Controversial Review/Interpretation of TPP (off-site)
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'A Series of Unfortunate Events': More Unfortunate Than You KnowA 'Series' essayBy Jenny Sorenson
If you are interested in reading book reviews with only effusive praise for the author, then you would be better off reading some other review. Not only is there mixed praise in this review, the author (Daniel Handler a.k.a. Lemony Snicket)'s true motives, as well as the need for him to assume a
nom de plume are called into question. If you've seen the movie or read the books, you've probably been enchanted by the originality, wit and skill of the storyteller; I know I was, at least until I finished book 12,
The Penultimate Peril. Then I realized that there really is a darker, more sinister side of the story to be told. I'm sorry to tell you this, but that is how the story goes.
Let me first start off by saying that from the get-go I've been a huge
Series fan. They've got all the elements which make books great: a wildly fresh premise (three orphans on a serious losing streak manage to save themselves time and again when their adult guardians fail them); quirky characters with nutty names; fast paced action; secret organizations; mystery; intrigue; anagrams; and outrageously evil yet hilarious villains.
Series has the ability to make not only young readers stretch through literary, gastronomical and political references, but most adults as well. And it has a writing style unmatched for imagination in the children's book genre today. It makes Harry Potter feel like reading lines in the phone book, and provides the reader with manifold laugh-out-loud moments due to sheer clever silliness.
Apart from the writing, the illustrations by Brett Helquist are spot on for tone and as well-crafted as the prose. An excellent movie adaptation also stands alone as a fine piece of work with Hollywood A-listers Jim Carrey and Meryl Streep well-leveraged and at their funniest.
It becomes apparent that something darker is going on beneath the surface of the series as soon as we are introduced to the Baudelaire orphans, the main characters in
The Bad Beginning,
Book the First. Baudelaire also happens to be the name of a notorious nineteenth century French poet akin to Edgar Allan Poe on steroids. Charles Baudelaire's own writing was so macabre, sexually deviant and blasphemous that he even managed to get six of his poems banned in France, a country not generally recognized for its prudishness. More recently Baudelaire has been praised by the Church of Satan for his sympathies toward the devil, and is considered one of the fathers of the modern Goth movement.
Baudelaire's most famous quote sheds interesting light on Series. He said, "The devil's cleverest trick is to convince us that he does not exist." Throughout the first half of the series, the Baudelaire orphans have a hard time convincing anyone about the murderous motives of Count Olaf and his reoccurring appearances in their lives in various disguises. It is a clever parallel, and it clearly shows Handler's capacity for hidden meaning, which makes my point later on.
Other literary allusions are equally as disturbing, if harmless and entertaining, and unfortunately will go unrecognized by most. Ever wonder about Beatrice, the mysterious dead woman to whom all the novels are dedicated? Perhaps in homage to Dante's lost love, Beatrice is also the title of a Baudelaire poem in which the eponymous character consorts with demons and behaves lewdly. Either would be a colorful inspiration for Snicket's lost love and a question ripe for book clubs.
Mr. Poe, the banker, may have been named in homage to Edgar Allan, Baudelaire's hero. Klaus and Sunny Baudelaire's names were likely inspired by Danish-born aristocrat Claus von Bulow who gained notoriety in the early 1980's for trying to murder his wealthy wife, Sunny, by injecting her with a lethal dose of insulin. Not forgetting the eldest Baudelaire, Violet was the name of one of the lawyers at the von Bulow trial.
I will leave the legion of other allusions to the delightful discovery of the reader and devoted websites and instead turn to the author's point. Judging from all 12 books teeming with references to literature, art, current events and cooking, Handler is practically screaming for someone to figure out what he's up to. Well, I've figured out all I need to -- Handler, you are one creepy dude.
First of all, why the pseudonym? If you brushed off Lemony Snicket's true identity you'd be missing out on another layer of intrigue. Daniel Handler has also written two "books for adults" although teenagers are clearly the target audience for
The Basic Eight, an offbeat high-school murder comedy which may soon be made into a movie. His other novel,
Watch Your Mouth has the distinction of creating its own genre called "incest comedy." What kind of person writes a comedy about incest? Maybe the same kind of person that idolizes Charles Baudelaire.
So if average Series readers will likely never become aware of this background, then why does it matter? It probably doesn't. None of it detracts from the enjoyment of the storyline -- it's only when the storyline itself gets dangerous that I have a problem. My complaint with Handler is that he has to go and get political in a very sneaky way. And not just "Rock the Vote" political. We're talking extreme-sedition political.
Up until about halfway through the series Sunny has mainly spoken gibberish. This serves as an effective comedic vehicle for Handler because he can assign funny meaning to whatever comes out of Sunny's mouth. Long before you realize it, Sunny is using roots of real words or even words in other languages which look and sound like gibberish to English speakers. For example she says, "Arigato" in
The Slippery Slope which is Japanese for "thank you."
Later she says "Busheney" to Count Olaf. The narration explains this as, "You're an evil man with no concern whatsoever for other people." Some might recognize the roots of the word as Bush and Cheney.
In
The Penultimate Peril, Sunny continues her extremist agenda by blurting out "Scalia" during a court scene in which everyone has to wear blindfolds because "Justice is blind." The commentary gives her meaning as, "It doesn't seem like the literal interpretation makes any sense," an open attack on Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court Justice.
But Handler's boldest move of all comes at the end of
The Penultimate Peril when Sunny actually instigates the deliberate arson of a hotel full of people. The children justify it by saying "We had good reasons, but we did bad things." To make his point perfectly clear, Handler again defers to literature, quoting from Richard Wright's Native Son: "Who knows when some slight shock disturbing the delicate balance between social order and thirsty aspiration, shall send the skyscrapers in our cities toppling?"
To put it in its simplest form, Handler has drawn a nifty metaphor for 9/11 and has told the entire story from the perspective of the terrorists, i.e. the orphans. He is the ultimate apologist, manipulating our sympathies to lie with those poor confused children whose parents were murdered by evil people, while naming the murderous villain of the series the composite of our current President and Vice President. If there were ever any question of Lemony Snicket's true identity, then let the case be closed. He is Ward Churchill in disguise -- a terrorist sympathizer who believes that we brought 9/11 upon ourselves.
My motive in writing this is not to provoke Christian watchdog groups to organize book burnings, but rather to shed light on the background of an author and the direction he may take the much anticipated final installment in this wildly successful series. I encourage parents of children who love this series to first read
Book the Thirteenth when it is released for yourselves before allowing your children to, in order to decide if its radical politics and moral ambiguity are something you'd like them to absorb.
Obviously this series is more successful than anything else by Handler, so if he knows on what side his bread is buttered, he'll write the final tome with the same formula for success he's mastered in books 1-11 (cute + funny=$) and stay away from the shock-and-offend approach of his adult novels. However, if his choice of muse is any guide, then my bet is that this writer will care more about pushing the envelope than protecting children from very adult themes.
And with his talent, he could write evil in such a way that many would never even suspect it was there.
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