Quote

It's risky to talk about one's most secret dreams a bit too early.

Tove Jansson

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Tove Jansson
Age: 86 †
Born: 1914
Born: August 9
Died: 2001
Died: June 27
Cartoonist
Illustrator
Novelist
Painter
Writer
Helsingfors
Tove Marika Jansson
Tove M. Jansson
Dream
Risky
Early
Dreams
Bits
Secret
Talk

More quotes by Tove Jansson

Image
...by and by a change came: I started to muse about the shape of my nose. I put my trivial surroundings aside and mused more and more about myself, and I found this to be a bewitching occupation. I stopped asking and longed instead to speak of my thoughts and feelings. Alas, there was no one besides myself who found me interesting.
Tove Jansson
Image
Gathering is peculiar, because you see nothing but what you're looking for. If you're picking raspberries, you see only what's red, and if you're looking for bones you see only the white. No matter where you go, the only thing you see is bones.
Tove Jansson
Image
One makes a trip by day, but by night one sets out on a journey.
Tove Jansson
Image
I mean, anyone can let Danger out but the really clever thing is finding somewhere for it to go afterwards.
Tove Jansson
Image
But he thought all the strange words were beautiful, and he had never had a book of his own before.
Tove Jansson
Image
''Just think, never to be glad or disappointed. Never to like anyone and get cross at him and forgive him. Never to sleep or feel cold, never to make a mistake and have a stomach-ache and be cured from it, never to have a birthday party, drink beer, and have a bad conscience... How terrible.
Tove Jansson
Image
You can't always be friendly. It's impossible, there isn't the time.
Tove Jansson
Image
Christmas always rustled. It rustled every time, mysteriously, with silver and gold paper, tissue paper and a rich abundance of shiny paper, decorating and hiding everything and giving a feeling of reckless extravagance.
Tove Jansson
Image
It was a particularly good evening to begin a book.
Tove Jansson
Image
When Mats came in the evenings, they would drink tea in the kitchen while reading their books and talking about them. If Katri came in, they were quiet and waited for her to leave. The back door would close, and Katri would have gone. “Does your sister read our books?” Anna wanted to know. “No. She reads literature.
Tove Jansson
Image
Quite, quite,' she thought with a little sigh. 'It's always like this in their adventures. To save and be saved. I wish somebody would write a story sometime about the people who warm up the heroes afterward.
Tove Jansson
Image
She started thinking about all the euphemisms for death, all the anxious taboos that had always fascinated her. It was too bad you could never have an intelligent discussion on the subject. People were either too young or too old, or else they didn't have time.
Tove Jansson
Image
I want your first trip to be with me. I want to show you cities and landscapes and teach you how to look at things in new ways and how to get along in places you don't already know inside out. I want to put some life in you.
Tove Jansson
Image
I need to write down my observations. Even the tiniest ones they're the most important.
Tove Jansson
Image
It’s only the sea,’ said Moomintroll. ‘Every wave that dies on the beach sings a little song to a shell. But you mustn’t go inside because it’s a labyrinth and you may never come out again.
Tove Jansson
Image
I'm not sure I would have ever started to draw, let alone write, if my childhood hadn't been so happy. It was a mixture of comfort and adventure. An excellent mixture!
Tove Jansson
Image
One can't be too dangerous, if they like to eat pancakes. Especially with jam on it.
Tove Jansson
Image
... 'I've been doing everything for an awfully long time, and I've seen and lived as hard as I could, and it's been unbelievable, I tell you, unbelievable. But now I have the feeling everything's gliding away from me, and I don't remember, and I don't care, and yet now is right when I need it!'. [pp. 84-85]
Tove Jansson
Image
Why are you in such a rush? Sophia asked, and her grandmother answered that it was a good idea to do things before you forgot that they had to be done.
Tove Jansson
Image
There's no need to imagine that you're a wondrous beauty, because that's what you are.
Tove Jansson