Portrait

 

“The closest the class got to Pippi Longstocking” (uddrag)

by writer Maria Grønlykke. Excerpt from: “The Fish Thief – stories from home”.

The setting is southern Funen (H.C. Andersen’s native soil). Grønlykke and Dahl were classmates.

“Only one of us could tackle Karsten when there was a fight during break, and that was Inge. She was our Pippi Longstocking, a divinely hot-tempered shrew who managed to sort him out. Inge, the very person that Tofte, the drawing teacher, tried to make short work of. When he was about to rubbish her work, Tofte’s brow would pucker like a corrugated roof.

Trained as a carpenter, he demanded straight lines in all our drawings. Inge refused to have straight lines in hers; she was determined to become an artist and paint what the fuck she liked, not following anybody’s rules.

After school she travelled the world, ferreting up and down the Amazon, even crawling all the way to the Himalayan summits to rid herself of all Tofte’s nonsense before she could finally paint her jolly muticoloured umbrellas and coffee cups and joyful characters, free of his dogmatic ruler shit…

In the Himalayas she met Irene’s younger sister, her neighbor from Sønderby. Typically her. ....

… “Kun én af os andre havde en minimal chance for at klare Karsten, når der var slåskamp i frikvarteret, og det var Inge. Godt nok var hun det nærmeste klassen kom på Pippi, men det var kun fordi hun var en hidsigprop af Guds nåde at hun på sine bedste dage kunne tyre ham. Inge, hende prøvede tegnelære Tofte også at få gjort kål på. Han var uddannet tømrer og krævede snorlige streger på alle tegninger. Inge ville ikke have lige streger på sine tegninger, hun ville være kunstmaler og male lige hvad fanden der passede hende, når bare det ikke lige var lige. Tofte fik dybe fure i panden, når han skulle til at gå i gang med at rakke ned på hendes ting.
Bagefter blev hun nødt til at rejse jorden rundt og op og ned ad Amazonfloden og endda kravle hele vejen op til Himalayas top, før hun slap fri af Toftes tossestreger og endelig kunne få lov at male sine muntre paraplyer og kaffekopper og glade folk i alle farver, i fred for alt hans åndssvage lineallort.
I Himalaya mødte hun Irenes lillesøster, sin nabo hjemme fra Sønderby. Hvis det ikke er typisk.”

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