Jason Fickett’s Reviews > [Fairy Tales (Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)] [By: Andersen, Hans Christian] [March, 2006] > Status Update

The emotions are an afterthought. In Little Claus and Big Claus, the man's only horse is killed, and afterwards, he skins it and goes off to sell the hide with only a mention of how he "began to cry." It would have been easy to put in a line about his grief or regret as he skinned the horse, but Andersen didn't. It creates a tone that's impersonal, otherworldly - a fairy tale, I guess.