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The Nightingale
Graceful and full of rich humor, Stephen Mitchell's retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's THE NIGHTINGALE is paired with impeccably researched, astonishingly beautiful paintings by Bagram Ibatoulline.
The Emperor of China lives in the most marvelous palace in the world, made entirely of porcelain, and his garden is full of the rarest flowers. But loveliest of all - so say visitors to his realm - is the song of the nightingale in the forest by the sea. Though his bustling courtiers can't find her, a clever kitchen maid can, and the nightingale soon enchants the Emperor with her song. But will the gift of a bejeweled bird with a mechanical tune replace the humble nightingale in his heart?
Warmly and accessibly retold by master translator Stephen Mitchell,
this definitive edition features breathtakingly intricate artwork by Bagram Ibatoulline, illustrator of CROSSING.
The Emperor of China lives in the most marvelous palace in the world, made entirely of porcelain, and his garden is full of the rarest flowers. But loveliest of all - so say visitors to his realm - is the song of the nightingale in the forest by the sea. Though his bustling courtiers can't find her, a clever kitchen maid can, and the nightingale soon enchants the Emperor with her song. But will the gift of a bejeweled bird with a mechanical tune replace the humble nightingale in his heart?
Warmly and accessibly retold by master translator Stephen Mitchell,
this definitive edition features breathtakingly intricate artwork by Bagram Ibatoulline, illustrator of CROSSING.
48 pages, Hardcover
Published October 1, 2002
24 people are currently reading
1148 people want to read
About the author
Hans Christian Andersen
7,811 books3,541 followersHans Christian Andersen (often referred to in Scandinavia as H.C. Andersen) was a Danish author and poet. Although a prolific writer of plays, travelogues, novels, and poems, Andersen is best remembered for his fairy tales. Andersen's popularity is not limited to children; his stories — called eventyr, or "fairy-tales" — express themes that transcend age and nationality.
Andersen's fairy tales, which have been translated into more than 125 languages, have become culturally embedded in the West's collective consciousness, readily accessible to children, but presenting lessons of virtue and resilience in the face of adversity for mature readers as well. Some of his most famous fairy tales include "The Little Mermaid", "The Ugly Duckling", "The Nightingale", "The Emperor's New Clothes" and many more. His stories have inspired plays, ballets, and both live-action and animated films.
Andersen's fairy tales, which have been translated into more than 125 languages, have become culturally embedded in the West's collective consciousness, readily accessible to children, but presenting lessons of virtue and resilience in the face of adversity for mature readers as well. Some of his most famous fairy tales include "The Little Mermaid", "The Ugly Duckling", "The Nightingale", "The Emperor's New Clothes" and many more. His stories have inspired plays, ballets, and both live-action and animated films.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
September 23, 2019
I don’t know if I knew this fable. It’s possible I did and forgot. This is a beautiful story about the beautiful song of a Nightingale and the healing power of nature. My favorite part was when death is sitting on the emperor’s chest and all these heads are around him. There are beautiful heads and ugly heads and they are our good and bad deeds we did in life and they are all saying, “do you remember me.” Wow, that was pretty powerful to me.
This Nightingale ends up saving the Emperor, at least for a time, with his song. Nature is really our best healing source. It’s the true elixir. This is a great secret revealed here. A teacher told a story of meeting a monk in Tibet and she asked if he needed acupuncture needles and the monk replied when he needs healing he will sit with a tree and the tree will heal him. When we flow with the natural rhythms, there really is healing power in nature. Humanities problem is we live outside those bounds of nature for 3,000 years and it’s only getting worse. Today, many of us have lost our connection completely to nature. Anyway.
The nephew thought this was long. He did like the robot bird in the story, completely missing the point of it. He thought the story was ok. He gave this 3 stars.
Jerry Pinkney did the illustrations in this edition.
This Nightingale ends up saving the Emperor, at least for a time, with his song. Nature is really our best healing source. It’s the true elixir. This is a great secret revealed here. A teacher told a story of meeting a monk in Tibet and she asked if he needed acupuncture needles and the monk replied when he needs healing he will sit with a tree and the tree will heal him. When we flow with the natural rhythms, there really is healing power in nature. Humanities problem is we live outside those bounds of nature for 3,000 years and it’s only getting worse. Today, many of us have lost our connection completely to nature. Anyway.
The nephew thought this was long. He did like the robot bird in the story, completely missing the point of it. He thought the story was ok. He gave this 3 stars.
