Boys And Girls Forever

by Alison Lurie

  In the real world, at this time, Masefield was fifty-seven and at the height of his fame, but he was also beset with public duties and demands. In 1930 he had been named poet laureate, and though he had once promised that he would not write to order, he now continually provided verses for ceremonial occasions. He was constantly asked to write, to speak, to answer letters, to travel abroad, and to appear at public events. It would not be surprising if, like Cole Hawlings, Masefield felt himself surrounded and even imprisoned. Moreover, outside his country retreat, in the larger world, things were not going well. In 1935, all over Europe, the wolves were running.

  And what of the Box of Delights, which the old magician can no longer guard and must entrust to a child? From the outside it is only a small flat rectangle, nothing much to look at. But when it is opened, Kay sees inside “. . . what he took to be a book, the leaves of which were all chased and worked with multitudinous figures, and the effect it gave him was that of staring into a wood.”33 The box that reveals one wonderful and sometimes also frightening scene after another, and gives one the power to travel in time and space, is in fact a book—or rather, all books. And the person who owns it has the power to bring the world to life through imagination; that is, he or she is a writer, or a child.

  Masefield’s literary sympathies were wide: he loved most of English poetry from its beginnings through the end of the nineteenth century, and he admired both Yeats and Frost. But he did not care for T. S. Eliot, and disliked most contemporary American poetry. Is it too far-fetched to point out that in The Box of Delights, or When the Wolves Were Running, the great danger is that the box may fall into the hands of a mercenary, wolfish American wizard?

  In the book, at least, the danger is averted. Cole Hawlings gets his Box of Delights back at the end of the story with the help of Kay Harker, who is both Masefield’s childhood self in the 1880s, portrayed in The Midnight Folk, and the child who survives within him in 1935. Magically or not, Masefield kept or regained his power to travel imaginatively in time and space, as a child does. He went on in the next few years to publish some of his most successful historical novels, including Dead Ned and Live and Kicking Ned, which many critics consider his best. Unfortunately, though, he never again wrote juvenile fiction. But he left to us, our children, and many children not yet born, four original and remarkable tales.

  MOOMINTROLL AND HIS FRIENDS

  To many Americans, Finland seems a strange and remote country. When they think of it, they imagine a largely empty landscape: snow-covered forests, gray rocky shores, icy lakes, and freezing rivers pass before their inner eyes to the accompaniment of the melancholy tone poems of Sibelius. Some, though, have another, more friendly and intimate vision of Finland. Because they know the stories of Tove Jansson, they imagine the country as bright with birds and flowers, and inhabited by fantastic and delightful creatures: the Moomintroll family and their sometimes charming, sometimes eccentric and difficult neighbors, so different from us in appearance yet so much like people we already know.

  Today, Moomintroll is famous almost all over the world; his adventures have been translated into thirty-three languages. In Finland there is now a Moomin World theme park, and in England he has been the hero of a comic strip and a television series. But in America, for a long time, he was unknown. Now, however, his adventures are available here.

  Tove Jansson, the creator of Moomintroll, who died in July 2001, was probably the best-known writer in Finland—not only for her children’s books, but for her stories and novels for adults, one of which, Sun City, is set in an upmarket retirement home in Florida. She was also a successful artist who illustrated her own work with deceptively simple line drawings. Because of this we know exactly how her characters looked to their creator, something that is rare in stories for children past kindergarten age.

  Jansson was born in 1914 of Swedish-speaking parents who had settled in Helsinki. Both were artists; her father, Viktor, was a well-known sculptor. Her mother, Signe, was a gifted illustrator who also designed two hundred Finnish stamps, and a famous storyteller. Tove Jansson inherited their talents. At fifteen she entered art school; later she studied in Germany, Italy, France, and London. Her first, brief Moomintroll story appeared in 1945. It was followed the next year by Comet in Moominland, the first of nine full-length Moomin books. Jansson, who never married, spent part of each year in Helsinki and the rest on a remote and beautiful island in the Gulf of Finland, where her family had gone in the summers since she was a small child. The island appears both in her adult stories and in Moominpappa at Sea (1954).

