Cartoon family the Moomins to celebrate 80th birthday
The children's book features Moomintroll and Moominmamma in their search for the missing Moominpappa.
Jansson, a Swedish-speaking Finn who died in 2001, went on to write eight more books, multiple picture books and a comic strip about the Moomins in Swedish.
The series, set in the fictional Moominvalley, has been translated into more than 60 languages, and sparked movie and TV adaptations, children's plays, art gallery exhibitions and an eponymous museum – plus theme parks in Finland and Japan. Finnair, the national carrier, has even put Moomins on its aircraft.
On Saturday, fans flocked to Tampere in southern Finland – home of the Moomin Museum – to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the 1945 publication as well as Jansson's birthday of August 9 1914.
Moomin merchandise is hugely popular across the world. There is a massive market for Moomintroll, Moominmamma and Moominpappa souvenirs across the globe, and secondary characters like their friends Stinky, Sniff, Snufkin, Snork Maiden and Hattifatteners are also well-loved.
'The Moomin mug is one of the best-known collector items worldwide,' Selma Green, director of the Moomin Museum, said. 'You buy a Moomin mug, you like the characters, you maybe see something on TV – but we all go back to the books, the original illustrations.'
Depictions of the character Stinky, described as a loveable rogue who has captured Moominmamma's heart, generated debate and outcry in Finland this summer after reports emerged in Finnish media that Stinky was removed from murals in an exhibit at the Brooklyn Public Library in New York due to concerns that the cartoon might be perceived as racist.
Jansson's drawings of Stinky shows the character with a dark, fuzzy body, with skinny legs and antennae. He has a reputation as an unsuccessful criminal – whose plans get foiled or he gets caught in the act – with an appetite for furniture and other wooden things.
The Moomin stories honour the idea of family as a flexible concept. Diverse gender roles and queer themes also come across in Moominvalley, as well as in Jansson's other works, reflecting her LGBT+ identity.
Her partner of more than 45 years, engraver and artist Tuulikki Pietila, was memorialised as the character Too-ticky in Moominland Midwinter.
While Jansson sought to portray Moominvalley as an escape, Moomin stories have always had a mixture of peril and comfort.
'Her first Moomin book came out in a dark era. She felt it was very difficult to paint, and she started writing what she called a fairy tale, but she excused herself not to include princesses or princes,' said Sirke Happonen, a Moomins scholar and associate professor at the University of Helsinki.
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Wales Online
2 hours ago
- Wales Online
Yacht grounding prompts warning to ‘stay clear of the hard bits'
Our community members are treated to special offers, promotions and adverts from us and our partners. You can check out at any time. More info North Wales readers have been responding to reports that a luxury yacht became stranded off Gwynedd, with a jet skier broadcasting the Titanic theme tune through a loudspeaker whilst the drama unfolded. Social media footage triggered widespread reaction, with readers discussing seamanship, safety, and the jet skier's actions. The mishap swiftly became a hot topic amongst mariners and residents. Dozens of vessels rushed to assist a luxury 50ft yacht after it struck rocks off the Gwynedd shoreline on Monday, August 11. A nearby jet ski blared the Titanic theme song via a loudspeaker whilst a crew member desperately held onto the tilting craft. The ketch, travelling from Aberystwyth to Pwllheli, met disaster on underwater rocks a quarter of a mile from St Tudwal's Island East near Abersoch on the Llŷn Peninsula. Island proprietor Carl Hollins arrived first at the scene and attempted unsuccessfully to free the yacht from its Carreg y Trai position, also called Half Tide Rocks. The craft was a Swedish-manufactured Hallberg-Rassy, considered the "Rolls Royce" of sailing yachts. Half Tide Rocks typically remain visible above water and serve as a preferred resting place for seals. This week they lay beneath a high Spring tide, though the rocks appear on charts and the twin-masted yacht ought to have received warning of the danger via its GPS equipment. Some discovered grim comedy in the incident. Peteryyz comments: "I hope the jet skier was aptly playing the social media, viral, out of tune recorder version of The Titanic theme." Another contributor, Md71 joked: "You can't park there." Farmernotpharma writes: "The skipper knew what he was doing 'obviously'." Pay1233 says: "Anybody who has not made a mistake in their life, hasn't learnt anything, At all, I've been skipper on Diving boat round there, and thanks to more season skippers give me advice what to do / look out for. I feel for this person, so don't anybody sling mud at this Skipper." Puffinisland12 replies: "No need to sling mud, it's more of s'ling me your hook'. A £500k boat without charts, GPS and radar makes you wonder what did it have to help that poor captain. In the dark and no lights, no wonder he made a mistake." Weneedpie joins in with: "Agree, the captain surely would have checked his charts before making the journey from Aberystwyth, Carreg y Trai is even shown on OS Maps. Anyway, seems no one was hurt other than their egos, and they live to sail another day." Daffyddthomas thinks: "Always interesting to see this sort of thing well done to the Jet-ski driver!" While over on our Facebook page - Aneurin Jones comments: "Luxury yacht? Just looks like an ordinary yacht to me! It does bother me that 'sailing' requires no training and marine charts show depths of water but sailors regular run aground. First rule of sailing, stay clear of the hard bits!" Katey Victoria Duncalf feels: "Easily done as that rock only sticks out at certain tides." Does the sailor of this yacht have your sympathy? Have your say by commenting below or HERE to join in the conversation.
