a student art show and the appearance of Randel McGee as Andersen. A juried art show inspired by Andersen's work will go up later at Elverhøj Museum and the City of Solvang last week issued a proclamation in honor of the birthday.

During the year the Andersen Museum expects to have visits from several authors and others with ties to Andersen. Beth Brust, whose articles on the Amazing Papercuttings of HCA (based on her book of that title) were recently serialized on the "L.A. Times" children's page, will be coming up from San Diego.

Management consultant Mette Norgaard - Danish bom, New York based-hopes to schedule a trip to Solvang to talk about her book that came out simultaneously in the US and Denmark on HCA's birthday. Titled The Ugly Duckling Goes to Work: Widsom for the Workplace from the Classic Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, it contains six Andersen tales plus plenty of inspiration that applies to all of life, not just the workplace. (AMACOM, $17.95)

Triggered by the bicentennial, authors. and publishers have produced piles of new Andersen titles.

We can list just a few: Two new translations aim to capture Andersen's colloquial language and humor that so often are lost in translation. Diana Crone Frank and Jeffrey Frank's Stories of Hans Christian Andersen, (Houghton Mifflin, $27) includes the original illustrations of Wilhelm Pedersen and Lorenz Frølich.

Tiina Nunnally (Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales, Viking, $27.95) is this country's preeminent translator of contemporary Scandinavian writers and has also translated Jens Andersen's biography of Andersen widely acclaimed in Denmark, just published here (Hans Christian Andersen, Viking, $35).

Andersen: The Illustrated Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, in English, but published in Germany, features illustrations by contemporary graphic artists. ($39)

Scandinavian Publishing House in Denmark has repackaged its long list of inexpensive, nicely illustrated editions of Andersen stories into six volumes, each containing four or five stories ($12.95). I only wish the publisher had not included short blurbs on the cover that explicitly state the meaning or moral of each story.

Dover, another publisher that gives good value, offers many HCA titles. Among the new ones is an Andersen coloring book that includes three stories on a CD.

The Rebild Society of Utah has put out a commemorative coloring book, Happy 200th Birthday Hans! that includes short bilingual versions of several stories plus lots of information about Andersen himself. ($5)

Among several brand new editions of Thumbelina is a lovely one retold and illustrated by Lauren Mills (Little Brown, $16.99). This was the only young children's book included in "USA Today's" recent article on Andersen that featured a sidebar list of some notable new HCA books.

H. C. Andersen 2005
Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense, on the island of Fyn, Denmark, April 2, 1805.

He is Denmark’s most famous figure, known and beloved all over the world for his fairy tales, and the arrival of his 200th birthday will set a global celebration in motion. Most dazzling and intense in Denmark where it has been years in the planning stages, the bicentennial fanfare is taking place everywhere and not just on April 2, but all year long.

It is happening in Solvang, the Danish capitol of America, as well.

Solvang is filled with homage’s to Andersen such as the statue in the town park; another park that bears his name; the Little Mermaid fountain at Denmarket Square (Mission and Alisal), a replica of his birthplace hidden away in a pedestrian alley off Copenhagen Drive; a shepherdess and chimney sweep perched on a rooftop. And, don’t forget the H. C. Andersen Museum located upstairs in The Book Loft Building.

Each year the museum celebrates Andersen’s birthday. One year the city contributed funds for a full blown festival that included folk dancing, storytelling, fairy tale characters strolling in costume around the village. Plus, Thor Nielsen’s one-man show about Andersen, a play with songs, ran for a dozen performances in the conference room adjoining the museum—an intimate, moving, educational theater experience.

Thor, who was quite eccentric, was a consummate actor, almost obsessed by Andersen and effectively transformed himself into the great writer. He often showed up on April 2 dressed as Andersen and would read stories, hand out his card, walk about town and make appearances in the HCA Museum, especially when the birthday cake and punch were served.

In recent years the birthday celebration has consisted of storytelling, kransekage (the traditional Danish celebratory “cake”) and showings of the Danny Kaye movie, Hans Christian Andersen.

This year the plans are still unfolding. There will be events throughout the year.

April 2 falls on Saturday this year, at a time Solvang hosts an abundance of visitors, many on their spring breaks from school. Solvang Chamber of Commerce has arranged a storytelling session in the town park from noon until 2 p.m. The HCA Museum will have movies and storytelling throughout the day with some special contests and giveaways. And there will be birthday cake.

In upcoming months the museum will welcome various authors, artists and others with special connections to Andersen. Entertainer Randall McGee, a favorite of both children and adults, who often visits Solvang as H. C. Andersen, will return two or three times during the year, including Danish Days.

In fact, the entire 2005 Danish Days celebration, September 16-18, will revolve around Andersen.

Contact the Andersen Museum, 688-2052 for more information.

* Kransekage in the photo was from the wedding of a former Book Loft employee, Anina Moore, this past December.