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Post by Sora on Mar 9, 2009 14:01:47 GMT -5
The Great 667 Re-Read: Week 3 - The Wide Window We are now into our third week of re-exploration of our beloved ASOUE, and this week tackle the blustery misfortune that befalls the Baudelaires in The Wide Window. In this tale the Baudelaires are faced with a hurricane, a signaling device, hungry leeches, cold cucumber soup, a horrible villain (again), and a doll named Pretty Penny. Enjoy and discuss! Feel free to also discuss any illustrations or additional material in the paperback release The Wide Window, Or Disappearance!
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Post by Dante on Mar 9, 2009 14:44:42 GMT -5
A few notes on Disappearance!: It marks the first illustration of the androgynous henchperson in a standard edition of any book (said henchperson had previously been illustrated only for the BBRE and The Loathsome Library #1-6 box set). It also marks the first illustration of Aunt Josephine, whose hair looks like a cake. In addition, while Helquist snuck the V.F.D. insignia into illustrations in Orphans! and Murder!, as far as I can tell, he didn't do so for Disappearance!.
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Post by cwm on Mar 9, 2009 14:51:10 GMT -5
Damocles Dock comes from the Sword of Damocles, a piece of Greek classic culture that now generally signifies a sense of foreboding in a precarious situation, which is throughly appropiate.
Mr. Poe giving the Baudelaires peppermints is a good measure of his character - he tries to help but what he does can even harm the Baudelaires.
Eating peppermint is meant to keep you more awake and alert; the Baudelaires' allergy to them could signify that they're already as bright and ready as they ever will be.
The taxi driver is smoking a cigarette, and is hypothesied sometimes to be the same taxi driver who apparently makes off with the sugar bowl during TPP. Some fans also suggest that he's also the taxi driver who delivers 'Stephano' to Monty's house in TRR, but I'm not quite sure where they got the connection beyond the fact that they happen to be taxi drivers and there's a 'taxi driver disguise' in TUA, which is hardly conclusive.
Aunt Josephine is completely paranoid of everything. The only thing she isn't frightened of is other people, apparently.
Count Olaf has set up a business by the time the Baudelaires bump into him, which gives us three theories to work from:
A - in the time between his learning that the Baudelaires were being adopted by Josephine, he managed to acquire permission to set up his boating business, which could well be a lengthy process. B - he murdered the people who would need to approve setting up a business and either forged their approval or replaced them with his assistants. (The High Court could even be involved with applying for a new business.) C - Captain Sham's Sailboats is a real business, and he has killed and replaced the real Captain Sham - we know that there was a real Julio Sham as per TUA.
The Baudelaires successfully cure Aunt Josephine's fear of the telephone, which ironically sets up the rest of the unfortunate events of the book.
Is the beginning of the chapter (I forget which) with the chapter title written in Aunt Josephine's handwriting the first example of the regular chapter heading being unusual in some way?
Lemony's friend Gina-Sue is mentioned. Once we cross the threshold into the V.F.D. part of the story, one or two of Lemony's friends, such as Madame DiLustro, are implied to have some kind of secret (see TGG). Gina-Sue is never mentioned again and we know nothing about her.
More tomorrow.
Do you have the illustrations of the person of indeterminate gender and Aunt Josephine, Dante?
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Post by Dante on Mar 9, 2009 15:05:44 GMT -5
Do you have the illustrations of the person of indeterminate gender and Aunt Josephine, Dante? Sure; I'll just upload them. If I ever hear that the new paperbacks are out of print, I'll upload all the illustrations, but I would feel guilty about doing so at present. They sell poorly enough as it is, apparently. The henchperson of indeterminate gender - good caption, but the wrong one for the illustration. The characters are also a little off-model, as though Helquist had outsourced his illustration work to an underpaid foreign studio. The Baudelaires, with Aunt Josephine bottom-right. This illustration, by contrast, is great, and the sort we need more of. Although Helquist still seems to be taking pains to draw as little of a new character as possible.
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Post by cwm on Mar 9, 2009 15:58:48 GMT -5
Thank you.
Is that the only illustration of Klaus without glasses? His hairstyle seems to resemble the person of indeterminate gender's.
More notes:
Larry the waiter is apparently some kind of V.F.D. agent, as the phrase 'I didn't realise this was a sad occassion' is, as per TUA and TPP, a V.F.D. coded phrase. He appears to be trying to make contact with the Baudelaires, but as with the sebald code in TPP he fails because the Baudelaires know so little about V.F.D. All this is retcon though, so it may be academic. Larry may be one of the Anxious Clown waiters present at the Hotel Denouement for the V.F.D. meeting.
