Tove Jansson Who will comfort toffle 1960

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01

Tove Jansson and anti-fascism


Though Tove Jansson generally stays out of politics, she takes a strikingly bold stance during the 1930s and 40s. The dolls have started saying “Heil Hitler” instead of “mama”.

Travels through Germany

It is the 1930s and very unusual for a young woman to travel alone. But since Tove Jansson has relatives in Velbert, Germany, she takes the opportunity to travel across the continent in 1934. She notices the widespread nationalist spirit and illustrates it in her notebooks. As she travels through Nuremberg, she depicts a distinctly hostile city.

The image of Germany she creates is far from romanticised. In the short story Brevet [The Letter], she expresses the horrors of life in Munich through the impoverished and unhappy Mr Vöpel who has sunk into a grey cloak of meaninglessness.” Unable to afford travel, he looks enviously upon the happy globe-trotters at the train station.

Tove Jansson considers herself a liberal, joking that she is hopelessly bourgeois, despite the fact that her father calls her left-wing on account of the sort of company she keeps. In her social life among the Helsinki literati of the late 1930s, conversations are increasingly moving from art to politics and the impending war.

Nazi greeting Tove Jansson Garm 1935

Dolls doing a Nazi greeting in Tove Jansson’s illustration for Garm, 1935.

Tove Jansson Nazi sketch Germany 1934

Tove Jansson’s Nazi sketch while traveling in Germany, 1934.

Hitler cries: More cake!!!”

As early as 1935, Tove Jansson produces an illustration for Garm wherein a customer wants to buy a doll that says mama”, but the toy shop exclusively stocks dolls that say Heil Hitler.” The spread of fascism is seeping into the everyday lives of normal members of society, including women and children, and having a concrete effect. Garm is a progressive satirical magazine, outspokenly critical of dictatorship, with anti-fascism as one of their core values.

Tove Jansson first appears on the cover of Garm in 1938, with a startling image of Hitler sitting on top of a warehouse of explosives. This is the year that the German army expands into Central Europe, and at the fateful Munich Conference, Hitler is given free rein in Czechoslovakia. Just a few weeks later, Tove Jansson portrays the German Führer as a spoiled child, surrounded by adults trying to appease him with cakes. Hitler cries: More cake!!!” while surrounded by cakes with names like Alsace-Lorraine and the Polish Corridor.

Tove Jansson Hitler illustration Garm 1938

Tove Jansson’s Hitler illustration for Garm cover, 1938.

These restrictive boundaries, this racial hatred

Tove Jansson also speaks out when fascism rears its ugly head in unexpected situations. While studying in Paris in the mid-30s, she spends time in Le Dôme Café with people who turn out to be Finnish nationalists (so-called genuine Finns”). In a letter to her family, she writes:

I didn’t say a word for an hour and a half, but then I couldn’t hold it in any longer and told them it was the curse of the world, these restrictive boundaries, this racial hatred, this linguistic baiting, this petty you-can’t-play-in-our-yard’, this ludicrous labelling, and next time they showed any tendency to start hacking on about politics, I would just get up and leave.” Letters from Tove

In 1939, shortly before the outbreak of war, Tove Jansson takes a trip to Italy. After staying in a hotel called Germania, she is inspired to pen the short story Aldrig mera Capri [Never Again Capri!] in which the island is invaded by German tourists. Aryan white and hygienic all around,” the narrator thinks, wondering where authentic Italy is hiding and why on earth she has come to Italy to eat German cuisine.

Tove Jansson Hitler illustration Garm 1938

Tove Jansson’s Hitler illustration for Garm (Den allvarsamma leken), 1938.

Censored Stalin

While stuck in Helsinki during the war in the 1940s, Tove Jansson increases her contributions to Garm. She often includes the infamous swastika on her cover illustrations and makes copious allusions to the atrocities of her native country.

