The Great 667 Re-Read : Week 1: The Bad Beginning

[cwm]

Wasn't it the beginning of The End featuring the return trip to Count Olaf's house?

The hook-handed man does a lot of implausible things relating to his hooks over the series, but I assume you're going to come to those later.

[Dante]

Feb 25, 2009 16:30:02 GMT -5 cwm said:

Wasn't it the beginning of The End featuring the return trip to Count Olaf's house?

It would be rather a poor show if I had remembered incorrectly, given that I'm the one who uncovered these facts in the first place. Now I shall have to dig up the interview reference. Let me see. Yep, it's in here. Twelfth book. Probably the end of the twelfth book, though, since Handler did indeed say that it was on the way to the island.

Edit: And I doubt I shall go into great detail on the hook-handed man's hooks - seems rather unfair to complain given what Sunny does with her teeth. Just so long as there's the odd reference to the hook-handed man having extreme difficulty performing some manoeuvre that would be simple if he had regular hands, I'm happy.

[Lunatic Fire Eyes]

I noticed a few of those things too, but not nearly as many as you have. It is kind of funny how a few things in this book add to some later things in the series, but arent meant to do that, just being slightly random.

I did have a thought [when I first read the books] that Mr. Poe may be evil, but I know that he isnt. Cant believe anyone else even thought that....

I got done with the book really quickly, and am waiting for next week to read the next book.

[Mijahu]

Here are my notes for chapter one, hopefully I'll get more in tonight. Sorry, Dante, if you've covered a lot of this already, I haven't had much time to read any of the posts here.

Chapter One
The first page is what brought many of us into the series in the first place. Right off the bat, first sentence is "If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book." It's a seducing sentence, really.

The city they live in is described as dirty, yet for some reason I have never imagined it that way. Perhaps there is some poetry in that? Take Gotham, Batman's hometown. Or even New York. It always seems sort of rich and glamorous on the outside but under that it's a very filthy place with evil people.

I noticed Sunny's size seems to change somewhat throughout the series. She is first described as the size of a boot here in Chapter One, and later a watermelon and a loaf of bread. These things are all pretty varying in size, if you ask me. And I noticed that her's is the only age not mentioned...

I like how Klaus is angry at Mr. Poe after he breaks the news. I feel I would have done the same in his situation, I would have felt very patronized. And to read this again really made me hate Mr. Poe all the more because he knows the children, and he knows that they know what "perished" means, so he's really only making things worse for them.

Klaus thinking he wouldn't get to read all of the books in the library anymore was a great line.

[Sora]

Great Response everyone!

So here are my notes on the first two chapters (my progress for this book will be slow - I'm sneaking my copy from my work during tea breaks, as the library one is out.

Straight of the bat - I love Lemony's style. No fruitless exposition, no haphazard attempts at suspense. Just blunt realities - the Baudelaires are kids with talents, and from now on their lives are misfortunate. No ifs ands or buts about it.

Notice also how Mr. Poe never appears in illustrations even when he should logically be right there – for example, the cover of any edition of TBB. Of course, this is because he’s really a side-character; on the first book in the series, you can’t really illustrate anyone besides the Baudelaires and Olaf.

Agreed that Poe is really a laissez faire charactor throughout the entire series - and of course when TBB was published Snicket had no intention of really going beyond TWW - Poe becomes hence even more irrelevant.

I do feel Violet should have thrown that stone at Poe. Maybe it would have knocked some sense into him.

It also had always perplexed me why Mr. Poe was the person to meet the Baudelaires anyway. Snicket suggests that the Baudelaires have only been at Briny Beach for a few hours at max - how in such a short space of time could the fire rage to the point the house had burnt down, the fire department arrive, gauge the extent of damage and the fact the parents were dead, phone Poe, work out where the Baudelaires were, then get Poe down there to tell them of the deaths?

