The Too-Muchness of Andersen

Excess as a World Literary Strategy

Abstract

This essay explores the concept of ‘too-muchness’ in Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tales as a literary strategy that contributes to their global appeal and translational richness. Drawing on Rabindranath Tagore’s notion of “bajey khoroch” (careless expenditure) and Lawrence Venuti’s critique of the assumption of invariants in translation, the essay argues that Andersen’s excessive, superfluous details invite imaginative freedom in adaptation and translation. Through close readings of selected tales and their early translations into English, German, and French, it demonstrates how seemingly irrelevant or playful elements – such as references to local landmarks or intertextual songs – generate interpretive and cultural variation. The essay concludes by suggesting that Andersen’s carefully calibrated excess operates as a world literary strategy that balances the specific and the universal, the local and the translatable.