Customer Reviews

Moomin: The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip - Book One

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I discovered Tove Jansson's Moomin world while visiting Finland in the summer of 1999. There was an exhibit at the Tampere library that caught my attention and where I fell in love with this wonderful world she created. Being an American who adored Winnie the Pooh as a child (and still do as an adult) I always tell people who have never heard of Moomin's that they're kind of like the Finnish version of Winnie the Pooh. We visisted Moomin World while in Finland which was great fun. I have since collected all of the books translated in to English and love reading them myself or to my grade school age children who also now love Moomins. This particular book is a collection of the comic series Tove Jansson did for the Londan paper in the late 1950s. They are magical; witty; wonderful; warm; and just plain great fun. Even my first grader was laughing out loud when we read through them last night. Who doesn't love the comics? Quickly becoming obsolete in today's high tech world this book is a charming respite back to good old basic fun. There is great little tid bits of wisdom woven in to this wonderful imaginary world and I always find some trivit to ponder or chuckle. I will always be grateful for discovering this wonderful world of Moomins. I am so glad that I did and can pass on the magic to my own kids. I think this book is a must have for Moomin fans!

I love children's literature, and Tove Jansson's Moominvalley books are in my opinion among the best children's books ever written. They are engaging adventures for a child, with excellent use of half-human, half-animal characters. At the same time, they provide more than enough depth of character, portrayal of family dynamics and other interpersonal dynamics, humor and gentle social satire, and expression of love of place to satisfy the adult reader.

The comic strips are good, but they are not nearly as good as the books. There simply aren't enough words, and the pictures are not sufficient to substitute for Jansson's masterful descriptions in the books. For the reader who already knows the books, the comic strips will be a pleasant diversion, just to see more of Jansson's work. But anyone who reads the comic strips without having read the books is missing out on the real treasure.

I wanted to love this book. I've loved all the Moomintroll books. The characters are real to me, and I love them all, even the naughty ones, like Little My, and the control-freaks called Hemulins.(I think I might be a Fillyjonk, myself.) But I was really surprised to find out how distorted all my favorite characters were in these comic strips.

For example, in the second story, Moominpappa asks Moominmamma to run away with him in search of adventure, not tell anybody, and leave their son at home wondering what happened to them. Moominmamma has some qualms about leaving her son without a word, but Moominpappa wins her over by saying "He'll get along." So they leave, and then Moomintroll is frantic with worry that they've drowned.

This was a real shocker to me! Moominmamma was always the mother everyone wished they had. Soft, round and comforting, her love for her "own, dear Moomintroll" is one of the sweetest things about the books. She makes tea and sandwiches, gives hugs, and takes little lost creatures into her house and treats them like her own children. That she would sneak away from her son without saying a word was beyond belief, considering that Jansson spent eight books building her character as the world's sweetest mother.

In one story, timid little Sniff bullies Moomintroll and cheats rich Aunt Jane out of a lot of money. In another, Moominpappa and the Snork Maiden drag the family to the Riviera for champagne, gambling, and pretending they are rich nobility. By this time I couldn't recognize any of my old friends except Moomintroll himself.

There's nothing really wrong or harmful about this book... except that it's nothing like the original Moomintroll books. Three of the four stories are obsessively about large amounts of money, which is hard to take when you remember Moominmamma as the one who, when she came into a lot of gold nuggets, used them to decorate the edges of her garden. Very little of the action happens in the Finnish forests, with its cast of assorted creeps, woodies, tree-spirits and trolls. I really regretted spending the money to buy this book new.

For those of you who loved the book, don't be angry with me. Remember that Fillyjonks never take well to changes of any sort.

Tove Jansson classic stories about Moomin family and friends have been enjoyed all over Europe for years. I've been reading all Moomin's books since I was 5 years old, and re-reading them recently for my 7-year old daughter who enjoyed them as much as I did when I was her age. The cartoonish comic strip is a great addition to novels and animated series. Although, the drawings are not colored, the book has been a huge favorite of mine and my daughter since publication in November. The stories are lively, humorous and educational. The plot is easy to follow and attractive enough to enmesh my daughter in reading for few hours every day. But since her first perusal of the book, she is going back to the book and reads and looks through the stories again and again. I wish US publisher would come out with the next installment pretty soon. I would also love to get my hands on DVD with animated series which has been such a huge children's hit in Europe.

