Concerning Moomins
Dec. 21st, 2006 10:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusBrowsing at a bookshop in Birmingham airport at the end of my last trip to Britain, I cast a skeptical eye along the shelves of ghostwritten TV memoirs, expecting to find little of interest. Suddenly A Winter Book, Selected Stories of Tove Jansson, caught my eye. Now this was of interest. Not only had I been brought up on the Finnish childrens' writer's Moomin tales, but this collection of her lesser-known adult work was introduced by Ali Smith, with whom I'd been smitten at university (she's since gone on to be one of Britain's best-known novelists). In fact, in one poem young Nick wrote for young Ali (we were both in the creative writing group, but I hadn't yet sussed that she was gay) I compared her frostiness to that of the Groke, another Moominland character.
Moomins are yet another of the thousand-and-one things I agree with the Japanese about the brilliance of, and yet another example (we saw it the other day in the way Helsinki kids are so Tokyo-oriented in their dress sense) of the weird affinities between the Finns and the Japanese. Ali's foreword to the short stories of Tove Jansson (also herself gay; she spent her life with a woman artist called Tuulikka Pietilä) begins like this:
"How old must you be to write a story?" a young Japanese fan wrote and asked her heroine, the Finnish writer and illustrator Tove Jansson. Jansson, at this point, was in her seventies and world-famous as the creator and illustrator of the Moomins, the extended family of big-nosed philosophising creatures (and their various neighbours, including a tiny anarchist no bigger than a thumbnail) who, simply by mildness and geniality, survive the terrible upheavals of their often topsy-turvy life in a beautiful Scandinavian setting of mountains, forests, seas and valleys."
I'm not sure exactly what creates the Japanese-Moomin affinity, though it is probably tied up with the mildness and geniality Ali mentions. You can see the Moomintroll in his simply-furnished house (no doubt there's a sauna nearby), or Jansson in hers for that matter (the wooden shed you see above was a country cottage; her Helsinki flat is now a museum) as Japanese people, somehow. You're certainly more likely to see images of Moomins in contemporary Japanese advertising than anywhere else, although a somewhat compromised Moomin family appeared worldwide in a TV
animation in the 70s. They were also ripped off, some would say, by Barbapapa (seen here hilariously shearing his own son like a sheep).
I'm rather pleased to find myself, today, transformed into a folk character of sorts. Someone called Eva, in Calgary, Canada, has baked a shortbread homage "to her favourite one-eyed, apron-wearing Scottish folksinger. She maintains that those are not nipples; those are buttons". I hope I tasted good, anyway; I always imagined Moomins would taste like marshmallow.
Moomins are yet another of the thousand-and-one things I agree with the Japanese about the brilliance of, and yet another example (we saw it the other day in the way Helsinki kids are so Tokyo-oriented in their dress sense) of the weird affinities between the Finns and the Japanese. Ali's foreword to the short stories of Tove Jansson (also herself gay; she spent her life with a woman artist called Tuulikka Pietilä) begins like this:
"How old must you be to write a story?" a young Japanese fan wrote and asked her heroine, the Finnish writer and illustrator Tove Jansson. Jansson, at this point, was in her seventies and world-famous as the creator and illustrator of the Moomins, the extended family of big-nosed philosophising creatures (and their various neighbours, including a tiny anarchist no bigger than a thumbnail) who, simply by mildness and geniality, survive the terrible upheavals of their often topsy-turvy life in a beautiful Scandinavian setting of mountains, forests, seas and valleys."
