|
|
Post by Charlie on May 11, 2012 19:00:51 GMT -5
So TBB Rare Edition got me thinking,
What if the Great Unknown was home to the Female Finnish Pirates? I mean in the TBBRE it says that the FFP may have come into contact with Violet the third time that she set out for Briny Beach, and at the end of TE she and her siblings are doing just that. Also at the end of Chapter Fourteen, the picture is of a question mark (The Great Unknown)
Discuss
|
|
|
|
Post by Kensicle on May 12, 2012 1:26:19 GMT -5
Great Unknown=Female Finnish Pirates submarine?
I've never thought about that, but it does fit in quite well by ASOUE standards.
|
|
|
|
Post by B. on May 12, 2012 2:20:50 GMT -5
Is it not implied in The Bad Beginning that Violet and her Siblings often took a trolley down to Briny Beach? This would mean that she has visited Briny Beach far more than three times by The End.
Not in the British edition. There was a misprint and we're missing three end illustrations and the picture for Chapter two. Has it been fixed in the British paperback form?
|
|
|
|
Post by Kensicle on May 12, 2012 2:48:46 GMT -5
For reference, here are TBB:RE notes, compiled by PJ. The relevant quote is this: Not in the British edition. There was a misprint and we're missing three end illustrations and the picture for Chapter two. Has it been fixed in the British paperback form? Here's the question mark:  |
|
|
|
Post by B. on May 12, 2012 2:58:31 GMT -5
Ah, thanks for that Kensicle.
|
|
|
|
Post by Dante on May 12, 2012 6:28:25 GMT -5
Is it not implied in The Bad Beginning that Violet and her Siblings often took a trolley down to Briny Beach? This would mean that she has visited Briny Beach far more than three times by The End. The references in the BBRE are generally interpreted as signifying visits within ASoUE itself, not all visits entirely, given that the reference to her second visit to Briny Beach clearly points to the event as related in TGG. Yes, it has been fixed. |
|
|
|
Post by Christmas Chief on May 12, 2012 7:02:47 GMT -5
So the FFP are something even Olaf scampers from? A sinister bunch, they must be. Unless, of course, no one knows who runs the operation of the Great Unknown. Or did you mean home to the FFP as well as others, with some other force doing the actual controlling? Not in the British edition. There was a misprint and we're missing three end illustrations and the picture for Chapter two. Has it been fixed in the British paperback form? The most oft-linked illustrations are the ones Antenora uploaded, although I'm sure you could find them elsewhere, if you've not seen them already. |
|
|
|
Post by B. on May 12, 2012 7:31:09 GMT -5
I have seen the images- the tidal wave one is on Brett Helquist's website I believe. I might just go ahead and buy the British paperback though, it'd be nice to have them as reference.
|
|
|
|
Post by Hermes on May 12, 2012 12:12:54 GMT -5
It seems to me that the picture at the end of The End is not the Great Unknown, the underwater being, but just a question-mark-shaped pattern in the waves - though of course it symbolises the same thing, the unknownness of life. Lemony is clear that he does not know what happened to the Baudelaires, which he would not say if they had definitely been swallowed by the GU.
As for the FFP, I wonder if that might have been, not a genuine prediction for The End, but a teaser for Handler's pirate novel, which he may at that tome have hoped would appear more quickly than it has done. The last time we heard about this there was a suggestion that the majority of the pirates would be female, though perhaps not Finnish.
|
|
|
|
Post by Dante on May 12, 2012 12:58:03 GMT -5
As for the FFP, I wonder if that might have been, not a genuine prediction for The End, but a teaser for Handler's pirate novel, which he may at that tome have hoped would appear more quickly than it has done. The last time we heard about this there was a suggestion that the majority of the pirates would be female, though perhaps not Finnish. An interesting theory. I can well imagine Handler having thought, around the time he was writing the BBRE (it came out at the same time as TSS, I think), that his plans for the final book might have extended to a return journey to land; indeed, by all accounts TPP also included a little more travel than it ultimately did. But at the same time, it does strike me as the kind of literary allusion Handler would make, an internal joke. Although he does point the reader to Book the Thirteenth. Well, the pirate novel is supposedly finally coming out this year, so maybe we will find out. I'll be disappointed if there isn't at least a passing reference to the F.F.P. I also agree that the illustrated question mark is metaphorical, but then again I think the Great Unknown is metaphorical as well, so I'm not sure if that changes whether it would be the entity itself in the picture or not. |
|
|
|
Post by Hermes on May 12, 2012 13:47:13 GMT -5
. Well, the pirate novel is supposedly finally coming out this year. It is??!! Well, it might be the shadow on the water's surface of the GU in the depths, I suppose. But what I mean is this: some people see the picture as having a direct plot-significance; they think it means the Baudelaires were swallowed by the GU. And then when Snicket said his new series would 'explore the other side of that question-mark' they took it to be referring to the GU, and that the series would tell us about it and its inhabitants. And it seems to me, by contrast, that all this is symbolic, and is about the unknownness of life, not about a submarine/monster. |
|
|
|
Post by Dante on May 12, 2012 14:54:49 GMT -5
Ah, my mistake; 2012 was on the cards for a while, it seems, but the most recent prediction puts it a couple of years from now (so nearer 2014). But it is finished! (Details in the Upcoming Books thread.) To be clear, I entirely agree with you. I think closing the series on a, not the, question mark is merely stating what we already know: That the future of the Baudelaires is a mystery, because their story is over, and we won't find out any more about them. And this is also true in TBL, when the Baudelaires are missing as well, with no clue even of the circumstances which saw them off. It's no longer any of our business, if you like. |
|
|
|
Post by Hermes on May 12, 2012 15:13:52 GMT -5
I was about to say 'It's finished now, but it won't be out till 2014?!'. And then I saw that the interviewer asked the same thing. And Handler's response was a bit weird - it explained why there had been a delay, but not why there was still one now. perhaps the pirates are trying to stop him publishing it.
|
|
|
|
Post by B. on May 12, 2012 15:25:03 GMT -5
And it seems to me, by contrast, that all this is symbolic, and is about the unknownness of life, not about a submarine/monster. I agree; the ending was best suited to ASoUE and I also hope there's never a continuum to the series, since that wouldn't feel right. But one has to wonder how Beatrice (Kit's daughter) is involved. If the Baudelaires didn't somehow die or get swallowed up then I wonder how they were separated from her. |
|
|
|
Post by Hermes on May 12, 2012 15:31:52 GMT -5
It seems clear from TBL that Beatrice (the boat) sank; I would suppose the separation happened then. What happened after that, though, is a mystery; perhaps they were drowned; perhaps they were swallowed by the GU; or perhaps they escaped and managed to swim or were carried to shore. If young B was, it's possible that the others were too
|
|
