The Santa Claus Machine
| Original title | Tomtemaskinen |
| Original language | Swedish |
| Place of first publication | Sweden |
| Original Publisher | Opal |
Pettson has told Findus that Santa usually comes on Christmas Eve, and now he is afraid that Findus will be very disappointed when no Santa comes. He sets about building a mechanical Santa, a project that turns out to be quite difficult. By Christmas Eve, the Santa machine is almost ready, although it does not work perfectly. But isn’t Santa coming anyway?
Sven Nordqvist
(Author, Illustrator)
Sven Nordqvist, born in 1946 in Helsingborg, has always drawn and painted. He has worked as an architect, teacher and graphic designer. In 1983 he won the competition for the best illustrated book organised by what was to become his publishing house, Opal. Already with his second book he brought to life his two best-known and best-loved characters, Pettson and Findus, the protagonists of many of his illustrated books. During his teenage years he was inspired by the illustrators of the Swedish magazine MAD, whose influence is still evident in his style today.
Sven also likes to build mechanical devices out of wood, a passion found in Pettson’s albums. His illustrations are characterised by an incredible richness of colour and detail. Each picture is like a world of its own full of little characters that one can observe for hours, always discovering new details. Perhaps that is why his drawings are so loved by everyone, children and adults alike.
Over the course of his career, he has received many awards, including the Astrid Lindgren Award, the August Prize for Where’s My Sister? and the Northern Lights Prize in 2020, both for Walking the Dog and for the Pettson and Findus series
Samanta K. Milton Knowles
(Translator)
Samanta K. Milton Knowles, graduated in Intercultural Studies with a thesis on the Chinese translation of Pippi Longstocking, and in Linguistic Sciences, with a thesis entitled “Translating Astrid Lindgren”, has been living since 2014 in Tuscany with her husband and her three children, working as editorial translator from Swedish to Danish (with some little intrusions in Icelandic every now and then). Besides Camelozampa, she works with other different publishing houses such as Beisler, Bompiani, il Castoro, Emons Raga, Fandango, Iperborea, Mondadori, Rizzoli, Salani, Sinnos, Terre di Mezzo e Uovonero. Furthermore, Milton collaborates with the Astrid Lindgren Company, the society in charge of the management of Astrid Lindgren’s rights, for which she has edited various analysis of the great Swedish writer’s Italian translations. From 2019 to 2024, she has been a member of the administrative office of StorieLab, a national association of editorial translators associated to the trade union SLC-CGIL. Milton is the re-elaborator and editor of the last integral Italian version of Pippi Longstocking, published by Salani in 2020, in occasion of the 75th anniversary from the first publication of the novel.