A Series of Unfortunate Events
A Series of Unfortunate Events is a series of thirteen children's novels written by American author Daniel Handler under the pen name Lemony Snicket. The books follow the turbulent lives of orphaned siblings Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire. After their parents' death in a fire, the children are placed under the care of a murderous villain, Count Olaf, who attempts to steal their inheritance and causes numerous disasters with the help of his accomplices as the children attempt to flee. Count Olaf pursues the children and their money throughout the books, wearing a different disguise each time. As the plot progresses, the Baudelaires gradually confront further mysteries surrounding their family and deep conspiracies involving a secret society, which also involves Olaf and Snicket, the author's own fictional self-insert.
Characterized by Victorian Gothic tones and absurdist textuality, the books are noted for their dark humor, sarcastic storytelling, and anachronistic elements, as well as frequent cultural and literary allusions. They have been classified as postmodern and metafictional writing, with the plot evolution throughout the later novels being cited as an exploration of the psychological process of the transition from the innocence of childhood to the moral complexity of maturity. As the series progresses, the Baudelaires must face the reality that their actions have become morally ambiguous, blurring the lines between which characters should be read as "good" or "evil".
Since the release of the first novel, The Bad Beginning, in September 1999, the books have gained significant popularity, critical acclaim, and commercial success worldwide, spawning a film, a video game, assorted merchandise, and a television series. The main thirteen books in the series have collectively sold more than 60 million copies and have been translated into 41 languages. Several companion books set in the same universe of the series have also been released, including Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography, The Beatrice Letters, and the noir prequel tetralogy All the Wrong Questions, which chronicles Snicket's childhood.
Background
Prior to the publication of A Series of Unfortunate Events, Handler had never written for children. According to an interview with Handler, he was encouraged to try writing children's books by his friend and editor, Susan Rich. In a separate author interview, Daphne Merkin wrote that Handler adapted a manuscript for a "mock-gothic" book originally intended for adults into a series more suited for children. Handler invented the pseudonym "Lemony Snicket" as an inside joke among friends years before the publication of A Series of Unfortunate Events.Handler acknowledges Edward Gorey and Roald Dahl as influences for his writing style in the series. The first book in the series, The Bad Beginning, was released on September 30, 1999.
Series overview
The series follows the adventures of three orphaned siblings. Lemony Snicket documents their lives and explains to the readers that very few positive things happen to the children.Plot summary by book
The series begins when the orphans are alone at a beach, where they receive news that their parents have perished in a fire that also destroyed the family mansion. In The Bad Beginning, they are sent to live with a distant relative named Count Olaf after briefly living with Mr. Poe, a banker in charge of the orphans' affairs. The siblings discover that Count Olaf intends to get his hands on the enormous Baudelaire fortune, which Violet is to inherit when she reaches the age of eighteen. In the first book, Olaf attempts to marry Violet to steal the Baudelaire fortune, doing so by pretending that the marriage is the storyline for his latest play, involving the oblivious Justice Strauss. The plan falls through when Violet uses her non-dominant left hand to sign the marriage document, thus causing the marriage to be invalidated. After the crowd realizes, Olaf manages to escape with his henchmen.In The Reptile Room, the Baudelaire children are sent to live with their herpetologist uncle Montgomery Montgomery. His new assistant, Stephano, is really Count Olaf in disguise. Olaf plans to steal the Baudelaire fortune by having his associates murder Uncle Monty and taking the children to Peru, which Monty had purchased tickets to. Olaf poisons Monty with the venom from one of his own samples. The children and Olaf crash into Mr. Poe when Olaf is fleeing with the children to Peru. Mr. Poe comes to investigate, and Stefano’s true identity is revealed. The children lose Count Olaf in the hedges outside Montgomery’s home.
Setting
The books seem to be set in an alternate, "timeless" world with stylistic similarities to both the 19th century and the 1930s, though with contemporary, and seemingly anachronistic scientific knowledge. For instance, in The Hostile Hospital, the Baudelaire children send a message via Morse code on a telegraph, yet the general store they are in has fiber-optic cable for sale. An "advanced computer" appears in The Austere Academy.Danielle Russell, a professor at Glendon College, argues that the settings are reflective of familiar places, but are "bizarre" enough that young readers feel distanced from the world of the Baudelaires. The setting of the world has been compared to Edward Scissorhands in that it is "suburban gothic". While the film version sets the Baudelaire mansion in the city of Boston, Massachusetts, real places rarely appear in the books, though some are mentioned. For example, in The Ersatz Elevator, a book in Jerome and Esmé Squalor's library was titled Trout, in France They're Out. There are also references to the fictional nobility of North American regions, specifically the Duchess of Winnipeg and the King of Arizona.