In any case, further correspondence in TUA - does the letter to the editor in TRR mention TAC? - indicates that the Anxious Clown itself is some kind of V.F.D. meeting place.
Mr. Poe, in TUA, describes the Surprising Chicken Salad as a recommended dish served at The Anxious Clown; the real Captain Sham suggests it to be unpalatable.
Violet is a bit quick to risk giving a baby a potentially serious allergic reaction. She could have just fed them to herself and Klaus and taken Sunny with them.
Ivan Lachrymose: Lake Explorer is a book used to store crucial documents and is written as incredibly tedious to disguise this. This is of course not much use if the document in question is so bulky it is obvious it doesn't belong in the book or somebody wants to read it to try and put themselves to sleep.
The exact nature of Count Olaf's peg-leg isn't made clear: it's only stated that it's covering up his ankle at least. He should be in some pain after pointing his foot for so long, although I suppose he could take it off when he's out of sight. How long it is isn't clear either; it could just be covering up some part of it.
How the Baudelaires get out of the docks once the gate is locked isn't clear.
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Post by Hermes on Mar 9, 2009 16:10:33 GMT -5
Some general comments first:
I've begun to notice a couple of recurring features of the books. One is a flashback to the Baudelaires' life before the fire; in this book there are a few, but the most notable is their father's reminiscence of the cousin who used to burn ants. Another is an update on Lemony's current situation; we are told that his room overlooks a graveyard.
Sunny continues to progress, rising to new heights of ingenuity. I didn't notice any of her utterances in this book having special significance, but what I think is new is the idea that her siblings can understand what she is saying. This appears on p. 114 where she says 'coik', meaning 'Thinking about all this is making me dizzy', and Violet repiles 'Me too, Sunny'. I get the feeling that the humorous element in the books is beginning to come into its own. There were a few things in this book that made me laugh out loud in a way that the previous books hadn't - e.g. the bit about how it might be all right, if one was very hungry, to steal a picture from an art gallery and eat it, or how if one is allergic to something one should not put it in one's mouth, especially if that thing is cats.
Chapters 1- 3
Mr Poe says the orphans can call or fax him if there is any problem, raising more puzzles about the technological level of the world in which ASOUE takes place.
Aunt Josephine's house seems to be built of wood. I wonder if the wood is green.
Some of the 'grammatical errors' which Josephine insists on correcting aren't really errors at all. For instance, when Klaus says 'the terrible tattoo on his ankle. It always scared me.', 'it' can perfectly well refer either to the tattoo or to the ankle.
So, what exactly is Josephine's relation to the Baudelaires? When Mr Poe says 'your second cousin's sister-in-law', I initially took him to mean 'your second cousin's spouse's sister', since if he meant 'your second cousin's brother's wife' he could just have said 'your second cousin's wife' (or, as it turns out, widow). On the other hand, later when commenting on the ability to whistle with crackers in one's mouth, she seems to imply that Beatrice was in fact related to Ike.
Once again we get the problem; if Josephine is a member of VFD, why doesn't she recognise Olaf? Why isn't she aware of the significance of his disguise? Indeed, if she is a member she must have been recruited before the schism, which should mean that she has a tattoo of an eye on her ankle; but she does not seem to see the significance of this.
Actually, can we be sure she is a member of VFD? It seems clear that Ike was a member, so Josephine must have had some knowledge of the organisation; and her ability to use codes is suggestive of VFD (though I'm not sure we are ever actually told the code she uses is a VFD code). On the other hand her fearfulness would make her a rather unhelpful volunteer. (So far as I can see, in the book she has always been fearful; the movie changes this, resonably enough, as it is trying to build in the VFD plot from the beginning.)
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Post by Sora on Mar 9, 2009 19:59:21 GMT -5
Once again we get the problem; if Josephine is a member of VFD, why doesn't she recognise Olaf? Why isn't she aware of the significance of his disguise? Indeed, if she is a member she must have been recruited before the schism, which should mean that she has a tattoo of an eye on her ankle; but she does not seem to see the significance of this. Actually, can we be sure she is a member of VFD? It seems clear that Ike was a member, so Josephine must have had some knowledge of the organisation; and her ability to use codes is suggestive of VFD (though I'm not sure we are ever actually told the code she uses is a VFD code). On the other hand her fearfulness would make her a rather unhelpful volunteer. (So far as I can see, in the book she has always been fearful; the movie changes this, resonably enough, as it is trying to build in the VFD plot from the beginning.) See, this is where retcon leads to blatant inconsistencies. Now it may not be certain if Josephine was a member of VFD like the movie seems to suggest. She may have just known certain members or been aware of Ike's participation but was too afraid herself to take part. However we DO know that Ike was a member, and being well into his fifties/sixties, certainly would have had a tattoo on his ankle. So why does Aunt Josephine not remember this? Why does she not find signifigance that the man she slept and lived with for forty or so years has the same tattoo as Olaf?
