The Snow Queen, illustrated by Errol le Cain.

After reviewing no less than eight versions of The Snow Queen during my recent Andersen project, it is probably unnecessary to state that it is one of my favorites, of Hans Christian Andersen's many magical tales. Always curious to see how different illustrators interpret the same tale, I was particularly anxious to obtain this edition, as Errol le Cain's artwork, seen in titles such as Cupid and Psyche and The Pied Piper of Hamelin, generally has great appeal for me.

Unfortunately, it would appear that this title is one of the exceptions, as I did not care for le Cain's paintings here at all. They felt too cramped to me, with figures all jumbled together, and the palette was a little too dark to really capture the sense of wintry enchantment that is so central to the tale. The translation by Naomi Lewis - the same one to be found in the edition illustrated by Toma Bogdanovic - is completely insufficient, omitting the story of the devil's mirror altogether, and so severely condensing the rest, that the end result is an unappealing and disjointed narrative. Such a disappointment, from both a narrative and aesthetic perspective! ( )