The Snow Queen

The mirror represents the interrelated ideas of the nature of evil, the transition from childhood to adulthood, and The Power of Perspective. The mirror is created by the devil, which in the story’s Christian framework establishes it as inherently evil. The mirror’s fall from the sky reflects humankind’s initial fall from grace, but its effects are not quite those of the biblical fall. Rather, pieces of the shattered mirror lodge in people’s hearts and eyes, rendering them susceptible to the mirror’s effect, which is principally to distort reality. Those who are directly affected by the mirror’s shards view everything cynically; they see only the flaws in their surroundings (or imagine flaws that do not even exist), and they consequently devalue things like beauty, love, and faith. Once Kai is pierced by the mirror, for example, he is dismissive toward Gerda and rips up flowers that he once thought were lovely. The mirror therefore facilitates evil by suggesting that the world is evil already, but it does not—contrary to what the devil claims—reveal the “truth” of things. Humans are flawed, Andersen suggests, but not as irredeemably as the mirror suggests.

The story associates the warped perspective the mirror provides with the transition from childhood to adulthood. Kai’s arc is an example of what adulthood and the stress of the world can do to childlike innocence and wonder. After shards of the mirror embed themselves in him, Kai loses interest in childhood play, instead spending time with older boys, poking fun at people’s foibles, and doing mathematics in his head. This impresses many people, who see it as evidence that Kai has a promising future ahead of him. The implication is that society stifles the best traits of childhood—such as joy, imagination, and compassion. As seen through Gerda and Kai’s happy ending, however, people can grow up and retain their innocence.

In its distortion of the childish capacity for wonder and its suppression of the individual in favor of societal norms, the mirror is also closely linked to the story’s exploration of Romantic ideals. It is telling that Andersen often explicates the mirror’s effects with reference to nature, as Romanticism prized the natural world as a source of awe and inspiration. Under the mirror’s influence, Kai rejects flowers in favor of snowflakes, which—though natural—are associated with winter and cold and thus the death of plant and animal life. The mirror also deadens Kai’s emotions, leaving him only able to reason. Paradoxically, however, rationality actually renders him unable to see the truth of his circumstances; when his heart is completely frozen, he thinks that he is fine because he can’t feel his own coldness. This suggests that reason alone leads to a kind of living death—an existence devoid of everything that makes life worthwhile.