Let's talk again about sugar bowls

[Optimism is my Phil-osophy]

At the moment, my research on Sugar Bowl is on the following point:



The item hidden inside Esmé's Sugar Bowl is likely to be the same item that was in a box under the power of Olaf and Esmé at the construction committee meeting. That meeting took place some time after Lemony's postponement / cancellation. At the time of Lemony's wedding cancellation, VFD was already using a sugar bowl (or perhaps several sugar bowls) for some purpose. I believe that the item carried by Olaf is the same contained in Esmé's sugar bowl at the time of the main events of ASOUE because both appear to be deadly, both fit in a small container. In addition, Esmé states that it was necessary to find a safe and beautiful container for the content that came to be inside her SB. By pointing out that the item needed to be placed in a safe container, she hints that the item would be dangerous in itself if the container were not appropriate. This same characteristic is demonstrated by the item under the power of Olaf at the construction committee meeting, as Olaf is asked to put the item back in the box, certainly so that the safe condition is restored. The box serves as a kind of containment box, and apparently the SB also serves as a type of containment box for the contents of Esme's SB at the time of the main ASOUE events. Thus, it is reasonable to believe that Esmé took the contents of that box and placed it in a sugar bowl, which she classified as safe and beautiful for that. (My particular opinion is that the content of that SB is something radioactive).



The question is: what was the previous use given to sugar bowls by VFD? I believe the answer lies in the construction committee meeting itself.



Note the excerpt below:



"LSTUA 40 and 41:

If they stay up all night bringing all of this material to a new headqarters ... if young people do not get enough sleep, their work is likely to suffer. Someone might, for example, forget crucial infomation regarding the exact location of the automobiles we use to store necessary files and convey messages, or they could forget the Sebald Code ... The sugar bowl secret could slip their minds entirely. This could lead to serious misunderstaings during coded comunication, and we can't afford that. "



According to R, who said those words, not sleeping properly could make you forget the sugar bowl secret. And if you forgot about it, you could cause confusion during code communications. Forgetting the secret of the sugar bowl secret would be a problem of the same nature as forgetting what the Sebald code looks like, or forgetting the positioning of vehicles used to transport messages. This phraseology indicates something simple: sugar bowls were used to pass information, transport information and / or store information. Note that there is a secret associated with this, and that this secret could be overlooked due to sleep restriction. Perhaps a detail in a sugar bowl or its placement indicated which sugar bowl was containing the crucial information. Forgetting what that detail was would make you lose information or even get the wrong information (that had been positioned there to deceive enemies). In any case, sugar bowls were used in code communication, there was some secret associated with this code communication and an error in that secret would lead to poor communication between those involved.



Lemony wrote to Kit in the TSS secret letter:



"I have at lest learned the whereabouts of the evidence that will exonerate me ... your suggestion, so many years ago at that picnic, that a tea set would be a handy place to hide anything important and small in the event of a dark day, has turned out to be correct. "



This is further evidence that VFD used the "tea set" to store information. Despite this, as Lemony wrote, the SB has proved useful not only for keeping information. But it also became useful for keeping anything important and small. Esmé evidently came to that same conclusion when she decided to use her SB to store a deadly weapon. What I find interesting is that Lemony said that SB would be especially useful in case of a dark day. I think that means that communication through SB's was used in extreme cases. Because it is not so frequent, this form of communication could easily have its details forgotten if the younger members did not have adequate nights of sleep.

[Dante]

A point, Jean Lucio: A container in which to secure something safely may indicate something dangerous, but it may also indicate something fragile. TGG p. 178 clarifies that the sugar bowl has a "tight-fitting lid"; a necessity if you want to keep anything in it while throwing it down rivers and so on, but this also implies that it's watertight, and that whatever is inside may be perishable or otherwise easy to damage.

It was generally agreed back in the day that the "classic" use for sugar bowls was probably for something along the lines of privately passing information or small objects during dinner parties or other meetings; consider how easy it would be to place something small inside a sugar bowl whilst seeming to take sugar, and for the other party to then retrieve it. Listening devices have also been proposed, which would allow coded communication to be potentially overheard but would also allow suspicious conversations to be recorded; it's easy to see how such a recording might incriminate a person who had set a lot of fires, for example, or more pertinently, to exonerate somebody who had not. Something like this I think is probably what is indicated by Lemony's statement on the subject in TSS. Notice also that Lemony, in the form of the TPP taxi driver, appears to have been the last known person to possess the sugar bowl; and that by the time of TBL, he has indeed been exonerated and can openly receive mail in his own name and work as a detective.

Information can also be dangerous, of course, and unlike human beings it's not so easy to destroy with a poisonous fungus. But I'm increasingly convinced that Handler's sugar bowl answer either changed at some point between TSS and TPP, or was never truly nailed down. At this point I think it's retroactively the ATWQ item, though "multiple sugar bowls confused for one" is probably the best explanation for what's going on during ASoUE.

