Hans Christian Anderson Museum

On my way over to Berkeley, I stopped by Solvang. I had been there before, but never got around to see the Hans Christian Anderson Museum.

The museum is free, and to get there, you need to enter the book loft, and climb a set of stairs. They may have an elevator, if you have a bad knee. I didn't look. Call before you go.

It's a quiet, quaint museum with the smell of old books, and an ambience of a petit library.

He wanted to be an actor, and join the Royal Theater in Copenhagen, but when he didn't qualify, he took on writing.

One of his hobbies was papercutting, and he used it to portray his characters in his stories, particularly to children during his book readings.

A scale model of Anderson's boyhood home in Odense Denmark, designed by Carl Jacobsen.

In the 1830s, he started to achieve recognition, but he had a troubled life—pulling himself out of poverty through hard work. Hans' first book in 1822, Youthful Attempts, was written under his pen name—Villiam Christian Walter.

He often felt insecure, and like an outsider because of his lanky looks, and impoverished background. Although the museum only showed his infatuation with women, I did a bit of research on him, and found articles about his confusion about his sexual orientation as he fell in love with both men, and women. He often felt lonely with a desire to find love.

No matter what his diaries and biographies say about him, he was an accomplished writer with many talents, and deserves high recognition in history. Not all of his struggles were unique to him because writing is lonely work. And let's be honest. Writers are outsiders. They're not supposed to "fit in". They see the world through a different lens. So, if you're ever in Solvang, do check out the Book Loft, and the Hans Christian Anderson museum. It's worth a visit, especially if you work in the writing world.