Letters from Tove

by Tove Jansson

  We’re no longer in love in that radiant, self-evident way, there are always complications – anguish and irritation and jealousy – and the constant need to conceal it!

  It’s going to be hard. We’re going to lose friends. Feel torn, hurt one another. But we’ll only grow closer to each other, I know, and I believe, helping each other become “truer” – and perhaps happier people.

  Right now we’ve both got more work than we can cope with, and assignments that take us just a little beyond our ability. The first film, the first fresco – and a host of minor tasks. Things will calm down. If we can get through this period – the Monday morning after the party – then it will be all right.

  Vif is terrified her little sister Erica will find out she’s a borderliner. Strangely enough, Erica and Lasse seem to have had some kind of relationship. Lasse broke it off on his last leave, and I’m sure it’s an indication he’s now gone over to the “rive gauche”. He knows about Vi and me, but nobody else does. Yet.

  Sometimes I’m very happy, Konikova, and feel brave and rich. Then everything comes crashing down and I feel like my own frightened observer. But I am going to be happy, that’s for sure – for sure!

  Yesterday I had bad news about Kummelskär; they won’t allow any building because of the herring fishing. But I’ve opened negotiations for another island! I must have my island, and I will get it.

  Good night, friend. Did you get my letters? Including the one I wrote before Christmas?

  Do you think you could write me a few lines sometime? It would make me so happy.

  frescoes: See Letters to Vivica Bandler

  Suihko: Niilo Suihko.

  “rive gauche”: “Left Bank”, a term for homosexuality.

  THE NEXT LETTER IS DATED MIDSUMMER EVE 46, BUT THIS must be a mistake. Tove Jansson is writing about events in the spring and early summer of 1947. She and Lars Jansson have been offered the chance of leasing Bredskär, after her vain attempts to lease Äggskär, Tunnholmen and Kummelskär. They sign the contract, valid for fifty years, on 26 June 1947.

  MIDSUMMER EVE 46 [should read 47]

  Eva, dearest,

  We had been planning for ages that when Lasse came out of the army we’d go out to Pellinge for two days and try to buy our island. I imagined what a nice trip it would be, what great fun, but as time went by I also looked forward to it for another reason. Lasse’s the only one who knows I’m bisexual. This spring has been the most insane muddle of disappointment, despair, excess and various different attempts to repair things that had irretrievably fallen apart, and by the end of it all I was just so tired. All I wanted was for someone, something, to help me decide – anything at all, in any way, as long as I didn’t have to brood on it any more. I longed to be able to express what was grinding me to pieces inside, in some light, informal, matter-of-fact way – and get an answer, a bloody hell – or it’ll pass – or get yourself out of that pile of shit – or you’ve been an absolute ass – or don’t give up, you’ll win in the end if you stick at it. Anything, however small – as long as it’s kindly meant!

  Things got off to a bad start. The evening before we were due to set off, Vivica wanted me to meet her best friend, Göran Schildt – a meeting I’d anticipated for ages, ready to win him over, be a credit to her. I was very nervous and had prepared, as if for an exam, the cheery, light style I intended to maintain. He would presumably be all eyes and ears, because he knew everything about Vivica and me.

  It was as if some strange urge came over me to thwart my own plans, demolish my gains just as I had made them, work against my own interests. I knew I was too tired for drinks with Sam during the day – but it was such a relief to go out for a drink with someone again, and I invented an excuse, namely his first prize in the Ahlströms’ fresco competition. But I wasn’t in great shape by the time I dashed back to the studio in the evening, and ran out of time to prepare things, or to titivate the place or myself for the party as planned. And I hadn’t reckoned on Vivica wanting to bring her lover with her, plus Maya who is her latest interest.

  A sparrow and a mouse saved us from the embarrassment of the introductions. The sparrow came flying out of the stove, black and wretched, and just after that the mouse scuttled from the woodpile in a state of delirium. – I liked Göran Schildt very much. Elegant, slim, with a bright, intelligent face and a balanced reserve that didn’t conceal the warmth and essence of him. But we felt shy because Vivica had told us both too much about each other. Little Koskinen was as lost and confused as the sparrow in the stovepipe, said nothing, smiled and stuck close to Vivica.

