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Post by lsandthebooks on Aug 20, 2019 9:49:18 GMT -5
I saw a theory (https://snicketsleuth.tumblr.com/post/140974435590/did-beatrice-survive-the-baudelaire-fire) that said Beatrice Baudelaire survived the fire in her home, and died at the fire on the night of the Duchess' masked ball.
In his letter to the Duchess from the Unauthorized Autobiography, Lemony says that their enemies are still searching for Monty's missing reptiles. And Lemony was writing the letter to the Duchess to confirm that he would still be attending her ball. The Duchess says in her reply to Lemony, that the masked ball was the last public event the VFD members attended.
But I feel skeptical, since I don't think the Duchess ever said that the fire happened the night of her ball. She just said that she was sorry that Lemony was captured at her ball. And she doesn't say that anyone died at her ball. The Duchess does say that her mansion burned down, but it reads like she was alone when it did, since she only mentions herself running out of the burning mansion.
But Lemony also says that he's been trying for 15 long and lonely years, to give Beatrice a message about Olaf. So that could prove that she was still alive after the fire...
But since Beatrice split from Lemony before Violet was born, couldn't 15 years have passed before the Baudelaire mansion fire? Violet turns 15 after the Baudelaire fire, so to me that implies that it's been at least 16-17 years since Lemony and Beatrice split.
What do you think? Could Beatrice have survived the fire?
Here's the part from the theory page that mentions the ball:
The most damning piece of evidence regarding Beatrice’s survival is the datation of the Masked Ball held by the Duchess of Winnipeg, where Lemony and Beatrice once met:
[The Austere Academy, Chapter Eleven]
It may surprize readers to learn that said Masked Ball happened AFTER the Baudelaire fire. Lemony makes it very clear:
[The un-Authorized Autobiography, p.144]
This refers to the hunt for Monty’s reptiles, which started after “The Reptile Room” and is mentioned numerous times. The only way to reconcile this apparent contradiction is to admit that Beatrice survived the Baudelaire fire and eventually made her way to Masked Ball, which apparently happened just a few months later. Probably while the Baudelaire were in the care of another guardian.
So, if Beatrice did not die in the Baudelaire fire, how did she die at all? The answer is actually very easy: Beatrice died in the fire which destroyed the Duchess of Winnipeg’s castle. Let’s hear her retelling of the day of the Masked Ball.
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Post by Dante on Aug 20, 2019 9:59:06 GMT -5
The idea that Beatrice surviving the fire is the only way to resolve this contradiction is unimaginative - as is the idea that she would require any kind of warning about Count Olaf if he'd already been tormenting her children for at least two books. There are multiple reconciliations, and I've given them in the past while discussing the matter with Jean Lucio. There may have been multiple masked balls; or there may have been multiple escapes of Dr. Montgomery's collection. There are probably other explanations, too.
Over the years, I've increasingly come to the conclusion that either the U.A. was quite carelessly written, or that it deliberately obstructs the construction of a coherent timeline via intentional contradictions; consider, for instance, the irreconcilability of Gustav as Olaf's murder victim and Gustav as film director warning Monty about Stephano. The U.A. presents the possibility that any number of its documents may be clever forgeries. Ultimately, this is why it can only ever be an unauthorised autobiography.
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Post by lsandthebooks on Aug 20, 2019 10:16:30 GMT -5
The idea that Beatrice surviving the fire is the only way to resolve this contradiction is unimaginative - as is the idea that she would require any kind of warning about Count Olaf if he'd already been tormenting her children for at least two books. There are multiple reconciliations, and I've given them in the past while discussing the matter with Jean Lucio. There may have been multiple masked balls; or there may have been multiple escapes of Dr. Montgomery's collection. There are probably other explanations, too. Over the years, I've increasingly come to the conclusion that either the U.A. was quite carelessly written, or that it deliberately obstructs the construction of a coherent timeline via intentional contradictions; consider, for instance, the irreconcilability of Gustav as Olaf's murder victim and Gustav as film director warning Monty about Stephano. The U.A. presents the possibility that any number of its documents may be clever forgeries. Ultimately, this is why it can only ever be an unauthorised autobiography. These are some great points. Especially this one: "as is the idea that she would require any kind of warning about Count Olaf if he'd already been tormenting her children for at least two books."