[Optimism is my Phil-osophy]

Oct 12, 2020 1:31:20 GMT -5 Dante said:

A point, Jean Lucio: A container in which to secure something safely may indicate something dangerous, but it may also indicate something fragile. TGG p. 178 clarifies that the sugar bowl has a "tight-fitting lid"; a necessity if you want to keep anything in it while throwing it down rivers and so on, but this also implies that it's watertight, and that whatever is inside may be perishable or otherwise easy to damage.

It was generally agreed back in the day that the "classic" use for sugar bowls was probably for something along the lines of privately passing information or small objects during dinner parties or other meetings; consider how easy it would be to place something small inside a sugar bowl whilst seeming to take sugar, and for the other party to then retrieve it. Listening devices have also been proposed, which would allow coded communication to be potentially overheard but would also allow suspicious conversations to be recorded; it's easy to see how such a recording might incriminate a person who had set a lot of fires, for example, or more pertinently, to exonerate somebody who had not. Something like this I think is probably what is indicated by Lemony's statement on the subject in TSS. Notice also that Lemony, in the form of the TPP taxi driver, appears to have been the last known person to possess the sugar bowl; and that by the time of TBL, he has indeed been exonerated and can openly receive mail in his own name and work as a detective.

Information can also be dangerous, of course, and unlike human beings it's not so easy to destroy with a poisonous fungus. But I'm increasingly convinced that Handler's sugar bowl answer either changed at some point between TSS and TPP, or was never truly nailed down. At this point I think it's retroactively the ATWQ item, though "multiple sugar bowls confused for one" is probably the best explanation for what's going on during ASoUE.

I agree with you. There is still the possibility that some characters have incomplete information on the subject. Captain W acts as if the content of the SB is scandalous information. Although an object that is potentially deadly would also be an outrageous finding. 
Still, in TPP Esme seems to indicate that the SB's content was deadly to some people on some kind of mission. 



Furthermore, I want to reinforce my belief that Lemony was twice at Hotel D. Once during the main events described in ASOUE, where he most likely recovered the SB that was Esme's, and again during the time of writing TPP , when Lemony stated that the record of what happened to the Baudelaires at Hotel D was protected for years. It is evident to me that Daniel Handler had a very clear mental image, of Lemony arriving again at the Hotel D region. I deduce that this last time he recovered the information he needed to prove his innocence, which was also in an item of a tea set, probably an SB. In a way this is a restoration of the double SB theory, but both are separated by time and both have Lemony and Hotel D in common. I wonder if Hotel D that Lemony referred to in TSS's secret letter could be the secret library itself. If I'm not mistaken, Dewey referred to the secret library as the real Denouement. Would it be possible for an underwater hotel to have curtains? I think so, after all the underwater hotel would need to accurately reflect the hotel above the surface. The machinery for leaving the hotel under water without water inside the rooms was mentioned in TGG, so I think this is possible.


Now let's talk about the author's apparent intentions.



In TSS Lemony indicates in the secret letter that he believes that the content of the mysterious item contains information to clear him.



Let's assume that Daniel Handler in TPP decided to change the content to something dangerous, almost as dangerous as the deadly fungus MM. That would be a change in TPP, which would affect the course of history going forward. It would be very strange that when writing TBL Daniel Handler returned to believe that the content of the SB that belonged to Esmé was information that cleared Lemony. (After all, he wrote TBL after writing TPP).



So I don't think there is a clear indication that Daniel Handler has changed his mind. There is an indication that Lemony was acquitted. There is indication that during the writing of TPP Lemony was in the region of Hotel D. The Hotel above the surface was destroyed, but the hotel below the surface was intact. The hotel below the surface in the greenery is a library of the record of acts of perfidy. Evidently Lemony wanted to find the record of a perfidious act, which he believed was Count Olaf who caused the fires. Lemony wrote this letter to his sister, who he believed was alive. His sister knew about the secret library, and she knew that Dewey saw the secret library as the real Hotel D. So, it all fits together. Lemony went to the real Hotel D at the time of writing ASOUE. He even had to throw stones in the water as a sign. He was admitted to the real Hotel D and found the tea set item containing the information that cleared him.

I would like to point out that there is a passage in one of the final books (I don't remember which one) in which Lemony seems to indicate that ASOUE's writing time would be approximately 10 years, as he compares ASOUE's writing time with publications for 10 years of a poet. (Dante , can you help me find that passage?) So when he was writing TPP, Beatrice Jr was about 10 years old. After that he was acquitted and met with her, and then wrote TE.


Years earlier, he had recovered the SB that belonged to Esme.

Edit 1:
I found it in TPP chapter 6:

A taciturn writer, for instance, might produce only one short poem every ten years,

which is unlikely to annoy anyone, whereas someone who writes twelve or thirteen books in

a relatively short time is likely to find themselves hiding under the coffee table of a notorious

villain, holding his breath, hoping nobody at the cocktail party will notice the trembling

backgammon set, and wondering, as the ink stain spreads across the carpeting, if certain

literary exercises have been entirely worthwhile.



