#text by Tove Jansson

[vargdottern]

shout out to all the authors who wrote insanely queercoded relationships but couldn't make them canon because being gay wasn't legal at the time

[pinkmoonmp3]

via moominofficial

[deweyduck]

the plot of the snufkin game was just be gay do crime

[poeticanthologies]

ive been reading every tove jansson book i can find in my language - moomin and nonmoomin - and its healing me

[skruttet]

F I N A L L Y

if anyone has a proper/clearer image of this pls gimme

[weirdthoughtsandideas]

I feel like you’re qualified to know this: Is Moomin actually queer or is it just something the fans started headcanoning

This reminds me of this instagram comment section I have saved on my phone

But answering seriously: Yes, Moomin is queer. The one doing the swedish voice for Misabel in the 2019 series brought this up

”It’s something you didn’t think of as a child, that the gender roles are very fluid in Moominvalley. There’s many queer themes. Misabel is an example of that. Also Misabel’s dog Ynk that’s a dog that only likes cats is a good example of this. It’s one of the big strenghts, which makes you as an adult have things to ponder about in the story. It’s fun that Moominvalley is a place where everyone can be just like they are. Man or woman, dog, cat, or something in between. You can like whoever you like. Moomintroll can like Snufkin more than he likes Snorkmaiden, and sometimes he likes Snorkmaiden more and that’s also wonderful.”

Tove Jansson was a queer woman. Two characters, who for some reason are named Thingummy and Bob in english, are named Tofslan and Vifslan in original text. They are nicknames of Tove and Viveca. Viveca Bandler was a woman Tove had a secret relationship with in 1946. Tofslan and Vifslan are two characters who speak in a secret language only they can understand, and they carry around a bag that they REFUSE to open, as inside is the most beautiful thing in the world (the king’s ruby) and they are terrified of anyone finding it. So, you can see the allegory of queerness, the closed bag as the ”closet” and when they eventually open it, the secret ”comes out”.

The character Too-Ticky is also based on Tuulikki Pietilä, who was Tove’s romantic partner, who were together from 1956 up until Tove’s death. In their letters to each other, Tove used to draw Too-Ticky at end of letters

The most emotional scene I think in all of the Moomin’s stories is when Moomin hides inside the magician’s hat and he gets turned into a hideous creature. No one recognizes him even when he cries that he IS Moomin. And then his mom comes, and he shouts ”Mama, it’s me! It’s me, Moomin!”

And she looked at him, and says ”Yes, you are my son.” And that’s what makes him turn back again.

This scene can be an allegory for when coming out and trying assure them that you’re STILL YOU, and everyone is starting to see you differently.

I think the anime was really good at capturing this scene (I mean the anime is superior in every way anyway)

(Flash forward to 1:55 for when the mom comes out)

[the---hermit]

21|10|2023

Today was a chaotic yet good day. Last night I went to sleep way past my usual bedtime, after spending hours texting a friend and doing tarto readings for each other. It was pretty a pretty intense experience in the best way possible, I really hope that my friendship with this new person will continue because they are giving me the best vibes, I tend to have a pretty hard time opening up, but this person makes me feel very comfortable, and is bringing me a lot of joy. This morning my alarm didn't ring, so I ended up sleeping more than I had planned, and when I woke up I wasn't even mad about it. Usually when things like this happened to me I would panic because my whole day plan had to change, and yet this morning I was happy I slept more because I felt reseted and energized. I did change my study plans, and I still got to be very productive. I also spent some time with my brother since he had errands to run and asked me to keep him company, we sang in his car and were very chaotic together as usual. Overall this was a very good day, and I am looking forward to my rest and relaxation day tomorrow.

