Cover of the first book
Pettson and Findus is a Swedish series of children’s books written and illustrated by Sven Nordqvist.
The stories feature an old farmer named Pettson and his cat Findus who live in a small village in the Swedish countryside. Pettson, Findus (who behaves more like a small child than a cat) and the chickens are all able to converse with each other, but they hide this from the other villagers who subsequently have come to view the old man who talks to his pets as something of a weirdo.
Pettson’s love for inventing strange apparatuses and the fact that even harmless activities like baking a birthday cake or gardening tend to result in absolute chaos certainly don’t help.
To date, ten stories have been published in Swedish, plus some tie-in books like a song book and a cook book.The books were very successful in Sweden and have been translated into over 40 languages. There are two different English translations. The UK version uses the original names of the characters, the US version refers to them as Festus and Mercury. The books have been adapted to three feature-length animated films and an animated series of 26 half-hour episodes as well as several games.
Pettson and Findus provides examples of:
- Adaptational Villainy: In the musical adaptation of The Fox Hunt the Fox is the main villain rather than Gustavsson, while in the book Pettson notices that the fox has a bad leg and deduces that it catches hens because it can't catch hares. In the film and animated movie, it's just a completely ordinary fox without any apparent alignments and just seems confused by the shenanigans and leaves.
- Ambiguous Time Period: The setting of the series is pretty ambiguous with most of the furniture being antiquated the technology mostly old. According to the movies and the tv-show the stories takes place in the 1950's.
- Bad Ol' Badger: In When Findus Was Little and Disappeared, Findus is terrified of the badger that is looking for food in Pettson's garden. However, despite its scary looks, the badger is actually harmless.
- Canon Illustrations: The author illustrated all of the books, and the drawings are organic parts of the story.
- Canon Invasion: Findus' backstory in When Findus Was Little and Disappeared is this. Findus being a gift to Pettson from Beda Andersson given in a findus-box was first used in Pettson och Findus – Kattonauten which came out a full year earlier.
- Chain of Deals: Pancakes. Pettson has to buy flour for the pancakes. In order to get to the store he needs to fix his bike. In order to fix the bike, he needs to get tools from the workshop. In order to get tools from the workshop, he needs to get the key from the bottom of the well. In order to get the key from the bottom of the well, he needs to get the fishing pole from the attic. In order to get the fishing pole from the attic, he needs to get the neighbor's bull to stop using the ladder for a pillow. Hilarity Ensues.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Pettson is viewed as crazy by his neighbors for treating his cat as a little child.
- Crosscast Role: Findus is mostly played by a girl in the various adaptations, through the books clear that Findus is a tomcat.
- Cute Kitten: Findus is an adorable cat who acts like a small child. When Findus Was Little and Disappeared is a Whole Episode Flashback to the time when Findus was a tiny kitten.
- Digital Tabletop Game Adaptation: One of the
Licensed Games based on the series features a digital food-themed Battleship clone that you can play against Pettson or a friend. - Funny Animal: Findus is basically a small child in a cat's body.
- Funny Background Event: All the illustrations are full of little visual jokes and tiny creatures doing all sorts of quirky things, sometimes referencing the actual plot.
- Gadgeteer Genius: Pettson invents some strange things in the books, such as the fishing bow (a bow and arrow with a fishing line tied between them, to let you fish further from the shore), and a lot more in the animated films.
- Grows on Trees: In A Rumpus in the Garden, Pettson is planting carrots. Findus doesn't like carrots, so he plants a meatball instead.
- Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Findus wears pants and a hat, but no shirt or shoes.
- The Hermit: Pettson, he lives alone with his animals on the countryside. And while other people do visit him on occasion, he is for the most part content with living alone.
- It Makes Sense in Context: The first book has a neighbor finding Pettson sweeping broken eggs into a bucket and adding his trousers, while saying that he's making a pancake cake. Then he tells the neighbor that he needs to go to the store, and promptly climbs up on the roof. Meanwhile, his cat is walking around with a curtain tied to its tail. There's a perfectly reasonable explanation (well, sort of) for all these things, but it's no wonder the neighbour walks away with the impression that Pettson is a bit crazy.
- Nice Guy: Pettson is about as friendly of an old man as they come. Even the times he loses his temper or isn't in the best of moods, it rarely lasts for any length of time.
- Older Than They Look: The narrator claims that Pettson is a very old man, but since he has dark beard and hair on the illustrations, he doesn't look above 50. Later illustrations show though that his hair has started to grey, suggesting that he is in his early to mid 60's
- Punny Name / Stealth Pun: Findus the Cats name is both of these, as well as a Shout-Out to another famous feline: Felix the Cat. Since both Findus and Felix are names of Swedish food companies. A fact that is referenced in the tv-series version of The Mechanical Santa, when the Box-shop clerk Henrik misremembers Findus' name as Felix, and when corrected says that "I knew it was something food-can related".
- Ridiculously Cute Critter:
- The Muckla, most of the time. They are tiny troll-like creatures who sometimes show up in the illustrations as Funny Background Events. They also like to steal things.
- Findus as a little kitten in When Findus Was Little and Disappeared.
- Straying Baby: In When Findus Was Little and Disappeared, kitten Findus wanders off to Pettson's garden and gets lost.
- Towering Flower: There are some giant flowers, especially dandelions, in the background. They are completely ignored by the characters or the narrator, and are just there as an artistic choice by the author (who is also the illustrator).
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: The whole moral crux of The Fox Hunt is that Pettson and Findus considers it morally wrong for Gustavsson to shot the fox and decides to scare the fox away an a non-lethal precaution.
- Whole Episode Flashback: When Findus Was Little and Disappeared is a story about Findus as a small kitten, told by Pettson to a somewhat older Findus.
- You Are Not Alone: The conclusion of Findus at Christmas shows that while a hermit, Pettson is not alone as the other villagers visit and help him complete his Christmas preparations in spite of his injured foot.