During the peace negotiations between Finland and the Soviet Union, her depiction of Stalin is censored. The illustration for Garm (1940 no. 1 & 2) jokes about the size of Stalin’s sword. For the picture to be approved, she has to change his physicality and give him a bushy beard, so that he might be interpreted as any typical Russian soldier.

But drawing caricatures of famous people is only a tiny fraction of Tove Jansson’s work. Portraits are not her main strength, after all. Most of her pictures for Garm deal with everyday life in a war-torn country and the experiences of the ordinary individual. In the New Year issue of 1943, she depicts the old year 1942 with its arms full of war-related debris, which it hands over to the innocent year 1943. She shows eternal sympathy for those crushed under the burdens of war, coupled with a talent for representing the absurd, and even comical, in ever more trying times.

Tove Jansson Stalin illustration Garm 1939

Tove Jansson’s Stalin illustration for Garm cover, 1939.

Though Tove Jansson generally stays out of politics, she takes a strikingly bold stance during the 1930s and 40s. The dolls have started saying “Heil Hitler” instead of “mama”.

Travels through Germany

It is the 1930s and very unusual for a young woman to travel alone. But since Tove Jansson has relatives in Velbert, Germany, she takes the opportunity to travel across the continent in 1934. She notices the widespread nationalist spirit and illustrates it in her notebooks. As she travels through Nuremberg, she depicts a distinctly hostile city.

The image of Germany she creates is far from romanticised. In the short story Brevet [The Letter], she expresses the horrors of life in Munich through the impoverished and unhappy Mr Vöpel who has sunk into a grey cloak of meaninglessness.” Unable to afford travel, he looks enviously upon the happy globe-trotters at the train station.

Tove Jansson considers herself a liberal, joking that she is hopelessly bourgeois, despite the fact that her father calls her left-wing on account of the sort of company she keeps. In her social life among the Helsinki literati of the late 1930s, conversations are increasingly moving from art to politics and the impending war.

Hitler cries: More cake!!!”

As early as 1935, Tove Jansson produces an illustration for Garm wherein a customer wants to buy a doll that says mama”, but the toy shop exclusively stocks dolls that say Heil Hitler.” The spread of fascism is seeping into the everyday lives of normal members of society, including women and children, and having a concrete effect. Garm is a progressive satirical magazine, outspokenly critical of dictatorship, with anti-fascism as one of their core values.

Tove Jansson first appears on the cover of Garm in 1938, with a startling image of Hitler sitting on top of a warehouse of explosives. This is the year that the German army expands into Central Europe, and at the fateful Munich Conference, Hitler is given free rein in Czechoslovakia. Just a few weeks later, Tove Jansson portrays the German Führer as a spoiled child, surrounded by adults trying to appease him with cakes. Hitler cries: More cake!!!” while surrounded by cakes with names like Alsace-Lorraine and the Polish Corridor.

These restrictive boundaries, this racial hatred

Tove Jansson also speaks out when fascism rears its ugly head in unexpected situations. While studying in Paris in the mid-30s, she spends time in Le Dôme Café with people who turn out to be Finnish nationalists (so-called genuine Finns”). In a letter to her family, she writes:

I didn’t say a word for an hour and a half, but then I couldn’t hold it in any longer and told them it was the curse of the world, these restrictive boundaries, this racial hatred, this linguistic baiting, this petty you-can’t-play-in-our-yard’, this ludicrous labelling, and next time they showed any tendency to start hacking on about politics, I would just get up and leave.” Letters from Tove

In 1939, shortly before the outbreak of war, Tove Jansson takes a trip to Italy. After staying in a hotel called Germania, she is inspired to pen the short story Aldrig mera Capri [Never Again Capri!] in which the island is invaded by German tourists. Aryan white and hygienic all around,” the narrator thinks, wondering where authentic Italy is hiding and why on earth she has come to Italy to eat German cuisine.

Censored Stalin

While stuck in Helsinki during the war in the 1940s, Tove Jansson increases her contributions to Garm. She often includes the infamous swastika on her cover illustrations and makes copious allusions to the atrocities of her native country.