In addition, in the Chapter One full-page illustration in Orphans!, Mr. Poe looks extraordinarily sinister compared to the situationally-identical Chapter Thirteen illustration of TGG;

Hence my feelings that Poe was somewhat in the know about this fire more than Snicket ever explicitly let on.

Sunny is established as having a few ordinary words in her vocabulary, whereas later on, when she starts using actual English, this is taken as character development. Of course, her “unintelligible shrieks” soon turned into in-jokes in practice.

The development comes in her use of full phrases or sentences - I think from the beginning she could say intelligble individual words here and there.

The Baudelaire children are allowed to join their parents at the table at dinner parties – there’s something that’ll cause problems for later continuity, as the children should probably have been overhearing things they shouldn’t. Then again, clearly these weren’t exactly V.F.D. dinner parties, since Mr. Poe was in attendance.

This was a bold one in my notes. Why if the Baudelaires had spent so much time at their dining table, could they not recognize Kit or Jacques - two people who surely would have frequented the Baudelaire house for meetings or even tea often?

TBB:RE notes also make mention of the fact Lemony spent much time at the table - suggesting Beatrice and Lemony were on talking terms and experiencing each others company for at least a few years before her death.

Typographically, it’s extremely nice that we go from ordinary, peaceful events at the bottom of page seven to “Your parents have perished in a terrible fire” at the top of page eight. I hope that was intentional. The effect is lost in the new paperback version.

I noticed this too - it flows well with the constant yin-yang of the series - for every good experience of the Baudelaires is an equal and entirely negative experience.

Chapter 2:

“Klaus’s favourite pen” – why would Klaus have a favourite pen, when he’s a reader rather than a writer? This is probably because Handler doesn’t want to make Klaus more important; as the reader, he’s always going to be at something of an advantage when every book features a library, and he’s also going to be especially devastated now that what was effectively his own library is gone. The pen is just to create a link to books without having to identify a specific one.

I always felt Klaus's talent wasn't so much that he was a reader - all three Baudelaires are - but that he had an incredible memory for things he'd read or seen. He's like the series version of Cam Jansen - he just can pull things from everything at his own desire.

More to come.

[Mijahu]

Yes, Jasper, I believe you're right about Klaus being more than just a reader. If this were the case, his talent wouldn't be so special, considering everyone "noble" reads--(never trust anyone who hasn't brought a book with them). And I think this is why, on promotional items for the aSoUE film, Klaus is referred to as "the scholar," rather than "the reader."

[cwm]

Sunny's age never being mentioned is to avoid comparison as to any real or typical babies of that age, I think.

If the fire started the minute the Baudelaire mansion was out of sight and spread quickly (in ASOUE, fires generally spread very quickly, as we'll see from THH onwards) then it could be just about plausible. I suppose it's possible that Mr. Poe had accompanied the children on at least one previous trip to Briny Beach; this may not have been the first place he looked.

[Dante]

According to page 2, the Baudelaires are spending the day at Briny Beach; they could've been there for many hours. Lunch provided by nearby cafés or food stands. I know there's a reference somewhere to the fire having started in either the morning or the afternoon, but I can't remember where or which.

[Mijahu]

The mansion started to burn when they were on the trolley, no doubt. In the illustration at the beginning, the Baudelaires are seen on the rickety trolley heading to the beach, while the firemen are going to a fire (presumably the Baudelaire mansion's). We know they are on their way to Briney Beach (not from) at this point because Mr. Poe takes them from the beach in his car, not on the trolley. So the only time they would have been on the trolley on this day is as the mansion started to burn.

[Hermes]

More comments on Dante's comments.

Chapter Five: Klaus fantasises a good deal more here – his imaginings clearly aren’t taking place in reality. He talks about living on the streets, about using their parents’ money, that Justice Strauss might adopt them…

Well, Justice Strauss does offer to adopt them - though admittedly only after the marriage plot, which I suppose makes rather a difference to her attitude.

“Fountain of Victorious Finance” strikes me as a strange name, but I suppose in the banking district they would celebrate money in such a fashion.

