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Post by Dante on Jun 30, 2009 15:30:43 GMT -5
It does at least imply, though, that the Quagmires are clients of Muctuary Money Management, and I never got the sense that Esme worked for them. Yes, I agree. It is a shame, because I do want the two to make sense. Perhaps Mulctuary Money Management hired Esmé as an outside consultant for the case? Hmm. I disagree somewhat. I don't think there's a contradiction in that I think the SSHAMH is as safe as it ever was; however, I don't think it was ever a legitimate future option for the Baudelaires, in the sense that if they ever got there, it would be brought down. Indeed, I think a number of theories about TPP - or TNN, or B12, or any variety of titles it was known as up to a couple of weeks before publication - used this idea. I know I did. Once again, I agree entirely. The entire set-up with the headquarters feels... well, very much like it was set up, like it's just a stage, a puzzle for the Baudelaires to solve. I'm actually very uncomfortable with it as it was always the spot which agreed most with the otherwise monstrous "it was all V.F.D. training" theory. Bit more suspense from "just behind," though - a bit more interesting, and one may argue that an ambiguous incident in TPP supports it. But still, look at us - in the position of having to argue that it may be a mistake to try and reconcile different books in the same plot-heavy series! Oh aSoUE. Some of the greatest works of art are the most flawed. An interesting idea. I shouldn't be surprised. I had contemplated the possibility that at a later stage in the story Olaf and co. may have moved their location, or there would be something else worth climbing for at the top of the slippery slope. But evidently this is not the case in the finished product. Abandoned plotlines and drafts fascinate me, though, and I've often wished we had our hands on Handler's plot notes. Alas, since these apparently take the form of many, many tiny notes stuck up on the wall, I suspect they are long gone. Well - but yes. One couldn't quite class Klaus and Fiona's relationship as running quite so untroubled as Violet and Quigley's, no. I far prefer the former to the latter, though. I'll probably get a chance to raise my problems with the character of Quigley when going through later chapters, but I'm not that interested in him. My theory: Recruited, without the actual kidnapping element, by the Prufrock librarian, much mirroring the case of Ms. K. and the replacement orphans. As such, Isadora and Duncan can, in some fashion, be in V.F.D. without Quigley having been cruelly left out. Poetry, check, journalism, check... cartography?! Get thee to the F.F.P., you are my son no more! The main attraction of the "multiple sugar bowls" theory is that it satisfies numerous conditions about the sugar bowl without being too ridiculous, and also maintains a sense of irony or cruel fate - you may find a sugar bowl, and discover to your horror that what is within, while interesting, has nothing to do with you. I've probably converted to it, insofar as I believe anything these days - this reread is increasingly making me distant and relucant to commit to any actual narratives, preferring to look at it from a step back. Ah well. The progression is a logical one. |
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Post by cwm on Jul 1, 2009 10:03:16 GMT -5
I was on holiday in America this last week. Will have to skip this one, I fear.
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Post by Hermes on Jul 1, 2009 10:35:26 GMT -5
Perhaps Mulctuary Money Management hired Esmé as an outside consultant for the case? Ah, that would make sense, wouldn't it? And in that case she wouldn't be able to get her hands on the sapphires. Though apparently it's not meant for the Baudelaires but for JS, whoever that is. More on this when we reach chapter 11, no doubt. How true! (And people complain about J.K. Rowling getting the Weasleys' ages wrong. I've seen people asserting that there is no other author more careless than her.) Oh, I prefer Klaus/Fiona as well - but it's definitely fraught. Could be - with the librarian playing a part somewhat similar to that of Jacques. I'm not sure it's necessary, though - but as I say, this should wait for the next chapter. I like the idea; my only worry is that surely members of VFD should know that there is more than one sugar bowl, and so not be too surprised by this. Perhaps you can make sense of what happens in TSS with several sugar bowls - Esme's, stolen by Lemony, the one from the headquarters, which the MWBBNH and WWHBNB are looking for, and perhaps another, Monty's for instance, which Jacques was looking for. But I think in TGG and TPP there really has to be jsut one sugar bowl in play - or else, when Esme says 'It is mine', why doesn't Dewey say 'No, that's a completely different sugar bowl'? On the other hand, I think the idea of multiple sugar bowls may make a comeback in TE. |
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Post by Dante on Jul 1, 2009 11:59:49 GMT -5
I was on holiday in America this last week. Will have to skip this one, I fear. Stalk any cultural icons? Perhaps Mulctuary Money Management hired Esmé as an outside consultant for the case? Ah, that would make sense, wouldn't it? And in that case she wouldn't be able to get her hands on the sapphires. I think I'll adopt that theory more permanently, then. Pfft. People do love complaing, don't they? She's said herself that she's not so good at math, and I'm fairly sure all her actual mistakes are along the lines of age and such. As fans of aSoUE, by contrast, we barely even have the right to complain about any inconsistencies. That is a big problem, yes. However, V.F.D. is fragmented, and we know from TGG that it's become increasingly difficult for them to communicate with one another. One enormous misunderstanding doesn't seem too impossible - contrived, certainly, but contrivances may be yet another thing we have little right to complain about... ~Chapter Four~ The particularly devastating effect that made that night such a dark day was the destruction of the V.F.D. headquarters library, even though I’d say it was dark enough given that the rest of the headquarters had already been destroyed over the course of several months. I remember before reading TSS that I’d heard somewhere that the Baudelaires