Publisher's Synopsis
'The Ice Virgin' (1862) is the most ambitious and searching of all his narratives. Its subject is Switzerland, which Andersen saw as a paradigm of the human condition. The relationship between a gifted young climber-hunter from the remote Bernese Oberland and a prosperous miller's daughter from a comfortable French-speaking canton plays out themes such as instinct versus reason, daring versus security, the role of early experience in shaping identity.