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The Complete Hans Christian Andersen Fairy Tales.

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From: The Nation
Date: 19920511
Author:Cravens, Gwyneth

Since "The Little Mermaid," by Hans Christian Andersen, was first read aloud to me by my mother when I was 4 or 5, I've read it over and over-to myself, to my own daughter and to other children. I always forget that it's a tale. It seems instead an immediate, intimate part of my life, yet suspended outside of time. When I was small, elements of the story troubled me. Growing up in the high desert of the Southwest and never having seen the ocean, I'd have given anything to be a mermaid rather than a girl, and yet the heroine yearned to become a human and live on the land. And what ...

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