I had remembered this quote differently. Apparently the hypothetical writer to Lemony himself contrasts writes a short poem every ten years, while he wrote a sequence of books in a relatively short time. Still, the time of 10 years is used here, and it seems to me to be a good time for comparison, and that in fact fits in with the reality we know about when Lemony's meeting with Beatrice Jr. Lemony may be contrasting here a single decade writing 12 or 13 books with several decades spent by the hypothetical taciturn writer writing a poem every ten years. 


Edit 2 - 

Here is the quote I referred to about Dewey's point of view as to what the real Hotel D. TPP chapter 8 is:

"Exactly," Dewey said. "The truth has been right under everyone's noses, if anyone cared

to look past the surface. Volunteers and villains alike know that the last safe place is the

Hotel Denouement, but no one has ever questioned why the sign is written backward. They're

staying in the TNEMEUONED LETOH , while the real last safe place-the catalog-is hidden

safely at the bottom of the pond, in underwater rooms organized in a mirror image of the

hotel itself. Our enemies could burn the entire building to the ground, but the most important

secrets would be safe."

[tricky]

I always associated the sugar bowl as one of the many (culinary) code devices within the organisation, such as Verbal Fridge Dialogue, reinforcing the multiple sugar-bowl syndrome. It's easy to imagine the Baudelaire parents having guests over for dinner and sharing information casually via the tea set. Probably a very mundane addition to this thread, I apologise.

What also reminds me of code sharing is in the Netflix series - in the Masked Ball flashback scene, where "Olaf knows" is frantically transported around the ballroom, with different volunteers rushing and hushing back and forth to relay the message.

[Esmé's meme is meh]

No

[Dante]

Oct 13, 2020 19:02:54 GMT -5 Esmé's meme is meh said:

No

It's not really as good a joke if you aren't in early and the thread has been lying fallow for a few days. I would appreciate it in future if, where you don't feel able to contribute meaningfully, you let your silence speak for itself.

[R.]

Interesting point you make there, Optimism is my Phil-osophy , but there is no proof that the sugar bowl contains anything important at all. It is always referred to as the Sugar Bowl, with no mention of what is inside it, suggesting that the bowl itself is the important thing. During TPP, Esmé tells Dewey Denouement that the sugar bowl is hers, and it is quite possible that the sugar bowl is simply an object of great sentimental and or monetary value to her: perhaps a family heirloom. My personal theory is that it was stolen because Lemony Snicket took her protection of the bowl to mean that it was something of value to VFD. As the bowl was circulated, rumours began to spread about its contents, until everyone thought it was important. I also think that the object in the box was either a harpoon gun or a sample of the Medusoid Mycelium. This theory regarding the sugar bowl would also explain the contradicting hints about its context; Lemony thinks it contains evidence, Kit and Captain Widdershins think it contains a weapon of some kind, and Esmé knows it’s just a valuable but empty sugar bowl.

[Dante]

That's another one of the classic sugar bowl theories, although as a theory it's more a way of sidestepping the fact that the problem is unsolveable rather than necessarily a serious statement that it's what was intended. That version of events generally tends to get mooted in combination with a "multiple sugar bowls" theory, which is something indicated in the U.A.; that there's more than one important sugar bowl knocking about, but through rumour and ignorance then in the minds of many volunteers and villains the various pieces of sugar-bowl-related information have been conflated into a single bowl of overriding importance. The attraction of this point of view is that it's essentially a statement that what's in the sugar bowl doesn't matter; and indeed, in terms of how it shapes the narrative, what's in the sugar bowl doesn't matter, it only matters that everyone wants it. The Baudelaires have no idea what's inside, but they still chase after it as fervently as everyone else; who's to say that they're the only ones acting that way?

[Optimism is my Phil-osophy]

Please comment what you think of the new theory, "The Dark Day and the Sugar Bowl".

As Dante indicated, in the secret letter in TSS there is a clear indication that Kit Snicket was the originator of the idea that keeping something small and important in an SB would be a good idea. And anyway, it doesn't matter if the SB is in fact empty or not. What makes us lose sleep is not what is actually in the SB. That's what the hell each one thinks is in there. Kit and Dewey said that if the SB content could cause damage similar to the MM fungus. (Or something like that, as Dante has already corrected me). What the hell did they think was inside? And what did Captain W believe he had inside? And Esmé said that people died in order to get their hands on what was inside. She believed there was something in there (although she probably cared more about the container). But what did she believe was in there that according to her people died for it? That is the right question. And if they opened the SB and it happened that there was not what they thought was there ... It doesn't matter. Each one would continue looking for where the content of the SB was, because each one would think it was taken from there at some point by someone.

Notice the difference between Fiona and W. Fiona is fully aware that she doesn't know what's inside, because Captain W didn't want to tell you. But the captain says in all letters that the SB does not matter, but what is inside. He does believe that there is something important and dangerous in there. What does he have in mind anyway? Is it the same thing that everyone has in mind? In my cited theory, I think I managed to reconcile something that could combine all (or most) of the different points of view on the SB.