Hans Christian Andersen/YMMV


 * Anvilicious
 * Esoteric Happy Ending: In The Cripple, a paralyzed boy manages to drag himself out of bed and attempts to walk so that he can save a caged songbird from a cat creeping up on it. Everyone celebrates the child's improved state, but in true Andersen fashion
 * High Octane Nightmare Fuel: There's a story about a fir tree that dreams of being a Christmas Tree because of the honour and the glory. Getting cut down hurts like getting your legs cut off. Then it slowly dies, like Christmas Trees do.
 * The hellish punishment in The Girl Who Trod on the Loaf. The Red Shoes, where the heroine is only saved from damnation by having  . And the literal nightmare in Aunt Toothache, featuring the Anthropomorphic Personification of aforementioned ailment, . It is possible to go on...
 * Hilarious in Hindsight / Funny Aneurysm Moment: One of Andersen's lesser known fairy tales The Little Green Ones is about a large army of small soldiers in green uniforms who invades a rose bush and are offended and rather hurt that humans give them such revolting names (wood lice). A Norwegian editor, who printed the story in a magazine, was sentenced to prison during the German occupation.
 * Tear Jerker: Andersen was a master at tugging the old heartstrings.
 * True Art Is Angsty
 * The Woobie: Most of his protagonists.