Cozy hobbit autumn activities and productivity:

slept in and actually had a great night of sleep which counts as a cozy hobbit autumn thing

read first thing in the morning (I am finally reading my first moomin book and I am in love after just one chapter)

read the 12 arguments at the beginning of each book of Paradise Lost (which is the last book I'll have to work on for my English lit class)

did some study planning for the next couple of months, to see when I can work and when I cannot, how much I'll have to do and so on; ngl it was a struggle but I have a clearer view of what I need to do now

ran some errands with my brother

worked on my power practices and men theories class (I found out one of the recorded lectures had no audio, so I moved on the next one, and in the meantime someone on our course groupchat was kind enough to send me their own notes on that particular lecture, I am so grateful to them they really saved me this time around. I also started to write down some notes of my own for said lecture, but I was too tired to finish)

did a bit of planning for next week and set up a new weekly spread on my bullet journal

daily Irish practice of duolingo

started working on a future post

📖: Finn Family Moomintroll by Tove Jansson

[henrykathman]

The Amateur's Guide to Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley

In this video, I return to the world of Moominvalley to analyze the hotly anticipated game Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley and its relationship with the original Moomin stories, Tove Jansson, and the philosophies it connects with.

Special Thanks to Kiki from Transparency for looking at the script. You can follow her Moomin Stuff at @marsmombestmom

Disclosure: My copy of the game was provided to me by Hyper Games and Raw Fury. While I think objectivity is overrated, the opinions in this video have not been influenced by the developers and are a reflection of my own thoughts on this game and the Moomins.

Work Cited Page

Bletchly, Rachael. “How Moomin Author Built a Brand Worth £700m and Why Brits Still Love Them.” The Mirror, Reach PLC, 4 Jan. 2021, www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/how-moomin-creator-built-brand-23260983. Accessed 15 Mar. 2024.

Dymel-Trzebiatowska, Hanna. “Moomins Take the Floor. Finnish Trolls in Contemporary Mass Social (Media) Events.” Children’s Literature in Education, Aug. 2022, pp. 1–16. EBSCOhost, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10583-022-09497-6 Link

Ellis, Rowan. “Why Is Cottagecore so Gay?” Rowan Ellis, YouTube, 30 July 2020, youtu.be/5odKiL7jRW0.

Kramer, Ash. “Philosophical Materialism: Vital Materialism.” Philosophical Materialism: A Study of Early Modern Literature and Contemporary Theory, The Alliance for Networking Visual Culture, scalar.usc.edu/works/material_philosophy/vital-materialism#:~:text=Frequently gendered female, vital materialism. Accessed 15 Mar. 2024.

Meereboer, Arwen Dagmar. "Moomins and Complicity with Matter: Tove Jansson’s Moominpappa at Sea as an Intervention in Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things by Jane Bennett." SATS 23.1 (2022): 17-32. https://www.doria.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/180011/meereboer_arwen.pdf?sequence=2

O’Connell, Joe. “The Melancholy Promise of Heidi, Girl of the Alps.” Beyond Ghibli, YouTube, 20 Sept. 2018, youtu.be/_DFPoZN-FoI. Accessed 15 Mar. 2024.

O’Luanaigh, Robin. “Co-Opting Cottagecore: Pastoral Aesthetics in Reactionary and Extremist Movements.” Global Network on Extremism and Technology, The International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation, 19 May 2023, gnet-research.org/2023/05/19/co-opting-cottagecore-pastoral-aesthetics-in-reactionary-and-extremist-movements/.

Peter Marten. “Moomin Characters Ltd Keeps a National Treasure in the Family.” This Is Finland, the Finland Promotion Board , Apr. 2010, finland.fi/business-innovation/moomin-characters-ltd-keeps-a-national-treasure-in-the-family. Accessed 15 Mar. 2024.

Samson, Anna. “How the Moomins Became an Anti-Fascist Symbol.” Huck Magazine, TCO London, 22 Sept. 2021, www.huckmag.com/article/how-the-moomins-became-an-anti-fascist-symbol.

[moomimania]

feeling those autumn vibes lately, so I had to put it to text. and after a very belated realisation that Tove Jansson wrote Höstvisa, this came to be 🍂

more chapters will be added eventually. I just needed to write something other than my much too long, angsty fic (which I'm adamant about not posting until I have it at least 90% done - which will be quite a while)

but I can never make purely lighthearted fluff. it has to hurt a little. which autumn is the perfect season for with these two 💔

I hope you enjoy! 🍂🍂🍂

[paper-hats-comic]

An Introduction

Well, hello there!

