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| | International Reading Association : Reading Today : World Celebrates Hans Christian Andersen Bicentennial |
 | | Hans Christian Andersen once described himself, in a letter to a friend, as “a plant from the swamp.” He was born to a couple living in the direst poverty—the father, mother, and son ate, worked, and slept in one rented room. |
| | Andersen wrote to another author about his own tales, “I have written them in a manner that I would tell them to a child.” The sentences were short, the words concrete, but the stories themselves were full of fantasy—with a difference. |
| | Andersen remained friends with Lind, but he never married, and toward the end of his life was prey to fears that he would be caught in a fire or fall into a coma and be buried alive. |
| www.reading.org /publications/reading_today/samples/RTY-0504-andersen.html (1314 words) |
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