Scandinavian literature summaries - 2023

Short summary - Pippi Longstocking (Pippi Långstrump)
Astrid Lindgren

How Pippi settled in the Chicken Villa

On the outskirts of a small Swedish town, a nine-year-old girl, Pippi Longstocking, settled. She lived all alone. Pippi's mother died when she was very young. The girl did not remember her at all and believed that her mother was an angel.

Peppy is sure that her mother now lives in heaven and looks from there through a small hole at her daughter.

Peppy's dad was a sea captain. During a terrible storm, he was washed away from the deck by a wave. Pippi, however, is sure that her dad did not drown, but ended up on an island "where many, many blacks live," and became the Negro king. One day he will build a boat, take Pippi to his island, and she will become a Negro princess.

All her life, Peppy traveled the seas with her father. When he disappeared into the sea, the girl said goodbye to the crew of the ship, took her Mr. Nilsson's monkey, a large suitcase full of gold coins and went to live in the Chicken Villa - an old house with a neglected garden that Peppy's father bought to settle there in old age.

Pippi is an unusual girl. She is so strong that she lifts the horse she bought on the day of her arrival. The horse lives on the terrace of the house, and Pippi takes it out into the garden every day.

Next door to Villa Hen lived a respectable family with two very well-mannered children, Tommy and Annika. They were very surprised to see a strange girl with carrot-red pigtails and a potato nose coming out of a neighboring house, dressed in huge black shoes and long stockings of different colors, with a monkey on her shoulder.

The children quickly became friends, and soon Pippi was already treating new friends with pancakes and giving them beautiful trinkets brought from distant lands.

How Pippi gets into a fight

The next morning, Tommy and Annika woke up early to meet Pippi as soon as possible. Having treated the children with home-made cakes, Pippi invited them to work as "lecturers".

A director is someone who always puts everything in order. <…> After all, the abyss of all sorts of different things is scattered on the earth. Someone has to keep order.

The children went outside and began to pick up everything that was lying on the ground. Pippi entertained her friends with funny stories about the customs of other countries.

Suddenly, friends saw a little girl who was offended by five boys from a neighboring street. Peppy stood up for her and threw all the boys into the nearest trees and fences.

Then Pippi invited Tommy and Annika to look into the hollow of the tree and under the rotten stump. The children found very nice things there and were delighted, although they suspected that kind Pippi planted them.

How Pippi plays tag with the police

Soon the adults learned that Pippi lives completely alone and does not go to school. They decided that "this little girl should be sent to an orphanage." One morning, while Pippi, Tommy and Annika were drinking coffee and rolls on the porch of the villa, "the gate was flung open and two uniformed policemen entered the garden."

Oh! Pippi exclaimed. - What a happy day! More than anything in the world—after rhubarb cream, of course—I love cops.

The police said that Pippi should go to the orphanage, but the girl refused - she suspected that neither the horse nor the monkey would be taken there. The policeman decided to take the girl away by force and tried to grab her by the hand, but Pippi began to play tag with him.

The police got completely angry and decided to grab the naughty girl, but she took them by the belts, dragged them out into the street and treated them to buns as a consolation. After that, the adults left Pippi alone.

How Pippi goes to school

Tommy and Annika went to school, of course. The children really wanted Pippi to attend school with them, and often told how interesting it was for them in the lessons and fun during the holidays. Pippi felt it was unfair that she would never have Christmas holidays, and one day she went to school on horseback.

The sweet and kind teacher tried very hard to make Pippi like it at school, but the girl interfered with her lessons all day. She called the teacher “you” and constantly interrupted her, told funny stories and could not calm down, although she really wanted to and was worried because of her bad manners.

You see, freken, when your mother is an angel, and your father is a Negro king, and you yourself have sailed the seas all your life, you don’t know how to behave at school.

The teacher realized that she could not cope with Pippi, and let her go, asking the girl to come to school when she grew up a little.

How Pippi climbs into the hollow

In Pippi's garden there was a huge old oak tree. One day, friends decided to drink coffee with buns on the branches of a tree. Climbing up the oak, the guys found a hollow, which turned out to be very deep and spacious. Through the cracks in the bark from the hollow one could see the lawn in front of the oak.

The children decided that this hollow would become their hiding place, where they could hide if uninvited guests appeared.

How Pippi arranges a tour

Tommy and Annika's school was closed for a cleaning day. Upon learning of this, Pippi decided to arrange a sanitary day at her villa. She poured a whole cauldron of hot water on the kitchen floor and scrubbed it with brushes.

After cleaning up, the girl invited her friends to arrange a tour of the surroundings. Peppy put picnic food in a basket, put Mr. Nielson on her shoulder, and the guys started off. Soon they made a halt at the top of a small hill and for a long time enjoyed various goodies prepared by Pippi, who learned how to cook from the ship's cook.

It was only after dinner that the guys realized that Mr. Nilsson had disappeared. When the kids started looking for the monkey, Tommy suggested they split up. Soon the boy came across a huge bull.

The bull saw Tommy. And the bull didn't like Tommy. It was an angry bull, and he could not stand children.