would be assisted by a young friend. When Carmelita returned, I thought to myself, “Huh? How can she be the one?!” Of course, in fact it was entirely the reverse; however, both Carmelita and Uncle Bruce illustrate a technique of Handler’s that I particularly like – bringing back characters from many, many books previous and reinventing them for a different context. It’s this subplot that helps make TSS so long – there are external factors at play in the narrative. The sinister duo probably also serve this role. It’s because TSS has no real single location in the way that earlier books did; it’s easier for old and new characters to turn up. “Like many pledges, the Snow Scout Alphabet Pledge had not made much sense” Bruce’s appearance is consistent with TRR – he’s still wearing plaid and smoking a cigar. Quigley’s thick wool sweater is a link to the other Quagmires, who also wore such garments. Clothing is much more distinctive than physical appearance in aSoUE; I’m not sure we know anyone’s hair colour, for example. How soon did Quigley suspect he might be dealing with the Baudelaires – or indeed, other stray volunteers? He seems awfully intrepid, quite the risk-taker, for one who spent weeks hiding out in an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. “We’re an organization for young people to have fun and learn new things.” I suspect the Snow Scouts are partly a parody of all kinds of young persons’ organisation, but it’s also awfully easy to tie in the V.F.D. link we were speculating about in another thread. False Spring is when “the weather gets unusually warm before getting very cold again” – which implies it’s mid-winter, really, as I know this debate has occurred. Since it gets very cold “again,” that suggests it was also very cold before the weather got unusually warm. It doesn’t even have to be very warm – any amount of warmth is unusual if it’s very cold the rest of the time. Perhaps it’s unique to this particular geographic area. Despite speculation to the contrary, we can’t say for certain that Bruce’s surname is Spats. He might be the brother of Carmelita’s mother, for example, or some other arrangement depending on post-marriage surname assignment. For some reason, I would assume that he is not personally a Spats. Don’t know why, since it’s 50/50. I’ve already addressed the origins of the bears, but the lions were, perhaps, those snatched by Olaf for TCC. However, since he had difficulty figuring out how to get to the Mortmain Mountains by the end of TCC, and since it is presumably quite difficult to capture a bunch of lions, perhaps they had already been captured and kept elsewhere. Regardless, they are presumably the same lions, since Olivia explains that they were trained to smell smoke. “When Snow Scouts tell stories, they skip everything boring and only tell the interesting parts.” Presumably Mr. Remora was never a Snow Scout, then. Carmelita’s story bears a distinct resemblance to the extract of her autobiography seen in the U.A. Perhaps she began writing it under Esmé’s tutelage, although Carmelita doesn’t seem much like a writer – either before or after joining Olaf. Of course, Lemony doesn’t really skip the boring details – or rather, he tells us just what it is he’s skipping. One almost wonders if, in an earlier draft, this was described in detail, but Handler realised it would be far more entertaining and in-keeping with the story to just skim over it. So by the end of the chapter, Quigley is pretty definite that the two strangers he’s met are the Baudelaires, which must still be quite a leap, if you think about it. For one thing, there are only two of them, and they’re not in anything like their regular clothing either. I can’t remember if he explains later how he guessed. ~Chapter Five~ One also imagines that Bruce might cause trouble for V.F.D. by bumbling around the Mortmain Mountains and staying every year right in the cave that leads to V.F.D.’s headquarters. That has to be a recipe for disaster. The Baudelaires never meet any real young volunteers. Even Fiona seems awfully out of the loop. It’s slightly disappointing. I know V.F.D. are on the run, but so are the Baudelaires. Of course, Handler’s really specialising in dangling the promise of plot advancement or revealed secrets right in front of our noses before snatching them away with a cruel snicker. Of course, there’s another practical reason to remove the pole from the Vertical Flame diversion – it’s a dead giveaway that there’s a secret passageway there. But I suppose the Volunteer Feline Detectives would originally have been there to guard it. “…in my experience, well-read people are less likely to be evil.” This probably bears up. Hermes raised the point about how one is supposed to have reached the Mortmain Mountains headquarters – especially if the Vertical Flame Diversion hasn’t been used for years, as page 97 tells us. The page also seems to contradict a later assertion that the questions change every season, unless the themes remain the same, or unless they cycle between the same set of questions. Actually, that would make the most sense. Yet more dead giveaway foreshadowing on page 99. I really like it; Snicket’s literary technique is quite effective. One is slightly jealous that he got to it first. Page 101 contains the famous implication by Lemony that the sugar bowl contains the evidence that will exonerate him, or rather, prove Olaf’s guilt. Much has been discussed over how something small enough to fit in a sugar bowl (or indeed, as Hermes suggests, a sugar bowl itself) could be so effective, but the query is not neutralised by the hype of later books. I would note, however, that the object is not so much hidden in the tea set, but rather, as we see later in the book, that the sugar bowl is missing from the tea set. As for the ugly curtains and the clear assumption that Kit is alive: Just as relevant is the suggestion that Lemony expects to find the sugar bowl (for the sugar bowl it must be) at the Valley of Four Drafts. The letter is definitely rooted in the “Lemony is just behind the Baudelaires” line of thought, if that's the case, as he doesn’t even know that the sugar bowl had then been swept to Gorgonian Grotto, and from there found its way to the Hotel Denouement. |
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Post by cwm on Jul 2, 2009 9:15:16 GMT -5
Nah. Spent most of the time walking about getting sunburnt.