I'm not sure exactly what creates the Japanese-Moomin affinity, though it is probably tied up with the mildness and geniality Ali mentions. You can see the Moomintroll in his simply-furnished house (no doubt there's a sauna nearby), or Jansson in hers for that matter (the wooden shed you see above was a country cottage; her Helsinki flat is now a museum) as Japanese people, somehow. You're certainly more likely to see images of Moomins in contemporary Japanese advertising than anywhere else, although a somewhat compromised Moomin family appeared worldwide in a TV
animation in the 70s. They were also ripped off, some would say, by Barbapapa (seen here hilariously shearing his own son like a sheep).I'm rather pleased to find myself, today, transformed into a folk character of sorts. Someone called Eva, in Calgary, Canada, has baked a shortbread homage "to her favourite one-eyed, apron-wearing Scottish folksinger. She maintains that those are not nipples; those are buttons". I hope I tasted good, anyway; I always imagined Moomins would taste like marshmallow.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 10:14 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 10:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 11:51 am (UTC)I should say that in Russia the Moomin stories were made into a great animation series in the 80ies. It was essential for a couple of Soviet kids generations, although today's kids top of mind association of the Moomin Troll word is the name of a Russian pop band, and only the second thought is the original characters.
The anonymous commentor was right about the inner sadness of the story - just look in that Moomin's eyes.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 11:51 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 01:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 01:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 01:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 01:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 02:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 02:43 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 02:50 pm (UTC)And coming to the analogy with Japan: I feel quite the same cultural and geographical distance everytime I see Miyazaki's films. Today I'm still fond of nonsense-poetry and eccentric stories, thought I don't like Miyazaki very much, maybe for other reasons (excess of sentimentalism for instance. For me the functional similarity between Moomins and Japan is that they're both exotic, almost unintelligible.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 03:20 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 03:23 pm (UTC)groke too soon
Date: 2006-12-21 03:31 pm (UTC)Hello. Hope you're well.
It's a great book. It was a real delight to put together. The good news is that Sort Of Books here in the UK are now hoping to publish (and republish) all of Jansson's writing for adults over the next few years, which is a breakthrough, since until now only three - Summer Book, Sculptor's Daughter and Sun City - had been translated into English. (I've just done an introduction for a very beautiful and gentle novel/story collection from 1979, called Fair Play, out next year.)
(And I know we never see ourselves as others see us, but personally i aspire to Snuffkin.)
yours with love
Grokey xx
Re: groke too soon
Date: 2006-12-21 03:42 pm (UTC)I'm just reading "The Accidental" right now, terrific stuff.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 03:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 03:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 03:48 pm (UTC)No, failing to fantasize about foreign places in unrealistic, idealistic ways is just another way of saying "I'm tired of life".
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 04:04 pm (UTC)the idea should be fino-ugrics are related to mongolian which is related to korean which is related to japanese but all links get lost even between finnish and hungarian.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 04:50 pm (UTC)i have been overjoyed with finding all of the wonderful japanese toys and figures of the moomins over the past few years, sadly not many of my friends know them at all. so it's like this fantastic little secret that delights me and confuses them.
i think i need to find myself a copy of the winter book.
thank you for this post...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 05:40 pm (UTC)Here is a german version (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gn4DkfoEILs).
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 05:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 07:37 pm (UTC)the moomin books are something of a bible to me and tove jansson is a god, or maybe moomin mama. so typical of a finnish girl-lover-girl really, but whatever.
tove is the one dead person i'm most in love with.
tales from moominvalley is a favourite book.
<3
i posted this on my journal a while back,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F45bt9r3Vw0&eurl=
it's felt moomins with a british accent.
<3
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 10:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 10:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-21 11:52 pm (UTC)Momus, as a Halloween pumpkin (http://i16.tinypic.com/44ah6rt.jpg)
Unfortunately you turned out black because you didn't look as good orange. I painted it during a church activity (dear me, I don't ever want to go to one again) and the people surrounding me kept asking if I was painting a pirate. I told them it was Momus, and they were ultimately confused. I hope that one day these people will understand my appreciation for you.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-22 02:40 am (UTC)You'll be happy to know that the Momus cookie has not yet been devoured. We're placing bets to see if he makes it through Christmas.
bad tempered zombie
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-22 06:41 am (UTC)i have been very out of touch with my friend's page
this is a good re-introduction for me
into your journallll
i have been wishing to fall asleep in my room
and awake in moominland for a few years now
(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-22 07:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-12-22 08:20 am (UTC)