The Moomins as queer family

February 25, 2021 11:29 AM

The unlikely queer family at the heart of the Moomins. "In recent years, Moomins creator Tove Jansson has become a queer icon. What her stories capture, says Elizabeth Lovatt, is the importance and joy of choosing your own family."

Tove Jansson was a queer artist and author who spent 45 years in a lesbian relationship with Tuulikki Pietilä, an engraver and graphic designer memorialized as Too-Ticky. She was a prolific letter-writer and you can read more about her letters here.
Beloved in Finland, Jansson was recently profiled in a feature film, Tove.
Her Moomins live on, in television, movies, online games and even a theme park. And of course there is merchandise.

posted by Biblio (7 comments total)

It's spelled wrong in the first article and that's where I got the spelling. I'll see if I can have it fixed.
posted by Biblio at 11:55 AM on February 25, 2021

Thinking about this--the first time Too-Ticky appears in the Moomin children's books, she's living in the Moomins' beach house during the winter, and one of the first things she tells Moomintroll is that he isn't ever to open the cupboard in the beach house. Of course, later, in the heat of anger, he does--and what comes out is "some kind of an old rat." Only it isn't a rat. It's a troll, the kind of troll that the Moomins were many years ago.

Moomintroll literally lets his own great-grandfather out of the closet--and ends up living in quiet and friendly harmony with him, as he helps himself to whatever shiny things in the house appeal to him.

I've known for some years about Tove Jansson and Tuulikki (hell, I probably learned about them here) but why I never thought about the Moomintrolls as a queer family before, I have no idea. It's beautifully clear.
posted by dlugoczaj at 12:05 PM on February 25, 2021 [5 favorites]

The "chosen family" aspect of The Moomins is why I love them so much.

But I have a Little My tattoo & the person who first shared the Moomins with me (who is absolutely chosen family) has a Moomintroll tattoo so I may be a bit biased here.
posted by edencosmic at 4:08 PM on February 25, 2021 [4 favorites]

I love that it can be read that way, and was no doubt meant that way. As a half-Finn who grew up on Moomins, I think it may have been what underlay my parents approach to Christmas where we would collect 'waifs and strays' that we knew to invite to spend the day with us. And more generally the house was always open to whoever was passing through. I shall talk to my mother about this.
posted by drnick at 1:05 AM on February 26, 2021 [3 favorites]

Maybe slightly off topic, but in Australia, Moomins is almost like a secret society. When my son broke something or other, I took him to hospital and he was wearing a Moomins t-shirt. The nurse was almost ecstatic , and talked about how she had discovered them in the library as a child and what they meant to her. We knew then that each other were all right, and a little bit like family.
posted by drnick at 1:19 AM on February 26, 2021 [8 favorites]

One of my favorite queer history podcasts, Queer As Fact, did an episode on her.
posted by bile and syntax at 7:07 AM on February 26, 2021

Love the Penguin article, thanks for posting Biblio.
posted by soundguy99 at 8:11 AM on February 27, 2021