[bksvol-discuss] lemony Snicket releases 13 and final book
- From: "Shelley L. Rhodes" <juddysbuddy@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, <bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2006 00:22:25 -0400
Wouldn't it be great if the kids who are subscribers to this service could
get their mits on this book next week. I don't have the money or would be
buying it, is anyone game?
And by the by Lemony Snickett is actually Daniel Handler, see the below page
from NPR and enjoy the story and interview by the author.
Ironically perhaps, but the last book is titled THE END, smile.
This is a huge series and definitely a must for Bookshare.
From: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6259842
Lemony Snicket Reaches 'The End'
Listen to this story...
Morning Edition,
October 13, 2006 · Children across the country have been waiting anxiously
for Friday the 13th. They've been waiting for the release of The End by
Lemony
Snicket. It's the 13th and final book in A Series of Unfortunate Events.
The hugely popular series tells the story of the Baudelaire children, and
the many horrible things that happen to them as orphans.
Daniel Handler, the real author of the series, speaks with Steve Inskeep.
A Gruesome Guide to Lemony
A Series of Unfortunate Literary Allusions
by Melody Joy Kramer
The first Baudelaire book.
The Baudelaire orphans draw their name from another Baudelaire who had it
really, really bad -- the French poet who wrote The Flowers of Evil.
HarperCollins
NPR.org,
October 12, 2006 · A Series of Unfortunate Events is chock full of evil
henchmen, evil henchwomen, and harpooned victims. It also contains a series
of literary
allusions, which here means references to "authors, poets and famous people
who are now corpses." Even if you have an ocular tattoo stamped on your
ankle,
these references may have escaped your eyes the first time around.
The Good Guys:
The Baudelaire Orphans: They are named after the 19th-century French poet
Charles Baudelaire. Baudelaire is most famous for his morbid poetry
collection,
"Les Fleurs du mal" (The Flowers of Evil).
Baudelaire's own life was a series of financial and personal disasters. He
was prosecuted on obscenity and blasphemy charges, suffered a stroke, was
placed
in a sanatorium, contracted syphilis, and became an opium addict. Plus, he
was in love with his own mother.
Klaus and Sunny: The two younger Baudelaire siblings bear the names of an
unfortunate couple in Rhode Island. Wealthy businessman Claus von Bulow was
found
guilty of injecting his wife, Sunny, with a deadly insulin cocktail. His
verdict was later overturned. The story later became a film: Reversal of
Forture.
Violet: Famous nonshrinking violets include the murderer Nozière, the
Lindbergh-baby-kidnapping suspect Sharpe and the wretched blueberry in Roald
Dahl's
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. A violet ray was a popular medical device
in the early 20th century, based on the coil technology developed by Nikolas
Tesla, Violet Baudelaire's favorite inventor.
Isadora and Duncan Quagmire: The first names of two of the three Quagmire
triplets are a reminder of the hazards of being fashionable. Dancer Isadora
Duncan
died when her fashionable scarf caught in a car wheel and the car kept
moving. Also, her children drowned, her love life was disastrous, her
husband committed
suicide and she repeatedly went into debt.
Beatrice: She is the dedicatee of the Snicket books. Baudelaire actually
wrote a poem entitled "La Beatrice." The first four lines:
In charred and ashen fields without a leaf,
While I alone to Nature told my grief,
I sharpened, as I went, like any dart,
My thought upon the grindstone of my heart...
The dedications in each novel also pay homage to Dante's Divine Comedy, in
which a woman named Beatrice appears as Dante's guide through heaven.
Dante's
fictional Beatrice was based on Dante's muse -- also named Beatrice -- who
died in 1290 at the age of 24. Tragic.
In addition, 15th-century Italian aristocrat Beatrice Cenci was beheaded
after successfully plotting to kill her husband with a nail, Shakespearean
Beatrice
was an orphan in Much Ado About Nothing and 20th-century Beatrice Straight
was the paranormal investigator in Poltergeist.
Mr. Poe: The coughing banker, who has two sons named Edgar and Allan, is
most definitely named after the always-hacking-because-he-had-consumption
poet,
who had a penchant for morbid tales.
The Bad Guys:
Count Olaf: The arch villain of the books could be named after either Olaf
Tryggvason, an ancient pillager and murderer in 11th-century Norway, or a
character
in Theophile Gautier's gothic fantastique Avatar. Of course, the most famous
Count in literature is none other than Dracula, based on Vlad the Impaler.
Count Olaf does not have fangs but his weapon of choice is an
impaling-friendly harpoon.
Stephano: The first of Count Olaf's many disguises takes his name from a
drunken character who plots to kill Prospero in Shakespeare?s The Tempest.
Dr. Georgina Orwell: The woman who hypnotizes Klaus most certainly resembles
her namesake, the author of 1984 and Animal Farm. Her hypnosis methods are
examples of a totalitarian Orwellian regime trying to make everyone think
the same way.
Vice Principal Nero: He is a violinist who makes the children sit through
six-hour concerts. Roman Emperor Nero supposedly "fiddled while Rome
burned."
Esme Squalor: Count Olaf's girlfriend and the 6th most important financial
adviser in the city draws her name from J.D. Salinger?s short story, "For
Esme
-- With Love and Squalor."
Coach Genghis: The terrible gym teacher who makes students run laps is
clearly connected to Khan, the ferocious Mongol military leader who
conquered most
of Asia.
Other Astounding Allusions:
Beverly and Elliot: Violet and Klaus pick these pseudonyms when they visit
Madam Lulu's carnival. Jeremy Irons plays Elliot and Beverly Mantle in the
1988
horror film Dead Ringers a movie with lots and lots of blood and gore.
Caligari Carnival: Madam Lulu's carnival is named after The Cabinet of Dr.
Caligari, a silent movie about a string of murders committed in Germany.
Hugo and Colette: The hunchback and the contortionist in the carnival are
named after authors Victor Hugo and Colette.
Nevermore Tree: "A poem drops beneath its leaves / Sent there by a flying
crow / Not a raven as in Poe"
Plath Pass: The orphans have a hard time getting through this pass, named
after the poet who committed suicide by sticking her head in an oven.
Prufrock Prepatory School: The boarding school where the Baudelaires are
sent pays homage to T.S. Eliot's poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,"
which
opens with a verse from Dante's Inferno.
The Ophelia Bank: Ophelia drowns by the riverbanks in Hamlet.
Sontag Shore: The shore pays tribute to Susan, noted critic and activist.
Queequeg: This tattooed South Sea Islander has a penchant for harpoons in
Melville's Moby Dick.
Virginia Woolfsnake: Montgomery Montgomery's slithery creature "should never
be allowed near a typewriter." Which is exactly what Count Olaf would say
about
Lemony Snicket.
E-mail this Page
Shelley L. Rhodes B.S. Ed, CTVI
and Judson, guiding golden
juddysbuddy@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Guide Dogs For the Blind Inc.
Graduate Alumni Association Board
www.guidedogs.com
Dog ownership is like a rainbow.
Puppies are the joy at one end.
Old dogs are the treasure at the other.
Carolyn Alexander
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