Post by twigz on Apr 20, 2024 7:51:00 GMT -5
hbd to marlowe: once spyfaller, now spyfallen. and an actual snicketeer and not a miscellanous member !
Hermes paused and furrowed his brow. “For some reason, I can’t recall how it ends, though it was once one of my favourite books.”
“Age might be catching up with you,” klausfan1 suggested. roxy222 glared at him. “Sorry.”
As klausfan1 said “Sorry,” Anka and MisterM burst through the library’s double doors. “We lost Marlowe,” Anka admitted.
By this point, no one was surprised.
My conclusion is that I can see Olaf idly defending Trump on occasion, but not actually getting out to go vote for him - he's just not politically motivated enough.
Monologues, speeches, ramblings, rants - whatever you want to call it, Snicket's tendency to diverge from his narration and into extended discussions of common phrases, literature, and mysterious anecdotes has been a trademark feature of his writing; I can't imagine ASoUE working as well as it does without it. While usually not strictly relevant to the plot, these digressions elevate tension, layer atmosphere onto the proceedings, deepen our understanding of the characters' emotions, or sometimes simply serve as comic relief. I create this thread to open a discussion of our favorites of these frequent asides throughout the series.
The "anxious vs nervous" discussion at the start of The Ersatz Elevator was the first to come to mind: I refer back to this passage whenever I have trouble remembering the difference myself, which is not infrequent. His warnings about opening sentences in TMM makes me laugh - it also recalls his introduction to the McSweeney's Noisy Outlaws collection, where he gives several very sarcastic/satirical excerpts from "very dull books".
I'm also fond of ones that give away surreal details about the dangerous circumstances he finds himself in as he writes, like the stuff about hiding an orchestra or preparing for a difficult job interview. But one I've carried with me quite often is a passage in THH where LS reflects on how his life has felt like a dismal play by a cruel playwright. I love it when LS bluntly speaks on his past regrets and actions, and he gets so honest and personal talking about this here that it's almost hard to believe it's being written "in character".
But my favorite monologue would have to be the beginning of Chapter Seven in TPP; also a contender for my single favorite passage from from the entire series, one I think about almost daily. Just absolutely beautiful writing, pure Snicket. It feels like Snicket has been a bird following the Baudealires around with a vision narrowly zeroed in on them all this time, and here he's spreading his wings to fly out further into the sky as his perception of everything below him expands and expands.
Welcome, urbanletteropener! I think actually the board is expanding right now, though from a small base: certainly three notable members, Roxy herself, Baudelaiire and Marlowe, have joined us in the last few months.
tune in tomorrow for more gaming ghosts