[ohanian]

Hans Christian Andersen was born in 2nd April 1805.

To celebrate 200 years of his legacy, I shall make one of his stories relevant to today's world.

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THE SHADOW by Hans Christian andersen

Once there was a learned man known by the nickname Mr Humanity who set forth from the northern regions of Europe took a trip to Africa. One night, he sat on his terrace, while the fire behind him cast his shadow on the opposite balcony. As he was sitting there, resting, the man was amused to observe how the shadow followed his every movement, as if he really did sit upon the opposing balcony. When he finally grew tired and went to sleep, he imagined the shadow would likewise retire in the house across the street. In his dreams, he gave his shadow a true name of Mr Corporation.

The next morning however, the man found to his surprise that he in fact had lost his shadow overnight. As a new shadow slowly grew back from the tip of his toes, the man did not give the incident another thought, returned to northern Europe, and took up writing again.

Several years passed by until one night a quasi man knocked at his door. To his suprise, it was his former shadow Mr Corporation, the one he lost years before in Africa, and now stood upon his doorstep, almost completely a legal human in appearance. Astonished by his sudden reappearance, the learned man invited him into his house, and soon the two sat by the fireplace, as the shadow Mr Corporation related how he had come to be a legal human.

The learned man was calm and gentle by nature. His main object of interest lay with the good, the beautiful and the true, a subject of which he wrote often but was of no interest to anyone else. The shadow Mr Corporation said his master did not understand the world, that he had seen it as truly was, and how evil some men really were.

The shadow Mr Corporation then grew richer and fatter over the years, while the writer grew poorer and paler. Finally he had become so ill that his former shadow Mr Corporation proposed a trip to a health resort at his expense, but on condition that he could act as the master now, and the writer would pretend to be his shadow. As absurd as this suggestion sounded, the learned man eventually agreed and together they took the trip, the shadow Mr Corporation now as his master. At the resort, the shadow met with a beautiful princess, and as they danced and talked with each other each night, the princess fell in love with him.

When they were about to be married, the shadow Mr Corporation offered his former master a luxurious position at the palace, on condition that he now became his own shadow permanently. The writer immediately refused and threatened to tell the princess everything, but the shadow had him arrested. Feigning his distraught, Mr Corporation met with the princess and told her:

"I have gone through the most terrible affair that could possibly happen; only imagine, my own shadow has gone mad; I suppose such a poor, shallow brain, could not bear much; he fancies that he has become a real man, and that I am his shadow."
"How very terrible,” cried the princess; "is he locked up?"
"Oh yes, certainly; for I fear he will never recover."

When the shadow Mr Corporation wed the princess later that night, the learned man Mr Humanity was already executed.