The Fir Tree

The Fir Tree is a fairy tale by the Danish author Hans Christian Andersen, published in 1844 (some say 1845) and collected alongside The Snow Queen in the first volume of New Fairy Tales, a representative work from the shift in style during his middle period. The story is about a little fir tree in the forest: each winter woodcutters carry off its companions, and it is both envious and curious, never content with its present life among "the sun shining and the birds singing" in the woods. It is in a hurry to grow up, to see the outside world, to become a recognized big tree. At last, on Christmas Eve, the axe falls on it—it is moved into a bright parlor, decked with silver threads, candles, and little gift bags, becoming the centerpiece Christmas tree, yet it is too nervous and frightened to truly enjoy the honor. Once Christmas passes, its usefulness ends: it is thrown into a storage room, then up into the attic, where in loneliness it recalls the sunlight and rabbits of the forest, and finally it is burned as firewood. Only at the end does it voice that chilling realization: one should be happy while one can be happy—but it is too late. In this tale Andersen writes not merely of holiday festivity but of the universal human predicament of always pinning hope on the future and thus missing the present.