  Maya was quiet and wide-eyed, too, and Samuli flopped and slurred and didn’t care that he was drunk. Perhaps it was a good party – but for me it felt like a series of convulsions. Vivica danced with Koskinen, Maya and me by turns and deployed her charm in overbearing outbursts. She was off to see her husband in Stockholm the following day and was elated and stimulated by being the centre of a tangle of relationships. After twelve my cheerfulness started to stick in my throat, I came out with stupid comments for fear that suddenly no one would have anything to say, and all I could think about was that Vivica was going away and that she had my studio keys in her pocket and I didn’t know if she planned to use them for my sake or Koskinen’s. We hadn’t spoken to each other. As Göran was on his way out, she quietly asked if Vannis were going home for the night and I answered far too loudly “I’m sure they are. You two can stay here if you like.” Göran slipped out in a trice and Vivica went all rigid and stood staring at the wall. I’d gone and acted against my own wishes again – I knew Vivica hadn’t asked for Koskinen’s sake this time and really wanted to be with me. That damn pride of mine always gets in the way.

  So the two of them left, and Vannis just sat there looking on. Suddenly the room was full of anxiety and I rushed to the telephone to call a cab and get rid of them. But I didn’t make it in time and the hysteria came crashing over me in all its disgusting uncontrollability and I dissolved into tears. Maya came over and held me, quietly and sweetly, and I think she got Sam into the studio before I blurted out that I’d had an affair with Vivica and just couldn’t bear hearing all the details of her new partners any more and pretending to be glad and interested, and didn’t want to be part of it any longer and all the other crap I talk when my nerves give way. Hush, Maya said kindly, don’t say anything. Samuli came in and said the frescoes were finished now, and he could well understand me being tired after all that and needing a rest in the country. Then they left.

  I forgot to pack all the things I’d meant to take on my trip with Lasse, the jam and chocolate and all the other treats, and went to Lallukka in a horrible travelling outfit even though I knew Lasse was going to dress in his best. And I must have looked pretty ghastly all round when we set off in the morning. I couldn’t control myself and started going on about the night until I noticed he’d clammed up and didn’t want to hear.

  It’s always worst in the morning. Even before I’ve groped my way up to the surface of consciousness, I have an uneasy sense of something being wrong. Then I wake up, recognise myself, remember everything and realise I’ve got to be part of a new day, right through to evening. And the machinery of my brain slowly cranks into action and starts champing on the usual subjects, back and forth, going over the same words, events and gestures until I could scream. After the frescoes I’ve no work to feed into the machine and it’s running on empty, ticking over on the dregs in the tank until I feel like puking myself up. Vivica rang in the morning and asked plaintively why I was so angry with her, she’d been no worse than usual. I stupidly answered that oh no, I wasn’t angry, just tired, your train will be leaving, have a good trip, be happy. And I knew then that I’d bungled my role again, pricked her guilty conscience, lost an immense amount of all I’d fought for. In Borgå I tried to ring her back while Lasse and I sat staring over a dismal celebratory meal but she had guests and couldn’t come to the phone. What would I have said? I don’t know. Maybe
used the pretext of telling her to put the safety chain on if she took Koskinen to the studio because I’d given a spare set of keys to a colleague so they could go and paint there. Maybe sounded all cheerful and talked about the island and how much we’d all enjoy it there, or joked about the day before and the Vivica Society we could set up for all her lovers, with me as chairman and monthly meetings and annual reports on the 28th when no one can do anything anyway!

  She’d have laughed at that, been amused and appreciative, and her sense of guilt would have subsided. Or maybe I would have said don’t be upset. We love each other, don’t we. We must try to be glad and not make life hell for each other. Let’s each have a wonderful trip and come back for your book, which I shall illustrate.

  I was just tired, and sick of everything, as Lasse and I walked to the bus, and I thought let me be ill and not have to talk and be cheerful. Never talk anything to pieces again, let others take responsibility.

  It was rather funny. I developed a sore throat en route, and by the time we got to Tirmo I couldn’t say a word, only whisper.