It may interest you that this book was the only one I could reach from my backpack whilst I was on the plane. In a tiny seat that was squashing me and giving me the universe's worst leg cramp. With no air conditioning. With nothing else to do. For 8 hours. It very nearly drove me clinically insane.
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Post by Dante on Jul 2, 2009 9:48:54 GMT -5
You could have read it again, cwm! AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN. Until you could recite it from memory! I do sympathise slightly. For various reasons, I frequently have to spend long periods of time sitting around doing absolutely nothing. I've managed to perfect a zen state in which my mind is completely blank, but eight hours with leg cramp would pretty much kill me, too.
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Oh, one last note about Chapter Five. The reference to ugly curtains in Hotel Denouement strikes me as a bit of a bad first impression… Even way back here, I wasn’t sure that the hotel was going to be an especially nice place.
~Chapter Six~
This chapter is three times longer than the preceding one. In later books, chapters overwhelmingly tend to be around the same length.
There’s a passage implying that Dr. Orwell’s office and Esmé’s THH purse are meant to resemble the V.F.D. insignia, which seems difficult if not impossible; I think that this is just meant to refer to the symbol of the eye in general, rather than the more stylised form… despite the fact that the passage almost certainly does mean the stylised form. Notice that it says the Baudelaires saw the eye “at” the office of an evil hypnotist, rather than “on,” say; it sounds more like they’d have seen it inside, that way.
Olaf’s ridiculous insistence on Sunny cooking a hot meal when she has no means of producing fire reminds me of Olaf expecting the Baudelaires to somehow know in TBB that he wanted roast beef for dinner. I think there’s a sort of, “If they’re so smart, they’ll figure it out” trend there, and he’s disappointed when the Baudelaires fail to meet that expectation.
Notice that the harpoon gun, or a harpoon gun, is in Olaf’s trunk.
Re: The hook-handed man’s dream about sneezing without covering his nose and mouth: How would he cover his nose and mouth, anyway? He has hooks for hands.
“It’s not in to burn down a headquarters without wearing a fashionable outfit” should be a lesson not to take Esmé’s proclamations on fashion too seriously.
The troupe’s portrayal here is very comic – I don’t just mean this in a detached way, I genuinely find it quite funny. I see this as a bit of a light-hearted scene – as opposed to, say, Chapter Ten of TGG.
Notice that the B snowsuit also bears the V.F.D. insignia, so it’s not just (presumably) Beatrice’s, it’s V.F.D.-issue. And not from too long ago, for that matter, or would it still fit? Actually, that depends on Esmé’s thoroughly ambiguous age.
“One of the white-faced women glanced at Sunny and gave her a small smile” – there are a few short clues this chapter that the white-faced women’s hearts are thawing. One wonders what prompted this. Memories of their own late sibling, perhaps?
It’s relevant that Olaf only really flips out when someone asks for sugar – which of course he cannot provide, as he does not have the sugar bowl. If Olaf hadn’t flipped, the troupe might still have eaten the full breakfast, although not without some complaints. Also, “raw toast,” honestly.
The composition of page 121 is perfect, as it teases in the introduction of the sinister duo – as I call them – right at the end and has no sentences that cross multiple pages. It’s quite excellent and I can’t believe it was accidental.
The sinister duo’s aura of menace is supposed to be completely unmistakable, although this doesn’t seem to be true in TPP. Also, this is my favourite character introduction in the series, and part of the reason I think so highly of TSS; they take a comic scene and make it utterly chilling. Even when they refer to finger puppets, it’s rather sinister.
The toboggan has a V.F.D. insignia, but I’m assuming that the sinister duo brought it with them as opposed to stealing it from the headquarters; it seems they came well-prepared, having been wearing their fire-proof suits, and thus been engaged in burning down the headquarters, for nearly a month.
“The entire headquarters were deserted. It was as if they knew we were coming.” Possibly the volunteers had used the eagles to spy out the sinister duo’s approach, and it says something about this pair that the whole headquarters cleared out in fear of them. Alternatively – well, what? Possibly volunteers are so thin on the ground right now that the headquarters had been abandoned for a long time anyway due to lack of staff. It just wasn’t feasible, or safe.
Oh, and I see that the figurine at Caligari Carnival with important evidence inside had already been sold there; the sinister duo just wanted to burn down the carnival to wipe out any trail, I guess.
I also quite like Handler’s approach to cigarettes here – Esmé loves them purely for how fashionable they are, and freely admits to not liking the smell nor the taste, and thinks they’re very bad for you. Other books might be patronising about it, but by brushing this aside so hastily and not even using real cigarettes, this manages to get what is essentially an anti-cigarette measure across without being patronising at all, I think.
Olaf doesn’t even want his own troupe to know the secrets of the Snicket File, so how much does the troupe know? About anything? As I said earlier, I’m sure those members of the troupe who’ve been with Olaf a long time have picked up something, but apparently Olaf feels they have no right to that information.
“If they’re friends of Count Olaf’s… how bad could they be?” Kevin, you’re an idiot.
