by Tove Jansson
He was angry, “someone’s been sticking their nose in where it’s not wanted”.
I told him that I’d just been glad to know he was with good friends who liked him but that it hurt me to know he was spending his precious days on people who gave him nothing and were only a danger to him. And I thought – they’ve no right to exploit him now, show off “the hero from the front”, pump him for painful recollections to feed their own craving for sensation or to create material, hector him for illustrations before he’s killed and their commissions risk being left incomplete, squeeze all the strength out of him before he goes back – and then to mock him.
He gave me the letters he received at the front for safekeeping, and none of them wrote to him except Elli Tompuri, Hagar, the family and v. Hellens. Nobody felt the anguish, nobody loved him. He’s mine, and they’ve no right to him.
Of course he defended them loyally, and what could I say? I had to stay silent. As we turned into Hagar’s street he suddenly said: I’ve been stupid. I laughed to lighten the atmosphere and said – it’s not that bad. Maybe they give you more than I know. The main thing is that you’re content. Is it stupid to care for one’s friends?
No, it’s not that, he said quietly. I went on with my banter – well, what can you possibly have done? Been sleeping with girls, perhaps?? We’d reached the front door of Hagar’s building and he answered “Yes”.
It was a delightful party as you can imagine; by the end I felt I could hold up a job in the theatre. The trams had stopped running so we had to walk the whole way in the rain, from right over at Tullbommen. We talked about the weather, I think. But there was a bitterness rising in me that knew no bounds and I was so full of unkind words that it scared me. But all the while I was remembering I’d promised myself not to give him a single unhappy minute in the short time he might have left to live, I remembered how the previous night when I couldn’t sleep I’d written a kind of verse with no rhyme – like when I was seventeen – where I tried to convince myself it didn’t matter where he was, or with whom, as long as he was happy. I recalled him twice leaving me with a smile, doing everything to stop me feeling bad that I’d fallen in love with someone else. I remembered the red carnation he gave me then, a symbol of freedom – and how I always used to say it was his turn to go – whenever he wanted – and I would smile as he once had. But at the same time I thought of all my anguish and waiting, the way I fought down my fear and my weariness with life for his sake and forced myself to write hopeful, positive, strong letters every day, when I thought the world had turned into a stinking pit. I thought about the detailed plans I’d made for what we’d do together when he came, and how none of it happened – with me. I felt my old fear and bitterness creeping back because I knew another person – maybe more – was helping him now, and that he didn’t need my courage any longer. And I thought of all sorts of stupid little details – Espana unplayed, the tin of sardines unopened, the toothbrush he hadn’t used …
And I felt myself going completely numb and empty inside and I lay beside him with no inclination, incapable of lifting my hand in caress.
He said nothing, laid his head on my breast and waited. And as I felt his warmth it all came bursting out and I wept as I seldom have. He tried male excuses: I was drunk. It was the protracted sexual abstinence. – And with that, all my conciliatory feelings were gone, because I realised that from our first evening, which I’d considered a sacred ritual, he’d gone straight to her. He couldn’t even wait two miserable extra days, because he’d come at a time of the month that wasn’t good for me. Didn’t he think women could feel the same level of desire, and have a right to, without being whores! (like Kajus, another “MAN” said). He made the naive objection that he’d thought I was doing it for him. I blew my nose and howled, and snarled that he had the temperament of a lukewarm bath sponge compared to mine – and all at once I saw the funny side of the matter. But I forgot to laugh, just as I’d forgotten my lovely poem, and turned my back on him and made a few remarks about men in general.
He wasn’t upset. I feel cheerful, he said when he went in the morning – and because I thought he’d be back in the evening I magnanimously said he could go to who he liked, I wouldn’t wait, freedom etc. “as long as he was happy” – like the chorus of the song. But he didn’t turn up in the evening, and I did wait, even so. I waited for three evenings because he’d said he loved me and because I decided not to try to comprehend that strange race, men, but to console and forgive them, that being the mission of that even stranger race, women.
But I couldn’t sleep, and that’s never happened to me before. But I didn’t dare take anything for it – in case he did come.
Today I went out and bought a red carnation. – (there’s no denying I’ve always liked grand gestures as much as he has) and planted it, with a message attached, in his room.
It was a very pretty letter, no overstatement, and I almost felt proud of it. I realised what he wanted was a baby, but I definitely didn’t want to give him one. And he had to go back to the front, anyway. (That was my way of glossing over the sadness in the situation.) And to round it off really nicely I promised to carry on not being scared, in spite of everything.
But it’s a lie, of course. I am scared. Life is grim and dreary and empty and I can’t paint.
But like hell am I going to produce cannon fodder, even so! When men stop killing, then I’ll bear a child – but I know they never will stop.
And now I’m going to take some sleeping powders after all, and I embrace you and thank you for letting me talk about this typical interlude on the home front.
So long, my dear old american missus!
Tove.
PTO!
28th Oct.
Today Prolle rang to say he’s coming on leave 8th Nov, and Wolle to say he’s going up to Petsamo to dig. More drawing jobs from Toini Aaltonen and Garm. I shall shortly be illustrating an English textbook by Prof. Reuter.