  I wonder if there is any greater poison than a sense of guilt. That was what made the time before Christmas so wonderful, almost sacred. She took away my anxiety about so many things, Faffan and Ham, my masochistic tendencies in sex, that ambitious sense of duty that’s driven the pleasure out of my painting, and she freed me from the timid, old-maidish prudery that makes people think I am, or pretend to be, naive. Those three weeks were one long hectic dance of bliss and ultimately she not only gave me hope, but also the assurance that one day, through her, I would reach the apex of the sexual act and finally be at peace and feel that I was a real woman after all. She felt freed, too, by the fact that we were so fond of one another. From the anxiety of trying to be a man, because it’s as a woman that I love her. And the fact that I perceived her as an artist as a matter of course, not as an agronomist or a failed minor writer – that I never for a moment saw anything unnatural in what we were doing. In all my life I’ve never felt more natural and proud.

  Tove Jansson on Bredskär. Late 1940s.

  [ … ] I’m going to send you photos of my frescoes. I painted them in a hell of a rush, but I think they’re good. Especially the second one, which I did when I wasn’t happy. The one with the trees.

  Perhaps sometime I shall come to count this spring as one of the most positive, in the same way. In spite of all the pettiness, weakness, drama and lack of self-control. Perhaps it’s better than the three weeks before Christmas, which Vivica never mentions. Tove Jansson on Bredskär. Late 1940s. I believe I was right when I told her “it wasn’t me she missed so much, but herself, the way she was then”. This is no different. It’s a continuation. Perhaps a logical one. Glimpses of miracles flash by just so one fights to make them gradually come true. So far nothing’s succeeded and I’ve understood nothing. But perhaps it will come. Before the war I thought one lived to do things that were as right as possible, and after it to try and be as happy as possible. Perhaps one is simply meant to work and live in as dignified a way as one can. If it can be done.

  Tove.

  Göran Schildt: Author, art historian and critic.

  Koskinen: Irja Koskinen, later a secretary at the Lilla Teatern theatre in Helsinki.

  10 AUG. 47. H:FORS.

  Dearest Eva,

  I lost track of your letter. I’m sending it now, to complete my lesbian lament. The poems, too – though I barely remember which ones you’ve already had. You are silent and so far away – and I wonder how things have been for you and Ramon. Perhaps you are going through a difficult time, my friend – or working too hard, otherwise you would write. At least I know you often write to me in your thoughts. That will have to do.

  It’s a long leap from last time again. After two bloody awful weeks, the glass paintings were done, Ham crawled out of hospital – far too early, as it turned out – and her brother Torsten arrived from Sweden. Another hectic week of sightseeing in town, and then we all went out to Pellinge, except Faffan who stayed with his reliefs and only went out there today. A few hours ago I waved Torsten off on the Stockholm boat, and my heart was full of genuine blessings for his séjour here.

  Our two Pellinge weeks have done me a power of good.

  Almost every day he, Lasse and I were out on Bredskär, the little island I’ve finally been able to lease for the next fifty years. It lies to the south of Tunnholmen, with just a narrow strait separating the two, and the whole sea beyond.

  Do you remember Tunnholmen? That was where Rosa and I built little houses in the sand while you were asleep. But Bredskär is at the other end of the island. There’s a little sandy beach there too, and rugged cliffs round the outside. Quite a lot of trees, flowers along the beach, bird cherry, rowan.

  Thanks to Torsten we’re going to have a house on the outer rocks 4m x 5 with a single room, three windows. He brought nails over from Sweden and was on hand with advice for Lasse and me while all three of us were building. To start with I was barely even interested, just feigned cheerfulness for Ham and Torsten’s sake. But the work, not to mention rounding up the materials, was harder than I’d imagined. And all of a sudden I noticed that my thoughts weren’t just running on empty any more but were engaging themselves in earth for the floor, roof trusses, joints and calculations. I was worn out after whole days of lugging stone and wood, clearing ground, putting in posts, sawing and hammering. I slept dreamlessly and ate like a horse. I got more and more interested, and took pride in every obstacle overcome. This is going to be the house for my friends and my solitude. Its name is Wind Rose (= compass). Lasse’s going to write his book there in September, Atos is coming some week end or other when he’s too tired. And lots of others.