Welcome to Paper Hats, a Moomin fancomic project written and drawn by @janetkwallace for the purpose of showcasing his/her/their artistic talents by transforming words into images, which may or may not accurately reflect each other, but which are somehow connected.

What is Paper Hats?

Paper Hats is a Moomin fanfiction I've been writing since 2022. You can read it on Archive of Our Own (AO3).

The title came from a song by This Heat, one of my favorite bands at the time I wrote the first drafts. So far, it has eight chapters in total and, at some point, I thought "what if I adapted this story into a comic book?", and that's how it all began.

And what's the story about? What are the themes?

Well, it began as a study of Mrs. Fillyjonk's character, an exploration of her worries and fears, whether a person's negative traits define their entire being and how someone feels after doing something wrong. The overall tone is borrowed from Moominpappa at Sea and November in Moominvalley, both novels which featured a melancholic and somber mood. I enjoy writing introspective characters and how they sort out thoughts, manage disorders, express their feelings, and this story is about states of mind, reflected in the writing and art style.

The writing

Stream of consciousness. Lots and lots of stream of consciousness, combined with introspection, nostalgia, existentialism and the absurd that is to think, act and feel about things. I try to make the characters as sympathetic as possible while not denying their flaws. And speaking of flaws, Paper Hats is a story about characters reflecting on their wrongdoing, what it means to them and others.

The artwork

Most of the comic is made up of individual pieces of art that somehow interconnect to tell a story. The text exists to complement the art, while the art exists to illustrate various meanings based on the text chosen for the page. Sometimes the text and artwork do not match at all, but they exist with each other. Eh, it's very experimental, and a lot of the artwork is there to translate emotions that always change shape, size, color, everything.

The inspiration for this comic came after I read "wake Up", a Daredevil comic written by Brian Michael Bendis and drawn by David Mack. The artwork of those comics has a dreamy, oneiric look, which I'm very fond of.

Artistic influences

Besides Tove Jansson, here’s a few: Francis Bacon, Bill Sienkiewicz, August Natterer, Barry Windsor-Smith, Hirō Isono, Deryk Thomas, Paul Klee, etc.

[librarycomic]

If you didn't get any books that wowed you for the holidays, these three volumes of The Illustrators series would be a great end of December gift to yourself. Each has a mix of text (biography and bits about the artist's work), finished illustrations, and sketches.

Tove Jansson (The Illustrators) by Paul Gravett. Series consultant Quentin Blake. Series Editor Claudia Zeff. Thames & Hudson, 2022. 9780500094334. 112pp. http://www.powells.com/book/-9780500094334?partnerid=34778&p_bt

This volume has a few bits of non-Moomin work, including a self-portrait in oils, though most of the illustrations are of Jansson's most famous characters. There are, unfortunately, only a few early versions of her illustrations for The Hobbit inside.

Posy Simmonds (The Illustrators) by Paul Gravett. Series consultant Quentin Blake. Series Editor Claudia Zeff. Thames & Hudson, 2019. 9780500022139. 112pp. https://www.powells.com/book/-9780500022139?partnerid=34778&p_bt

Simmonds started making comics when she was very young, and there are examples from when she was nine or ten. The book places more emphasis on her editorial illustrations and comics for adults (Cassandra Darke, Gemma Bovary, Tamara Drewe, and Mrs. Weber's Diary) than her picture book illustrations, though I probably wouldn't give this book to a child. My favorite drawing in the book is of her workspace.

Ludwig Bemelmans (The Illustrators) by Quentin Blake and Laurie Britton Newell. Series consultant Quentin Blake. Series Editor Claudia Zeff. Thames & Hudson, 2019. 9780500519950. 112pp. https://www.powells.com/book/-9780500519950?partnerid=34778&p_bt

The fantastic thing about many of Bemelmans' art is that they're so simple that it's easy to see how they were drawn, yet so elegant that it's also easy to see his genius. I loved Madeline before I picked this up, but this book made me a fan, and now I'm out to track down a few of his other books that I first saw here.