  The author of the only book about Tove Jansson in English has compared the world of Moomintroll to that of A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh.1 There is something to be said for this connection, though Jansson, by her own account, did not read the Pooh books until long after she had created Moomintroll. Perhaps the resemblances between the two series are the result of what a folklorist would call polygenesis: similar human situations tend to produce similar stories.

  Tove Jansson’s characters, like Milne’s, are highly individual creatures, part human and part animal and part pure invention, living in a remote and peaceful rural world. Jansson’s simple language, comic gift, and down-to-earth relation of odd events all recall Milne; and so does her love of the countryside and the high value she places on affection and good manners. Like Milne, she is a humanist; and also like him, though she writes for children, she deals with universal issues.

  Some of Jansson’s characters also recall Milne’s. Her hero, Moomintroll, shares with Pooh his good nature, love of adventure, and innocent trustfulness. Though on first glance Moomintroll suggests a toy hippopotamus, his plump, pear-shaped body, short legs and arms, stand-up ears, and quizzical expression also make him look rather like E. H. Shepard’s drawings of Pooh. Perhaps, though, it is not so much that they resemble each other as that both of them look like small children.

  In Tove Jansson’s earliest books Moomin, like Pooh, has a small and timid companion. Moomin’s friend is called Sniff, and somewhat resembles a kangaroo. Sniff, however, is a less attractive character than Piglet. He is self-centered and dazzled by wealth, and in later books he becomes less prominent and finally disappears.

  Misabel, who appears in Moominsummer Madness (1954), initially seems like a female version of Eeyore. (“Everything’s gone wrong for me, simply everything,” she declares on her first appearance.)2 But whereas Eeyore remains perpetually gloomy, Misabel’s self-dramatization of her own unhappiness is eventually transformed into theatrical talent, and she becomes the leading lady of a floating theater. In Tove Jansson’s books, unlike Milne’s, it is possible for characters to change.

  There are also important differences between Moomintroll’s world and that of Pooh. The setting of Milne’s books is limited: a few acres of Sussex downs and woods. The Moomintroll landscape, on the other hand, stretches from the Lonely Mountains in the north and east to the villages south of Moomin Valley and the remote islands of the western sea. The world of Moomintroll is also less sheltered than that of Pooh. It contains parks and orphanages and prisons and astronomical observatories, lighthouses and telephones and fishing boats. It is much subject to natural disasters: not only floods and high winds (which also occur in Milne), but violent snowstorms, deadly cold, earthquakes, the eruption of a volcano, and a near-collision with a comet. The difference between the climates of southern England and Finland is also reflected in the books. Tove Jansson’s characters spend a lot of time simply trying to keep warm and dry.

  Another and perhaps central difference between Milne’s world and Jansson’s is that the Pooh stories depict an ideal society of friends, while the Moomintroll tales portray an ideal family. And whereas Milne’s world is ruled by a male, Christopher Robin, Moomin Valley clearly centers around Moominmamma.

  Milne’s model for the world of Pooh, apparently, was the boys’ school run by his father. All his characters are male, with the exception of the fussily maternal Kanga
, who can be seen as the school nurse or matron. Jansson’s stories, on the other hand, contain many strongly individualized female characters. It must be admitted, however, that this is true mainly of her later books. In the first two tales of the series, the only female besides Moominmamma is the timid and featherbrained Snork Maiden. Though she is fond of Moomintroll (whom she almost exactly resembles except for her bangs), the Snork Maiden is mainly interested in her own appearance and in clothes and jewelry.