~Chapter Seven~
I’m not entirely sure about the logistics of the cave chimney leading directly up into the very centre of the Valley of Four Drafts.
Mature attitude to cigarettes portrayed again, I think. Handler doesn’t lay it on strong. He doesn’t need to.
Quigley having a notebook with a coloured cover in the pocket of his sweater is another major TAA callback – I’m starting to think that this may be the sole reason Carmelita was brought back, actually. Was Quigley’s interest in cartography mentioned in previous books? I’m not sure, although I don’t think it was. Probably best that Handler didn’t come up with a skill before now, though, as he might have written himself into a corner if he’d said Quigley was an adept movie critic.
Why and how would a newspaper article have details of the secret passageway here (the small area used for sled and snowsuit storage)?
Notice that the Vernacularly Fastened Door device fits over the doorknob. It seems like it should be smaller than the impression the chapter illustration gives.
As I said earlier, I think the fact that the coded phrases change every season merely indicates a seasonal cycle – only four sets of phrases repeated each year.
Also, this scene was clearly used for reference when composing the Vernacularly Fastened Door sequence in TPP, as the description is entirely consistent in every fashion.
It’s astonishing that the precise wording Klaus chose is also that used as the coded phrase here… unless the Baudelaire mother thought Klaus might someday have use of it, and specifically drilled the right words into him.
And indeed, the sweatered scout knows that the Baudelaires’ telegram never arrived, despite the fact that he shouldn’t know anything about this, and that it did arrive. Best just to overlook this one, I think – it’s only meant to give the impression that this individual knows a great number of secrets and is more knowledgeable about the mysteries of this world than the Baudelaires are. Mr. Poe ignoring the telegram is practically the same as the telegram never arriving, anyway, and also suits the chopping down of the telegraph pole (even if this is contradictory, etc.).
Unless the kitchens of the V.F.D. headquarters were built right up against the mountain wall, why would the secret passageway just look like part of the mountainside? I suspect this is more a matter of specific interior decoration, though.
So Quigley Quagmire is the survivor of the fire. What exactly is the relevance of the page thirteen photograph to its caption, then? (The magical caption which, you may recall, swaps between above and below the photograph pretty much every book.)
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Post by Hermes on Jul 2, 2009 9:49:31 GMT -5
That is a big problem, yes. However, V.F.D. is fragmented, and we know from TGG that it's become increasingly difficult for them to communicate with one another. One enormous misunderstanding doesn't seem too impossible - contrived, certainly, but contrivances may be yet another thing we have little right to complain about... My worry is that according to TUA, sugar bowls are a fairly regular part of VFD equipment - so no volunteer, on hearing 'sugar bowl', should just assume that it's the same one they are interested in. (Esme may not have been a volunteer, so one can allow some confusion on her part.) (By the way, there's also a reference to multiple sugar bowls in The Puzzling Puzzles - which I realise is not canon, as it contains movie references, but may still be interesting.) Are you assuming it's very cold only at midwinter? I don't think that has to be true; I think in some places it stays very cold for six months - and especially so, no doubt, in mountainous areas. Well, 'Bruce Spats' just sounds wrong to me; one hopes his parents would not give him such a name. But some parents are cruel. We later hear that the bad side got them at the time of the schism. Presumably the MWBBNH and the WWHBNB had them before they came to Olaf. Not so far as I've noticed. (But volunteers often make radical leaps of judgement and get it right; Duncan and Isadora did so before, and the Captain and Fiona will do so later.) I wonder if there are any real (fully initiated) young volunteers by now, apart from the two recruited by Kit (if they're still canonical). After all, both the Baudelaires and the Quagmires kept their children from knowing about VFD, even while giving them relevant skills - this may have become the common practice. It's missing from one tea set (Esme's). It may be hidden in another tea set (the one used at headquarters, if your general reading of the passage is right). Although L clearly does know how his story is going to unfold, since he's already referred to the Baudelaires coming down the mountain after learning Verbal Fridge Dialogue. So this letter, at least if read in the most straightforward way, is inconsistent with earlier passages about sugar bowls; it's inconsistent with later pasages about sugar bowls; and it's inconsistent with everything else L says about the dating of his research. Do you think it might have been inserted by a villain in the publisher's office? I think there’s a sort of, “If they’re so smart, they’ll figure it out” trend there, and he’s disappointed when the Baudelaires fail to meet that expectation. Quite often they do, of course. Later Sunny does manage a hot meal. Though if he did have the SB, it's still not clear he would be able to provide sugar, since it's not clear that's what it contains. (And in this book the SB does not seem to be so important to Olaf, as opposed to Esme.) May I borrow that? Writing their initials every time is a strain. I think the eagles were already on the bad side. Clearly at least one volunteer was still there (to throw the sugar bowl, etc.). But given we're told the VFDiversion had not been used for a long time, I suspect that the headquarters had long since ceased to be the hub of activity it once was - there was probably just a skeleton staff there. I didn't read it that way; I think 'sold' can just mean 'exposed for sale.' If you want to make sense of it, that would work. I just see it as surrealism myself - if 'Who discovered gravity?' has a precise answer, available to all well-read people, why shouldn't 'What is the central theme of Anna Karenina?' I suspect that Handler has confused the unread telegram with the cutting of the wires; but if we like we can ascribe the confusion to the characters. (Doesn't explain how Q knows, to be sure.) Well, the relevance of the photograph is rather remote anyway, even if a Baudelaire parent was the survivor; it doesn't show them at, or near, the time of the fire. But I wonder if the Snickets themselves, when they compiled the file, may have misunderstood some piece of evidence, and thought it referred to the Baudelaires when in fact it did not. |