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Post by Lunatic Fire Eyes on Mar 9, 2009 21:58:48 GMT -5
I think Snickett should have actually planned the series out before he started writing it, instead of writing in story elements and other small details in the later books that conflict with the earlier ones. I am aware he didnt have to good of an idead where he wanted to take the series when he started, but still.
I think Aunt Josephine is hilarious. I found it so ridiculous how she was afraid of EVERYTHING! It was funny because of that. Also, I find it to be pretty stupid that how, after the hurricane [that the orphans passed through], Aunt Josephine wanted them to bring food. I had forgotten about that detail, and when I re-read through that my jaw almost hit the ground.
Another thing that I noticed is that when someone buys the orphan a present, it is always something none of them wants. [Like the peppermints, the "in" clothes in EE, Josephines presents ect.]. I guess it just goes with the unfortunate theme.
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Post by Sora on Mar 10, 2009 3:50:47 GMT -5
I think Snickett should have actually planned the series out before he started writing it, instead of writing in story elements and other small details in the later books that conflict with the earlier ones. I am aware he didnt have to good of an idead where he wanted to take the series when he started, but still. Well originally Snicket had only planned to write three books - centered around an unfortunate children's tale. There wasn't any mystery or secrets unsolved. That's why TMM was so oddly bad - it was the sort of in between work while Lemony sorted out an actual long term plotline. So unfortunately LS had to deal with the problems that his rather systematic and somewhat generic first three books had in a way that wouldn't stop the flow of further books - which inevitably involved retconning.
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Post by Hermes on Mar 10, 2009 10:20:24 GMT -5
Why does she not find signifigance that the man she slept and lived with for forty or so years has the same tattoo as Olaf? I guess she is very forgetful. Um. Carrying on, chapters 3 to the end: Is there any significance in the statement that Gina-Sue is socialist? I know the barn door saying (though I would say 'stable door'), but I've never associated it with any particular political position. At this point, Lemony regards the stealing of the boat as clearly justified. Later on, this is the sort of thing that would prompt agonisings over the moral ambiguity involved in being a volunteer. Here, for once, the Baudelaires do recognise a henchperson of Count Olaf's, though I suppose he/she/it cannot really be said to be in disguise. That being so, its being there is rather a giveaway. What would have happened if Mr Poe had met it before arranging the adoption? The idea of the cave being for sale is a bit odd. It's been suggested that Aunt Josephine's fear of realtors is caused by the treacherous team of realtors who took over a cave belonging to VFD. But another reading might be that Curdled Cave is that cave, a former VFD headquarters, and that the treacherous realtors have taken possession just before Josephine arrives, so that her irrational fear turns out to be correct in this case. cwm has pointed out that the Baudelaires help to cause the unfortunate events by curing Josephine's fear of the telephone. They add to the problem by persuading her to get in the boat- if they had stayed in the cave a bit longer she would have survived. (Though of course she could have pointed out that she had just eaten a banana, and then they would presumably have waited.) Anyway, this seems to be the second time that the Baudelaires are partly responsible for a death. Lemony's story of the Gordian knot is not quite the same as the story that is normally told - the way I heard it, Gordius had died before Alexander arrived, leaving the knot for his people to puzzle over. Olaf volunteers the information that he is wanted for arson. I think this is the first time it's suggested he may be an arsonist (though if it's literally true that he is wanted for arson, this can't refer to the Baudelaire fire, which he wasn't suspected of at the time.)
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Post by cwm on Mar 11, 2009 15:27:35 GMT -5
The End establishes that the Baudelaires had believed Olaf to be responsible for the fire for quite some time, although when exactly isn't made clear. The first indication that Olaf enjoys committing arson is in THH, I believe.
Mr. Poe doesn't seem to recognise the enormous creature, since it is present when Olaf returns the Baudelaires to the dock.
Since we might as well mention it: 'sham' means 'something which is not what it purports to be', and is probably a deliberate choice to emphasise Olaf's disguise. The only other instance of Olaf's disguised name being indicative of the fact that he is in disguise is Detective Dupin - 'Dupin' could be taken as a reference to the word 'dupe', meaning 'easily deceived person', referring to the people who fall for Olaf's disguise.