During the peace negotiations between Finland and the Soviet Union, her depiction of Stalin is censored. The illustration for Garm (1940 no. 1 & 2) jokes about the size of Stalin’s sword. For the picture to be approved, she has to change his physicality and give him a bushy beard, so that he might be interpreted as any typical Russian soldier.

But drawing caricatures of famous people is only a tiny fraction of Tove Jansson’s work. Portraits are not her main strength, after all. Most of her pictures for Garm deal with everyday life in a war-torn country and the experiences of the ordinary individual. In the New Year issue of 1943, she depicts the old year 1942 with its arms full of war-related debris, which it hands over to the innocent year 1943. She shows eternal sympathy for those crushed under the burdens of war, coupled with a talent for representing the absurd, and even comical, in ever more trying times.

Tove Jansson Astrid Lindgren 1950s
02

Tove Jansson as children’s author


A child wants to be frightened, just the right amount, and a child wants to be comforted. Despite the positive disposition of Tove Jansson’s children’s books, she finds inspiration in fear and catastrophe, and a lot of her work focuses on the subtle balance between security and danger.

The tightrope between light and shadow is a running theme in Tove Jansson’s work. It is not in her nature to deny the darker sides of life. Even at the tender age of 11 she produces a picture book entitled simply: Death. The contrast between the safety, fun and pleasure of childhood, and issues such as loneliness and fear, is inherent to her work.

Tove Jansson early illustration 1925

Tove Jansson’s early illustration “Döden” (Death), 1925.

Who will Comfort Toffle?

Tove Jansson’s second picture book Who will Comfort Toffle? comes out in 1960, eight years after the award-winning and much-lauded The Book about Moomin, Mymble and Little My.

While her first picture book is colourful and full of delights, telling the story of a mother’s longing and a child’s path to freedom, Who will Comfort Toffle? is an epic in verse, a romantic tale of the path from loneliness to companionship, and the importance of overcoming fear and working towards a goal.

The lonesome Toffle must overcome his fears when he meets a kindred spirit, Miffle, who is even more fearful than he is. Toffle and Miffle end up living together in a seashell, enjoying the security of partnership, and the certainty that comes from meaning and purpose.

The book is dedicated to Tuulikki Tooti” Pietilä, Tove Jansson’s new partner. It is Tooti’s book, a most earnest love letter.

The devious children’s author

Around the same time as Who will Comfort Toffle? is published, and becomes an instant hit among readers and critics alike, Tove Jansson writes a magazine essay in which she attempts to answer the question of why she writes for children. It is something she is often asked and a sensible answer seems almost impossible. She prefers not to draw too much attention to herself or the Moomins. Alongside this essay, she works on The Invisible Child, about a little girl who is so mistreated that she turns invisible.

The essay is called The Devious Children’s Author, in which Tove Jansson expresses her view of writing for children as anything but innocent. She writes with childlike zeal, for her own pleasure, as a form of escapism, and as an exploration of self. Writing for children is not intended as a means of educating or entertaining young people, but for the author to let off steam and find an outlet for their own urges and needs.

Tove Jansson Who will comfort Toffle beach 1960

Tove Jansson’s beach illustration for the book Who will comfort Toffle, 1960.

Safety given meaning

In this essay, Tove Jansson also expresses her view of art in general, where the balance between safety and danger is crucial. Fantasy is safe due to its escapist nature, just as reality can be thrilling, like an electric storm.

In a children’s book there must always be a road on which the author respectfully comes to a halt, letting the child continue on their own. Some threat or wonder that is never explained.” Den lömska barnboksförfattaren [The Devious Children’s Author]

According to Tove Jansson, any tales told in too neat and clear-cut a fashion end up coming across as naive. Through horror and peril, safety is given meaning, and the seemingly innocent role of children’s author, or Moominmamma’, becomes much more nuanced.

Tooticky Moominhouse Tove Jansson Invisible Child 1960

Too-ticky arriving Moominhouse in Tove Jansson’s story The Invisible Child, 1962.