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Post by Dante on Jul 2, 2009 12:11:41 GMT -5
My worry is that according to TUA, sugar bowls are a fairly regular part of VFD equipment - so no volunteer, on hearing 'sugar bowl', should just assume that it's the same one they are interested in. They get caught up in the hype? I just want the blasted thing to work. I may have to peruse TPPuzzles again - depends whether the reference was in the original movie edition or the updated non-movie edition (the one with an introduction by R.). I'm not the one trying to figure out when the fictional seasonal variation takes place, I'm just throwing it out there. I think the point still stands. No matter how long winter lasts - and it must have a beginning and an end or there'd be no point to False Spring at all - then one would assume False Spring happens not too near either the beginning or the end as it's very cold on either side. Perhaps it came to be considered bad practice after the (a) schism (around the same time the whole tattooing business came under renewed scrutiny). My initial theory was that it could be a historical artifact inserted into the narrative for the sake of keeping the readers informed, but then I realised that Lemony refers to the writing of TSS and the hiding of the letter in its place within the letter itself, so obviously that couldn't be true. I remain uninterested in unreliable narrators for the series, though. I'm prepared to just overlook the problems and take it at face value, because that's probably how it was intended. I think the mere idea of a sugar bowl would be enough to cause strain. I don't believe that the sugar bowl contains sugar as well as valuable evidence, unless said evidence or magical item happens to be particularly small. Have I mentioned yet that there's a Thunderbirds episode in which a listening device is hidden inside a sugar cube in a sugar bowl? (Probably. I've been a member of this forum for about five years, it's bound to have come up.) Be my guest. I consider it a perfectly serviceable fan nickname. Actually, yes, they would be, as the sinister duo have perfectly-positioned pads on their shoulders which evil eagles can grab. They still managed to clear out awfully quietly, though. And for that matter, we're not entirely sure what route the sinister duo took to the headquarters - mountain-climbing, eagle-riding? Maybe there's a mole in the villains' camp. Both sides probably have undercover members of the other sides, just to make things even more confusing. I've dismissed far too many things as being "just humour" to complain about such a response. |
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Post by cwm on Jul 2, 2009 14:27:33 GMT -5
Oh, I did read it. Again and again. Why else do you think I nearly went insane?
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Post by Hermes on Jul 2, 2009 15:18:48 GMT -5
I may have to peruse TPPuzzles again - depends whether the reference was in the original movie edition or the updated non-movie edition (the one with an introduction by R.). I think the version I have must be the original - it doesn't have an introduction. (I'm interested to know what the introduction contains.) The puzzle is one in which one has to decide which files to take from Count Olaf's house; one is advised to take a file on Sugar Bowls because they often contain valuable information. Though the recruitment manual in TUA clearly still envisages young recruits being taken; I think if this practice dropped out it must have been a bit later (and clearly it never stopped entirely, just became unusual, if we accept the recruitment of two orphans by Kit). I'm thinking that there's some evidence that Lemony himself is inclined to deceive himself about the survivor; note the bit in THH about the author weeping, and the end of TSS, where he seems confident that Bertrand is dead but says nothing about Beatrice. If that's so it may affect the content of the file as well. Edit: just in case it wasn't clear, the 'inserted by a villain' thing was an expression of frustration, not a serious proposal. |
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Post by C. on Jul 2, 2009 21:14:35 GMT -5
I'll start on this tomorrow, but incidentally, some buyers of TCC were lucky enough to get a promo item - a foldable piece of card, or some such, with various words on it. Folded correctly, it would spell out the message, "Two will disappear and never be seen again." Or words to that effect; I don't have access to any images of it, and for that matter it's so rarely mentioned that I can barely remember the details of it. If anyone has a copy, it would be extremely helpful if you could scan it. At any rate, it's fairly obvious what it was referring to, but before and during TSS, what reactions might you have had to this clue? I remember this clue very well. There was a website which had the clue before it was done and I remember printing it out on paper to try to duplicate it without success. I have found this one on some obscure website, which was already finished. If I find the unfinished one, I'll post it.  |
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Post by Dante on Jul 3, 2009 4:24:50 GMT -5
