JANSSON. Tove (author and illustrator); Kingsley HART (translator). Who Will Comfort Toffle? London: Ernest Benn. 1960.
Large 8vo. Publisher’s red cloth with white illustration and lettering to upper board, illustrated dust-jacket; ff. [14]; jacket price-clipped, wear with a closed tear to spine (c. 25mm) and front flap (c. 40mm), four small holes to jacket spine, spine a little bumped but cloth remains bright; lacking the blank single sheet showing Toffle in the top right-hand corner that was loosely inserted into volumes at the time of publication, Christmas label, previous owner’s purple stamp and bookseller’s label all to front free endpaper, a little spotting to preliminaries and endpapers, but the illustrations remain clean and bright; very good.
First edition, first impression of Jansson’s touching children’s story that follows Toffle’s search for companionship.
Towards the end of the 1950s, Jansson was becoming restless with being labelled solely as a children’s writer, and longed to be recognised as a painter, her first and primary passion. In the summer of 1959, however, she once again felt the pull to write another story. Her work had taken a slightly darker tone after the publication of Moominland in Winter (1957), and Who Will Comfort Toffle? continues in a similar vein.
At the beginning of the story, Toffle feels isolated; he walks past a Hemulen party, but feels as though he cannot go in, which only deepens his loneliness. Eventually, he must set aside his own troubles when a message in a bottle washes up to shore from Miffle, asking for someone to comfort her. Toffle then sets out on a journey to rescue her.
This book is among one of Jansson’s best-loved works in the Nordics, and it has never been out of print since its first publication.
See, Westin, Tove Jansson: life, art, words (2024)
SKU: 2124954