(Each volume includes a chronology, selected bibliography, and index at the back.)

[speedlimit15]

jess post simulator

post 1: good morningggg it’s such a happy day

post 2: (screenshot) are you kidding me right now

post 3: (screenshot) oh my god are you for real

post 4: and here’s another reason i’m upset

post 5: reblog of someone doing something silly

post 6: reblog of a beautiful landscape

post 7: reblog of a beautiful landscape

post 8: I am so upset at the world

post 9: reblog of a cat pic

post 10: two pics of me petting my cat

post 11: reblog of a black and white pic of tove jansson and tuulikki living peacefully and happily

post 12: picture of my tv screen with whatever i’m watching

post 13: i went on a walk and it was nice

post 14: quick one line text post that gets ~300 notes just because i put the words in a fun order

post 15: Stop hurting women

post 16: I CANT DRAW

post 17: ok i can draw but i don’t like it

[pinkmoonmp3]

via tovejanssonofficial

[rye-in-a-coat]

Hiii Rye, how does your tagging system work? I'm guessing it has something to do with Toki Pona but I'm curious

That's a great question, let's go through some of the tags I use in this blog.

Also. This will be a bit long.

GENERAL TAGS

The most well known and used is ofc, #ryeblog ,which is given to any post I reblog. It comes from "rye" and "reblog". Another interesting fact is that when I reblog many posts in a short time, I call it a "ryeblitz" (ryeblog + blitz [German for lightning).

For original text-based posts of mine, the tag is #handful of grains, which comes from the fact that I am Rye; but also because originally there was a tag called #sack of grain that never got used and was intended for large text-based original posts.

Images and videos get #pics and flicks, except if these are art. If the art was posted by the artist it gets #art of them and if it's someone else's art it gets #art of those.

#letters to rye will be the tag used in this post, as it is for the asks I answer.

#poll #tag game #ask game #quiz Self explanatory.

Prev tags get marked with #Previously on Tags: and then I mark my answer to those with a #My reaction to that information:

MEDIA TAGS

Quite self explanatory, if I'm reblogging some cute art from blorbo from my shows, tags would look like

#ryeblog #art of them #my shows

Must be understood that this system isn't 100% reliable. If I don't have a tag for a media because I have no knowledge of it or even interest; it won't get a tagged or have a tag.

Imagine this, a fanart featuring characters from the shows A, B, C and D. I only have tags for B and C. Only appliable media tags are #B and #C.

This is why you can find stuff like few Chainsaw Man fanart in my blog, but a tag for Chainsaw Man doesn't actually exist. When I reblog Out of Touch Thursday, I don't do it with a tag for the Lucky Star anime. Characters don't have tags in my system.

I can't give a full list of all of them, but here's the top 45 as of now:

#moomin

#deltarune

#sparklecare

#toh (The Owl House)

#sonic the hedgehog

#dhmis (Don't Hug Me I'm Scared)

#su (Steven Universe)

#tf2 (Team Fortress 2)

#pokemon

#lwa (Little Witch Academia)

#hatsune miku [Ok. It's ironic that this is a character. There's no tag for Vocaloid btw. Cuz of my lack of knowledge on the matter.]

#mlp

#minecraft

#fnaf (Five Nights at Freddy)

#undertale

#bluey

#danganronpa

#homestuck

#breaking bad

#cunk on earth [It applies to other media with Philomena Cunk like "Cunk on Britain"]

#neil cicierega [Technically a person. Applies to all his work. Forgot to mention, artists and bands also fit in this category.]

#tove jansson [Again. A person. This tag exists to not tag her with #moomin in non-Moomin issues.]

#talking heads [Again, a band.]

#jerma985 [A person.]