North Wales Live
6 hours ago
- North Wales Live
Yacht grounding prompts warning to ‘stay clear of the hard bits'
North Wales readers have been responding to reports that a luxury yacht became stranded off Gwynedd, with a jet skier broadcasting the Titanic theme tune through a loudspeaker whilst the drama unfolded. Social media footage triggered widespread reaction, with readers discussing seamanship, safety, and the jet skier's actions. The mishap swiftly became a hot topic amongst mariners and residents. Dozens of vessels rushed to assist a luxury 50ft yacht after it struck rocks off the Gwynedd shoreline on Monday, August 11. A nearby jet ski blared the Titanic theme song via a loudspeaker whilst a crew member desperately held onto the tilting craft. The ketch, travelling from Aberystwyth to Pwllheli, met disaster on underwater rocks a quarter of a mile from St Tudwal's Island East near Abersoch on the Llŷn Peninsula. Island proprietor Carl Hollins arrived first at the scene and attempted unsuccessfully to free the yacht from its Carreg y Trai position, also called Half Tide Rocks. The craft was a Swedish-manufactured Hallberg-Rassy, considered the "Rolls Royce" of sailing yachts. Half Tide Rocks typically remain visible above water and serve as a preferred resting place for seals. This week they lay beneath a high Spring tide, though the rocks appear on charts and the twin-masted yacht ought to have received warning of the danger via its GPS equipment. Some discovered grim comedy in the incident. Peteryyz comments: "I hope the jet skier was aptly playing the social media, viral, out of tune recorder version of The Titanic theme." Another contributor, Md71 joked: "You can't park there." Farmernotpharma writes: "The skipper knew what he was doing 'obviously'." Pay1233 says: "Anybody who has not made a mistake in their life, hasn't learnt anything, At all, I've been skipper on Diving boat round there, and thanks to more season skippers give me advice what to do / look out for. I feel for this person, so don't anybody sling mud at this Skipper." Puffinisland12 replies: "No need to sling mud, it's more of s'ling me your hook'. A £500k boat without charts, GPS and radar makes you wonder what did it have to help that poor captain. In the dark and no lights, no wonder he made a mistake." Weneedpie joins in with: "Agree, the captain surely would have checked his charts before making the journey from Aberystwyth, Carreg y Trai is even shown on OS Maps. Anyway, seems no one was hurt other than their egos, and they live to sail another day." Daffyddthomas thinks: "Always interesting to see this sort of thing well done to the Jet-ski driver!" While over on our Facebook page - Aneurin Jones comments: "Luxury yacht? Just looks like an ordinary yacht to me! It does bother me that 'sailing' requires no training and marine charts show depths of water but sailors regular run aground. First rule of sailing, stay clear of the hard bits!" Katey Victoria Duncalf feels: "Easily done as that rock only sticks out at certain tides."
Spectator
10 hours ago
- Spectator
The scourge of the sensitivity reader
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Szetela trenchantly suggests that white authors are now required to hire tour guides… to help them understand what happens when a black American walks into the kitchen. If one were to ask a black co-worker 'What do blacks eat for dinner?' they might be reported to HR. If they pay a sensitivity reader for an answer, they will be lauded for 'trying to get the story right'. The book cites the case of a well-known sensitivity reader who wrote to an author that 'going to national parks is not a thing we [black people] do'. Authors and editors, Szetela claims, now feel pressure to abide by 'rules of authenticity' which 'will not permit a black character to enter a national park unless they explain why they want to enter a national park' and 'do not leave room for a novel about six English-speaking Latinas who met at Boston University'. The very existence of sensitivity readers, Szetela claims, rests on a form of essentialism which implicitly sees Afro-American life, for example, as both so opaque that it needs 'cultural ambassadors' to explain it to white people and so homogeneous that a single person can claim to speak for 'Black/African-American culture' across history. Stringent demands for inclusivity often have a blind spot about class, Szetela argues, citing writing guides and policy statements for literary festivals which sometimes seem to be 'competing to see who can create the longest identity list that does not mention class'. Yet poor, ill-educated writers miss out because they cannot afford the very well-paid and generally well-educated sensitivity readers that publishers now often insist on. 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In addition, according to Szetela, 'there is no room for even one uncontested thought crime in contemporary literature written for young people'. If a character says something offensive, they have to be challenged immediately and explicitly. Readers are given no chance to work out for themselves that the person is bigoted, or even to accompany them on a journey where they come to see the error of their ways. There are moments when Szetela is baffled by what he finds. As a former keen wrestler who sometimes got into the ring with concussion or stitches under his eye, he simply 'can't imagine a situation in which I would break down crying, like the employees at Penguin Random House, because somebody wrote a book that I'm not interested in reading'. Yet he urges his fellow progressives to realise that 'there are bigger fish to fry than well-intentioned books written by other progressives'. This applies even within publishing, where commercial houses naturally continue to issue popular and often influential books by conservative authors. As a tool for addressing more serious inequalities, the initiatives he describes are simply non-starters. Furthermore, he reminds us, 'most Americans think cancel culture is a big problem', while prominent liberals 'deny that it even exists' or 'call you a white supremacist for believing it exists' (even though some occasionally call for 'more cancelling'). This has proved a spectacular own goal, since the politicians now running the show have been able to attract easy and widespread support by criticising cancel culture. This is hardly the first polemical book to explore the failings of 'woke' cultural crusades. Yet its combination of lively wit and rich detail makes it a particularly rewarding one.