Jerry Pinkney did the illustrations in this edition.
March 22, 2022
The Nightingale, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney.
After being signally unimpressed by Jerry Pinkney's retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's The Nightingale, in which the setting has been shifted from China to Morocco, I've been trying to figure out why it is that some fairy-tale adaptations involving a major cultural or national switch are successful, and others are not. Debbie Allen's Brothers of the Knight , for instance, is a wonderful retelling of the Brothers Grimm tale, The Twelve Dancing Princesses , transplanting the story from Germany to the African-American community of Harlem. Pinkney himself created a lovely edition of The Little Match Girl , set in turn-of-the-century America, rather than the more traditional nineteenth-century European city.
So why do such adaptations appeal to me, when this one leaves me cold? Part of it, of course, is that I'm a bit of a traditionalist, and while I recognize that adaptation and borrowing is a necessary part of the folk process - that, indeed, it is the folk process - I tend to prefer the tales (and songs) that are as close to the "original" as possible, whether that be the text of a literary fairy-tale, or the unexpurgated version of a folk-tale. So those adaptations which diverge widely from that original should do so for some good reason, or I tend to be unimpressed.
Debbie Allen's tale of the twelve dance-loving sons of a strict Harlem minister, for example, clearly draws inspiration from the idea of forbidden musical expression - a theme that has great significance in African-American history - and makes a connection between two traditions some might think have nothing in common. Likewise, Pinkney highlights the continuing significance of The Little Match Girl by transplanting it to another continent and time, demonstrating that children have suffered the ill effects of poverty and neglect in many different societies.
What then, does this Moroccan version of The Nightingale tell me? According to his afterword, that Pinkney and his editors wanted to set the tale in Africa, rather than China. No real reason for such a transplant is given, although the author does mention that he double-checked to make sure that nightingales do live on the continent. As far as I can tell, nothing in the tale spoke to Pinkney (or his editors) of Africa, nothing sparked a particularly Moroccan chord, suggesting some unexpected commonality. That being so, the change in setting struck me as rather arbitrary. It's admirable that Pinkney wanted to highlight the racial diversity of Morocco (again, according to his afterword), but wouldn't a traditional Moroccan tale have done that, while also exposing young children to another tradition?
After being signally unimpressed by Jerry Pinkney's retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's The Nightingale, in which the setting has been shifted from China to Morocco, I've been trying to figure out why it is that some fairy-tale adaptations involving a major cultural or national switch are successful, and others are not. Debbie Allen's Brothers of the Knight , for instance, is a wonderful retelling of the Brothers Grimm tale, The Twelve Dancing Princesses , transplanting the story from Germany to the African-American community of Harlem. Pinkney himself created a lovely edition of The Little Match Girl , set in turn-of-the-century America, rather than the more traditional nineteenth-century European city.
So why do such adaptations appeal to me, when this one leaves me cold? Part of it, of course, is that I'm a bit of a traditionalist, and while I recognize that adaptation and borrowing is a necessary part of the folk process - that, indeed, it is the folk process - I tend to prefer the tales (and songs) that are as close to the "original" as possible, whether that be the text of a literary fairy-tale, or the unexpurgated version of a folk-tale. So those adaptations which diverge widely from that original should do so for some good reason, or I tend to be unimpressed.
Debbie Allen's tale of the twelve dance-loving sons of a strict Harlem minister, for example, clearly draws inspiration from the idea of forbidden musical expression - a theme that has great significance in African-American history - and makes a connection between two traditions some might think have nothing in common. Likewise, Pinkney highlights the continuing significance of The Little Match Girl by transplanting it to another continent and time, demonstrating that children have suffered the ill effects of poverty and neglect in many different societies.
What then, does this Moroccan version of The Nightingale tell me? According to his afterword, that Pinkney and his editors wanted to set the tale in Africa, rather than China. No real reason for such a transplant is given, although the author does mention that he double-checked to make sure that nightingales do live on the continent. As far as I can tell, nothing in the tale spoke to Pinkney (or his editors) of Africa, nothing sparked a particularly Moroccan chord, suggesting some unexpected commonality. That being so, the change in setting struck me as rather arbitrary. It's admirable that Pinkney wanted to highlight the racial diversity of Morocco (again, according to his afterword), but wouldn't a traditional Moroccan tale have done that, while also exposing young children to another tradition?