I remember this clue very well. There was a website which had the clue before it was done and I remember printing it out on paper to try to duplicate it without success. I have found this one on some obscure website, which was already finished. If I find the unfinished one, I'll post it. The image as you're linking it doesn't work because of the trickery of the page it's from, but I've put it on my Photobucket. I couldn't find an unaltered one either, and while I recall a website which once had it, I think that website's been gone for a long time. Anyway:  Apparently the unaltered version also contained the words "red" and "herring." ~Chapter Eight~ Basically just a chapter’s worth of exposition. Apparently there was a shattering of glass in the Quagmire mansion when the fire started. This suggests to me that, much like the destruction of the Montgomery home, a flaming torch was thrown through one of the windows. A peculiarly effective flaming torch, but then again arson doesn’t seem too difficult in real life either. TPP has a more seemingly realistic presentation. For timeline purposes, the length of the tunnel could theoretically be extended with, say, regular rest stops and foodstores… for some reason I’m imagining railway tracks, like an abandoned subway system. But I think the suggestion must be that it’s about as long as the passageway between 667 Dark Avenue and the Baudelaire mansion. It still raises questions, though. Was the Quagmire mansion also out in the countryside – or on the edge of Tedia, perhaps? “I think everyone’s parents have secrets. You just have to know where to look for them.” In retrospect, it’s probably at this point, although it’s especially clear in TPP, that all this V.F.D. business is symbolic of something, although I’m not entirely sure what of. And we’ve already come up with a decent explanation for issues relating to the Quagmire estate being under Esmé’s care. Prufrock Prep. isn’t too far, but Quigley’s still gathering supplies, so let’s call that maybe a day or two of journeying? It also suggests that the school is north of the city… we can’t be clear on whether it’s outside the city boundaries or not, though, although of course Olaf’s smuggling operation of the Quagmire siblings makes it likely that it’s a little way away. I wonder which important file Jacques came to Dr. Montgomery’s house for. It could be anything, just as the evidence hidden in the carnival figurine could be anything. I’m not sure it’s meant to be anything in particular, although I can’t help but feel that the series would’ve been more interesting if the Baudelaires had stumbled upon some clues while living with Dr. Montgomery. But that’s the problem with V.F.D. being a late invention, and we can’t exactly ask for a rewrite of the whole series to be more consistent. Intriguing though it might be. I’ve suggested before that Young Beatrice is essentially a fan of aSoUE, and I think something similar applies to Quigley – he’s deduced that V.F.D. stands for Volunteer Fire Department in much the same manner that fans did (although we needed a full confirmation in The End to stop arguing about it). Violet makes the pertinent point that this doesn’t actually explain anything, though. The schism seems to have been very extreme if former colleagues could become enemies. Just what exactly could divide them so? There are various hints here and there – Olaf’s performance in the Building Committee transcript, an extremely dubious offhand remark in The End – but it seems to me that some sort of philosophical disagreement would be necessary to divide opinion so strongly. Except then half of them went around starting fires and being villainous, so I’m still not sure. It’s interesting to compare Quigley’s photograph in the chapter illustration to the TWW frontispiece. Sunny and Violet have changed positions relative to the changed angle of the photograph. Klaus is right where he should be, though. But it’s not a straight copy, although it would be neat if it was (but the camera angle would have been difficult to achieve). “He wanted to find you before it was too late.” “Too late for what?” Do we know what this referred to? I assume that “too late” here means “before they are killed for their parents’ fortune,” or something like that, as it’s not as though the Baudelaires possess any climactic knowledge or had the location of the sugar bowl hidden in a nursery rhyme their parents sang or something. Which’d be a bit more clichéd. Now, has it been suggested that, while Lemony was doing a slower and more thorough investigation, Jacques was zipping from location to location as fast as he could to find the Baudelaires? Or was he in Paltryville on unrelated business – say, investigating the death of Dr. Orwell as per his letter in the U.A.? Quigley was at Dr. Montgomery’s house for “weeks and weeks,” which is why he must’ve arrived only shortly after TRR – or TAA lasted quite a lot longer than it appeared. I think there’s scope for that, although I don’t remember very well. We were told in the U.A. that Dr. Montgomery’s library had been destroyed, but here we learn more of the circumstances. What kind of notes did Jacques just leave lying around in Dr. Orwell’s abandoned office that they could clue Quigley in on the existence of the V.F.D. headquarters? I wonder just when Quigley ran into the Snow Scouts? Probably when they’d already entered the Mortmain Mountains – he couldn’t keep his face uncovered, or Carmelita at the least would recognise him as a Quagmire triplet. Not that Quigley would be aware of this, but I’m sure the possibility would have occurred to him. How do you write a book with a hidden chapter? I suggest it was either encoded within other chapters, or hidden in the middle of a particularly long and boring chapter, much like the evidence concealed in copies of Ivan Lachrymose: Lake Explorer. What research could Isadora and Duncan do to learn that Quigley’s still alive? I’ve suggested that they may have many useful books, stacks of newspapers, and can perhaps hook up to telephone lines. They may learn of Quigley in some fashion – perhaps through an intercepted (or legitimately-received) Volunteer Factual Dispatch. Or perhaps he accidentally might show up in the background of a photograph in a newspaper. Depending on the timing of the schism… there was a time when Lemony and his associates could watch the volunteer eagles, trained to spot smoke from a very great distance. Despite later wording, I’m not so sure that division of the volunteer animals would’ve happened immediate at the schism – I think it would’ve been a longer process (particularly given that Bertrand and Beatrice apparently helped train the lions, according to the BBRE). ~Chapter Nine~ “Remember, the codes of V.F.D. are used by both sides of the schism.” In practice, though, I’m not sure we ever meet a double agent – J.S. seems like a wasted opportunity in that sense. Hmm. Climbing up the Vertical Flame Diversion and hearing Quigley’s story must have taken a good number of hours, as they started at midnight but it’s now between breakfast and lunchtime for Sunny. The white-faced women are really sticking up for Sunny; it’s partly because, I think, she’s actually proving a good cook, but even before she was cooking they were sympathetic. Maybe it’s because she’s an infant, or maybe, as I suggested before, she reminds them in some way of their lost sibling. “But we never complain… I try to be as accommodating as possible.” I wonder why the hook-handed man has parallels drawn to the Snow Scouts here. I think he shows some enthusiasm for their rituals later in the book, too. Just to confirm that the villains didn’t know there was one last safe place until after they read the Snicket file. It’s possible they might have known about Hotel Denouement, though, but not as a V.F.D.