  In the later Moominland books, however, there are several independent, brave, and attractive female characters, including Mymble, Little My, and Too-Ticky. Instead of displaying the stereotyped vanity and flightiness of the Snork Maiden, they are more rational and detached than the male characters. Little My, especially, is almost frighteningly cool. In appearance she resembles a plump little girl with a blond topknot, and though brave, resourceful, intelligent, and psychologically perceptive, she is not especially affectionate and seems to have no need for other people. She also has no illusions about herself. In Moominland Midwinter (1957), when a little squirrel freezes to death, Moomintroll remarks that Little My doesn’t feel sorry. “No,” she agrees. “I can’t. I’m always either glad or angry.”3

  Too-Ticky, another semihuman character, though as independent and practical as Little My, is more complex. Jansson has said that Too-Ticky was based on a close friend, the artist Tuulikki Pietila, whom she met in 1950 when she was feeling overworked and depressed. It was Tuulikki Pietila, she says, who taught her to have a more relaxed attitude toward life and to take things as they came. This is what Too-Ticky teaches Moomintroll in Moominland Midwinter, when he leaves the cozy house in which his family is hibernating and ventures out into the Finnish winter for the first time in his life. With Too-Ticky’s encouragement he gradually begins to enjoy himself: he learns to ski and sees the Northern Lights.

  When the first book in the series, Comet in Moominland (1946), appeared, Finland was just emerging from the dark years of World War II, during which the country was invaded by Russia and occupied by Germany. It is perhaps no surprise that the book tells of a difficult and dangerous time. In the course of the story, Moomintroll and his friends discover that a huge comet is approaching the earth. Gradually the rivers and oceans dry up; the world becomes hotter and hotter and darker and darker; there are tornadoes and plagues of grasshoppers. What keeps the story from being frightening or depressing is Moomintroll’s optimism and love of adventure, and his confidence that whatever happens, Moominmamma will be equal to it.

  In this book, as in those that follow, Moominmamma is the stable center of the story. She is the perfect mother: always kind, understanding, giving, and forgiving, an unending source of warmth and love and food. It is she who solves problems, gives advice, comforts the distressed, and generally holds the family together. Moominmamma believes that “all nice things are good for you,”4 and wherever she is, even on a desert island or in the midst of a disaster, there is lots to eat and drink: raspberry juice, pancakes with homemade jam, birthday cake, blueberry pie, coffee, and sandwiches. Tove Jansson has said that Moominmamma is based upon her mother, Signe, whose stories were the beginning of the Moomintroll tales.

  Moominmamma cares not only for her family but for any stray creature that wanders onto the scene. In Tales from Moominvalley (1995) she takes in a little girl so badly abused that she has become invisible. Moominmamma, with the help of her grandmother’s old book of Household Remedies, gradually cures her. In Moominpappa at Sea she also manages to overcome the hysteria and confusion of a former lighthouse keeper who has had what seems like a nervous breakdown, and is described as “not a human being at all . . . more like a plant or a shadow.”5

  Moominpappa, on the other hand, is a somewhat ambiguous figure. Though he is an excellent craftsman, he is somewhat dreamy and self-preoccupied. He has a continual need to feel important, to be recognized by the world, and to think of himself as in charge. This leads him first to write his memoirs—published as The Exploits of Moominpappa (1952)—and later to insist that the whole family leave Moominvalley and go to live on a small island far out in the ocean.

  The story of this move is recounted in one of Tove Jansson’s best and most perceptive books, Moominpappa at Sea. (The original Swedish title does not have the double connotation of the English one, but it is certainly apt.) The story begins one afternoon, when

  Moominpappa was walking about in his garden feeling at a loss. He had no idea what to do with himself, because it seemed everything there was to be done had already been done or was being done by somebody else.6

  He does not enjoy or even practice his hobbies any longer. As Tove Jansson puts it,

  Moominpappa . . . had got his fishing-rod on his birthday a couple of years before and it was a very fine one. But sometimes it stood in its corner in a slightly unpleasant way, as though reminding him that it was for catching fish.7

  Moominpappa, like many suburban fathers with a rather meaningless job, or none at all, is bored and depressed. He consoles himself by going into the garden and looking at his family reflected in a crystal ball, which

  made them all seem incredibly small, . . . and all their movements seem forlorn and aimless.