August 24, 2016
A beautiful, wonderful, heart-touching story. One wonders if Reagan’s Secretary of Education, that brain-storming market solutionist (who achieved a switch from government tuition grants to a market in student loans thus sowing the seeds of today's student loan crisis), fairy tale fan and gambling addict, Bill Bennett, included this story in his book of forgotten tales that all children should learn because they embody and cultivate the principled soul. [update: He did not.]
The Tale of the Nightingale indirectly poses (at the very least) the following questions: Does material wealth bring happiness or inculcate wisdom? Do society’s enthusiasms tend to follow things of inherent value? Is power or expertise required to recognize true beauty?
*****************SPOILER ALERT**************
The emperor of China has a wonderful palace and garden filled with exquisitely wrought objects of beauty that cost enormous amounts and show off human ingenuity in spades, but what do all the visitors like the best? The song of a humble gray bird. The emperor is not even aware of the existence of such a bird, and when he finally finds out, he is disgusted that no one has told him (where does the emperor finally discover the truth from?—a book!). The bird is duly captured for the emperor and made to sing. The emperor of Japan sends as obeisance a mechanical bird covered in jewels that sings (plays) a single flawless song. And it turns out everyone at the palace loves the MECHANICAL bird. It plays so RELIABLY, you see. It’s so beautiful covered as it is with sparkling JEWELS, isn’t it. Moreover, its song CONFORMS to the palace musical director’s THEORY of melody. What’s not to love? In the course of all the fawning, the real nightingale flies away. No one misses it.
Questions my six year old son asked: Is a real bird better than a mechanical bird? Why? (In our high rise in the middle of the city we don’t have opportunity to hear any birds other than crows.) And why does society love the mechanical bird so? (Also tough to explain.)
The last part of the story: The old emperor falls sick, but no one seems to care. Why don’t they care? They are the type of people who enthuse over a mechanical bird covered with jewels. How could they be expected to care? Death awaits the emperor, who is haunted by the ghosts of all that he has done and failed to do. He lays on his sick bed, alone with the spirit of death above him, the mechanical bird on a table beside him. He cannot listen to the bird, because there is no one there to wind it up. Suddenly the real nightingale appears at the window. At her song, death is sent packing, and the soul of the emperor is rescued. The emperor recovers; everyone is astounded.
Could the mechanical bird have rescued the soul of the emperor or sent death packing, if someone had been there to wind it up? Would it have had that power? (One wishes Andersen had set the story up like this.) I think everyone instinctively knows the answer, although I get the feeling Silicon Valley capitalists would answer by simply denying the existence of the soul (which, to be fair, would be true for them).
The Tale of the Nightingale indirectly poses (at the very least) the following questions: Does material wealth bring happiness or inculcate wisdom? Do society’s enthusiasms tend to follow things of inherent value? Is power or expertise required to recognize true beauty?
*****************SPOILER ALERT**************
The emperor of China has a wonderful palace and garden filled with exquisitely wrought objects of beauty that cost enormous amounts and show off human ingenuity in spades, but what do all the visitors like the best? The song of a humble gray bird. The emperor is not even aware of the existence of such a bird, and when he finally finds out, he is disgusted that no one has told him (where does the emperor finally discover the truth from?—a book!). The bird is duly captured for the emperor and made to sing. The emperor of Japan sends as obeisance a mechanical bird covered in jewels that sings (plays) a single flawless song. And it turns out everyone at the palace loves the MECHANICAL bird. It plays so RELIABLY, you see. It’s so beautiful covered as it is with sparkling JEWELS, isn’t it. Moreover, its song CONFORMS to the palace musical director’s THEORY of melody. What’s not to love? In the course of all the fawning, the real nightingale flies away. No one misses it.
Questions my six year old son asked: Is a real bird better than a mechanical bird? Why? (In our high rise in the middle of the city we don’t have opportunity to hear any birds other than crows.) And why does society love the mechanical bird so? (Also tough to explain.)
The last part of the story: The old emperor falls sick, but no one seems to care. Why don’t they care? They are the type of people who enthuse over a mechanical bird covered with jewels. How could they be expected to care? Death awaits the emperor, who is haunted by the ghosts of all that he has done and failed to do. He lays on his sick bed, alone with the spirit of death above him, the mechanical bird on a table beside him. He cannot listen to the bird, because there is no one there to wind it up. Suddenly the real nightingale appears at the window. At her song, death is sent packing, and the soul of the emperor is rescued. The emperor recovers; everyone is astounded.
