Pippi...

A reflection all of a sudden: Pippi, the rebel, meant a lot for Tommy and Annika?? The two well-mannered children. With her attitude of questioning things, her way of living, her whole appearance... Stockings in two different colors, the shoes and cloths, the red-hair... Slept with her shoes on and the feet on the pillow... Let her horse walk into he house. When she should clean the floors in her house she put the brushes on her feet and skated around there!!

"Can one really do like that???"

Look at the picture below! Tommy and Annika peeping over the fence, with big eyes and dropped chins!!

But how was it actually for Pippi? Under the surface? Did she hide something? Did she sacrifice something? Was she allowed to express everything or only certain things?

"I have my monkey and horse and the house Villavillekulla, and a lot of money..."

Strong independent... Not needy... I wonder with a lump in my throat..

PS. And the grown up world found themselves in this? That a child lived alone in a big house. No, they tried to put Pippi on a children's home, even tried to force her there with the help of two constables, but Pippi refused to be taken there. The constables couldn't handle her. Pippi was so strong so she lifted them up and threatened them with throwing them away. Or did she actually throw them away? I don't remember (how many children wish they could do that or something like that? That they had the strength to protect themselves? Even if it isn't verbalized or thought in real thoughts?).

Of two bad things she choose the less bad; to have the (relative) freedom living in her own house, with her monkey and horse...

And if one should take this further to real life and real children!!?? Struck me...

PPS. And that about women's voices: are they needed to be heard, or...? You can really wonder... Do we need them at all?? Do women have anything to say? Do they have anything to contribute with? Or do only some have something to say? And what is the most important: what you say or how you say it, seen formally...?

When people raise their voices it must be done in a certain way? And even more if it is woman raising her voice? Then she must do it perfectly??? And not so seldom she has these demands on herself too?? Even if she dares to put them aside, or challenge this by nevertheless raise her voice and try to communicate and speak out loud, despite if how she says it isn't perfect seen to grammar etc.

How many voices have been silenced on the road?

And who keep on raising their voices? Not troubled of the impression they make? Who are more bothered an concerned about the outer appearance even if one maybe don't think they do??

Silently wondering... In fact not so gladly...

It has been things on this road, so now it is soon too much???

But my wish and need to express things has been greater than all self-criticism, and it still seems to be a little greater than this criticism... Because after all, I don't think I am totally stupid?? That I don't realize my limitations at all... Because I do? Or don't I?

Once again, concerning my work, research has found that women have more problems with stage-fright than men... What can this mean? Even there women's voices have become silent?

And it's not only talent or capacity that are the prerequisites for a career as musician, I think I read this recently in a book I have referred to on another forum, that you need someone on the road believing in you and supporting you.

And in the music-history men are dominating... And they are still dominating... Even if things are better" there today. And, of course, men also can have handicapping troubles with stage-fright!!!

Who gets (the) support, and who gets less support???

Strikes me now about my youngest brother, during summer-vacation from his education (to medical engineer at college) he worked at hospital. He in fact reacted, with a smile (a little ironic??), that he thought he got differently treated than the young women...

But I am not at all striving for any career in this work!!! I am satisfied with how it is... Sometimes it feels as I would like to move out into nowhere and disappear...

Harshly beating myself, you stupid, lousy, bad... No, not so glad, no...

Working and working, tired to death!!! With this not said that anyone is forcing me! Of course it is "my own fault"!!!

I wonder what this is triggering: people talking above my head, as if I didn't exist? And had nothing to say? As if what I have to say is so shamy?? And the way I do it is too??

Struggling with this, and in fact challenging this side!?

The "funny thing" is that a female physician (psychiatrist and gestalt-therapist), I didn't visit as a client in therapy though, said to me that I should dare to do things less perfect or how I shall express it!! In a similar manner as a young woman sick-paid for exhaustion was encouraged to deliberately spell words wrong when she wrote, to challenge her perfectionism, allow herself to be more human or something like that...

And, what is behind or beyond (??) these perfectionist demands, or the rebellion against them (which doesn't exclude blushing cheeks)? Who help one with this? Who want to know about them? Maybe last of all a physician (the clever girl or boy)??

Astrid Lindgren's Emil, among her all other strong children-figures (many a bit rebellion!?), got a fairly high position in society... A position with societal power... Noone else of her figures did?? Pippi never grew up?? What happened to her?

Earlier postings on disobedient child (both in Swedish and in English).

