Do you know the strongest woman in the world?
Feminist icon Pippi Longstocking has been thoroughly celebrated in 2020 – the year the forever-young turned 75. However, even the strongest girl in the world (she can actually one-handed lift her own horse) had to give up facing the pandemic when one of the high-lights of the celebrations, a musical and circus performance featuring among others the ABBA duo Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus had to be postponed until the summer 2021.
The story about the independent and kind Pippi started when Astrid Lindgren was making up fairy tales for her daughter Karin who had to stay at home from school. In the stories, Pippi grew up with her sea captain father and his crew creating a financially independent, reckless but compassionate anarchist with an intolerance for bullies. “If you are very strong, you also have to be very kind”, Pippi explains when told she is the kindest in the world. Pippi is a 9-year-old-girl living alone with her horse and monkey. With a chest full of gold to support herself, she is independently wealthy and able to finance her battles against various adult authority figures. She is a girl with power but she never missuses it!
Publishing house Rabén & Sjögren, announces a writing competition. The story of Pippi Longstocking won the first prize and Astrid Lindgren got a publishing contract which became the start of Pippi´s world fame.
70 language translations, 60 million copies and several film and television adaptations later, Pippi Longstocking (full name: Pippilotta Delicatessa Windowshade Mackrelmint Ephraim’s Daughter Longstocking) is more popular than ever. She is often mentioned as a role model in feminist contexts, showing girls and boys of all ages that power and free will have little to do with gender.
As the name was so peculiar, it became a story about a peculiar girl,” Astrid Lindgren said in an interview. The stories about a girl who lives on her own in a large, yellow house, sleeps with her feet on her pillow and is strong enough to lift her horse with only one hand.
FANS AROUND THE GLOBE
Pippi was perhaps meant to be a feminist role model from the very first story. Anyway, Pippi has been mentioned by a variety of strong women as an icon and kilometers of essays have been written about her as a feminist.
Michelle Obama recently told the New York Times that ”Pippi Longstocking was my girl. I loved her strength — not just her physical power, but the idea that she wouldn’t allow her voice to be diminished by anyone. She’s independent, clever and adventurous — and she’s clearly a good person, someone who always does right by her friends. What I loved most was that she was a girl, and she was a little different, and she was still the most powerful character in those books.”
German punk queen Nina Hagen said her big idol in her childhood was Pippi. “Pippi Longstocking taught me equality”!
Rooney Mara, the actress playing another strong Swedish woman, Lisbeth Salander in the US film The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo said she used Pippi Longstocking as inspiration for the character. In an interview published in the Swedish newspaper Svenska Dagbladet she says that she found many things in common between Lisbet Salander and Pippi Lockstocking. “I grew up with Pippi and went back to her stories.”
THE ULTIMATE POWERFUL WOMAN
In an article 19 Reasons Pippi Longstocking is the Ultimate Powerful Woman, BuzzFeed summarizes: “She can lift a horse. Game over”.
Astrid Lindgren’s flat on Dalagatan 46 in central Stockholm is now open to the public, preserved exactly as she left it. Her shoes and hats still remain by the door; notebooks with her writing lie open on her desk next to the typewriter on which she wrote many of her books.
Across from Dalagatan is Vasaparken, a park where Lindgren often went for walks recognized by children greeting her as a celebrity. Now, a section of the park has been renamed the Astrid Lindgren terrace in her honour.
Lindgren was born in a village in Småland in southern Sweden where there is now entertainment park called Astrid Lindgren’s World that however is fighting for survival suffering from lock-down and the pandemic.
After writing almost 40 children’s books, at the age of 70, Astrid Lindgren started a new career as political activist, fighting tax laws, speaking up for environmental issues, animal protection, immigration and many other things. She died in 2002 at the age of 95 with many quoting one of her basic rules:
Give the children love, more love and still more love – and the common sense will come by itself!
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