Could the mechanical bird have rescued the soul of the emperor or sent death packing, if someone had been there to wind it up? Would it have had that power? (One wishes Andersen had set the story up like this.) I think everyone instinctively knows the answer, although I get the feeling Silicon Valley capitalists would answer by simply denying the existence of the soul (which, to be fair, would be true for them).
August 24, 2025
#Binge Reviewing my previous Reads #Classic fairy tales with Modern Implications
Hans Christian Andersen’s The Nightingale is one of those deceptively simple tales that operates like a hinge between worlds—the folk imagination of songbirds and the proto-modern anxieties of mechanization, empire, and desire. At its surface, it tells of an emperor who learns to prize the natural nightingale’s song over the artificial glitter of a jeweled mechanical bird.
But read more closely, the text is less a quaint fable about authenticity than an allegory of power, consumption, and the aesthetic economies that still govern us in the twenty-first century.
The emperor’s obsession with possession—of turning song into a collectible, of converting wonder into display—marks the story’s central critique. The nightingale, initially free and uncommodified, sings in the forest, accessible to everyone. The emperor’s court, with its ornate blindness, requires mediation: it takes a maid’s testimony for the bird’s existence to even register in official consciousness.
In this, Andersen anticipates the postmodern suspicion of representation: the bird is not valued for itself but for how it can be inscribed into imperial discourse. The transition from wild bird to palace ornament is the violent reduction of alterity to capital—what Derrida might call the pharmakon of aestheticization, simultaneously cure and poison.
The arrival of the mechanical nightingale intensifies this logic. Here, the critique slips into the proto-industrial: technology promises permanence, regularity, mastery over the unpredictability of life. The artificial bird, set with jewels and wound up to play endlessly, represents the fantasy of art stripped of contingency.
Yet it also signifies death, for in its endless repetition it has no breath, no mortality, no soul. Andersen seems to anticipate Benjamin’s meditation on mechanical reproduction, suggesting that what is gained in circulation is lost in aura.
The emperor’s choice of the artificial over the natural is not mere folly—it is symptomatic of an order that mistakes simulacra for the real, spectacle for substance.
But Andersen complicates the binary. For when Death comes to the emperor’s bedside, it is not the mechanical bird that intercedes but the living nightingale, whose song charms Death away.
The tale thus posits art not as mere ornament but as intervention in the most intimate of human thresholds: mortality itself. In this sense, the story suggests that only art which retains its rootedness in the living—its risk, its ephemerality—can actually “save” us. The mechanical bird, like all consumerist surrogates, fails precisely because it is immune to death. It cannot meet us where we are most human.
For a twenty-first-century reader, the implications are uncanny. We live in a world where music, images, and even voices are endlessly reproducible, streamed, or AI-generated. The “mechanical nightingale” is no longer fantasy—it is Facebook’s algorithm, TikTok’s endless loop, or generative soundscapes built to soothe productivity.
The emperor’s court could easily be read as a mirror of our digital lives, entranced by the gleaming simulacrum, blind to the living texture of voice and breath. The problem is not that technology exists but that we no longer know how to distinguish between song and its copy, between aura and algorithm.
And yet, Andersen does not offer nostalgia as an easy out. The nightingale still consents to sing for the emperor, even after having been displaced by its jeweled double. It offers grace despite betrayal. The tale, therefore, is not a call to abandon technology but to recognize the limits of substitution. The lesson for us is not to smash the machines but to refuse to let them exhaust our capacity for wonder.
Postmodernly, the nightingale can be read as the figure of the Other—whether nature, art, or even marginalized voices—constantly threatened with instrumentalization yet always bearing the possibility of resistance. The emperor’s salvation is contingent not on power but on listening. Perhaps this is the most radical gesture of Andersen’s text: that survival, even sovereignty, rests on our willingness to hear what cannot be owned.
In the end, The Nightingale endures because it dramatizes a choice we still confront daily: between authenticity and simulation, between art that risks death and art that loops forever.
In the twenty-first century, as voices are digitized, mechanized, and commodified, Andersen’s story reminds us that only what breathes, what sings in and against finitude, can actually accompany us into the night.
Hans Christian Andersen’s The Nightingale is one of those deceptively simple tales that operates like a hinge between worlds—the folk imagination of songbirds and the proto-modern anxieties of mechanization, empire, and desire. At its surface, it tells of an emperor who learns to prize the natural nightingale’s song over the artificial glitter of a jeweled mechanical bird.