If you are very strong you have to be very kind…

I thought more on power and the power of defining things for others either as parent, other grownup or in society on different levels... And wondered who had said “If you are very strong you have to be very kind”. It was Pippi who had said that…

Then I found this here (click on "Pippi Longstocking" in the margin to the left):

“On the outskirts of a tiny little town was a neglected garden. In the garden stood an old house, and in that house lived Pippi Longstocking. She was nine years old, and she lived there all alone. She had no mother or father, which was actually quite nice, because it meant that no one could tell her that she had to go to bed just when she was having most fun. And no one could make her take cod liver oil when she would rather eat sweets.

Once upon a time Pippi did have a father whom she loved very much. And of course she once had a mother too, but that was so long ago that she couldn't remember her at all. Her mother died when Pippi was a tiny little baby, lying in her cot and crying so terribly that no one could stand to come near. Pippi thought that her mother was now up in heaven, peering down at her daughter through a hole.

Pippi would often wave to her and say, 'Don't worry! I can always look after myself!'

But Pippi had not forgotten her father. He was a sea captain who sailed the great seas, and Pippi had sailed with him on his ship until one day a big storm blew him overboard and he disappeared. But Pippi was sure that one day he would come back. She didn't believe that he had drowned. She believed that he had washed ashore on an island that was inhabited by natives and that her father had become king of them all. He walked around wearing a gold crown on his head all day long.

But Pippi had not forgotten her father. He was a sea captain who sailed the great seas, and Pippi had sailed with him on his ship until one day a big storm blew him overboard and he disappeared. But Pippi was sure that one day he would come back. She didn't believe that he had drowned. She believed that he had washed ashore on an island that was inhabited by natives and that her father had become king of them all. He walked around wearing a gold crown on his head all day long.

'My mamma is an angel, and my pappa is king of the natives. Not all children have such fine parents, let me tell you,' Pippi used to say with delight. 'And as soon as my pappa builds himself a ship, he'll come back to get me, and then I'll be a native princess. Yippee, what fun that will be!'”

A child (re)assuring herself?

Här finns texten ovan på svenska (klicka på "Pippi Långstrump" i marginalen till vänster).

The rebellion...

Pippi Longstocking at school.

Pippi Longstocking on a German stamp!! The rebel. Against what? And what expression does her rebellion take?

A reply to the leader about homo ludens triggered more thoughts and reflections (a lot more)...

The background to Pippi: spring 1941 Astrid Lindgren's seven-year-old daughter Karin was sick in pneumonia and she told her mother (ordered her!!??) that she wanted to hear a story about Pippi Longstocking (so it was the daughter's whole idea about Pippi Longstocking. Lindgren started to romance about Pippi with enormous fantasy. And with the stories about Pippi Lindgren amused not only her daughter but also her friends!

And the model for the red-haired Pippi exists in real life: a red-haired friend to the daughter Karin, a girl daring to do things that wasn't allowed then!?

When Lindgren one day had sprained the foot, she started to write those stories down. When Karin turned 10 she got these stories in birthday present. And Lindgren sent the manuscript to the Albert Bonniers förlag, but the story got refused!!

Lindgren revised her book and made Pippi a little more house trained than the original Pippi, and sent it to another publishing house Rabén & Sjögren, where it got accepted. It awoke a hot debate: Should all children start to behave like Pippi now?? Horrible thought!

Yes, what was this book the expression of then back in 1941?? The book about that rebellion girl... What child refused to go to school then? And dared to put her feet on the desk like on the picture? Or question things? Least of all the authority. No, children should be obedient and keep quiet...

The first book about Pippi was the first book I read on my own, had borrowed it from the school-library - a brand new world opened for me!!!

Miller writes about how increasing violence among young people can - and is- attributed lack of rules and limit setting... A sort of weakness among those raising children...

But what is the truth? Actually... Came to think about Arthur Silbers essays on Miller, where "obedience" is mentioned once and again... He shows (is pointing out) results of the obedience-culture!!??

See former blogpost on homo ludens, and the one about the scapegoats.

And Lindgren was 38 years when her writing-career started! She hadn't grown up as the only child, on the contrary, they were four siblings in a nuclear family with two parents, non-divorced, living at the countryside in the south of Sweden (Vimmerby, Småland, in the county Kronoberg I think).

It stood in a reader's review on Pippi, that today she would have been diagnosed with DAMP!!! See earlier postings about hyperactive children.