Reader Series: 'The End,' Lemony Snicket
This is the thirteenth post in a series leading up to the premiere of Netflix's 'A Series of Unfortunate Events' on January 13, 2017. The series will cover each of the 13 books and 'Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography.' Be warned: there are spoilers ahead.
The Baudelaires and Olaf shipwreck on an island, where the siblings are welcomed by a girl named Friday; Olaf is shunned. Island facilitator Ishmael takes in the Baudelaires and introduces them to the island's strangely oppressive customs, which the siblings secretly defy. Kit Snicket and the Incredibly Deadly Viper also wash up on the shore, and Olaf attempts to pass himself off as Kit to the islanders. For the first time in the entire series, the adults see right through his terrible disguise. Eventually, the children (for holding "contraband" items) and Olaf are kicked out of the community. However, the Baudelaires discover Ishmael's hypocrisy, in addition to his corruption and his maintenance of the island people's complacency with fermenting coconut juice. When some of the islanders ask the Baudelaires help, the Baudelaires discover a horseradish apple tree that hides a small room, where they find evidence of their mother and learn more about the history of the island community. Olaf remains a danger as do the actions of the corrupt Ishmael.
Among the mutiny, Olaf also returns, still in disguise, and Ishmael shoots him with the harpoon gun; the harpoon strikes true but also shatters the helmet containing the Medusoid Mycelium, which Olaf was using to simulate a pregnant stomach. Everyone is infected, Olaf is bleeding, and the Baudelaires rush to gather enough apples to cure everyone. Unfortunately, once again bringing us the inept adults we're so accustomed to, the islanders have abandoned their mutiny, climbed aboard their outrigger, and trust Ishmael to get them to a horseradish factory in time; he doesn't allow the apples on board.
Kit goes into labor, but is also dying from the fungus, and suddenly Olaf steps up to help, despite bleeding out and also dying from fungus. Neither Olaf nor Kit survive the mushrooms' poison. The baby is a girl, whom the Baudelaires name Beatrice, after their mother. Lemony Snicket's obsession and his love for a woman named Beatrice become clearer for we readers, in a bittersweet way.
The Baudelaires leave the island a year after Beatrice is born, but that is the last Lemony Snicket knows of the Baudelaire siblings. They have endured many hardships, grown up sooner than anyone should, and learned just how unfair the world truly is. Although we as readers still know little about VFD, the Baudelaire parents, or the backgrounds of many adults in the series, we have good experience-based faith in the Baudelaires' abilities as they sail away from the island. I believe they easily could have survived, but I often wonder at Snicket's decision to stop their story here, as if protecting us from the last injustice in the Baudelaire siblings' unfortunate tale.
This is not The End for the ASOUE Reader Series as we read Lemony Snicket: An Unauthorized Autobiography this week, leading up to the Netflix series premiere on Friday the 13th.
The Baudelaires and Olaf shipwreck on an island, where the siblings are welcomed by a girl named Friday; Olaf is shunned. Island facilitator Ishmael takes in the Baudelaires and introduces them to the island's strangely oppressive customs, which the siblings secretly defy. Kit Snicket and the Incredibly Deadly Viper also wash up on the shore, and Olaf attempts to pass himself off as Kit to the islanders. For the first time in the entire series, the adults see right through his terrible disguise. Eventually, the children (for holding "contraband" items) and Olaf are kicked out of the community. However, the Baudelaires discover Ishmael's hypocrisy, in addition to his corruption and his maintenance of the island people's complacency with fermenting coconut juice. When some of the islanders ask the Baudelaires help, the Baudelaires discover a horseradish apple tree that hides a small room, where they find evidence of their mother and learn more about the history of the island community. Olaf remains a danger as do the actions of the corrupt Ishmael.
Among the mutiny, Olaf also returns, still in disguise, and Ishmael shoots him with the harpoon gun; the harpoon strikes true but also shatters the helmet containing the Medusoid Mycelium, which Olaf was using to simulate a pregnant stomach. Everyone is infected, Olaf is bleeding, and the Baudelaires rush to gather enough apples to cure everyone. Unfortunately, once again bringing us the inept adults we're so accustomed to, the islanders have abandoned their mutiny, climbed aboard their outrigger, and trust Ishmael to get them to a horseradish factory in time; he doesn't allow the apples on board.
Kit goes into labor, but is also dying from the fungus, and suddenly Olaf steps up to help, despite bleeding out and also dying from fungus. Neither Olaf nor Kit survive the mushrooms' poison. The baby is a girl, whom the Baudelaires name Beatrice, after their mother. Lemony Snicket's obsession and his love for a woman named Beatrice become clearer for we readers, in a bittersweet way.
In this way, the story of the Baudelaire orphans is like an onion, and if you insist on reading each and every thin, papery layer in A Series of Unfortunate Events, your only reward will be 170 chapters of misery in your library and countless tears in your eyes. Even if you have read the first twelve volumes of the Baudelaires' story, it is not too late to stop peeling away the layers, and to put this book back on the shelf to wither away while you read something less complicated and overwhelming.
And for a minute the four castaways did nothing but weep, letting their tears run down their faces and into the sea, which some have said is nothing but a library of all the tears in history.
You cannot live far from the treachery of the world, because eventually the treachery will wash up on your shores.
"This isn’t fair," Klaus said finally, but he said it so quietly that the departing islanders probably did not hear. Only his sisters heard him, and the snake the Baudelaires thought they would never see again, and of course Count Olaf, who was huddled in the large, ornate bird cage like an imprisoned beast, and who was the only person to answer him.
“Life isn’t fair,” he said, in his undisguised voice, and for once the Baudelaire orphans agreed with every word the man said.
The Baudelaires leave the island a year after Beatrice is born, but that is the last Lemony Snicket knows of the Baudelaire siblings. They have endured many hardships, grown up sooner than anyone should, and learned just how unfair the world truly is. Although we as readers still know little about VFD, the Baudelaire parents, or the backgrounds of many adults in the series, we have good experience-based faith in the Baudelaires' abilities as they sail away from the island. I believe they easily could have survived, but I often wonder at Snicket's decision to stop their story here, as if protecting us from the last injustice in the Baudelaire siblings' unfortunate tale.
What do you think of The End?
This is not The End for the ASOUE Reader Series as we read Lemony Snicket: An Unauthorized Autobiography this week, leading up to the Netflix series premiere on Friday the 13th.
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