The Summer Book (New York Review Books Classics) [Paperback]

Tove Jansson (Author), Thomas Teal (Translator), Kathryn Davis (Introduction)

Book Description

Series: New York Review Books Classics | Publication Date: May 20, 2008

In The Summer Book Tove Jansson distills the essence of the summer—its sunlight and storms—into twenty-two crystalline vignettes. This brief novel tells the story of Sophia, a six-year-old girl awakening to existence, and Sophia’s grandmother, nearing the end of hers, as they spend the summer on a tiny unspoiled island in the Gulf of Finland. The grandmother is unsentimental and wise, if a little cranky; Sophia is impetuous and volatile, but she tends to her grandmother with the care of a new parent. Together they amble over coastline and forest in easy companionship, build boats from bark, create a miniature Venice, write a fanciful study of local bugs. They discuss things that matter to young and old alike: life, death, the nature of God and of love. “On an island,” thinks the grandmother, “everything is complete.” In The Summer Book, Jansson creates her own complete world, full of the varied joys and sorrows of life.

Tove Jansson, whose Moomintroll comic strip and books brought her international acclaim, lived for much of her life on an island like the one described in The Summer Book, and the work can be enjoyed as her closely observed journal of the sounds, sights, and feel of a summer spent in intimate contact with the natural world. 

The Summer Book is translated from the Swedish by Thomas Teal.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"It's deceptively simple, refreshingly unembellished, distilled, grounded in sensory experience, and absolutely direct. It's comforting for precisely the same reasons it's unsettling, like standing on the shore looking across a dark sea at a horizon you swear you could almost touch. " --Rain Taxi

"Poetic understatement, dry humor and a deep love for nature are obvious throughout her oeuvre.... The book is as lovely, as evocative as a film by Hayao Miyazaki." --Time Out New York

“Tove Jansson was a genius. This is a marvelous, beautiful, wise novel, which is also very funny.” –Philip Pullman

“A wise, joyous book...it unfolds the knowledge and the beauty of the two lives it embraces–old wisdom and young discover, intertwining like vines.” –Rex Reed

“The Summer Book manages to make you feel good as well as wise, without having to make too much effort...[it] says so much that we want to hear in such an accessible form, without ever really saying anything at all.” –The Independent (London)

"Few books since Robinson Crusoe have evoked the joys of island living so powerfully as this Finnish novella." –The Observer, PAPERBACK OF THE WEEK

"The Summer Book is a marvellously uplifting read, full of gentle humour and wisdom." –Daily Telegraph (London)

"A marvellous book...The prose is sublime: plain, but not oppressively so." –Independent on Sunday (London)

"A...beautiful novel which blends humour and poetry with detailed observation of tiny things." –Daily Mail (London)

"It's hard to describe the astonishing achievement of Jansson's artistry...a perfection of the small, quiet read." –The Guardian, (London) BOOK OF THE WEEK

"A wonderful novel to devour in the sunshine...full of charm and character." –The Independent, 50 BEST BOOKS FOR SUMMER

"Every so often, a book is published that captures something in us...The Summer Book is one of those." –Daily Telegraph

“Responses, conversations, and observations yield quietly reflective and funny ruminations on life and death.” –The Age (Australia)

“Thomas Teal, a luminous translator of Jansson’s twin talent for surface and depth, simplicity and reverberation in language, and someone who knows exactly how to convey her gift for sensing the meaning embedded in the most mundane act or turn of phrase.” –Ali Smith

“This is a wonderful, life-affirming, spirited book. Reading it was a tonic.” –Chris Stewart (author, Driving Over Lemons)

“Eccentric, funny, wise, full of joys and small adventures. This is a book for life.” –Esther Freud

"The Summer Book is beautiful and warm, with the kind of wisdom we can adapt to our everyday lives." -Liv Ullmann

"Take a book in which there is no plot but bucketloads of positive feelings presented simply, and it will become a cult. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Jonathan Livingston Seagull were both bestsellers; no one could say what either was really about, but everyone could quote a meaningful truism from them. The Summer Book is in this mould: it manages to make you feel good as well as wise..." -Independent

Language Notes

Text: English, Swedish (translation) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 176 pages
• Publisher: NYRB Classics (May 20, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 159017268X
• ISBN-13: 978-1590172681
• Product Dimensions: 5 x 0.5 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #89,968 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

TOVE JANSSON (1914-2001) is revered around the world as one of the foremost children's authors of the twentieth century for her illustrated Moomin chapter books.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A perfect book, September 22, 2001

By 

M. J. Walters "dargelos" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Summer Book (Paperback)

The connection between grandmother and granddaughter is a marrow-deep one in "Summer Book." Sophia and her grandmother spend their days exploring, talking about life, nature, everything but their feelings about Sophia's mother's death and their love for one another. And yet, underneath the offhand, and often strange conversations that take place between them, you feel their affection and the concern they feel for one another.

"Summer Book" is a strange and beautiful story. There's no false emotions here, no manipulation for the sake of effect. Just an account of a very real relationship between a child and her grandmother, during the last weeks of the grandmother's life. Very highly recommended.

33 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finn family Jansson, March 27, 2005

By 

lowell duluth "lowell duluth" (Manchester, UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Summer Book (Hardcover)

Based very much upon the late (and yes, great) Tove Jansson`s own family experiences on an island in the Finnish archipelago, this magical, elegiac, very funny, yet - despite its title - autumnal book, subtly draws the reader into the seemingly mundane lives of six-year old Sophia, whose mother has recently died, and `Grandmother` (who could almost be a humanised character from one of Jansson`s immortal Moomin books), as they potter and squabble around their small, idyllic island summer home.
Sophia`s `Papa` never speaks (never? Hm...) but is a silent, prosaic presence throughout, while Sophia is (as her name implies) wise, as well as temperamental, and Grandmother dispenses brief, ironic snippets of wisdom and can be just as prickly. They are a double-act; and, like all the best double-acts, rely on each other - at least for the grateful reader - to each `complete` the other. One feels Grandmother learns from her granddaughter as well as vice versa.
This is a beautiful, thoughtful, unsentimental, deceptively straightforward meander through the summer months with three generations of a grieving family each determined to hang on to their individuality. There are also the occasional - and rarely welcome - visitors.
If I make The Summer Book sound more than simply a light read, it is because even Tove Jansson`s children`s books (of which this can hardly be said to be one) have a tough melancholy strain to them, and a `message` of independence and personal integrity as the sanest way to be.
In its modest, breezy way, this is a great little book. One to treasure.

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Charming, beautiful and philosophical, June 21, 2005

By 

T. Bently "tbently" (Berkshire, England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Summer Book (Hardcover)

I rejoice that this short work has come into print again, though it's rather sad that it took the author's recent death to prompt the publishers into action. I'd read an extract in a guide to the top 100 books of the twentieth century and was surprised and disappointed not to be able to get my hands on the full edition.

Jansson has an inate understanding of the wisdom and skewed world-view of children, and manages to capture the fragile - and ephemeral - friendship which can exist between the very old and the very young. There is a freshness about her style which never teeters into whimsy. A rare achievement indeed.