-managed location. …Uh, despite the fact that the managers cover both sides of the schism. But the weird relationship between the Denouement siblings will have to wait until TPP. Why do Olaf and the sinister duo think that destroying all evidence of their crimes means that they’ll be able to commit crimes with impunity? With new crimes comes new evidence! “If she learned what we were up to, she’d never sleep again.” I can believe that the sinister duo’s plans are wicked, but I’m not sure this ever comes quite to fruition. But then again, I guess conning the entirety of V.F.D. into a sham trial and then torching them all is pretty horrible. This is a better Violet invention than some we’ve seen recently. In TCC she just analysed and repaired, THH’s invention was very simplistic, and TVV’s were downright impossible. Of course, there’s something of a gap between the real C.M. Kornbluth and the fictional one, but the shared identity still stands. The real and fictional versions don’t need to exactly resemble one another. “Jacques told me that he was working closely with his two siblings on an important file.” This makes it sound like the Snicket file was still being compiled at the time of TRR-TAA, which accords with it being… about the Baudelaire… fire… Hold on. Let’s say Jacques was still writing the Snicket file at the time he met Quigley, as indicated by this line. Now let’s suggest that the Snicket file’s last page really does refer to the Quagmire fire. “Because of the evidence discussed on page nine, experts now suspect that there may in fact be one survivor of the fire, but the survivor’s whereabouts are unknown.” This doesn’t sync. Jacques wouldn’t write this. He personally knows for certain both that there is a survivor of the Quagmire fire and that survivor’s location because he was standing next to him talking to him. It’s also been pointed out that Duncan and Isadora would technically have been survivors of the Quagmire fire. They were in the house when it started. “Like an envelope, a hollow figurine, and a coffin, a refrigerator can hold all sorts of things” – the collocation of hollow figurine with coffin reminds me of the conclusion of the U.A., with the coffin-carrying truck adventuring all over the place. |
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Post by Hermes on Jul 3, 2009 13:58:22 GMT -5
~Chapter Eight~ It also suggests that the school is north of the city Because Monty's house is to the north? That would turn on the accuracy of the map in TUA, of course, which I think some have doubted. Well, in TVV Jacques says 'thank heavens you are still alive'. I thought this a bit odd at the time, since Olaf had not shown any particular desire to kill them, but I guess there was always a risk of that happening. The length of time TAA takes is left very unclear. I hold to the view that it was several weeks, taking 'half-semester' to mean what it would normally mean. But that's disputed, of course. It seems to me that all this rather spoils the concept of a self-sustaining hot-air mobile home, the attraction of which is precisely that it doesn't have to have contact with the outside world; but I guess this is going to be spoiled sooner or later anyway, since we know that the people in the SSHAMH sent a message to Quigley and Kit later on. I really don't like the idea of them getting a VFDispatch, though - that would imply Hector is a full member of VFD, in which case his behaviour in TVV is very dubious. Ah - thanks; I knew there was a problem of some kind here, but I couldn't put my finger on it. With the dating of the schism most people assumed at this point - something like 15-20 years ago - it isn't a problem. With the TPP dating, it is. So, in retrospect, I guess we have to say the division of animals didn't happen immediately, and indeed the words of the sinister duo are vague enough to allow this. And he calls Bruce 'Uncle Bruce'. Among others, perhaps (as it was initially introduced as 'the file on the Snicket fires'). Hm. Well really, of course, it's a slip - I think when Handler first thought up the file he didn't think of it as being made by the Snickets. But let's see - I think we later learn that even though J and his siblings were 'working closely' on the file, they hadn't actually met for many years. (Also that J and K weren't sure L was alive, but let that pass.) So it may be that the last page was written by one of the other siblings and J never saw it. Chapter 11. Who left the message in the fridge, and for whom? It seems that it must have been left after the fire, both because the Dill is still Very Fresh, and because the code with the olives only works if we are still within the week the message was left. (In fact, it can't really have been left earlier than yesterday, since if it had been left before that 'Thursday' would refer to yesterday.) On the other hand, we know from the next chapter that the sugar bowl was thrown into the stream at the beginning of the fire. Clearly at least one volunteer is still hanging round the neighbourhood. I think the bit here about VFD training is very important. Duncan and Isadora had VFD skills, which led to the suspicion that they were already members; but in fact Q has VFD skills as well, and so do the Baudelaires; they were trained for it without realising. They are not members - except in so far as anyone who has the skills and commits themselves to the cause is a member. From now on, the Baudelaires and Q will be referred to as volunteers; and in TPP we will discover that Jerome, Justice Strauss and Hal (and probably Charles as well, though that's less explicit) are also volunteers despite not having been formally recruited. 'The message can't be for Jacques Snicket. He's dead.' 