Summary “The Snow Queen” by Andersen


1. Once upon a time there was an evil troll, and one day he made a mirror that reflected all the imperfections of objects reflected in it. The troll’s students began to run around the world with this mirror, and finally they wanted to get to the sky, god and angels. But the higher they rose, the more the mirror writhing, and suddenly it trembled and shattered into fragments that scattered all over the earth, falling into people’s eyes and hearts. From this people became angry and started to see everything in a negative light.

2. In a big city in the neighboring houses lived a boy and a girl, Kai and Gerda. They were like a brother and sister and went to visit each other every day, they were sitting in the garden, which their parents were bred under the windows of houses. In the winter, when it was cold, they exchanged glances through the window, through the round window where the frost thawed. One winter the boy saw the Snow Queen, about which his grandmother told

him, and was frightened of her.

Then came the spring, and the children again sat in the garden, admiring the roses, and looked at the picture book. Suddenly Kayu fell into the eye and pierced her heart. Gerda was frightened, but the boy said that everything was gone. In fact, it was a splinter of the mirror made by the troll, so Kai was immediately replaced: he began to talk rudely with Gerda, called the roses ugly and fled, tearing down three of them. Now he called the picture books “children’s”, mimicked the grandmother and neighbors and admired the exact and strict beauty of snowflakes.

One day he went to the sled on the square and hooked them to some big sled. They left the square and took the boy out of town. From the sleigh the Snow Queen leaves. She kisses him, and Kai forgets her grandmother and Gerda and everyone else. Now the Snow Queen seems to him beautiful, and the boy allows her to take herself to her palaces.

3. Gerda worries about the loss of Kaya. Finally, everyone decided that he was dead, but spring came and the girl decided to look for him. She put on new red shoes

and went to the river to ask if the river had taken him to her. She threw her shoes into the river, but she took them back, and Gerda sat in the boat to throw them away. The boat was not tied, and Gerda carried along the river until it was nailed to the shore on which stood a straw-covered house with multicolored windows.

In this house there lived a woman who knew how to conjure. In her garden there were many different colors that could tell stories. She really liked Gerda, and she decided to leave the girl at home, forcing her to forget that she was looking for Kai. The woman deprived Gerd of memories and hid the roses under the ground so that they would not remind her of Kay.

Gerda spent many days in a woman’s house, playing in a flower garden, but she thought that one flower was missing in the garden. Looking at the old woman’s hat, she saw roses on her and remembered everything. Roses that grew again from the tears of the girl, said that Kaya is not among the dead. Gerda, distressed that she spent a lot of time in vain, began to question the flowers about Kai, but none of them knew anything but their own history. Then the girl ran away from the house of the old woman. Outside, it was late autumn.

4. Gerda notices the crow in the snow and begins to talk with him. The raven tells her, from the words of her bride, the court crows, a story about a princess looking for herself such a bridegroom who would be an interesting conversationalist. All the candidates were speechless from the luxurious environment and high position of the princess and only one poor boy was not afraid of all this and fell in love with the girl. Gerda is sure that this boy is Kai and asks the crow to take her to the palace. He promises to help.

In the evening he arrives and says that his bride will lead Gerd to the bedroom of the princess from the back door. At night, Gerda makes her way through the palace halls to the princess’s bedroom and sees that her fiance is not Kai. The prince and the princess wake up, and after learning the story of Gerda, they feel sorry for her and allow her to live in the palace. But she asks to give her a wagon and shoes to go again to look for Kai. They fulfill her request, giving her a rich carriage, shoes and a dress and say goodbye to Gerda.

In the forest, the robbers are attacked by robbers, and Gerda is captured by them. The old robber is about to slaughter Gerd, but the girl is rescued by her daughter, asking Gerda to leave to play with her. The daughter of the robber, along with Gerda, goes to the castle of the robbers. Learning the story of Gerda, the little robber became even more attached to her. In the castle, the robber shows Gerda his animals – pigeons and deer and puts him to sleep next to him.

The pigeons tell Gerda that they saw the Snow Queen take Kai to her palace and the little robber decides to release Gerda along with her deer who knows those places, with the condition that the deer will take her to the palace of the Snow Queen. A little robber waits until her mother falls asleep, having drunk from a large bottle, and lets Gerda escape, providing her with food and warm clothes.

The deer stops at the lap-hut, and she instructs them to go to Finland, passing a letter for the Finn to the dried cod.

In Finnish, the deer tells the story of Gerda and asks her to help them and weld a potion that will help Gerda overcome the Snow Queen. But the Finn says that Kai is sure that he is happy with the Snow Queen. And Gerda is stronger than anyone else, because people and animals obey her, and her strength lies in the fact that she is a child. And all you need to do is take out the splinters of the mirror from Kai’s heart and eyes. But she can not say anything about her strength, but just leave it in the bush in the snowdrift. Forgetting about the mittens and boots, the deer leaves Gerda by the bush in the freezing frost, and she goes ahead. The fog, formed from her breathing, fights with the army of snowflakes and Gerda gets to the palace of the Snow Queen.

At this time, Kai is in the empty, dead and majestic palace of the Snow Queen. She herself flew to warm countries to whiten the peaks of volcanoes, and left him to put the words “eternity” out of the ice floes, promising that if he does this, he will get freedom and domination over the whole world. He could not solve the puzzle in any way.

Then comes Gerda. At first Kai does not recognize her, but her tears and a song about roses melted the ice in his heart, he remembered everything and rushed to her, and the ice floes danced and made up the word “eternity”.

The girl and the boy came out of the snowy quarters of the Snow Queen, and on their way across the whole earth came the spring. They go on the road to visit Finland and Lapland, meet old friends: a reindeer who has already acquired a family, and a young robber who has decided to travel all over the world. She tells that the prince and the princess left for other lands, and the crows died. Kai and Gerda return home, already adults, but the children are at heart.


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Summary “The Snow Queen” by Andersen