Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen Quiz

Answer: Nothing

"The Emperor's New Clothes" introduced a very vain Emperor. Two crooks came by the palace and promised they would sell a very fine set of new clothes for the Emperor, clothes made of so fine material that no stupid person could see them.

After payment, the crooks set up a workplace to weave the clothes - using nothing at all. But of course, the Emperor and his staff would not say anything about it, for they would be marked as stupid.

Then the Emperor went out on a public procession, dressed in his "new clothes". The citizens did not say anything for fear of being called stupid - until a young boy cried out the truth.

Answer: Matches

"The Little Match Girl" was a poor girl, trying to sell some matches in order to gain a few pennies. But no one wanted to buy anything. She did not dare go home without any revenue and crawled away in a corner.

To keep warm, she lit her matches one by one, each giving a delicate vision: the warm stove, the finely decorated Christmas tree, the goose roasted for dinner, her dead grandmother...until she ran out of matches and froze to death, with a mysterious smile on her face.

Answer: No

"The Little Mermaid" is one of Andersen's best known fairy tales. It tells the story of a mermaid who just became fifteen and was allowed a look above the sea. She saw a handsome prince on a boat and when the boat sank, she rescued her prince - but did not wait until he awoke. The prince was thus thought to have been rescued by a priestess from a nearby temple.

The mermaid asked the sea witch to make her human, as she wanted to be with her prince. The price for getting legs was giving up her beautiful voice. The prince found the mermaid and trusted her with all his secrets.

Then the king and queen arranged a marriage between the prince and a princess from a neighbouring country, who happened to be the priestess from the temple. The mermaid got only one chance to avoid dying as soon as the marriage was pronounced, but to survive she had to kill her prince - which she of course did not want to do. In the end, the prince married the princess and the mermaid died - but became a spirit of the air because of her decision not to kill. 

Answer: By slipping a pea under the twenty mattresses she slept on

"The Princess and the Pea" is the fairy tale in this question.

Once upon a time, a prince turned down several girls because they were not true princesses. Then a girl claiming to be a princess arrived, soaking wet because it rained outside. The prince showed her to her bedroom, in which twenty mattresses were piled upon the bed.

The following morning the girl complained that there was some hard lump under her mattresses, and that she had not slept all night. This proved to the prince she was a real princess.

Kissing a frog (or a toad) is, in several fairy tales, a job a princess has to do to find her prince.

Answer: A pair of red shoes

"The Red Shoes" told the story of Karen, a spoiled girl. When she was shopping, she spotted a pair of red shoes. She wanted to go to church in these shoes but her adoptive mother told her one could only wear black shoes to church. When Karen put on the red shoes and started to dance, she could not stop anymore - up to the point where she asked someone to chop off her both feet. And the shoes danced on, getting in her way and keeping Karen from attending church. Finally she repented and died peacefully.

The rabbit, the ring and the peach refer to stories by famous other authors: Lewis Carroll, JRR Tolkien and Roald Dahl.

Answer: Because she too stood on one single leg

"The Steadfast Tin Soldier" was the last of a set of 25 tin soldiers cast out of one load of tin. Because there was just not enough tin, this very last soldier missed one of his legs. In the toy room where the soldier landed, there was also a ballerina making a pirouette (and thus standing on one leg, the other being hidden behind her skirt) and a devilish Jack-in-the-Box.

The tin soldier fell in love with the ballerina, but the Jack-in-the-Box also had an eye upon her. So the Jack-in-the-Box caused the tin soldier to fall out of the window onto the street. A street orphan picked the soldier up, built a paper boat for it, and sent it through the sewers. The boat sank and a fish swallowed the soldier. Miraculously this fish was served in the toy room where the ballerina still stood, and the soldier reunited with the ballerina. The Jack-in-the-Box caused the soldier and the ballerina to be thrown into the fire.

The next morning the maid found a tin heart, being the remnant of the tin soldier, and the ballerina's sash.

Answer: Boots

Galoshes are indeed boots, especially designed for wearing outdoors in muddy streets and heavy rain.

In the fairy tale "The Galoshes of Fortune" Judge Knap was presented with this pair of magical galoshes. He wished to be in medieval times, put on the galoshes and was taken back in time - but he didn't know he had travelled through time. When he got in a row with other visitors of a local inn, the others removed his galoshes, thus breaking the spell and sending him back home to his own time.

The galoshes then went on from one owner to another, and each got into weird adventures. The last owner landed in Italy in very poor times, and wished to die - a wish immediately granted by the galoshes.

Answer: A swan

"The Ugly Duckling" was mocked by mother duck and the other ducklings for being different. This different duck wandered off and got in trouble everywhere. Ducks, geese, a hen, and even a cat teased him while he was growing up.

When fully mature, he decided to throw himself at the mercy of a flock of swans - who welcomed him heartily. And then he saw his reflection in the pool: he was no duck at all, but a beautiful swan.

Answer: Little Claus

Little Claus and Big Claus were neighbours. Where Little Claus had only one horse, Big Claus had four of them. Little Claus used to borrow Big Claus' horses to plough the field. But as he then told others that all five horses were his, Big Claus was angered and killed Little Claus' horse.

Little Claus then went out to sell the carcass of his horse. Fooling a farmer resulted in Little Claus earning a bag full of money for his dead horse, and threatening a priest earned him another full bag of money. Big Claus asked where the money came from, and as Little Claus answered it came from selling the horse, Big Claus killed his own horses and tried in vain to sell these for two bags of money.

Other adventures ensued, and finally Big Claus tried to drown Little Claus in the river. Little Claus narrowly escaped and tricked Big Claus into placing himself in a sack with a heavy rock, which Little Claus then threw in the river.

Answer: Hans

"Blockhead Hans" is the tale of a young princess, who declared that only the most eloquent suitor would marry her, and all others would be beheaded. Three sons of a nobleman went on their way. The first entered a hot room where the princess waited, along with some journalists eager to write down all what was told. Alas, he stammered and was beheaded. The second son came in, only to meet a similar fate.

The youngest son, Hans, asked the princess why the fire was so hot. When she replied that she was cooking some roosters, Hans gave her the crow to cook it with the roosters. The princess then asked for a pot to put the crow in, and Hans gave her an old shoe. When the princess asked for some gravy, Hans poured some mud in the shoe. And when the princess introduced Hans to the journalists, he threw mud in their face with the words "I'll give the best to the editor".

The humour convinced the princess to marry Hans and they lived long and happily ever after.