Count Olaf is an ORPHAN??

[~ali@yH~]

[glow=red,2,300]I'm sorry if this has aleady been posted but in TPP on pg225 "The second phrase is the weapon that left you an orphan,Olaf,"[/glow]If Count Olaf was rele an orphan what was the weapon and does it give any clues to why he is an orphan. Were his parents members of V.F.D.?

[Dante]

Perhaps you weren't paying full attention to some of the later few chapters? Page 308 in particular.

"It was a performance of La Forza del Destino. Your mother was wearing a red shawl, with long feathers along the edges. During intermission I followed them to the snack bar and slipped them a box of poison darts before Esmé Squalor could catch me."

p8-9

Count Olaf ... gave all three Baudelaires a smile that made them shudder. "I guess the sub-sub-librarian hasn't told you the story about your parents," he sad, "and a box of poison darts. Why don't you ask him, orphans? Why don't you ask this legendary librarian about that fateful evening at the opera?"

p211

Sunny took a sip of tea... "Mama and Poppa," she said hesitantly, "and poison darts?"

p270

"Tell me what the weapon is that left you an orphan, and I'll type it in for you."
Count Olaf gave Klaus a slow smile that made the Baudelaires shudder. "Certainly I'll tell you," he said. "It was poison darts."

p308

I'm moving this to GLooms, although I think there might already be a thread on this. I'll check soon.

[mat]

The real question is why? Duty? Revenge? Had Beatrice died before this?

[Grace]

The world may never know. Especially since we have NO IDEA WHO THE BAUDELAIRE'S MOM IS. And we're running out of options.

I'm betting on duty, but it wasn't as if they didn't enjoy doing it. O is certainly not their favorite person. I'm guessing O was at a youngish age, that's why he's bitter and evil, after all, as therapists say, a bad childhood makes a bad adulthood, man.

[Hooky]

Maybe the same sort of things happened to him at that age that have happened to the Baudelaires. What I mean is, maybe Olaf had an unfortunate childhood too.

[TopHat]

if Olaf was an Orphan couldn't this mean he doesn't have any brother and sisters because it didn't say it left oyu and your siblings.

[Antenora]

And Dewey probably would have known about any siblings of Olaf's, especially if they were, as I rather suspect, the man with a beard and the woman with no beard. However, maybe he just didn't see fit to mention them.

[TopHat]

Correct. It's all speculation at the moment. May Handler tell us in Book the thirteenth.

[vksbaudelaire]

"It was a performance of La Forza del Destino. Your mother was wearing a red shawl, with long feathers along the edges. During intermission I followed them to the snack bar and slipped them a box of poison darts before Esmé Squalor could catch me."

Could Esma' Squalor have been Count Olaf's Girlfriend before the Baudelaires since all the way back then? Or did they just know each other?

[Dante]

Esmé and Olaf knew each other long before the events of TEE - he was her acting teacher. I think that they were probably a couple even then - although we don't know how long ago this particular event happened; I think the book was ambiguous as to whether Sunny had been born by then or not, although I think it was implied that she had been. At the very least, I expect they were associates.

[Antenora]

If this murder happened recently, Olaf's parents must have been quite old, and Olaf might well have been too old to be considered an "orphan", as the word is usually defined as a child who has lost their parents. Then again, the timeline's so confused that we have to make compromises in all sorts of places, and fill in gaps ourselves.

[Brian]

I don't recall - had Sunny been alive during the Baudelaire parents' "A Night at the Opera?" (Scaramouche, scaramoche, will you do the fandango...Sorry.) If so, it would have happened fairly recently. I only have the audiobook, so it's more difficult for me to look these things up.

[Sugary Snicket]

hmmm...... I'm not quite sure. All I know is that when I first read the mentioning of Olaf's orphaned status, I looked like this for a half-hour straight:

[Dante]

The book wasn't specific about whether Sunny was alive or not. It's not stated that she wasn't, whereas it usually would be stated if she hadn't been around at the time - and Sunny remembers what the poster looked like, although if the Baudelaires had it up on their wall somewhere rather than stored away, then that would explain it. But it's basically left open, and probably intentionally, unless there's something I've forgotten.

[Hanna Squalor]

I think that Olaf was older I mean he can't be much younger than the Baudelaire parents. think of it like this: If Olaf is about 40-45 then the parents of the Baudelaire's must be about them same age considering their children. So Olaf had to be old enough to live on his own at the time. Not to mention if my theory on age is correct Esme Squalor would have been a lot younger. 10 to 15 if Olaf was in his 20s or 30s......