'Perhaps whoever wrote this message doesn't know that.' This remark is perfectly sensible - J has only been dead for about a week, and his death was intially reported as that of Count Omar - but seems to be forgotten later. Nevertheless one might suspect that the message is not for Jacques, because along with the code, instructions for decoding it seem to have been carefully placed, suggesting that it's not for a practiced VFD member. 'Safe at sea', I think, does not refer to the last safe place, as Lemony later seems to think (unless, as has just struck me, he means something else; but that will have to wait till chapter 13) - but to the place where the sugar bowl will end up - the Gorgonian Grotto. This is supported by the fact that 'sugar bowl' is written on the page of Swinburne, and also, I think, by something Dewey says in TPP. 'Count Olaf loves Esme Squalor'. Does he? My sense is that he never really loved anyone but Kit. 'We'll fight fire with fire'. Is this the first time the phrase is used? Klaus is here using in in a sensible way - using villainous tactics to combat villainy - while later it seems that Olaf and friends use it in a rather different way. I am getting more and more worried about the Baudelaires' sleeping patterns. After various sleepless nights at the village and the hospital, they did in fact sleep, though not well , on the two nights they spent at the carnival. But now they have two sleepless nights on the mountain, one climbing and one digging, and they will have more in the next two books. In TUA someone - I think the duchess - said that if people are kept up all night 'the sugar bowl secret may slip their minds entirely'. Is this why people are so confused about it in the series? |
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Post by Dante on Jul 3, 2009 16:13:13 GMT -5
Oh Hermes, I think I meant to go look up my copy of the updated PPuzzles and relate details of the introduction. I'll try and remember to do so tomorrow. There were also several new puzzles, but I think they might've been spread throughout... I know we had a thread on all this but it's become actually quite hard to dig many of them up. Because Monty's house is to the north? That would turn on the accuracy of the map in TUA, of course, which I think some have doubted. Okay, how about for "north" you read "in roughly the same direction as Monty's house"? As in, not on the opposite side of the city. As you say, it's unclear, but I feel that there aren't really enough deictic markers in TAA to show the passing of several weeks. It feels maybe slightly longer than the week or so the Baudelaires spend with their guardians on average before Olaf turns up, and once he does you can measure the number of days S.O.R.E. takes. "Half-semester" can indicate anything from six weeks to three months, for that matter, so we can't even be entirely sure what standards that's judged by. I don't think it unreasonable that - since there is evidently some form of contact with the self-sustaining hot air mobile home, as seen in TPP - any volunteers who considered them to be useful allies might send them a VFDispatch. They're certainly drawn into volunteer business in TPP, since they're expected by Kit to turn up at the hotel by the end. Indeed. Were it not for Fernald's probable ocean-borne upbringing I'd tag him as a former Snow Scout. Among others, perhaps (as it was initially introduced as 'the file on the Snicket fires'). That seems an awful lot of slips and contradictions to be certain of a resolution that never really made sense. I think Handler just tied the plotline off as best he could in favour of his new and improved McGuffin, the sugar bowl. Olaf/Kit, as far as I'm concerned, was invented for The End and has little relevance outside it. Ditching Esmé was little more than the tying off of loose ends. As for Olaf/Esmé, permit me to consult Chapter Twelve of TCC: --- Count Olaf and Esmé Squalor were standing together in the doorway of the tent, with their arms around one another, looking tired but happy, as if they were two parents coming home after a long day at work, instead of a vicious villain and his scheming girlfriend coming into a fortune-teller’s tent after an afternoon of violence. Esmé Squalor was clutching a small bouquet of ivy her boyfriend had apparently given her... --- That's outright positive. |
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Post by Hermes on Jul 4, 2009 13:02:08 GMT -5
"Half-semester" can indicate anything from six weeks to three months, for that matter, so we can't even be entirely sure what standards that's judged by. If there were no breaks at all, it would be three months; clearly there are breaks, though, otherwise Carmelita wouldn't be able to get to the mountains. But yes, the possibilities are fairly broad; but at least it should be more than a few days. Within the book, the significant point is that they had been there long enough to lose count of the days before Genghis arrived. Since this is one of our few chances to get the whole series to last more than a month or so, I'm going to embrace it. I had supposed that a VFDispatch required a telegraph machine connected to the VFD network (not a physical network, since we know they use regular wires, but a set of linked addresses and perhaps a coding system). Otherwise it wouldn't differ from a simple telegram. I'll have to check the passage again. Fernald was already a teenager when his mother married the Captain - and even then I take it he had holidays. I don't think his having been a Snow Scout is at all improbable. Hmph. Well, I still think the 'survivor of the fire' plotline was always meant to go roughly where it did go. It's true that the details don't quite fit together, but this book is full of details which don't quite fit together, not just in bits involving Quigley. Well, yes, but surely we can try to make sense of the series as a whole, hard though this sometimes is. I agree that at this point Handler hadn't thought of Olaf/Kit - indeed he hadn't really created the character of Kit. On the other hand I think it does in fact fit in with the developing theme of the last few books that villains do not just do terrible things because they are terrible people - it gives Olaf more of a human background which helps to explain how he was first driven to do these things. I'll grant, though, that there is a real tenderness between O and E; so perhaps he would have given up Sunny in exchange for her. I would now comment on chapter 12, had not my copy of TSS mysteriously disappeared. |
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