#spiderman

#undertale 2 [Yep. That's a game. A parody fan-game RPG of Undertale. This tag isn't for Deltarune. I found many people tagging Deltarune as Undertale 2.]

#animal crossing

#hetalia

#loz (Legend of Zelda)

#adventure time

#epithet erased

#lemon demon [Again, an artist; also not everything Neil Cicierega does is for Lemon Demon. This is why this tag is also a thing.]

#omori

#mcyt (Minecraft YouTuber)

#tally hall [A band.]

#barbie

#doctor who

#ghibli

#tetris

#touhou

#ytp

#ella minnow pea

#ena

#they might be giants [A band.]

#alexkansas [Applies to all his work. Currently MISTERMANTICORE]

NOT THAT SPECIFIC TAGS. THEY ARE THE SAME LEVEL AS THESE

#the past for the stuff about the past. The limit of how old has to be the thing to be tagged with this is 20 years.

#language is for everything linguistics, scripts, phonetics, anything of that matter and related. This tag isn't for swear swords, those bitches don't fucking get tagged.

#chemistry #geology #toki pona [An artistic constructed language by Sonja Lang] #handwriting #cursive #flags [Because vexillology was too long and I never knew if I was writing it right] #maps #biology #philately [#stamps is out of use] #reaction image ,etc.

MEET THE SPECIFICS

These tags exists because I have decided to.

TAGS THAT USE TOKI PONA WORDS

#pilin This Toki Pona word describes many concepts, like feelings, emotions, the heart in its both physical and emotional form. However, in this blog, this tag shall only be used for the heart (organ or not) and heart shapes and heart-shaped things.

#kili This word describes fruits and vegetables, all the edible parts of a plant. I also use this tag for stuff made with kili, like French fries, jam and jelly or milkshakes.

#mun This word doesn't just describe the Moon but also all night-sky objects and space objects. This tag replaced the now abandoned #astronomy as stuff like a blanket with sun and moon motifs or the fanart of a furry on the Moon aren't quite related with the science of space.

#kala This word describes fish and all the aquatic animals. Axolotls, whales, jellyfish and crabs may not be fish, but they sure are kala.

#pan As a Spanish speaker you probably have realised this word is for bread. That's right, it's for grains and all grain products. Stuff that is pan but not bread: tortilla, beer, peanut butter, crackers, communion wafers, tejuino. This tag isn't for pansexuality, Tumblr just colours it like that.

#pipi The word for insects and all the little bugs and crechurs, so it includes stuff like spiders and worms.

#waso The word for birds, flying animals and winged animals.

#soko The word for fungi. This tag replaced #mycology.

#akesi The word for reptiles. This tag isn't used for "non-cute animals" as the original meaning of the word expressed and was corrected in 2021.

#kijetesantakalu The word to describe procyonids and musteloids, like ferrets, racoons and tanukis. For the non-Toki Pona speakers. The reason why this word is long and very specific is because it's an April Fools joke that just got too popular.

#in front of them sensors I wears glasses, I like characters that wear them too. So this tag is for that. It also applies to stuff like sport/lab goggles, sunglasses and other eyewear.

#the florist's For flowers. The name is as in a flower shop, just like the butcher's or the chemist's.

#city made of light For photographs of, or art depicting urban light during the night. The night scared us, so we killed it; some beautiful examples of this massacre to our health are Times Square, the Las Vegas strip or Hong Kong neon capital of the East.

#KÖT For cats! The word "köt" isn't for cat in any language btw.

#i do the squeaking For ratas and mice. Tag name based on that one post with the mousegirl house wife.

I don't tag furries for some reasons: First is, what is a furry? Are Moomins furry? Are Sonic characters furries? Furries' opinion on what is furry and what is not a large broad spectrum of thoughts. Second is so people don't block furries from me. If you don't wanna see furries, go and try and see how many tags you need to block to see none, and you will still see some cuz not everyone tags. Also, furries don't get tagged any of the animal tags.

#boyfriendposting Those posts that are like "yeah, sorry that your boyfriend..."

