Introduction
96km (60 miles) W of Copenhagen; 34km (21 miles) W of Nyborg; 43km (27 miles) NW of Svendborg
Many people make their living off Hans Christian Andersen and all the visitors his memory brings to Odense. But the town never seemed to appreciate the boy until the world discovered his writing. In some respects, he was treated like Salzburg treated Mozart. Actually, the storyteller had a very unhappy childhood in Odense and left as soon as he was old enough to make his way to Copenhagen.
His cobbler father was always out of money, and had been forced to marry Hans's ill-tempered, peasant mother when she was 7 months pregnant. The Andersen grandmother was insane and, as noted by Andersen himself, was a pathological liar. No wonder the boy wanted to get out of Odense.
But those unpleasant memories are long gone today, and Odense is proud of its world-famous son, hawking souvenirs of him and dusting off the writer's memorabilia for each new generation. This ancient town, the third...
more local info
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Bymuseet Møntegården (Odense City Museum)
Not the typical dull city museum with dusty artifacts, of which we've seen too many, this museum traces Odense's history back to the Viking era...
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- Museums
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H. C. Andersens Hus (H. C. Andersens Museum)
Though not the rival of the Shakespeare properties in Stratford-upon-Avon, the object of most Funen pilgrimages is to the house of the greater...
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- Museums
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Skt. Knuds Domkirke
Dating from the 13th century, this is the only purely Gothic cathedral in Denmark. It was named after King Knud (Canute), who reigned from 1080...
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