Dead squirrel Tove Jansson Moominland Midwinter 1957

Dead squirrel in Tove Jansson’s book Moominland Midwinter, 1957.

A child wants to be frightened, just the right amount, and a child wants to be comforted. Despite the positive disposition of Tove Jansson’s children’s books, she finds inspiration in fear and catastrophe, and a lot of her work focuses on the subtle balance between security and danger.

The tightrope between light and shadow is a running theme in Tove Jansson’s work. It is not in her nature to deny the darker sides of life. Even at the tender age of 11 she produces a picture book entitled simply: Death. The contrast between the safety, fun and pleasure of childhood, and issues such as loneliness and fear, is inherent to her work.

Who will Comfort Toffle?

Tove Jansson’s second picture book Who will Comfort Toffle? comes out in 1960, eight years after the award-winning and much-lauded The Book about Moomin, Mymble and Little My.

While her first picture book is colourful and full of delights, telling the story of a mother’s longing and a child’s path to freedom, Who will Comfort Toffle? is an epic in verse, a romantic tale of the path from loneliness to companionship, and the importance of overcoming fear and working towards a goal.

The lonesome Toffle must overcome his fears when he meets a kindred spirit, Miffle, who is even more fearful than he is. Toffle and Miffle end up living together in a seashell, enjoying the security of partnership, and the certainty that comes from meaning and purpose.

The book is dedicated to Tuulikki Tooti” Pietilä, Tove Jansson’s new partner. It is Tooti’s book, a most earnest love letter.

The devious children’s author

Around the same time as Who will Comfort Toffle? is published, and becomes an instant hit among readers and critics alike, Tove Jansson writes a magazine essay in which she attempts to answer the question of why she writes for children. It is something she is often asked and a sensible answer seems almost impossible. She prefers not to draw too much attention to herself or the Moomins. Alongside this essay, she works on The Invisible Child, about a little girl who is so mistreated that she turns invisible.

The essay is called The Devious Children’s Author, in which Tove Jansson expresses her view of writing for children as anything but innocent. She writes with childlike zeal, for her own pleasure, as a form of escapism, and as an exploration of self. Writing for children is not intended as a means of educating or entertaining young people, but for the author to let off steam and find an outlet for their own urges and needs.

Safety given meaning

In this essay, Tove Jansson also expresses her view of art in general, where the balance between safety and danger is crucial. Fantasy is safe due to its escapist nature, just as reality can be thrilling, like an electric storm.

In a children’s book there must always be a road on which the author respectfully comes to a halt, letting the child continue on their own. Some threat or wonder that is never explained.” Den lömska barnboksförfattaren [The Devious Children’s Author]

According to Tove Jansson, any tales told in too neat and clear-cut a fashion end up coming across as naive. Through horror and peril, safety is given meaning, and the seemingly innocent role of children’s author, or Moominmamma’, becomes much more nuanced.

Tove Jansson J. R. R Tolkien The Hobbit 1960s
03

Horror for grown-ups and children


The threat of catastrophe is exhilarating. Tove Jansson loves ghost stories, perceives anxiety in the work of Lewis Carroll and reads J. R. R. Tolkien as horror. Life cannot be lived only within the grey scale; darkness must abound.

Tove Jansson decorates the bathroom wall of her studio with a collage of newspaper clippings about horrific disasters: the flooding of the Seine, tornadoes and sinking ships. A proper storm never fails to inspire, bringing stories to life with the threat of catastrophe. Master of horror literature Edgar Allan Poe is one of her favourite authors, and his macabre style can be seen reflected in some of her short stories. It is a dream of Tove’s to illustrate Poe.

Tove Jansson bathroom wall

A catastrophe collage from Tove Jansson’s bathroom wall.