#fake posts Those posts that are made to look like many and have some theme.

#fauxnetics People trying to spell pronunciation using non-standarized methods like the IPA, usually just causing more confusion. Example: "How do you pronounce Chara? Car-uh, Care-uh, Chair-uh or Char-uh?"

#illinois chess Games (doesn't have to be chess, but if chess, funky non-standard chess) [usually board games] with strange setting or rules, impossible to understand. Tag named after this thing from 20020.

#present as the past from the future Meme/joke posts describing modern/contemporany history or the current world as how we speak of the past. Example: "Cowboys were a sort of itinerant warrior class common in Meiji-era Texas."

#rainbow #emoji #ethanol [Alcohol found in drinking alcoholic beverages] #radiation #tbh creature #tea #picrew #9/11 #plush #tell-o-phone [Telephones] #tell-o-vision [Televisions] #jesus #gastronintestinal issues #isobutyl propionic acid [Ibuprofen] #rain #butane [Alkane of four carbon atoms, fuel in cigarette lighters] #loss ['Loss' by Tim Buckley for Ctrl+Alt+Del] #snow #blåhaj #R-Ë-PLANE [Airplanes and similar aircraft.] #ZUG [German for trains. Anything on rails.] #mpreg [Male pregnancy] #cool S [This one.] #aspirin ,etc, probably there are more.

I hope this ask has answered your doubts. There's probably more tags out there.

Now for an example.

Example.

Tag-relevant details: A Sparklecare Cometcare AU fan art piece made and posted by Edward featuring Barry Ill and Uni Sock Cornelius in a night picnic. Uni is wearing her rose-tinted goggles, holding a milkshake with a cherry on top, there's another one present next to Barry. Barry is holding a sandwich with visible lettuce and tomato, there's another one next to Uni. The picnic blanket has the colours of the rainbow. There are stars and hearts around them, the picnic case also had a heart detail. On the field there are white small flowers.

Tags: #ryeblog #art of them #sparklecare #in front of them sensors #kili #pan #rainbow #pilin #mun #the florist's

The tags after the Sparklecare one could be in any order.

And this is an ideal case. As I have stated, I'm not 100% reliable and this sytem isn't either. I sometimes miss some tags.

As a final detail. Comments about the post will go after all of these tags and will have proper sentence capitalization and punctuation. This is the hierarchy the tags go which I sometimes miss too.

[mmepastel]

J’ai acheté ça pour ma nièce, je l’ai lu incognito avant de l’emballer. C’est bon, je peux lui offrir, c’est super. J’en avais juste entendu parler avec beaucoup d’éloges.

Doux, sensible, introspectif, profond.

Pour elle qui a du mal à rester en place, qui est un feu follet, ça va sûrement être une lecture étonnante, mais je pense que ça peut la toucher. Les interrogations sur soi-même, la voie que l’on choisit, la féminité, sont assez partagées dans la jeunesse qui s’attarde, je pense.

Les dessins aux crayons de couleurs sont très beaux, comme inachevés, croqués, mais ils sont aussi très forts, voire puissants. Le choc des couleurs, les contrastes. Le texte écrit à la main, au crayon aussi, donne un côté enfantin, qui contrebalance la gravité de certaines considérations.

Les paysages visités, les activités de Julie m’ont fait rêver : Finlande, Grèce, Montréal, poterie, dessin, lectures, rencontres autour de la figure centrale féministe et anti conformiste qu’était Tove Jansson, l’inventeuse des Moomins, peuple rigolo et inoffensif, plus subversif qu’il n’y parait.

J’ai envie d’en lire d’autres de Julie Deplorte du coup !

[skruttet]

I can’t remember trying to comfort her, it wasn’t common for siblings to hug each other at the time, we would certainly have more openly shown our feelings if we were children today. It felt easier to write, and when Tove decorated the paper-covered walls of Gustafsson’s little outhouse with pictures, aphorisms and quotes, I wrote comments under Tove’s text – instead of talking to her.

- Per Olov Jansson