But read more closely, the text is less a quaint fable about authenticity than an allegory of power, consumption, and the aesthetic economies that still govern us in the twenty-first century.
The emperor’s obsession with possession—of turning song into a collectible, of converting wonder into display—marks the story’s central critique. The nightingale, initially free and uncommodified, sings in the forest, accessible to everyone. The emperor’s court, with its ornate blindness, requires mediation: it takes a maid’s testimony for the bird’s existence to even register in official consciousness.
In this, Andersen anticipates the postmodern suspicion of representation: the bird is not valued for itself but for how it can be inscribed into imperial discourse. The transition from wild bird to palace ornament is the violent reduction of alterity to capital—what Derrida might call the pharmakon of aestheticization, simultaneously cure and poison.
The arrival of the mechanical nightingale intensifies this logic. Here, the critique slips into the proto-industrial: technology promises permanence, regularity, mastery over the unpredictability of life. The artificial bird, set with jewels and wound up to play endlessly, represents the fantasy of art stripped of contingency.
Yet it also signifies death, for in its endless repetition it has no breath, no mortality, no soul. Andersen seems to anticipate Benjamin’s meditation on mechanical reproduction, suggesting that what is gained in circulation is lost in aura.
The emperor’s choice of the artificial over the natural is not mere folly—it is symptomatic of an order that mistakes simulacra for the real, spectacle for substance.
But Andersen complicates the binary. For when Death comes to the emperor’s bedside, it is not the mechanical bird that intercedes but the living nightingale, whose song charms Death away.
The tale thus posits art not as mere ornament but as intervention in the most intimate of human thresholds: mortality itself. In this sense, the story suggests that only art which retains its rootedness in the living—its risk, its ephemerality—can actually “save” us. The mechanical bird, like all consumerist surrogates, fails precisely because it is immune to death. It cannot meet us where we are most human.
For a twenty-first-century reader, the implications are uncanny. We live in a world where music, images, and even voices are endlessly reproducible, streamed, or AI-generated. The “mechanical nightingale” is no longer fantasy—it is Facebook’s algorithm, TikTok’s endless loop, or generative soundscapes built to soothe productivity.
The emperor’s court could easily be read as a mirror of our digital lives, entranced by the gleaming simulacrum, blind to the living texture of voice and breath. The problem is not that technology exists but that we no longer know how to distinguish between song and its copy, between aura and algorithm.
And yet, Andersen does not offer nostalgia as an easy out. The nightingale still consents to sing for the emperor, even after having been displaced by its jeweled double. It offers grace despite betrayal. The tale, therefore, is not a call to abandon technology but to recognize the limits of substitution. The lesson for us is not to smash the machines but to refuse to let them exhaust our capacity for wonder.
Postmodernly, the nightingale can be read as the figure of the Other—whether nature, art, or even marginalized voices—constantly threatened with instrumentalization yet always bearing the possibility of resistance. The emperor’s salvation is contingent not on power but on listening. Perhaps this is the most radical gesture of Andersen’s text: that survival, even sovereignty, rests on our willingness to hear what cannot be owned.
In the end, The Nightingale endures because it dramatizes a choice we still confront daily: between authenticity and simulation, between art that risks death and art that loops forever.
In the twenty-first century, as voices are digitized, mechanized, and commodified, Andersen’s story reminds us that only what breathes, what sings in and against finitude, can actually accompany us into the night.
January 24, 2019
The Nightingale, illustrated by Bagram Ibatoulline.
"In China, as you know, the Emperor is Chinese, and all the people are Chinese, too," begins this classic tale from Hans Christian Andersen, originally published in 1843, as part of the first volume of Nye Eventyr (New Fairy Tales). The story of an emperor who learns the true worth of the nightingale's song only when beset by death, and virtually abandoned by his many courtiers and servants, it has been interpreted as everything from a tribute to Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind ("The Swedish Nightingale"), to a meditation on the superiority of individual creation to mechanized production.
However one chooses to read the story, Stephen Mitchell's lovely translation for Candlewick Press must surely entertain and enthrall. His detailed explanation of his process - which he correctly labels "adaptation," rather than pure translation - will be particularly welcome to anyone who enjoys comparing various retellings of the same story. Bagram Ibatoulline, who has also illustrated Andersen's The Tinderbox and Thumbelina , delivers gorgeously detailed ink, watercolor and gouache illustrations, inspired by classical Chinese art. Every panel is a pleasure to behold, with a lush palette and many expressive details - even the endpapers are beautiful!