Anxiety in Wonderland

Tove Jansson is invited to illustrate a new Swedish edition of Lewis Carroll’s children’s classic Alice in Wonderland, and accepts even though she is very busy and usually rejects external assignments. She has previously illustrated Carroll’s The Hunting of the Snark and J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, and one of the reasons she says yes to Alice is that the request comes from publisher Åke Runnquist, a friend and important professional contact.

Another reason why Tove accepts is that it gives her the opportunity to communicate the feeling of horror she experienced on reading the book in childhood. She remembers perceiving the anxiety permeating Lewis Carroll’s work when she read it as a child.

These stories are terrifying. Can I draw them in horror style? The way I saw them when I was little. (I love horror stories nowadays, too).” Letters from Tove

Tove Jansson wishes she could make her illustrations even bolder, creating deeper, darker landscapes to bring her vision of a nightmarish Wonderland to life. Could the book really be aimed at adults? On the publisher’s request, she keeps the pictures relatively tame, otherwise the result would have been a genuine horror book.

Still, the landscape of Wonderland remains surreal, and she explores the potential for more adult interpretations of its symbolism, with Wonderland read as a reference to Freudian ideas of repressed desire. It is an engaging but difficult assignment resulting in eerie pictures in a muted colour palette.

Tove Jansson Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll 1966

Alice floating in Tove Jansson’s illustration for the book Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, 1966.

Tove Jansson Alice in Wonderland Lewis Carroll 1966

Alice and a cat in Tove Jansson’s illustration for the book Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, 1966.

House of horrors and delight à la Gorey

Tove Jansson’s aesthetic takes inspiration from the similarly suggestive and humorous style of American illustrator and author Edward Gorey. She writes a short story dedicated to him in which she weaves in her artistic motto: “What is merely hinted at is much more important than what is clearly shown.”

In the short story Black-White, the protagonist is coming up against problems illustrating a horror anthology and, on the suggestion of his wife Stella, moves into a dilapidated old turreted house high on a hill. It’s a real house of horrors with a basement filled with water.

The illustrations all come out grey, and while he thinks the problem is too much white, his wife Stella claims that the problem is in fact too much black. He wants to make the pictures dark and dominating, like the glistening black water in the basement.

The illustrator stops drawing pictures for the anthology and focuses instead on drawing the house where he is staying. He unleashes himself into his art, and dark cracks in the walls take over all the white.

“Stella, do you know what it feels like to see everything grey and cautious all your life and to always try to do your best but all you get is tired? And then suddenly you know, you know with absolute certainty.” Black-White

Only desire can drive true creation, anything else would be tired and grey. At their best, passion projects result in fully realised, liberated art, overflowing with excitement. What a thrilling feeling it is – to know with absolute certainty.

Tove Jansson The Hobbit J. R. R. Tolkien 1960

Horses and dragon in Tove Jansson’s illustration for the book The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien, 1960.

The threat of catastrophe is exhilarating. Tove Jansson loves ghost stories, perceives anxiety in the work of Lewis Carroll and reads J. R. R. Tolkien as horror. Life cannot be lived only within the grey scale; darkness must abound.

Tove Jansson decorates the bathroom wall of her studio with a collage of newspaper clippings about horrific disasters: the flooding of the Seine, tornadoes and sinking ships. A proper storm never fails to inspire, bringing stories to life with the threat of catastrophe. Master of horror literature Edgar Allan Poe is one of her favourite authors, and his macabre style can be seen reflected in some of her short stories. It is a dream of Tove’s to illustrate Poe.

Anxiety in Wonderland

Tove Jansson is invited to illustrate a new Swedish edition of Lewis Carroll’s children’s classic Alice in Wonderland, and accepts even though she is very busy and usually rejects external assignments. She has previously illustrated Carroll’s The Hunting of the Snark and J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit, and one of the reasons she says yes to Alice is that the request comes from publisher Åke Runnquist, a friend and important professional contact.

Another reason why Tove accepts is that it gives her the opportunity to communicate the feeling of horror she experienced on reading the book in childhood. She remembers perceiving the anxiety permeating Lewis Carroll’s work when she read it as a child.

