Fugl Phønix
“The Phoenix” is the most lyrical of Andersen’s tales. Eulogizing the bird of paradise, it combines biblical narratives with Scandinavian lore and ancient mythologies to construct an aesthetic in which beauty constantly renews itself in bursts of cataclysmic destruction. Nature becomes the model for an art that pulses with organic vitality and the promise of metamorphosis and rebirth. Ducks, swans, sparrows, storks, butterflies, and other ordinary winged creatures perpetually find their way into Andersen’s narratives. Sometimes they enact fables about human behavior, sometimes they encounter humans to offer wisdom, direction, or assistance, and frequently they incarnate the human soul in flight. The phoenix, with its glorious color and song, rises above the ordinary to serve as the model for an art that will never perish, even as it repeatedly goes up in flames. That winged creature has inspired one critic to refer to Andersen’s art as governed by “the phoenix principle,” a profound faith in the power of art to endure beyond its material existence.
Beneath the tree of knowledge in the Garden of Eden,1 a rosebush was growing. From its first blossom, a bird was born, with beautiful plumage, glorious colors, and an enchanting song.
When Eve plucked fruit from the tree of knowledge, she and Adam were driven from Eden, and a spark flew from the flaming sword of the angel into the bird’s nest and set it on fire. The bird perished in the flames, but a new bird arose from the egg glowing in the nest, the only one of its kind, the peerless phoenix. Legend tells us that it comes from Arabia2 and that it sets itself on fire every hundred years. But almost at once a new phoenix, the only one in the entire world, flies out from the egg glowing in the nest.
The bird darts around us as swiftly as light. Its colors are glorious, and its wondrous song captivates us. When a mother sits by a cradle, it flits around the pillow, creating a halo around the infant’s head. It flies through a shabby parlor, spreading sunshine, and suddenly a humble cupboard smells of violets.
The phoenix is not native to Arabia alone. In the glimmer of the Northern lights, it soars over the icy plains of Lapland and hops about amid the yellow flowers in Greenland’s brief summer. It can be seen beneath the copper mountains of Falun3 as well as in England’s coal mines. It hovers like a powdery moth above the hymnal resting in the hands of a pious miner. It floats down the sacred waters of the Ganges on a lotus leaf, and the eyes of Hindu maidens brighten when they behold it.
VILHELM PEDERSON
The phoenix! I’m sure you know it. It is the bird of Eden, the blessed swan of song. It was seated in the carriage of Thespis4 and sat back there like a chattering raven, flapping its gutter-stained black wings. The swan’s red beak, resounding with song, swept over the harps of Iceland’s bards. It sat on Shakespeare’s shoulders, looking like Odin’s raven,5 and whispered the word “immortality” in his ear. At the minstrels’ contest, it fluttered through the halls of the Wartburg.6
The phoenix! I’m sure you know it. It sang the “Marseillaise” to you,7 and you kissed the feather that dropped from its wing. It landed in all the glory of paradise, but perhaps you turned away to look at the sparrow perched before you with gold-tipped wings.
Oh bird of paradise, renewed with each new century, you are born in flames and die in flames. Framed in gold, your portrait adorns the halls of the wealthy, yet you yourself soar through the air and off course, nothing but a myth. The phoenix of Arabia!
When you were born beneath the tree of knowledge as the first rose in the Garden of Eden, God kissed you and gave you your proper name: Poetry.
1. Beneath the tree of knowledge in the Garden of Eden. The rosebush growing in Eden is Andersen’s invention, but he remains otherwise faithful to the biblical story. The angel with the flaming sword is described in Genesis 3:24: “After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.”
2. Legend tells us that it comes from Arabia. The phoenix is associated in many cultures with death, resurrection, and immortality. In ancient Egyptian myths, the phoenix was a male bird with gold and red plumage. At the end of its life span (the exact number of centuries varies), it was said to build a nest of sweet-smelling wood, to which it set fire. From the ashes of the phoenix arose a young new bird. The new phoenix took the ashes of the old and made of them an egg of myrrh, which was deposited in Heliopolis (“city of the sun” in Greek) on the altar of Ra, the Sun God. In the Egyptian myth, the bird was known as Bennu and was sometimes represented on sarcophagi as a heron. Russian folklore has its counterpart to the phoenix in the firebird.
In Andersen’s story “Garden of Eden,” the South Wind reports the following about the phoenix: “I saw the phoenix set fire to its nest, and I just sat there while it burned like a Hindu’s widow. The dry branches made a crackling sound, and there was smoke and perfume! Finally, everything went up in flames, and the old phoenix burned to ashes. But its glowing red-hot egg was lying in the fire, and then burst with a loud noise, and the young one flew out. Now it rules over all birds and is the only phoenix in the world.”
3. beneath the copper mountains of Falun. Located in the central part of Sweden, the great copper mines of Falun were put into operation as early as the twelfth century. Andersen traveled to Sweden (where there were no “roaring cannon”) in 1849, when fighting erupted between Denmark and Prussia. He published a travel memoir, Pictures of Sweden, in 1851, documenting his appreciation of the Swedish landscape. The copper mines in Sweden also served as the setting for The Mines of Falun, a short story by E.T.A. Hoffmann. Andersen’s inventory of geographical sites, including Falun, is intended to underscore that the myth shows no signs of cultural fatigue.
4. seated in the carriage of Thespis. Renowned as the inventor of tragedy, Thespis was born in Attica in the sixth century B.C. He is said to have introduced the notion of an actor (as opposed to the chorus), as well as costumes, masks, and make-up, which he carried through Athens in a cart for his street performances. The term thespian, denoting actors and actresses, comes from his name.
5. looking like Odin’s raven. Odin, the chief god of Norse mythology, has two ravens, Huginn and Muninn, and they fly all over the world to bring news back to him. (The melodious bird in Andersen’s “Nightingale” takes on a similar role for the Emperor in China at the end of that story.)
6. it fluttered through the halls of the Wartburg. Wartburg Castle, built early in the eleventh century, overlooks the town of Eisenach, in Thuringia, Germany. It became the site of courtly culture, in particular the so-called Sängerkrieg, or Contest of Minstrels, at the beginning of the thirteenth century. Participants included the renowned poets Walter von der Vogelweide and Wolfram von Eschenbach. The Sängerkrieg is at the center of Richard Wagner’s opera Tannhäuser.
7. It sang the “Marseillaise” to you. The “Marseillaise,” now France’s national anthem, was written and composed in 1792. It was sung during the French Revolution by troops from Marseille upon their arrival in Paris. By Andersen’s time, it had already become the international revolutionary anthem.