Goodbye, Mr Muffin by Ulf Nilson (text) and Anna-Clara Tidholm (illustrations) was awarded the August Prize in 2002 in the best children's and youth book category. It starts off like this:
Here is an old guniea pig named mr Muffin. Mr Muffin is going to turn seven years old and he is grey and tired. He lives in an upside-down, blue cardboard box that looks like a house with a door and a chimney.
Outside his house there is a mailbox where he sometimes finds a piece of cucumber or an almond. Sometimes he gets a letter. Can Mr Muffin read? Usually he eats the letter.
Nowadays Mr Muffin spends most of his time in his blue house sighing and reminiscing and thinking about his well lived life.
Once Mr Muffin was married to his beautiful guinea pig wife Victoria. They had six, small furry children - so cute!
One day they all went hiking to the end of the world. Suddenly they met a bird that pierced them with its eyes, maybe thinking they were wandering sausages. Mr Muffin fainted with fear.
When Mr Muffin was young he dreamt of being lean and agile as a hamster.
One morning Mr Muffin is too weak to get up. His stomach and legs hurts. A veterinarian makes a house call and examines him.
The next morning he doesn’t wake up, he is dead.
“Our beloved Mr Muffin has hastily passed away. A little guinea pig angel came, smiled and then turned around. The funeral takes place in a corner of the garden.”
My comment:
This is the book I would have cherished when I was about 8 years old and my own beloved guinea pig Closse hastily passed away in a similar way as Mr Muffin. My guinea pig also lived in a cardboard box house and when he died was honoured with a funeral, orchestrated by me with a solemn procession and burial in the corner of our garden in the presence of my whole family.
Ulf Stark and Anna-Clara Tidholm are among Sweden´s foremost creators of children’s books. This is a wonderful book about life, love and sweet death.
(Closse died because I fed him raw potatoes. I did not know that it was poisonous for a guniea pig.)