These stories are terrifying. Can I draw them in horror style? The way I saw them when I was little. (I love horror stories nowadays, too).” Letters from Tove

Tove Jansson wishes she could make her illustrations even bolder, creating deeper, darker landscapes to bring her vision of a nightmarish Wonderland to life. Could the book really be aimed at adults? On the publisher’s request, she keeps the pictures relatively tame, otherwise the result would have been a genuine horror book.

Still, the landscape of Wonderland remains surreal, and she explores the potential for more adult interpretations of its symbolism, with Wonderland read as a reference to Freudian ideas of repressed desire. It is an engaging but difficult assignment resulting in eerie pictures in a muted colour palette.

House of horrors and delight à la Gorey

Tove Jansson’s aesthetic takes inspiration from the similarly suggestive and humorous style of American illustrator and author Edward Gorey. She writes a short story dedicated to him in which she weaves in her artistic motto: “What is merely hinted at is much more important than what is clearly shown.”

In the short story Black-White, the protagonist is coming up against problems illustrating a horror anthology and, on the suggestion of his wife Stella, moves into a dilapidated old turreted house high on a hill. It’s a real house of horrors with a basement filled with water.

The illustrations all come out grey, and while he thinks the problem is too much white, his wife Stella claims that the problem is in fact too much black. He wants to make the pictures dark and dominating, like the glistening black water in the basement.

The illustrator stops drawing pictures for the anthology and focuses instead on drawing the house where he is staying. He unleashes himself into his art, and dark cracks in the walls take over all the white.

“Stella, do you know what it feels like to see everything grey and cautious all your life and to always try to do your best but all you get is tired? And then suddenly you know, you know with absolute certainty.” Black-White

Only desire can drive true creation, anything else would be tired and grey. At their best, passion projects result in fully realised, liberated art, overflowing with excitement. What a thrilling feeling it is – to know with absolute certainty.

Sources & rights

Text

Hanna Ylöstalo

English translation: Annie Prime

Sources

Björk, Christina. Tove Jansson. Mycket mer än mumin (2003). (Horror for grown-ups and children: “The Hunting of the Snark”)

Happonen, Sirke. Afterword to Bulevarden och andra texter (2017).

Jansson, Tove. “Brevet”, Helsingfors-Journalen nr. 6 (1936). Printed in Bulevarden och andra texter (2017). (Tove Jansson and anti-fascism)

Jansson, Tove. “Aldrig mera Capri!”, Julen (1936). Printed in Bulevarden och andra texter (2017). (Tove Jansson and anti-fascism)

Jansson, Tove. “Atos min vän”, in Astra Nova nr. 2/1996. Jorden går under! Tove Janssons första muminserie i Ny Tid 1947–48 (2007). (Tove Jansson and anti-fascism)

Jansson, Tove. “Den lömska barnboksförfattaren”, Horisont nr. 2 (1961). Printed in Bulevarden och andra texter (2017). (Tove Jansson as children’s author) 

Jansson, Tove. The Listener (1971), translated into English in 2014 by Thomas Teal. (Horror for grown-ups and children: “Black-White”)

Kruskopf, Erik. Skämttecknaren Tove Jansson (1995). (Tove Jansson and anti-fascism)

Westin, Boel. Tove Jansson. Life, Art, Words (2014), translated into English by Silvester Mazzarella  (Tove Jansson as children’s author: p. 349–351, Horror for grown-ups and children: p. 334–338, p. 356–369.)

Eds. Westin, Boel & Svensson Helen. Letters from Tove (2019), translated into English by Sarah Death. (Tove Jansson och antifascismen: Letters to family 24.4.1938 and11.6.1939. Horror for grown-ups and children: Letter to till Åke Runnquist 8.2.1965, Letter to Ham, undated, September 1965)

Image rights

01 © Moomin Characters ™

02–05  © Tove Jansson

06 Moomin Characters archives

07  © Tove Jansson

08-11 © Moomin Characters ™

12-16 © Tove Jansson