  We now have all the upright timbers in and the roof trusses up, and two gable ends weatherboarded. I got the roof timber through a sugar transaction, but there’s still no proper floor and no roofing felt. I’ll send you photos of the island and the house in the autumn – perhaps you’ll feel like coming here at some juncture …

  I suspect that this time has done my poor body good. Before I went out there, the X-ray plates of my lungs were pretty much covered in black speckles. But now I only feel the occasional stab of discomfort and I’m not as thoroughly tired and listless.

  And yes – there are certainly stabs of another kind as well. Sometimes that anguished old dream comes back, always the same; the last evening with her before I wrote the letter. Then I build like a thing possessed to wear myself out and avoid dreaming, avoid thinking. So I’m building two houses: an external one, and an internal one of calm and indifference.

  This evening I’m in bed in the studio again – and missing the nights in the tent on Bredskär. Here, the walls are still steeped in the melancholy of last time – the city seems horrible, somehow. The spring and early summer are crowding in on me – all the bad things that happened then. These last weeks while I was writing your letter, my self-control entirely gone, coming up with all sorts of mad exploits so as not to have to think. I would go to three cinemas, one after the other, or get drunk, or sleep with people I happened to meet, or seek out any old bore to talk the time away. It was extraordinary that the glass paintings turned out as charming, humorous and elegant as they did. Sheer force of manual habit. – It doesn’t worry me that my painting’s ground to a halt, it barely interests me at present. I want nothing but peace.

  Lars Jansson on Bredskär, 1950s.

  I’m going out to Bredskär with Lasse on the next boat and won’t be back until October. The address is Borgå, Stor-Pellinge, Söderby. He and I are on good terms again, now that I’ve cheered up. My embraces and best wishes for all good things, Eva. Good luck to you.

  Tove.

  If you write sometime and care to have the rest of my poems, do send me the first words of the poems you’ve already had, I can’t remember which ones I’ve already sent. There ought to be about 30 of them.

  the glass paintings: TJ’s decorations in the
student hall of residence Domus Academica in Helsinki.

  1 OCT. –47 [Helsingfors]

  Dearest friend Eva,

  Your parcel has come! Yesterday I got back to Lallukka from Pellinge and we had a big unpacking session and mannequin parade. The brown dress will be fabulously useful this winter, because in-between dresses for town are just what I need most. It’s lovely! It will be a very good fit in every way if I just let it out a little across the chest. And the shoes fitted Lasse – that was lucky, wasn’t it! He sends his best wishes and also says thanks for the pale-blue wool shirt, which was too big for me. He was delighted. I’m sitting here writing in the mustard-checked jacket, teamed with the brown skirt. My dear friend, you’ve pretty much renewed my wardrobe! [ … ].

  For most of September I was alone on Bredskär – an unbroken stretch. I did a bit of drawing, got the house finished, cleared the overgrown places in the trees, wrote poems and some Moomintroll. Immense peace and a slight sense of desolation, especially in the evenings. It blew a gale almost the whole time and the wind really whistled through the house, out on the point. The sea spraying up all around, and the strangest illusions of voices, steps and music in the wind. Particularly the acoustic phenomenon of rhythmic fiddle music before I drifted off to sleep, which was a bit disturbing. It makes you a different person with different thoughts, living alone with the sea and yourself. I discovered that I like solitude (at least for three weeks!) but am incurably afraid of the dark. The sun had scarcely gone down before, despite all my resolve, I was putting covers over the three windows and turning the mirror to the wall. It’s a shame, really, because there’s been moonlight, and the northern lights. And I started talking to myself like some old biddy! One time I nearly lost the boat in the storm, and another day the sparks from the chimney set fire to the moss. After that I didn’t dare cook anything for a week – which was how long the s.w. lasted. – at ½ past 2 one night I managed to row all my stuff over to Pellinge just as the wind was changing. It was absurdly magnificent and sombre. The northern lights, grey dawn and an enormous swell, a clear starry sky. And a great illuminated steamer, sleeping at anchor between Tunnis and Odden.