Post by gliquey on Oct 5, 2014 17:44:06 GMT -5
Right, so, each book in ATWQ has a question for a title. The first is 7 words long; the second is 6 words long; the third is 5 words long. We can predict that the fourth will be 4 words long.
The first page of each book shows a question Snicket should have asked, followed by the sentence "Instead, I asked the wrong question--four wrong questions, more or less."
In ?1, the title question, Who Could That Be At This Hour?, is asked first by Ellington and then by Snicket. When Ellington "asked the question that is printed on the cover of this book", it is described as "the wrong question". The right question in that instance was "What was happening while [Snicket] was opening the door?" This doesn't make total sense, as Ellington was the one who asked it and she knew exactly what was happening while Snicket opened the door. When Snicket asks the question, Handler describes it using the exact same phrase ("cover of this book") and says that the right question was "When had I heard this person's voice before?" This time, it makes more sense.
In ?2, the title question, When Did You See Her Last?, is what Snicket asks Zada and Zora. Again, it is asked twice - the first time, Snicket says "It was the wrong question, both when...", like in ?1. The correct question was supposedly "Why was she wearing an article of clothing she did not own?", but I don't think that "When did you see her last?" was a "wrong" question - he wouldn't have gotten far if he hadn't known the answer. The second time Snicket asks it, he doesn't really get a useful answer, but we're not told (for the first time in the series) what the correct question to ask in that instance was.
This spoiler contains the ?3's title-drops:
We don't know the title for ?4 yet. It's almost certainly a four-word question, though. "What are you doing here?" "Where are you going?" "What [is/was] that noise?" "What do you want?" Does anyone have any other ideas?
The first page of each book shows a question Snicket should have asked, followed by the sentence "Instead, I asked the wrong question--four wrong questions, more or less."
In ?1, the title question, Who Could That Be At This Hour?, is asked first by Ellington and then by Snicket. When Ellington "asked the question that is printed on the cover of this book", it is described as "the wrong question". The right question in that instance was "What was happening while [Snicket] was opening the door?" This doesn't make total sense, as Ellington was the one who asked it and she knew exactly what was happening while Snicket opened the door. When Snicket asks the question, Handler describes it using the exact same phrase ("cover of this book") and says that the right question was "When had I heard this person's voice before?" This time, it makes more sense.
In ?2, the title question, When Did You See Her Last?, is what Snicket asks Zada and Zora. Again, it is asked twice - the first time, Snicket says "It was the wrong question, both when...", like in ?1. The correct question was supposedly "Why was she wearing an article of clothing she did not own?", but I don't think that "When did you see her last?" was a "wrong" question - he wouldn't have gotten far if he hadn't known the answer. The second time Snicket asks it, he doesn't really get a useful answer, but we're not told (for the first time in the series) what the correct question to ask in that instance was.
This spoiler contains the ?3's title-drops:
I didn't keep track of the question's uses when reading, so I could have missed instances. But I'm fairly sure that Snicket didn't ask "Shouldn't you be in school?" to anyone. This contradicts the first page - it's fairly clear that when Snicket says "I asked the wrong questions [...] This is the account of the third", that it means he asked "Shouldn't you be in school?" at some point, but he never does.
Hangfire asks Snicket the question "printed on the cover of this book" - we're not told if there was a correct question in this case. Later, Pip asks the question, and Snicket replies "yes" - again, there's no mention of a better question or if there's a reason Pip's question was wrong. I thought there was another use of the question, but I don't know where. That would have broken the pattern of the question being used twice per book, though.
Hangfire asks Snicket the question "printed on the cover of this book" - we're not told if there was a correct question in this case. Later, Pip asks the question, and Snicket replies "yes" - again, there's no mention of a better question or if there's a reason Pip's question was wrong. I thought there was another use of the question, but I don't know where. That would have broken the pattern of the question being used twice per book, though.
We don't know the title for ?4 yet. It's almost certainly a four-word question, though. "What are you doing here?" "Where are you going?" "What [is/was] that noise?" "What do you want?" Does anyone have any other ideas?