"In China, as you know, the Emperor is Chinese, and all the people are Chinese, too," begins this classic tale from Hans Christian Andersen, originally published in 1843, as part of the first volume of Nye Eventyr (New Fairy Tales). The story of an emperor who learns the true worth of the nightingale's song only when beset by death, and virtually abandoned by his many courtiers and servants, it has been interpreted as everything from a tribute to Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind ("The Swedish Nightingale"), to a meditation on the superiority of individual creation to mechanized production.
However one chooses to read the story, Stephen Mitchell's lovely translation for Candlewick Press must surely entertain and enthrall. His detailed explanation of his process - which he correctly labels "adaptation," rather than pure translation - will be particularly welcome to anyone who enjoys comparing various retellings of the same story. Bagram Ibatoulline, who has also illustrated Andersen's The Tinderbox and Thumbelina , delivers gorgeously detailed ink, watercolor and gouache illustrations, inspired by classical Chinese art. Every panel is a pleasure to behold, with a lush palette and many expressive details - even the endpapers are beautiful!
September 23, 2019
Beautiful, detailed art by Ibatoulline.
The story begins:
In China, as you know, the Emperor is Chinese, and all the people are Chinese, too.
I'm pretty sure that's not the beginning line in the version I used to read, but it's been so long since I read it, maybe it is.
Then, several pages later when the Emperor wants to see the nightingale for himself, he threatens, "If she doesn't appear after dinner at 7:00 on the dot, every courtier in the palace will get one punch in the stomach." Yep, that's what it says. Is Mitchell being politically correct with a sense of humor?
More humor and gorgeous art when the courtiers mistake a cow for the nightingale. Using fine art with the humor in the text is an appealing combination.
I appreciate the author's note at the end of the book. He explains why he considers this a retelling rather than a translation. He even compares examples of a translated paragraph with one to which he made minor changes thus retelling the story. This book will definitely reside on my shelves.
The story begins:
In China, as you know, the Emperor is Chinese, and all the people are Chinese, too.
I'm pretty sure that's not the beginning line in the version I used to read, but it's been so long since I read it, maybe it is.
Then, several pages later when the Emperor wants to see the nightingale for himself, he threatens, "If she doesn't appear after dinner at 7:00 on the dot, every courtier in the palace will get one punch in the stomach." Yep, that's what it says. Is Mitchell being politically correct with a sense of humor?
More humor and gorgeous art when the courtiers mistake a cow for the nightingale. Using fine art with the humor in the text is an appealing combination.
I appreciate the author's note at the end of the book. He explains why he considers this a retelling rather than a translation. He even compares examples of a translated paragraph with one to which he made minor changes thus retelling the story. This book will definitely reside on my shelves.
June 15, 2017
কেনো? বাগরাম ইবাতুলিনের আঁকাবুকির জন্য। খালি চোখে না দেখলে বিশ্বাস করা যায় না।
'অনুবাদ'-ও নাকী ভালো হইছে। আমার কথা না, শেষে ভেঙে বলা হইছে বইতেই, তাদের এরম দাবী করার কারণটা।
আমি হা হয়ে তাঁকায় বেশি ব্যস্ত ছিলাম যদিও। গুগল করে দেখতে পারেন বিষয়টা
'অনুবাদ'-ও নাকী ভালো হইছে। আমার কথা না, শেষে ভেঙে বলা হইছে বইতেই, তাদের এরম দাবী করার কারণটা।
আমি হা হয়ে তাঁকায় বেশি ব্যস্ত ছিলাম যদিও। গুগল করে দেখতে পারেন বিষয়টা
October 24, 2018
A rich, beautiful rendering of the classic Hans Christian Andersen tale, akin to a tapestry.
October 4, 2020
A lovely adaptation of this Anderson tale. I love that the illustrations are based on ancient Chinese art. It really grounds the story and is also just absolutely gorgeous.
July 18, 2022
C: CHILDREN: No offensive language, sex or nudity but might contain occasional comedic Violence.
E:Easy: 3rd grade Vocabulary
E:Easy: 3rd grade Vocabulary
March 31, 2022
I have arranged my takeaway thoughts on this story into a haiku:
"Despite the outlook,
You’ll find what simulates life
More likely to fail."
"Despite the outlook,
You’ll find what simulates life
More likely to fail."
