The capital of Denmark and the birthplace of physicist and Nobel laureate Niels Bohr, comedian Victor Borge and Georg Jensen’s silversmithy was once described as the “goal of my desires” by noted children’s author Hans Christian Andersen. The Library’s Rare Book and Special Collections Division is the home of the Jean Hersholt Collection of Hans Christian Andersen, which is the largest collection of Anderseniana outside of Denmark. Included are manuscripts, letters, first editions, presentation copies and other related materials, such as Andersen’s annotated transcript of his autobiography “My Life’s Fairy Tale” and a digitized copy of “Stories from Hans Christian Andersen.”

The Library’s Danish collections extend to many other divisions. More than 2,000 retrospective or current newspapers, magazines, journals, bulletins, annuals and other serials from or about Denmark can be found in the Newspaper and Current Periodical Reading Room. The Manuscript Division has the papers of John Murray Forbes from his says as the American consul residing at Copenhagen and Hamburg during the years 1801-19, and Norman Hapgood's papers from when he served as United States minister to Denmark in 1919. The Geography and Maps Division provides access to thousands of maps pertaining to Denmark, including reproductions of the earliest map of Scandinavia, drawn by Danish mapmaker Claudius Clavus in 1427. For a complete listing, the European Division offers a general overview to all the Library’s Danish materials.