Post by Optimism is my Phil-osophy on Aug 2, 2019 11:41:36 GMT -5
I was analyzing the old commonplace book of a volunteer from my country called C. Wisely the commonplace book had a cover in disguise. She is actually the owner of @virtualfindignsdocumented, in Tumblr, and currently I would say she is the owner of greatest commonplace book on the planet. C. showed me a note she made when she was younger involving the mystery of the sugar bowl.
The note was about Chapter 8 of TGG.:
"And a small, ceramic bowl, with a tight-fitting lid to keep something important inside, might be difficult to find in the laundry room of an enormous hotel, particularly if there were a terrible villain nearby, making you feel nervous and distracted. "
The question is, what was Lemony talking about? We know none of the sugar bowls came to rest in the laundry room at Hotel D.
Was Lemony lying in this passage? We talked about this possibility. But we can't think of a concrete reason for Lemony to lie about it. Lemony may be an unreliable narrator, however I learned in my literature classes that lies are not told without reason, even when it comes to unreliable narrators. I talked to @snicketsleuth about this, and he showed me an interview with Daniel Handler where it became apparent that the author is very concerned about leaving no holes in his work.
This means that Daniel Handler does not use the excuse of "Lemony is an unreliable narrator" to justify errors in his narrative.
snicketsleuth.tumblr.com/post/143061305220/hi-in-a-recent-post-you-said-that-daniel-handler
In fact, I bet that every lie that exists in ASOUE is well planned and justified in the author's mind. So if there is no reason to lie, and there are no errors of continuity, then the quoted passage must be regarded as truth.
C. presented me with a good theory. She explained that the laundry room to which Lemony refers could be another laundry room of another hotel. This means that the sugar bowl in this quote would also be another sugar bowl. So the theory I am presenting now is not entirely my own. I don't know where C. heard this theory, and maybe it was she who thought about it a long time ago. I just made sure that this theory makes perfect sense.
In TPP there are some very important laundry remarks, which show that this conclusion is the right one.
TPp Chapter 2:
"The Hotel Preludio is a lovely place, "Kit said," but the Hotel Denouement is more than that. For years, it's been a place where our volunteers can gather to exchange information, discuss plans to defeat our enemies, and return books we've borrowed from one another. Before the schism, there were countless places that served such purposes. Bookstores and banks, restaurants and stationery stores, cafes and LAUNDROMATS, opium dens and geodesic domes-people of nobility and integrity could gather nearly everywhere."
TPP chapter 6:
That's the laundry room, you know," said Hal, squinting at Sunny through his glasses. "AS with MANY LAUNDRY ROOMS, there's a vent, which funnels the steam from all the washing machines to the outside, so the room doesn't overheat."
So, there is internal evidence of using laundry rooms to exchange information on VFD. And there is internal evidence that other hotels were used by VFD to exchange information, and other laundry rooms had the same shape as the Hotel D Laundry room. Also, the scene described by Lemony in TGG is slightly different from the scene that occurred as described in TPP.
In the scene described in TPP, a villain (Olaf) searches for the sugar bowl next to volunteers.
In TGG it was written that someone searched for a utensil (probably sugar bowl) in a laundry room next to a villain. In TPP it is described that a villain sought a sugar bowl near volunteers.
TPP chapter 12:
Count Olaf shouted, waving his harpoon gun in the air and stomping into the laundry room. In just a few moments, however, it was clear that the middle Baudelaire had spoken the truth. The laundry room of the Hotel Denouement was very small, just large enough to hold a few washing and drying machines, some piles of dirty sheets, and a few plastic jugs of what were presumably some extremely flammable chemicals, just as Dewey had said. A metal tube hung over one corner of the ceiling, allowing steam from the machines to float up the tube and outside, but there was no sign that a sugar bowl had fallen through the funnel and dropped out the metal tube to the wooden floor of the laundry room. With a hoarse, angry roar, Count Olaf opened the doors of the washing and drying machines and slammed them closed, and then picked up the piles of dirty sheets and sent them tumbling onto the floor. "Where is it?" he snarled, drops of spit flying from his furious mouth. "Where's the sugar bowl?" "It's a secret," Klaus said. "A secret that died with Dewey Denouement."
So it seems that what we see here is further evidence that my theory called "Daniel Handler duplicates events to confuse you" is correct.
At some point a volunteer known as Lemony, or Lemony himself, searched for a sugar bowl containing something important in the laundry room of a hotel. There was a villain nearby when it happened. The hotel in question may have been Hotel D itself, but in the past or future in relation to the events described in TPP. Or it could have been another hotel. The sugar bowl in question may or may not have been the same sugar that belonged to Esme. But we can say without a doubt that the scenes described in TGG and TPP about looking for a utensil in a laundry room are not the same scenes. Both are true, but they didn't happen at the same time (or in the unlikely event they happened at the same time, they didn't happen at the same place).