Why does Count Olaf bother ensuring that the adoption papers are his, since he gives up on this line of thinking pretty soon, suggesting that whatever his plan to extract the Baudelaire fortune by having the Baudelaires in his clutches does not involve being their legal guardian? It would be much simpler to just push a Baudelaire or two overboard and then make an escape with the remainder.
The letter to the editor at the end makes reference to a jeep parked at Orion Observatory. Are the details here the same as the ones mentioned in TUA (Snicket mentions them in his note on the potentially fake R.'s letter)?
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Post by Hermes on Mar 11, 2009 17:07:17 GMT -5
Since we might as well mention it: 'sham' means 'something which is not what it purports to be', and is probably a deliberate choice to emphasise Olaf's disguise. The only other instance of Olaf's disguised name being indicative of the fact that he is in disguise is Detective Dupin - 'Dupin' could be taken as a reference to the word 'dupe', meaning 'easily deceived person', referring to the people who fall for Olaf's disguise. More straightforwardly, though, it's a reference to the character of C. Auguste Dupin, a detective in the works of E.A. Poe (and, one might add, specifically in 'The Purloined Letter', a story about something hidden in plain sight, which is a technique which VFD seem to use a lot.) Yes, it's hard to see just what his plan is. It's reasonable to think that just having the orphans in his possession wouldn't enable him to get the fortune; on the other hand, being their legal guardian wouldn't by itself do that either, as we know from TBB. I think he is still interested in legal guardianship in TMM and TAA - in them he's trying to get their existing guardian/Vice-Principal to give them up; and in TEE his girlfriend is their guardian anyway, so he can focus more on the Quagmires. (You could ask, of course, just what his plan with them is.) After that it's hard to say just what he is planning to do - perhaps he doesn't know himself, but just thinks that grabbing the orphans is a a good idea as a first step. I believe so.
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Post by Dante on Mar 11, 2009 17:11:06 GMT -5
The letter to the editor at the end makes reference to a jeep parked at Orion Observatory. Are the details here the same as the ones mentioned in TUA (Snicket mentions them in his note on the potentially fake R.'s letter)? Snicket's note gets them true to TWW, unlike "R."'s letter. A couple of things I don't think anyone's mentioned yet (going from memory, since once again I'm too swamped with work to participate fully): The incident with the woman Lemony loves and an eagle, and the fact that Josephine indicates that Ike was only slightly less fearful than her - she mentions that Ike used to answer the telephone, but used a special glove to do so. Ike being as terrified of the world as Josephine has more serious consequences for his V.F.D. membership than Josephine being terrified, but having been involved with V.F.D. they may well be quite paranoid.
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Post by Hermes on Mar 12, 2009 12:09:41 GMT -5
the fact that Josephine indicates that Ike was only slightly less fearful than her - she mentions that Ike used to answer the telephone, but used a special glove to do so. Ike being as terrified of the world as Josephine has more serious consequences for his V.F.D. membership than Josephine being terrified, but having been involved with V.F.D. they may well be quite paranoid. Perhaps Ike was a researcher or an instructor rather than an active agent. (He gave Lemony a graduation gift, if I remember rightly.) I suspect, though, that his slightly lesser degree of fearlessness may have made all the difference; being able to use the phone when wearing a special glove doesn't restrict action in the way not being able to use it at all does; and he may have had parallel ways of dealing with other fears.
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Post by Sora on Mar 12, 2009 13:04:24 GMT -5
the fact that Josephine indicates that Ike was only slightly less fearful than her - she mentions that Ike used to answer the telephone, but used a special glove to do so. Ike being as terrified of the world as Josephine has more serious consequences for his V.F.D. membership than Josephine being terrified, but having been involved with V.F.D. they may well be quite paranoid. Perhaps Ike was a researcher or an instructor rather than an active agent. (He gave Lemony a graduation gift, if I remember rightly.) I suspect, though, that his slightly lesser degree of fearlessness may have made all the difference; being able to use the phone when wearing a special glove doesn't restrict action in the way not being able to use it at all does; and he may have had parallel ways of dealing with other fears. Or equally he could have been simply appeasing Josephine's fears. If Ike truely loved her, he wouldn't have wanted her to feel bad for being so fearful - he easily could have just gone about the motions of his life in a slightly less OCD manner to Josehphine to disguise to herself how foolish she was. In the long term this may not have been beneficial to Ike, Josephine or the Baudelaires, but at least it gave the married pair a fairly content forty or so years together.
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