Do you know The Little Mermaid（《海的女兒》）？ The story’s author is Hans Christian Andersen（漢斯·克里斯蒂安·安徒生）. He told great stories to children. April 2 is his birthday. Let’s learn more about him.

Young baok lover年輕的書迷

Andersen was born in Denmark in 1805. His family was very poor. His father was a shoemaker. He read Andersen a story every day.

His father died when he was 11. Then he had to leave school.

But he loved reading books very much. He went back to school at 17. He began to write at college.

His first book of fairy tales（童話） came out in 1835. From then on， he wrote almost one book a year for 37 years.

His fairy tales小故事，大道理

In his lifetime， Andersen wrote hundreds of fairy tales， such as The Emperor’s New Clothes（《皇帝的新衣》） and The Little Match Girl（《賣火柴的小女孩》）. Andersen showed his own ideas in his stories. For example， he believed people should not judge others by their appearances. In The Ugly Duckling（《丑小鴨》）， everyone laughs at the ugly duckling. But it grows up to be a beautiful swan.

Andersen Museum安徒生博物館

Andersen’s home is now a museum. There are lots of pictures from Andersen’s stories. You can also find Andersen’s hat， umbrella and bag.

A day for Andersen國際兒童圖書日

To honor Andersen， people celebrate International Children’s Book Day（國際兒童圖書日） on his birthday every year. The day is to inspire children to love reading. What books do you like reading most？

The Little Mermaid小美人魚

Look at the statue of the Little Mermaid（小美人魚）. She has a human body（人身） and a fish tail（魚尾）. It’s a symbol of Denmark. It’s to remember Andersen and his story The Little Mermaid.

Words

author /???θ?（r）/ n.作者 Denmark /?denmɑ?k/ n.丹麥

shoemaker /??u?me?k?（r）/ n.鞋匠 college /?k?l?d?/ n.大學(xué)

lifetime /?laIftaIm/" n.一生 judge /d??d?/ v.評(píng)判

appearance /??p??r?ns/ n.外表 swan /sw?n/ n.天鵝

honor /??n?（r）/ v.紀(jì)念 inspire /?n?spa??（r）/ v.激勵(lì)

statue /?st?t?u?/ n.雕塑 symbol /?s?mbl/ n.象征