The note was about Chapter 8 of TGG.:
"And a small, ceramic bowl, with a tight-fitting lid to keep something important inside, might be difficult to find in the laundry room of an enormous hotel, particularly if there were a terrible villain nearby, making you feel nervous and distracted. "
The question is, what was Lemony talking about? We know none of the sugar bowls came to rest in the laundry room at Hotel D.
Was Lemony lying in this passage? We talked about this possibility. But we can't think of a concrete reason for Lemony to lie about it. Lemony may be an unreliable narrator, however I learned in my literature classes that lies are not told without reason, even when it comes to unreliable narrators. I talked to @snicketsleuth about this, and he showed me an interview with Daniel Handler where it became apparent that the author is very concerned about leaving no holes in his work.
This means that Daniel Handler does not use the excuse of "Lemony is an unreliable narrator" to justify errors in his narrative.
snicketsleuth.tumblr.com/post/143061305220/hi-in-a-recent-post-you-said-that-daniel-handler
In fact, I bet that every lie that exists in ASOUE is well planned and justified in the author's mind. So if there is no reason to lie, and there are no errors of continuity, then the quoted passage must be regarded as truth.
C. presented me with a good theory. She explained that the laundry room to which Lemony refers could be another laundry room of another hotel. This means that the sugar bowl in this quote would also be another sugar bowl. So the theory I am presenting now is not entirely my own. I don't know where C. heard this theory, and maybe it was she who thought about it a long time ago. I just made sure that this theory makes perfect sense.
In TPP there are some very important laundry remarks, which show that this conclusion is the right one.
TPp Chapter 2:
"The Hotel Preludio is a lovely place, "Kit said," but the Hotel Denouement is more than that. For years, it's been a place where our volunteers can gather to exchange information, discuss plans to defeat our enemies, and return books we've borrowed from one another. Before the schism, there were countless places that served such purposes. Bookstores and banks, restaurants and stationery stores, cafes and LAUNDROMATS, opium dens and geodesic domes-people of nobility and integrity could gather nearly everywhere."
TPP chapter 6:
That's the laundry room, you know," said Hal, squinting at Sunny through his glasses. "AS with MANY LAUNDRY ROOMS, there's a vent, which funnels the steam from all the washing machines to the outside, so the room doesn't overheat."
So, there is internal evidence of using laundry rooms to exchange information on VFD. And there is internal evidence that other hotels were used by VFD to exchange information, and other laundry rooms had the same shape as the Hotel D Laundry room. Also, the scene described by Lemony in TGG is slightly different from the scene that occurred as described in TPP.
In the scene described in TPP, a villain (Olaf) searches for the sugar bowl next to volunteers.
In TGG it was written that someone searched for a utensil (probably sugar bowl) in a laundry room next to a villain. In TPP it is described that a villain sought a sugar bowl near volunteers.
TPP chapter 12:
Count Olaf shouted, waving his harpoon gun in the air and stomping into the laundry room. In just a few moments, however, it was clear that the middle Baudelaire had spoken the truth. The laundry room of the Hotel Denouement was very small, just large enough to hold a few washing and drying machines, some piles of dirty sheets, and a few plastic jugs of what were presumably some extremely flammable chemicals, just as Dewey had said. A metal tube hung over one corner of the ceiling, allowing steam from the machines to float up the tube and outside, but there was no sign that a sugar bowl had fallen through the funnel and dropped out the metal tube to the wooden floor of the laundry room. With a hoarse, angry roar, Count Olaf opened the doors of the washing and drying machines and slammed them closed, and then picked up the piles of dirty sheets and sent them tumbling onto the floor. "Where is it?" he snarled, drops of spit flying from his furious mouth. "Where's the sugar bowl?" "It's a secret," Klaus said. "A secret that died with Dewey Denouement."
So it seems that what we see here is further evidence that my theory called "Daniel Handler duplicates events to confuse you" is correct.
At some point a volunteer known as Lemony, or Lemony himself, searched for a sugar bowl containing something important in the laundry room of a hotel. There was a villain nearby when it happened. The hotel in question may have been Hotel D itself, but in the past or future in relation to the events described in TPP. Or it could have been another hotel. The sugar bowl in question may or may not have been the same sugar that belonged to Esme. But we can say without a doubt that the scenes described in TGG and TPP about looking for a utensil in a laundry room are not the same scenes. Both are true, but they didn't happen at the same time (or in the unlikely event they happened at the same time, they didn't happen at the same place).
