The Wild Swans (fairy tale)

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This article is about the fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen. For the band, see The Wild Swans (band). For the animated feature adaptation, see The Wild Swans (film).

The Wild Swans
Vilhelm Pedersen illustration
Author	Hans Christian Andersen
Original title	De vilde svaner
Country	Denmark
Language	Danish
Genre(s)	Fairy tale
Publisher	C.A. Reitzel
Publication date	1838
Media type	Print

"The Wild Swans" (Danish: De vilde svaner) is a fairy tale by Danish poet and author Hans Christian Andersen about a princess who rescues her brothers from a spell cast by a wicked queen. The tale was first published 1838 and has been adapted to various media including ballet and animated film.

1 Plot
2 Source
3 Publication
4 Adaptations
5 See also
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Plot

In a faraway kingdom, there lives a King with his twelve children: eleven princes and one princess. One day, he decides to remarry. He marries a wicked Queen who is actually a witch. Out of spite, the queen turns her eleven stepsons into swans and forces them to fly away. They carry their fifteen year old sister Elisa to safety in a foreign land where she is out of harms way of her stepmother. There, Elisa labors mutely day and night knitting magic shirts from nettles to help her brothers regain their human shapes, as this is the only way to break the spell their stepmother forced them under. The king of another faraway land happens to come across the mute Elisa and falls in love with her. He grants her a room in the castle where she continues her knitting and eventually crowns her as his Queen and wife. One night Elisa runs out of nettles and is forced to collect more in a graveyard. She is spotted by the evil Archbishop who is looking for an excuse to accuse her of witchcraft. He convinces the King that Elisa is a witch and sentences her to death by burning at the stake. At the place of execution, the swans descend and rescue Elisa. The magic shirts are donned and the brothers return to their human forms. Elisa regains her voice and explains the reason for her mysterious work to the king. Elisa's courage prevails and she is forever reunited with her brothers.

[edit] Source

The source for Andersen's tale is Matthias Winther's "The Eleven Swans" from Winther's Danish Folktales (1823). "Twelve Brothers", "Seven Ravens", and "Six Swans" are similar tale types found in the 1812 and 1815 collections of Grimm's Fairy Tales collections. ^[1] The tale may have originated in Ireland as The Children of Lir.

[edit] Publication

The tale was first published by C.A. Reitzel in Copenhagen 2 October 1838 in Fairy Tales Told for Children. New Collection. First Booklet. 1838. (Eventyr, fortalte for Børn. Ny Samling. Første Hefte. 1838.). The tale was republished twice during Andersen's lifetime: 18 December 1849 as a part of Fairy Tales. 1850. (Eventyr. 1850.), and again 15 December 1862 as a part of Fairy Tales and Stories. First Volume. 1862. (Eventyr og Historier. Første Bind. 1862.).^[2]

[edit] Adaptations

H.C. Andersen

The American television program Shirley Temple's Storybook presented a live-action adaptation of The Wild Swans 12 September 1958 starring Olive Deering as Queen Flavia, Grant Williams as King Julio, and Phyllis Love as Elisa. The production was written by Jean Holloway and directed by Robert Morris.^[3]
The Wild Swans (Russian: Дикие лебеди; tr.:Dikiye lebedi) is a 1962 Soviet traditionally-animated widescreen feature film directed by the husband-and-wife team of Mikhail Tsekhanovskiy and Vera Tsekhanovskaya. It was produced at the Soyuzmultfilm studio in Moscow.
The thirtieth anniversary of the opening of the Sydney Opera House was celebrated with a ballet choreographed by Meryl Tankard based on Andersen's tale called Wild Swans. The world premiere performance was 29 April 2003. The role of Hans Christian Andersen was performed by Stephen Baynes. The ballet is a mix of dance and photographic and video illuminations created to a specially commissioned score for orchestra and soprano voice by Elena Kats-Chernin. The visual design was inspired by the eccentric paper cut-outs of Hans Christian Andersen.^[4]
The Wild Swans, a puppet opera for adults and children based on the Hans Christian Andersen tale with music and libretto by Susan Hulsman Bingham and puppets by Christine Rugullies won a special commendation at the Vienna Masterworks 2004 Nancy Van de Vate International Composition Competition for Opera.^[5]