My father had a Fullbright fellowship to teach and research blood diseases in Finland from August 1960 to August 1961. I was eleven when the family moved to Turku for the year. We had a copy of this book in English, possibly published in Great Britain. From the description of stories yet to be released, it sounds like the book we had included the entire series and not just the story in this volume. I remember the pictures of the Moomintrolls wearing their bikinis in the Riviera. It was and still is my favorite picture book. My brother, sister, and I read it until it fell apart. We don't know what happened to our copy, but it was unreadable by the time we were finished with it. Mom probably tossed what was left of it when we weren't paying attention. The Moomintroll stories are a little darker, edgier and more mysterious than many other popular children's series, I think. That was certainly part of their appeal for me. I'm thrilled to see this in print through a US publisher. I've searched for it for years, not even finding a used copy anywhere.

This oddly meandering story follows the adventures of the hippo-like character Moomin and his friends. It starts out with a story about unwanted house-guests, which leads into the search for a new house, to prison and then to a home for old-ladies, who Moomin inadvertantly changes into old men. In short, it's a strange and soft story. The child-like illustrations are quite charming and there is something refreshingly unpretentious about the whimsical style of Tove Jansson. It reminds me of the graphic novel version of a haiku poem-so much is left unsaid. A refreshing change from the more driven and visceral type of graphic-novel which seems so popular now.

If you've never heard of Tove Jansson's comic strip "Moomin," you're in for a treat. The title character is a troll, but looks like a hippopotamus. He is a loveable character with a childlike innocence. He tries to be friends with everyone, and like many nice people, doesn't know how to set limits. In the first sequence, he has dozens of friends and family visit him, and are extremely demanding, but he doesn't seem to be able to say no. He then gets a rather smelly friend to drive everyone away, but he eats Moomin's house! We then follow Moomin and his friend Sniff as they search for riches and fame. That's the first of four parts in this collection, and the storylines flow into each other nicely. There's great character development with real pathos, and the art is unique and a pleasure to look at. If you're looking for a comic strip that's different from the ones you typically see in the paper, look no further.

I just wanted to add to the other comments that this is an absolutely beautiful edition, very nicely bound. A great job (as always) from the folks at Drawn & Quarterly.

To be perfectly honest, I didn't understand the Moomin collections at first, and it took some significant steps before I could absorb their meaning. Despite this work to get through my own notions of "comics" and how Moomin conflicted with them, the result was ultimately very rewarding.

Drawn & Quarterly began reprinting Tove Jansson's Moomin comic strips in 2006, assembling the complete collection as originally published (after translation from the original Swedish) from 1953 to 1959, in London's Evening News.

As modern readers, most of us with a relatively limited exposure to the format of old-school comic dailies, we naturally see three panels and expect a joke at the end of each set. What we do not typically expect is a continuing narrative, unpunctuated by gimmicks and gags, running through this format. The occasional punchline or astute observation about human nature certainly doesn't help in setting a steady pace, but once the reader realizes that there is no pace, that these are fanciful stories of troll life, it becomes an entirely comfortable place to sink into.

I downloaded the Moomin Voices album, which was released in 2003. It collects a whole bunch of Moomin songs written and performed between 1959 and 2003, and hearing the occasionally jazzy, completely peaceful and occasionally strange music that the Moomins would theoretically live by brought that understanding of the strange Moomin world to completion. I very much suggest finding a copy of the album if you're having trouble understanding the Moomins. It serves to amplify the fact that Jansson was creating a world rather than creating a comic. The complex, moral, and exciting world of the Moomins just happened to express itself through comics.

Jansson's black-and-white line drawings are at once simple, almost geometric and supremely expressive. She manages to fit complex situations, surreal landscapes, and bizarre creatures into relatively small panels without losing any sense of animation, style, or story. That, I can tell you, is a feat, accomplished with an understated mastery of light and shadow.

The stories themselves meander--cause and effect are constantly bouncing off one another in endless chains of events that eventually resolve, though not without a few loose ends along the way. It's not about continuity, though--it's about the journey.

I also love the charm of the 1950s drawings. While far more elegant than something you'd find in a textbook, I can't help but feel shades of the angular, simple figures that might be demonstrating what sodium and chlorine turn into when combined.

And there's no ill will to be found. A little bit of punished selfishness, a Moomin calling another one an "ass" because of a philosophical disagreement, but everything returns to normal and everyone's a little wiser for it. It's a simple way to tell stories, and one that really isn't used too much anymore (except in the most saccharine of cartoons), but it's refreshing to see it in this original context.

Absolutely worth a look and a solid, meaningful addition to your collection--all packaged in huge books that you can sink into a sofa with.

-- Collin David

Utterly and completely charming.
I'd read all her books but had never seen these.
I've returned to them often.