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Post by Optimism is my Phil-osophy on Aug 20, 2019 20:43:06 GMT -5
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Post by Foxy on Aug 21, 2019 11:56:31 GMT -5
But I feel skeptical, since I don't think the Duchess ever said that the fire happened the night of her ball. She just said that she was sorry that Lemony was captured at her ball. And she doesn't say that anyone died at her ball. The Duchess does say that her mansion burned down, but it reads like she was alone when it did, since she only mentions herself running out of the burning mansion. I read it this way, as well. Maybe this suggests the ball took place very shortly before the Baudelaire fire. This could be another masked ball? It is a very entertaining notion. That's a creative theory - I don't think I've heard that one before! Over the years, I've increasingly come to the conclusion that either the U.A. was quite carelessly written, Yes, I'm going with that.
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Post by Hermes on Aug 22, 2019 10:15:06 GMT -5
I think it's clear that TUA is deliberately inaccurate in some respects: there are various indications of this, like the suspicion that the Duchess's letter is a forgery, or the bit where Lemony says if he can't find a picture of himself as a child, he will include a picture of another boy of that age. It may be careless as well, but the deliberate inaccuracies make carelessness hard to spot.
Regarding the letter to the Duchess, another ball is certainly a possible explanation, but it seems quite likely to me that it is a forgery; it is very clumsily written, for one thing, with the absurd greeting 'Your royal Duchessness' (whereas Lulu's collection includes a similar letter which begins, more sensibly, 'My dear Duchess').
'Fifteen long and lonely years' can be explained by saying that the count begins, not from the breakup, but from L's attempt to send a telegram to Beatrice, while she was pregnant with Violet. This will indeed put the ball fairly clearly just before the fire. (The alternative, of course, is to adopt the Violet Theory, which would have the consequence that the fire came just fifteen years after the breakup: but I'm sure Handler did not intend that, and it's quite likely he put the telegram in specifically to ward it off.)
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Post by Foxy on Aug 22, 2019 12:23:09 GMT -5
(The alternative, of course, is to adopt the Violet Theory, which would have the consequence that the fire came just fifteen years after the breakup: but I'm sure Handler did not intend that, and it's quite likely he put the telegram in specifically to ward it off.) Is the Violet Theory where people think Violet was actually Lemony's daughter?
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Post by Hermes on Aug 22, 2019 12:48:13 GMT -5
Yes, that's exactly what it is.
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Post by Uncle Algernon on Aug 22, 2019 13:53:52 GMT -5
- as is the idea that she would require any kind of warning about Count Olaf if he'd already been tormenting her children for at least two books. Would she necessarily know what has happened to the children yet, though?
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Post by Dante on Aug 22, 2019 15:00:15 GMT -5
- as is the idea that she would require any kind of warning about Count Olaf if he'd already been tormenting her children for at least two books. Would she necessarily know what has happened to the children yet, though? If Beatrice has time to go swanning about at masked balls with any number of other members of the organisation, I refuse to believe that she wouldn't have made even the slightest enquiry about her children, who she's spent nearly fifteen years caring for. What's been happening to them is not exactly a secret.
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Post by Optimism is my Phil-osophy on Aug 22, 2019 15:50:03 GMT -5
To me, the only phrase that makes sense is, "Count Olaf is dead." Olaf died on a desert island and few people knew about his death. This is evident because the couple who informed Lemony about the cow believed the cow was an undercover Olaf henchman. But he was an undercover Genius henchman. Lemony could not disclose the information he passed to Beatrice, because if he divulged this information, the general public would realize that Beatrice survived the fire. Lemony does not want this information to be released to the general public of his universe. The long years that followed was the great publishing hiatus, which took place between books 3 and 4. So at the time of the publication of book 5, Lemony could claim that Prufrock Prep was closed for many years. And so, by the time Book 4's manuscript arrived in the black jeep at Orion Observatory, R. claimed that Lemony had spent many years dead.Another detail is that none of the characters who died in the main story is cited as being at the ball. That's because the ball happened 15 years after the main story.
