This is a delicate issue for any illustrator of Hans Christian Andersen’s sly tale, now so deeply embedded in the culture that often passes as an anonymous folk classic.  To what extent should young readers be protected from the sight of the emperor’s nakedness?  But if they are shielded from any view of the vain ruler’s embarrassing condition, can the story make an indelible impression?

Here are four radically solutions to the problem.

From Ardizzone’s Hans Andersen: Fourteen Classic Tales (1978) Cotsen 37999.

Edward Ardizzone drew him at the head of a very long procession fully clothed in long wooly underwear, a full-bottomed wig, and bare feet.  It is hard to think of another outfit that undercuts royal majesty more ridiculously, while also very conveniently spares the illustrator from answering awkward questions from the publisher.

Des Kaisers neue Kleider. Illustrated by Karl Lagerfeld (1992) Cotsen 19998.

Karl Lagerfeld, the celebrated fashion designer and longtime creative director of Chanel (aka “Kaiser Karl”) dressed his emperor in transparent underthings that cruelly expose his aging, stout body.  He could hardly be more repellent undressed.  The elderly Lagerfeld himself flamboyantly concealed the ravages of the years with outsized sunglasses, high starched collars, and fingerless gloves, topped by a mane of snow white hair.

Andersen Kalendar. Illustrated by Heinrich Lefler and Joseph Urban (1910). Cotsen 951.

Frequent collaborators Heinrich Lefler and Joseph Urban had their cake and ate it too in their sumptuous color illustration.  The splendidly dressed courtiers and attendants in the foreground nearly conceal their royal master, whose profile dominated by an outsized chin and Adam’s apple is at the dead center of the plate.  His straight black hair streaked with gray is covered by an enormous gold and scarlet imperial helm and that is all he has on.  The ghostly pale shoulders and torso are thrown into relief by the robust young men surrounding him.   He is a foolish old man, beguiled by the trappings of his office.

The Emperor’s New Clothes. Illustrated by Angela Barrett (1997) Cotsen 34676.

Angela Barrett breaks with tradition by representing the emperor as a young dandy.  Head held high, he marches down the street, with just a bit of bare chest showing.  He and his attendants may be engulfed by the tittering crowd, six or seven spectators deep, but almost nothing is left to the imagination because an oval portrait of the striding monarch taken from behind hangs overhead.  Is the tall, slim man in elegant slipper a closet exhibitionist, or is he making the best of the situation in which he has landed, by forging ahead instead of fleeing?

Each of the artist’s solutions to illustrating the emperor’s humiliation is so satisfying that it is difficult to say if one if better than the other three.  Why choose?