Garm (magazine)

Garm was established in 1923 as a successor of Kerberos which was also a satirical magazine published in Finland.[2][3] The founder was Henry Rein.[3] The magazine was published in Helsinki on a monthly basis.[4][5] It had a conservative political stance like its predecessor.[2] However, unlike Kerberos Garm opposed both the nationalism in the form of true Finnishness and the extreme leftist politics.[2] In addition, although Garm supported the Swedish language and culture in Finland, it did not call for the cooperation with Sweden.[2] The magazine mocked both Communism and Nazism during World War II.[1]

Garm's readers were mostly politicians, celebrities, and other leading figures.[1] Tito Colliander and Jarl Hemmer were among the Garm contributors.[1] One of the most significant contributors of Garm was Tove Jansson who started her career in the magazine as a cartoonist in 1929 when she was just fifteen.[3][6] Tove Jansson's mother, Signe Hammarsten-Jansson, also worked at the magazine from its start in 1923.[3] Over time the former became the magazine's chief illustrator.[7] Some characters in her Moomin cartoon strips first appeared in the magazine.[1] Jansson's political cartoons ridiculing Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin published in Garm were censored by the Finnish authorities.[7] Garm folded in 1953 when its founder Henry Rein died.[1][3]