June 27, 2017
Contains one picture that is a little scary for my daughter who is very sensitive to images. It is the Emperor's good and bad deeds when he is on his death bed and a few look like demons, etc. Otherwise it's a fine book, set in Africa. I read the Fiona Waters version to my daughter instead which is excellent, set in China.
February 27, 2015
Stunning illustrations.
December 7, 2018
Lovely, lovely illustrations, similar in drawing and presentation: with multiple panels. The words of the book have all kinds of double meanings, and why not read that time and again to little ones?
October 27, 2024
This retelling of one of Hans Christian Andersen’s beloved tales has changed the translation of some of the original language. When a courtier dismissively denies the existence of the nightingale, he states that writers often make up fairy tales. Just because something is in a book doesn’t mean that it’s true. That’s a bit of sly humor, given the nature of this story.
The familiar tale is accompanied by breathtakingly beautiful prints in the Chinese style. The backgrounds are often in tones of brown and sepia. It is the people of the Emperor’s court who bring the vibrant hues of red, blues and greens. They are, of course, in stunning contrast to the plain-looking, drab nightingale. As the same disdainful courtier points out, she must have lost her color because of nerves in the presence of so many distinguished visitors.
The nightingale’s unobtrusive presence and the equally silent nature of her departure all serve to highlight her humble nature. She has a glorious song worthy of kings but prefers the outdoors to the Emperor’s court. She will bring news of what’s happening in his kingdom but cautions him to tell no one of her surveillance; it’s better that way. It remains a tale of how amazing talent can often be found in unassuming personages.
The familiar tale is accompanied by breathtakingly beautiful prints in the Chinese style. The backgrounds are often in tones of brown and sepia. It is the people of the Emperor’s court who bring the vibrant hues of red, blues and greens. They are, of course, in stunning contrast to the plain-looking, drab nightingale. As the same disdainful courtier points out, she must have lost her color because of nerves in the presence of so many distinguished visitors.
The nightingale’s unobtrusive presence and the equally silent nature of her departure all serve to highlight her humble nature. She has a glorious song worthy of kings but prefers the outdoors to the Emperor’s court. She will bring news of what’s happening in his kingdom but cautions him to tell no one of her surveillance; it’s better that way. It remains a tale of how amazing talent can often be found in unassuming personages.
July 6, 2025
After reading The Great Alone and The Women I knew I had to read the Nightengale. Each of Hannah's historical novels are written with such intense skill I am transformed into each bit of history. This one did not disappoint. The story or Isabel and her courageous life during Nazi occupation of France is exquisite. I now have officially cried over each one of her books.
December 21, 2025
Another amazing book by Kristen Hannah! Like how does she continue to write books that rip at your heartstrings so deeply? His is a book I will come back to. I love how she integrates history to its nitty gritty routes. This was the first book I have read from a French occupied perspective. It really made me want to read more about occupied France during ww2.
July 11, 2020
I had never heard of the story as a kid, aside from a reference from a King's Quest game I didn't quite get. I'm more curious to read the translated original from Anderson now.
December 12, 2022
This is a wonderful story about a nightingale and how it's interactions with Emperor of China influenced the man's life. It's a beautiful story.
January 1, 2023
I loved this one. I never even heard of it until I read it. I’m excited to read more from Hans Christian Anderson.
April 28, 2023
Charming short story with a good lesson.
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May 3, 2024i thought i imagined reading this story for years.. feeling vindicated it’s actually real
July 1, 2024
Relocating to Morocco is an interesting idea, and does not change the primary story.
October 12, 2024
I enjoyed it. I've heard that the writing wasn't the best, but I had no problem with it. Especially good was the beginning. You can't please everyone.
January 19, 2025
Such a good book! Definitely one that pulls you in and you can't put down! Was a tear jerker but I loved it!!!
January 31, 2025
Easiest five star read 😭🤍
May 2, 2025
There is nothing more beautiful than the song of a free nightingale.
An artificial bird is not the same; it has to come from nature and it must be free.
That is where its beauty comes from.
An artificial bird is not the same; it has to come from nature and it must be free.
That is where its beauty comes from.
May 23, 2025
Favorite book of all time
December 27, 2025
I could not put this book down. I cried, I laughed, and went on the unreal journey of a lifetime. I’ve read it twice, and will absolutely read it again
December 28, 2025
Sad book but I love the historical fiction surrounding the storyline.
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