  Moominpappa liked this. It was his evening game. It made him feel that they all needed protection, that they were at the bottom of a deep sea that only he knew about.8

  When he declares that they are all going to move to the island, Moominmamma accepts it philosophically. “Now the proper thing to do was that they should begin an entirely new life, and that Moominpappa should provide everything they needed, look after them and protect them,” she thinks.9 In fact, once the family reaches the island and moves into a deserted lighthouse, it is Moominmamma who looks after everyone and solves the problems that arise, though Moominpappa does finally catch some—indeed, far too many—fish.

  Living on the island is difficult, especially as the weather turns colder. Moominpappa becomes bewildered and confused, even mildly paranoid. Moominmamma does her best, but sometimes she has to retreat into the garden she has painted on the walls of the lighthouse. The book ends happily, but it is reassuring to learn that eventually the family will return to Moominvalley.

  One of Tove Jansson’s most remarkable creations is her gallery of strange and eccentric characters, many of whom, in spite of their odd appearance, are familiar human types. The strangest species in Moominland are the Hattifatteners—mobs of pale, anonymous beings who resemble stalks of white asparagus with rudimentary arms and hands. They cannot hear or speak to Moomintroll and his friends, and are “interested only in traveling onwards, as far as possible.”10 The Hattifatteners irresistibly suggest mobs of packaged foreign tourists, and it is not surprising that at one of the times when Moominpappa is feeling especially restless and dissatisfied at home, he goes on a voyage with them. During a thunderstorm they suddenly come to life and start swaying back and forth, and Moominpappa becomes disillusioned. “They were heavily charged but hopelessly locked up,” he thinks. “They didn’t feel, they didn’t think, they could only seek.”11

  The Hemulen, on the other hand, represent established authority, organization, the adult world. They look like larger, more rectangular Moomins in human dress (though all Hemulen, both male and female, wear skirts). They are officials, policemen, park-keepers, and managers of orphanages. Some are oppressive and hateful, others merely pathetic. The Hemulen in Moominvalley in November, for example,

  spent the whole day arranging, organizing and directing things from morning till night! All around him there were people living slipshod and aimless lives, wherever he looked there was something to be put right, and he worked his fingers to the bone trying to get them to see how they ought to live.12

  Nevertheless he is chronically tired and bored, and feels “that days passed without anything of importance happening.”13 Other Hemulen do not try to organize anyone, but are obsessed with collecting butterflies or stamps, and none of them are any help abo
ut the house or in times of trouble.

  Fillyjonks also seem to represent adult authority, but of a less oppressive kind. Most of them are female, just as most Hemulen are male. Fillyjonks, who slightly resemble greyhounds, tend to be silly and fussy, to fear dirt and insects. They are house-proud, attached to their possessions and constantly cleaning. They rigidly observe the rules of polite behavior, and often invite relatives and neighbors they really dislike to meals. But sometimes, at these depressing social events, the mask slips:

  “We are so small and insignificant,” [one Fillyjonk suddenly whispers to a guest] “and so are our teacakes and carpets and all those things, you know, and still they’re so important, but always they’re threatened by mercilessness. . . .

  “Tornadoes, whirlwinds, sand-storms. . . . Flood waves that carry houses away. . . . But most of all I’m talking about myself and my fears, even if I know that’s not done. I know everything will turn out badly. I think about that all the time.”14

  There are also many characters in Moominland who do not represent a species. There is, for instance, the Muskrat, who announces that he is a philosopher (an illustration shows that he has recently been reading or pretending to read Spengler). The Muskrat spends most of his time in a hammock, waiting for other people (usually Moominmamma) to bring him lunch. “It’s all a matter of thinking,” he says. “I sit and think about how unnecessary everything is.”15 When the Muskrat absentmindedly sits on Moomintroll’s birthday cake, he is unaware of it. “I don’t bother myself over things like cakes,” he says. “I don’t see them, taste them, or feel them in any way, ever.”16 The accompanying illustration, however, shows the Muskrat consuming a large piece of squashed cake.