I was up at the Kunsthalle to fetch my canvases – 3 of them have sold, in all. Most recently the flowers, to Prof. Björkenheim. So now I’m nearly 7,000 marks richer. Stupid that it doesn’t make me feel happy. But yes, of course. I shall come and see you one day. Strange that it will all just go on, we will paint, travel, love, grieve, collect money, buy things, grow old … whether we want to or not. Ham sends warm regards.
Hug.
Tove.
29th.
Today he sent me orchids – “live well, dearest” – nothing else. He leaves tomorrow. I shall paint them.
Socialidemokraatti: The newspaper Suomen Sosialidemokraatti.
Toini Aaltonen: Editor, translator and critic.
Kaisa Park: Kaisaniemi Park.
Hellens: Doctor Arno von Hellens, Tapiovaara’s childhood friend.
Kajus: Musician Kaj Kajanus.
1 NOV. –41. H:FORS. CONTAINS 4 SHEETS WRITTEN IN SWEDISH.
Eva dearest!
Tapsa’s returned to the front now. Lots more happened on that score after I wrote to you about my carnation “gesture”, but I understand less than ever. I only feel – well, in fact, that I feel nothing and have no other urge than for someone else to relieve me of all responsibility and choice so I am spared having to say things and do things. Or – for me to understand. There’s an awful lot I’ve got to understand before I can go on.
And because of course I will go on with everything, painting, talking, collecting money, waiting, brooding, eating, going about, meeting people – since no one is going to carry this responsibility for me – I still have to try to understand. That’s why I’m writing to you. Perhaps things will grow clearer if I write. You don’t have to understand, or help me. You’ve nothing to do with my burden. But you can listen and I know you’re my friend.
The day before the one I’d worked out he’d have to leave on, I threw all pride and big gestures overboard and rang him at home. They seemed used to it and promised in a resigned, bored-sounding way that they’d ask him to telephone
me. While I was waiting I painted his orchids, those beautiful, twisted, wax-like ornaments that looked so out of place in my studio. And then he was there, on the phone, promising to come and say goodbye. I sat there and went through everything I wanted to say, trying not to feel so uncomfortably noble and artificial. Conciliatory stuff – the wonderful parts cancelling out all the rest, gratitude and forgiveness, that I understood him and wasn’t bitter, but loved life and would go on being brave, “God be with you” and “Don’t worry about” … But all the while I had the feeling God was laughing at me. And I was afraid.
It went very well. I said it all and didn’t lose the thread. It was like being in the theatre. Then he said – The thing is. I’m not going to the front. My friends have got me another job. It was as if I’d written a pompous obituary and its main character had suddenly popped up, grinned knowingly and said “Stop! Are you sure you want to drivel on like that now I’m not planning to die after all?”
I couldn’t believe it was true, simply sat and stared. Swear you’re not joking. Is it absolutely definite?
99% definite, he replied. And now – I must dash. Got to have breakfast. I’m already late.
Breakfast, I repeated like an idiot. Is there somebody waiting for you? I still felt sleep-dazed and empty, and experienced a sudden pang as I remembered the pure intensity and honest joy that filled me the first day he was back on leave.
And I only gradually took in the fact that this wasn’t the last time I would see him. That he would go on living and didn’t need the last rites from me. And that infused me with verve and passion, I woke up and felt the urge to fight and said, Fine. I haven’t had breakfast either. I’ll come too.
Tapsa looked scared, but then started to laugh and shrugged his shoulders. An absurd exhilaration came over us. We held hands, ran for a tram that was already on the move and laughed all the way to Alko.
She was big and platinum blonde and very made-up and seemed kind and pathetic. She’d been waiting three-quarters of an hour. We had a friendly chat about bread coupons, children and cod, and how terrific it was that her husband was going to get some leave and how dreadful that everywhere had sold out of nail varnish remover. Tapsa said nothing, toyed with his food and grinned. After two hours, she wanted us to come home with her for coffee – but by then my elation had drained away and I didn’t feel like it. I wanted to go to an exhibition. That fine theory about the child he wanted to have before he went back no longer held water. I didn’t understand a thing and I was tired. [ … ]
In the evening I set the table for tea – the first time I’ve done it without listening for the lift – and for the first time, he arrived punctually.
But nothing was the same as on that first night. I was filled with a sense of distaste, with fear at having grown so niggardly. Instead of warmth, of our uncomplicated old togetherness that asked and demanded nothing, there were only bitter memories, brooding and uneasy thoughts. I withdrew and he felt entirely alien to me. First I have to understand, I said. The most important things. Yes, I had to understand. That his letters meant nothing, that I was not needed just then, when I had plucked up my courage and positivity for his sake, that he loved me yet still let me wait every night and knew he was doing it, that God was love even though He exacted vengeance and much, much more.
Tapsa said nothing. I lay there mulling things over gloomily and felt somehow it was very urgent and I had to hurry. I understood less and less. He fell asleep and I was terribly lonely.