Characters
Violet Baudelaire, the oldest Baudelaire child in the series, is fourteen in the first book. She uses her inventive mind to create various helpful items, showcasing her talent and resourcefulness. Klaus Baudelaire, the middle child, is twelve when the series begins; he loves all types of books and is an extraordinary speed reader with a photographic memory. Sunny Baudelaire is a baby at the beginning of the series and enjoys biting things with her abnormally large and sharp teeth; she develops a love for cooking later in the series.In most books, the children's skills are used to help them defeat Count Olaf's plots; for instance, Violet invents a lock-pick in The Reptile Room. Occasionally, the children must switch roles, such as when Klaus must try inventing and Violet reading in The Miserable Mill. Other characters also have particular skills that they use to assist the Baudelaires, for example, Duncan Quagmire used his journaling skills to remember important information, Isadora wrote poems to pass notes, and Quigley Quagmire's cartography skills help Violet and Klaus in The Slippery Slope.
Snicket translates for the youngest Baudelaire orphan, Sunny, who in the early books almost solely uses words or phrases that make sense only to her siblings. As the series progresses, her speech often contains disguised meanings. Some words are spelled phonetically: 'surchmi' in The Slippery Slope and 'Kikbucit?' in The End; some are spelled backwards: in The Carnivorous Carnival, and in The Miserable Mill. Others contain references to culture or people: for instance, when Sunny says "Busheney", it is followed by the definition of "you are a vile man who has no regard for anyone else". Some words Sunny uses are foreign, such as "Shalom", "Sayonara", or "Arrête". Some are more complex, such as when she says "Akrofil, meaning, 'they were not afraid of heights'", which phonetically translates to acrophile, meaning one who loves heights. She begins to use standard English words towards the end of the books, one of her longer sentences being "I'm not a baby" in The Slippery Slope.
When asked in a Moment Magazine interview about the Baudelaire children and Snicket's own Jewish heritage he replied, "Oh yeah! Yes. The Baudelaires are Jewish! I guess we would not know for sure, but we would strongly suspect it, not only from their manner but from the occasional mention of a rabbi or bar mitzvah or synagogue. The careful reader will find quite a few rabbis."
Literary analysis and themes
Allusions
While the books are marketed primarily to children, the series features numerous references that adults or older children are more likely to understand.Many of the characters' names allude to other fictional works or real people with macabre connections. For example, The Reptile Room includes allusions to Monty Python. The Baudelaire orphans are named after Charles Baudelaire; Violet's name also comes from the T. S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land, specifically its verses concerning the "violet hour", and Sunny and Klaus take their first names from Claus and Sunny von Bülow, while Mr. Poe is a reference to Edgar Allan Poe. In the seventh installment, The Vile Village, Count Olaf's disguise, Detective Dupin, is an allusion to C. Auguste Dupin, a fictional detective created by Edgar Allan Poe.
Isadora and Duncan Quagmire are named after Isadora Duncan, a notorious dancer also remembered for her unusual death by strangulation when her scarf entangled around the wheels of the open car in which she was a passenger. In the fourth book, The Miserable Mill, Dr. Georgina Orwell is a reference to British author George Orwell. Orwell finished his famous book 1984 in 1948, and in the sixth book, The Ersatz Elevator, it is not clear if the skyscraper in which Esmé and Jerome Squalor live has 48 or 84 stories. The Squalors' names reference Jerome David "J. D." Salinger and his short story For Esmé – with Love and Squalor. While in an auction on which the plot hinges, Lot 49 is skipped, i.e. not cried, an allusion to Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49. Both Salinger and Pynchon were reputed not to be actual persons at one time. The ninth book in the series, The Carnivorous Carnival, takes place at Caligari Carnival; the carnival's name is a nod to the 1920 silent horror film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Also in the ninth book, Hugo the Hunchback's name is an allusion to French author Victor Hugo, who wrote the famous book The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Subsequently, many of the inhabitants of the island the Baudelaires find themselves on in The End are named after characters from The Tempest, a play by William Shakespeare, while some are named after characters from Robinson Crusoe, Moby-Dick and others after general nautical or island-based literature. The Fire and the Sugar Bowl was inspired by We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson.
The name of Beatrice, Snicket's dedicatee, may be an allusion to the poem La Béatrice by Charles Baudelaire. The poem references an "actor without a job", like the actor Count Olaf. The poem also begins with the line "In a burnt, ash-grey land without vegetation", similar to the Baudelaire mansion burning down at the beginning of the series. The name Beatrice could also be an allusion to Italian poet Dante. Dante dedicated all of his works to "Beatrice", with whom he was obsessed, and who was also dead, like Snicket's Beatrice.
In the final book, in an allusion to the Book of Genesis, a snake offers the children a life-giving apple.