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Post by Foxy on Aug 23, 2019 10:55:20 GMT -5
I think the phrase could be "Count Olaf is behind you" or "Count Olaf is the arsonist."
With the former, Count Olaf could be attempting to push her off a balcony. With the latter, Snicket could be trying to clear his name and tell Beatrice Count Olaf is really the one who started all the fires the Daily Punctilio reported Lemony Snicket started. I suppose it could also be "Count Olaf is working with ______" fill in the blank. Esme? My favorite hypothesis, I suppose, is "Count Olaf is a cake thief."
This gets me wondering, who started the fire at the Duchess's home. Count Olaf?
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Post by Hermes on Aug 23, 2019 16:48:00 GMT -5
If Beatrice has time to go swanning about at masked balls with any number of other members of the organisation, I refuse to believe that she wouldn't have made even the slightest enquiry about her children, who she's spent nearly fifteen years caring for. What's been happening to them is not exactly a secret. To be fair, Violet in TCC Ch. 5 does suggest that their imagined surviving parent may be unable to find them 'because we've been hiding and disguising ourselves for so long'. While you may well feel this doesn't really fit what has happened, it's confirmed by Quigley in TSS, who says Jacques was looking for the Baudelaires, as if they were hard to find. On the other hand, in TGG it turns out that VFD has actually been tracking them all along. In any case, the surviving parent, if there was one, would almost certainly be in hiding in a 'safe place', and not attending masked balls.
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Post by Optimism is my Phil-osophy on Aug 23, 2019 17:38:20 GMT -5
Yes, one more reason to believe that ball where Lemony was captured happened many years after the main events described in ASOUE. Please note that at the time of the ball, Prufrock Prep was still fully operational as Lemony received information about the reptiles from the Prufrock Prep librarian. However when Lemony wrote TAA, Prufrock Prep was already closed for many years. The only logical explanation for this, (considering that the documents in LSTUA were not fraudulent) is that Prufrock Prep has stopped working between the publications of some of ASOUE's books. If Beatrice was at that Ball, it is because the Ball itself happened many years after the events recorded in the books. If you consider what Lemony wrote in TRR about having spent several years between recorded events and the publication of the books, that explanation makes sense.
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Post by Violent BUN Fortuna on Aug 23, 2019 19:30:30 GMT -5
Another thing to note in regards to the ‘Your Royal Duchessness’ letter is the design.
Whereas other letters supposedly ‘From the desk of Lemony Snicket’ sometimes have ‘From the desk of’ crossed out, this letter has ‘the desk of Lemony Snicket’ crossed out, which is a notable difference and perhaps suggests that the letter is not from Lemony at all. Additionally, Lemony’s signature is slightly different to its normal appearance at the end of letters — though it must be noted that his signature does vary throughout the book; however, at the end of letters it is normally fairly consistent.
Now of course this COULD be accidental on the part of the book’s designers, but I think it’s worth noting, as the book is a very visual document and a lot of thought must have gone into how it was presented. Ordinarily — say, in one of the 13 novels — I wouldn’t refer to the design or illustrations as meaning anything because of course they are secondary to the text. But I think TUA is rather different as it makes such heavy use of illustrations/photos/design, and in such a way that the images are often just as important as the writing.
Personally, I believe that Beatrice died in the Baudelaire mansion fire and this letter is intended as a red herring, but one which we should be able to see through: it certainly appears odd, and I think it is most likely supposed to be either a forgery or a code which we don’t have the resources to figure out — or, indeed, it may refer to another ball (we know the Duchess hosted more than just the one), or another instance of the reptiles being scattered. I agree with what others have said about TUA being quite clearly intentionally contradictory and filled with mystery and confusion, and in all likelihood many forgeries. And of course this helpfully give DH plenty of room to make mistakes/keep various potential plot lines open.
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