The furious beast rushed at the boy, raised him on his horns and threw him very high. Peppy ran up to the bull and tugged hard on his tail. The bull turned around and "saw a girl whom he also wanted to put on his horns", but he did not succeed - Peppy broke off both horns of the bull, and then rode on it for a long time in the meadow. Finally, the bull got tired and lay down on the grass, "dreaming only of one thing: that all children disappear from the face of the earth."

The children found Mr. Nilsson and returned home singing the song they had learned at school. Peppy didn't know the song, but she also sang along, making up words as she went.

How Pippi goes to the circus

One day a circus came to town. Tommy and Annika asked their parents for money for tickets and went to Pippi's to invite her along. Hardly realizing that you have to pay for the performance, Peppy took a gold coin from her suitcase. At the circus box office, the girl refused to take change, and the usher gave the children three tickets for the best seats.

What is this strange yurt? Pippi asked, looking at the circus with surprise. - And someone scattered sawdust on the floor. I'm not that neat, but, really, this is too much!

Not quite understanding what a circus is, Peppy also decided to have some fun in the arena. First, she rode a circus horse, and then walked along the tightrope after a smart lady. The director of the circus was beside himself with anger, because the audience liked Peppy's performance much more than the tricks of his artists, but he could not expel the girl from the circus.

Finally, a strong man entered the arena, and the director offered one hundred crowns to the one who would defeat him. Peppy could not sit still, she went out and quickly laid the strong man on her shoulder blades, but refused the money.

Then the girl decided that the circus was boring, and peacefully slept through the rest of the performance. Tommy and Annika looked at the clowns, sword-swallowers and gutta-percha people, but in the end they decided that Pippi performed the best.

How thieves get to Pippi

After the incident at the circus, everyone in the city learned about Pippi's extraordinary strength, but people from other places did not suspect what an unusual girl she was. One day, two vagabonds passed by the Chicken Villa.

They were real thieves - they wandered around the country to look out for where to steal something.

The tramps decided to go to Pippi's to ask for some food, looked through the window and saw that the girl was sitting in front of a pile of gold coins, trying to count them. They learned from Pippi that the girl lives with Mr. Nilsson and thought that this was the owner of the house.

The thieves decided to wait until everyone in the villa was asleep and steal the gold. They waited in the rain for a long time, while Pippi learned to dance the twist. Finally, the thieves got into the house and realized that Mr. Nilsson was just a little monkey. Deciding that they had nothing to fear, the tramps tried to take away the suitcase with coins from Pippi, but she immediately threw them on the closet.

The bandits got scared and began to ask Pippi for mercy. In response, the girl made one bandit dance the twist with her, and the other accompanied them on a comb with tissue paper. Then the girl fed the thieves and gave each of them a gold coin - they honestly earned them.

How Pippi is invited for a cup of coffee

One day, Tommy and Annika's mother invited several noble ladies for coffee and called Pippi, hoping that the children would mind their own business and not interfere with the ladies' gossip. Peppy dressed to smithereens.

She painted her lips brightly with red chalk, and smeared her eyebrows with soot so thickly that she looked simply awesome.

As it turned out, Pippi did not know how to behave at the table at all. In the blink of an eye, she devoured a lot of sweets, including a huge cream cake, and scattered granulated sugar on the floor of the living room. Then she heard the ladies scolding their maids and began to interrupt them, talking about her non-existent grandmother's strange maid.

Finally, the patience of the mistress of the house burst, and she forbade Peppy to come to visit them. The upset girl left the house with the ladies. Despite her disappointment and resentment, she still managed to finish her story on the go.

How Pippi saves two babies

Once Peppy went for a ride on horseback. Arriving at the main square, she saw that a fire had started in the highest building in the town - a three-story "skyscraper". Suddenly, in the attic, under the very roof, a window opened, and people saw with horror in it two little boys. They cried and called for help, but it was already impossible to save them.

The fire was raging, children were screaming in the attic window, people were crying in the square.

Realizing that the children would not get out on their own, Peppy decided to save them. She made Mr. Nilsson climb a tree with a smooth trunk, growing next to a burning house, and tie a long rope to a branch. Taking a board with her, the girl climbed up the rope and placed it on the fork of the branches. The board reached the attic window sill. Pippi went in and soon came out with the boys in her arms.

Having lowered the children from the tree on a rope, Peppy returned to the board and began to dance on it, like in a circus. Flames shot out of the burning house, the crowd below shouted “Hurrah!” to Pippi, and the girl was happy.

How Pippi celebrates her birthday

In the fall, Peppy decided to celebrate her birthday and invited Tommy and Annika to it.

She sat up all night writing an invitation letter. And when it began to dawn, and the last stars went out, Pippi dropped the envelope into a box on the door.

The children gave her a large music box. Pippi also made gifts for friends and arranged a wonderful holiday for them. At first, the children drank chocolate with whipped cream, buns and cookies that Pippi baked. Then they played the game "Don't step on the floor", after which Tommy and Annika's smart clothes weren't so smart anymore.

When it got completely dark, the children climbed into the attic to visit the ghosts living there. In the attic, Peppy found a chest with three pistols, a spyglass and a bag of gold. She gave Tommy one pistol. The children had fun until late in the evening, until Tommy and Annika's dad came and took them home.