Yes; if it came in a later book one would think it was a code of some kind. (Perhaps it stands for Fire Volunteer Foundation, or something like that.

All along, the enormous one has seemed barely human. One wonders what exactly its relation is to Olaf or the other troupe members, how it communicates with them.

Also what part it takes in the actual acting.

Later canon suggests Lemony would have difficulty holding down a room

I get the sense that his situation changes quite a lot, with ups and downs, in the course of his research. I don't think he's been consistently on the run for the last fifteen (or more) years. (Of course, he definitely has a room during the 'future' bit of TBL.) So perhaps this was written during one of his more stable periods.

Strangely, The Marvelous Marriage is described as being a tedious play and the audience are bored. And yet just a few pages ago Act Two closed to rapturous applause for Count Olaf!

Perhaps he had ordered them to applaud him, with a threat of some kind.

“I’m sorry to tell you this, children, but I cannot allow you to be raised by someone who is not a relative.” I guess Justice Strauss was busy at the time of TMM, TEE, and TVV.

It's possible that Sir, and either Jerome or Esme, are related to them. TVV is certainly more puzzling.

Edit: a couple of points from cwm and mijahu's comments.

On the fire spreading quickly; the mansion, on the evidence of TUA, is probably built of wood.

On dinner parties; if I remember rightly, Kit and Jacques haven't seen each other for some years, so it's not all that surprising they haven't seen the Baudelaires either. I get the distinct sense that VFD is very fragmented by this stage; its glory days are long past; so we can't assume people will be in contact just because they are both involved. (And of course, as will emerge in TE, the Baudelaires want to shelter their children from the troubles of the world.)

[cwm]

Whoever started the fire could have started a second blaze nearby to stop any chance of the Baudelaire parents and anything else they wanted destroyed in the fire surviving; since the Baudelaires could well have noticed the fact that their house was on fire.

Possibly it's another piece of Helquist artistic license.

Edgar and Albert are highly insensitive. They deem Violet and Klaus 'no fun' and don't even consider that their parents have just been killed and all their possessions except what they took to Briny Beach destroyed. They say the 'baby bites', so it seems probable that Sunny took a dislike to them (see Violet talking to Justice Strauss on the day of the puttanesca incident) straight away and bit them several times.

Mrs. Poe isn't a very good cook, either; Lemony at least (in THH, I believe) notes that boiling vegetables is unpalatable.

When the bald man with the long nose first appears, he is wearing a black robe; this is also bought up in his description in TRR when the Baudelaires summarise Olaf's henchmen, but not afterwards; he's disguised in TMM and THH, of course, but in TCC it's not described what he's wearing as I recall. Possibly it's something theatrical - is it in the V.F.D. disguise kit?

(There's another point I want to make about TRR, but it's only semi-relevant here so I'll wait.)

What are we going to do with this discussion? Archive it in Ravaged Resources, or summarise the important stuff and then put it in Ravaged Resources?

[katekor]

I'm so happy we're doing this re-read. It's been way too long for me and I hardly remember anything.

I've always wondered about the whole "the guardian has to be a relative" thing. That seems too big of a deal just ignore.

I had always thought the lines emphasizing Violet's right-handedness were hilarious, but I never saw the end coming for some reason!

I get so hopeful that their situation will improve even though I know it won't. It's so tragic when they've had such a good day, and they're proud of their accomplishment of making dinner, and then Olaf is a complete jerk. I guess I don't really have anything worthwhile to add because Dante took such incredible notes. But I'm here reading as well

[MasterKlaus247]

It would be good to do for this fan site but.......really why?

[Mijahu]

Feb 26, 2009 14:05:15 GMT -5 MasterKlaus247 said:

It would be good to do for this fan site but.......really why?

What, the reread? Well it's a great series to read over again: in light of mysteries being revealed you can go back and not have to wonder, and possibly conjure up more theories. It's been pretty interesting so far taking notes and everything.

[FIREBURST]

i'll do it. sounds like fun