Suddenly I had a feeling there must be one thing that could transform horrible back into beautiful, and it must be if people loved each other enough. Enough to understand – or not worry about understanding – and not just forgive but also forget. I woke him and tried to get it all out of my brain and said Tapsa, I’ve forgotten everything. Let’s just be happy.
It wasn’t so important what he felt for me or what he’d done – the main thing was for me to love him enough. He smiled at me and hugged me. Then he went back to sleep and I lay there trying to feel full of love and nothing else. But I found no peace, I wasn’t happy with myself. Everything that makes me not want to get married came back to me, all the men I’ve seen through and despised – and the Faffan pressure at home – men’s whole, loyally preserved and protected pedestal of privileges, the glorification of their weaknesses in just as many unassailable slogans, the lack of consistency and consideration in their whole puerile fraternity, asserting themselves without a hint of nuance and banging their big drum from morning to night. I hadn’t the money, the time or the inclination to get married! I can’t find the hours to admire and console and pretend it’s not all just a false front! I feel sorry for them, yes – but I don’t want to give my life for a performance that’s so transparent to me! I see the way Faffan, the most helpless, most short-sighted of us all, tyrannises the whole house, I see that Ham is unhappy because she’s always said yes, covered up, given in. Given up her life and got nothing in return but children that men’s war will kill, or turn into bitter, negative people. I see what will happen to my Painting if I get married. Because when all is said and done I have in me all those inherited female instincts for solace, admiration, submission, self-sacrifice. Either a bad painter or a bad wife. And if I become a “good” wife, then his work will be more important than mine, my intellect be subordinate to his, I shall bear him children, children to be killed in future wars! And at the same time I shall see through it all, and know that I acted against everything I believed in.
If we are just together – without any claims on each other’s work, life or ideas – then we can carry on being free individuals and not get on each other’s nerves, neither of us need be subordinate. – But, can I talk about love, I – when my own concerns take precedence for me? That must mean I’m not loving enough. I pay nothing, and therefore I shall get nothing. Everything went round and round, the hours passed – towards morning I fell asleep, to be woken by the telephone while it was still completely dark. A woman as usual, asking for him. Everything felt dirty to me somehow – and God was laughing at me even more.
We made tea, played España, as per the good old ritual, I mended his sweater and then he left. He was off to find out about that job on the home front they’d promised him.
He rang me in the evening, and said very quietly and wretchedly: “I was wrong. It’s the front, after all.” I asked if he had time to see me. Yes, he was at the station now. We walked round the dark station and I tried to be cheerful. He got his papers and found out when the train was due to leave. But that gives you several hours! I said. I’d thought of saying “gives us several hours” but my trust wasn’t what it had been and I held back. I knew he would go to Alko. He walked with me to the tram – and I went home.
So that leave was over. Now I’m waiting for Prolle’s. As far back as I can remember, I’ve always been waiting for somebody or something. – I remember the expectation – but only rarely the fulfilment. Perhaps I waited too much? Perhaps I expect too much of life? What can I demand of other people – as someone who gives nothing? A painter of genius can demand – but my canvases don’t give enough. And yet – I expect them to give me something. To give me back my pleasure. You’re going to write to me that it will come. That I already paint unusually well for someone so young. That it will all be all right. Once the war’s over. Maybe.
A lot of things are behind me, a lot of things have stopped hurting. Much remains of pleasure, travel, success. Perhaps even, some time, understanding. It’s just that I’m so tired. And alone, as every human being is. I hug you and thank you.
Tove.
Alko: The state-owned alcohol store.
3/12 –41 H:FORS. TO MISS EVA KONIKOFF C/O F. BARRON. 141-25-72 AVE, FLUSHING L. I. NEW-YORK, U.S.A. FROM TOVE JANSSON. APOLLOG. 13. HELSINGFORS. FINLAND.
Dearest Konikova!
I’m sitting at Colombia to write. I seem to remember we were here this time last year. – As now, I’d just handed in my canvases for the “clea
rance exhibition” at the Ateneum. – I sometimes feel as though I miss you more than Tapsa – even if it’s childish to measure you two against each other in those terms. Yearning can take a thousand forms. But what I most need just now is a person of my own sex and my own generation, someone I’m close to. There’s Carin of course – albeit in Sweden – but even though she’s a wonderful friend to whom my heart will always be open, she lacks something that I’ve found in you: wisdom of insight, life-affirming strength, a permanently burning flame that even in moments of depression, and unconsciously, lends others its fire. In this time of total upending of all concepts of justice, of morals and ethics, it’s hard for those who still haven’t stabilised their attitude to existence – for young people – to find a foothold.
Under the pressure of being obliged to keep quiet, anxious about their own little circle, everyone hunches more deeply into their shell. The great events unfolding around us, rather than widening our horizons, have shrunk them into petty stubbornness, we get manically hooked on the phraseology of misdirected nationalism, on slogans, boundaries grow less and less flexible, logic goes out of the window. But the old prejudices and principles continue to be defended. In a chaos of monologues, all contact becomes impossible within a people that was already so reserved and pig-headed. People shout and argue, or shut their mouths. – I’ve chosen to shut my mouth. – except for the times when I meet Ham in No-Man’s-Land and talk to her.
