To be perfectly honest, I didn’t understand the Moomin collections at first, and it took some significant steps before I could absorb their meaning. Despite this work to get through my own notions of “comics” and how Moomin conflicted with them, the result was ultimately very rewarding.

Drawn & Quarterly began reprinting Tove Jansson’s Moomin comic strips in 2006, assembling the complete collection as originally published (after translation from the original Swedish) from 1953 to 1959, in London’s Evening News.
 
As modern readers, most of us with a relatively limited exposure to the format of old-school comic dailies, we naturally see three panels and expect a joke at the end of each set. What we do not typically expect is a continuing narrative, unpunctuated by gimmicks and gags, running through this format. The occasional punchline or astute observation about human nature certainly doesn’t help in setting a steady pace, but once the reader realizes that there is no pace, that these are fanciful stories of troll life, it becomes an entirely comfortable place to sink into.
 
I downloaded the Moomin Voices album, which was released in 2003. It collects a whole bunch of Moomin songs written and performed between 1959 and 2003, and hearing the occasionally jazzy, completely peaceful and occasionally strange music that the Moomins would theoretically live by brought that understanding of the strange Moomin world to completion. I very much suggest finding a copy of the album if you’re having trouble understanding the Moomins. It serves to amplify the fact that Jansson was creating a world rather than creating a comic. The complex, moral, and exciting world of the Moomins just happened to express itself through comics.
 
Jansson’s black-and-white line drawings are at once simple, almost geometric and supremely expressive. She manages to fit complex situations, surreal landscapes, and bizarre creatures into relatively small panels without losing any sense of animation, style, or story. That, I can tell you, is a feat, accomplished with an understated mastery of light and shadow.
 
The stories themselves meander—cause and effect are constantly bouncing off one another in endless chains of events that eventually resolve, though not without a few loose ends along the way. It’s not about continuity, though—it’s about the journey.
 
I also love the charm of the 1950s drawings. While far more elegant than something you’d find in a textbook, I can’t help but feel shades of the angular, simple figures that might be demonstrating what sodium and chlorine turn into when combined.
 
And there’s no ill will to be found. A little bit of punished selfishness, a Moomin calling another one an “ass” because of a philosophical disagreement, but everything returns to normal and everyone’s a little wiser for it. It’s a simple way to tell stories, and one that really isn’t used too much anymore (except in the most saccharine of cartoons), but it’s refreshing to see it in this original context.
 
Absolutely worth a look and a solid, meaningful addition to your collection—all packaged in huge books that you can sink into a sofa with.