A series of unfortunate events

This article covers the series of books by Lemony Snicket. For the series adaptation, see A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV Series) . For the film adaptation of the first three volumes see Lemony Snicket - Puzzling Events .

A series of unfortunate events (original title: A Series of Unfortunate Events ) is an American children's book series by Lemony Snicket , which comprises a total of 13 volumes and was published between 1999 and 2006. Parts of the series also appeared under the titles Die schauige Geschichte von Violet, Sunny and Klaus and Schauriger Schlamassel . The unauthorized biography of the author and a collection of letters, the Beatrice Letters, also appeared.

The story revolves around the three siblings Violet, Klaus and Sunny Baudelaire, who lost their parents in a fire . Since the three are not of legal age, they are entrusted to changing guardians, who, however, all become victims of their first guardian, Count Olaf, in one way or another. This is targeting the family assets. As the action progresses, the children discover various secrets of their parents and learn that they - and many of their guardians, good or bad - were members of a secret organization. They are trying to uncover the secrets of the organization and finally find a safe place to stay. Count Olaf, the Snicket family and the individual guardians play a decisive role in this.

Characters from the book series

Violet Baudelaire

Violet is between 14 and 15 years old in the book, an enthusiastic inventor and the oldest of the children. She builds life-saving devices from the most banal objects with which the siblings save themselves from various situations. When she reaches the age of 18, she should receive parental assets.

Klaus Baudelaire

Klaus, the middle child and between 12 and 13 years old, is a keen reader. He memorises what he has read and never forgets it. He is thus the walking lexicon of the siblings and often helps them out of dangerous situations with his diverse knowledge and makes a significant contribution to solving the puzzles that arise.

Sunny Baudelaire

Sunny is the youngest child and loves biting and chewing. At first she can't speak properly and just crawls. During the story, she learns to express herself clearly and starts to walk. Later she also proves to be an excellent cook and conjures up the most unusual dishes from the simplest of ingredients.

Count Olaf

Count Olaf is the first guardian of the Baudelaire orphans and is probably the cause of the terrible fire that killed the children's parents. He pursues the orphans and tries again and again to usurp their fortune with violence and deceitful tricks. Despite being a gruesome actor, he always manages to fool guardians and Mr. Poe with his disguises and false names. He is helped by his acting troupe, which consists of a strange combination of different people and his girlfriend Esmé.

Mr. Poe

Mr. Arthur Poe, banker and a friend of the late parents, is the administrator of Baudelaire's estate until Violet is 18 years old. He brings the three orphans to their relatives who he believes are suitable guardians. When the Baudelaires tell him that Count Olaf has reappeared in their lives, he thinks they are just imagining it because of their fear. His constant coughing and a handkerchief that he always carries with him are characteristic.

He is interested in everything that has to do with money and is busy working as successfully as possible for his bank, Vereinigte Vermögensberatung , so that he can keep his good post. He also became more and more ambitious and later saw the Baudelaires as a threat to the reputation of his impeccable bank. In the 6th volume he is also responsible for the Quagmeirs. He is married to the writer of the local newspaper, who always carries a camera with her.

Duncan, Isadora and Quigley Quagmeir

The Quagmeir triplets are friends of the Baudelaires. Duncan and Isadora get to know them in The School of Terror (Volume 5) because they too were sent to boarding school as orphans. Her parents were also killed in a house fire. It is said that Quigley died in the same fire; however, he reappears towards the end of Der finstere Fels (Volume 10) and helps the Baudelaires.

Count Olaf wants to get hold of the famous Quagmeir sapphires and is also responsible for the fire. Each Quagmeir triplet has a distinctive notebook. As with the Baudelaires, every Quagmeir has his strength: Duncan is the reporter, Isadora the poet and Quigley the cartographer.

At the end of The School of Terror (Volume 5), Duncan and Isadora help the Baudelaires and are kidnapped by Count Olaf. In The Dark Village (Volume 7), the Baudelaires can free them and help them escape with a hot air balloon.

Esmé misery

Esmé Gigi Geneviève Elend is a cruel, fashion-obsessed woman who dated Jerome Elend, the guardian of the Baudelaire orphans at the time, in Volume 6. She mostly wears absurd clothes that are “in” right now and is in no way inferior to Count Olaf in cruelty and meanness. At the end of Volume 6, she reveals that she is working with Olaf and eventually became his girlfriend. Until she separates from him in Volume 12, she helps him in his attempts to usurp the Baudelaire fortune.

The book series

The books were published by different publishers under different titles. The titles used here are based on the Manhattan edition, which is also used on the official Lemony Snicket homepage .

Volume 1: The Terrible Beginning

One day, the three children Violet, Klaus and Sunny suddenly learn from Mr. Poe that their wealthy parents were killed in a fire. Nobody knows what started the fire that burned down the parental home to the ground.

After living with Mr. Poe for a short time, they are placed with Count Olaf, who is unknown to them. Count Olaf turns out to be a very cruel person who actually only wants the children's wealth and also lets them work in the household for him. To get the Baudelaires' fortune, he arranges a play in which he and Violet play a married couple. The pastor is played by his neighbor, Judge Strauss, which would make the wedding legally binding. Thus, the family fortune would pass into Count Olaf's possession. The children realize what Count Olaf is up to and want to thwart his plan, but he kidnaps Sunny. Olaf blackmails Violet by letting Sunny, who he is now imprisoned in a cage on a tower, fall down if she does not say "yes" and signs the marriage certificate. Violet and Klaus try to save Sunny. In the end, Violet escapes the evil plan by signing with her left hand and the marriage is not legal because you have to sign with the right hand (with Violet on the right).

Olaf's plan is revealed when, in front of the theater audience, after Violet has signed, he believes he is in possession of the Baudelaire property. Mr. Poe then revokes his guardianship.

Volume 2: The House of the Snakes

Mr. Poe has appointed Dr. Montgomery Montgomery (Uncle Monty), a herpetologist (snake researcher) selected. In contrast to Count Olaf, Uncle Monty is a lovable person and tries to make the children as beautiful as possible.

A reptile hall lets the children experience the beauty of snakes, lizards and other reptiles - including the "incredibly deadly viper". The snake discovered by Monty, which is actually hand-tame, befriends Sunny. Monty tells the children that his assistant suddenly quit recently and that the new assistant Stefano will be arriving soon. He also tells the children that he is planning a trip to Peru to research the snakes there and that they and his new assistant should accompany him. When Stefano arrives, the orphans immediately recognize him as Count Olaf in disguise. They want to warn Monty, but "Stefano" threatens her and doesn’t let her out of his sight so that they cannot tell Monty anything. But when they finally get a chance to talk to Monty in private, they can't convince him, because he only thinks Stefano is a spy of his research colleagues who want to steal his fame, and he decides that he and the children without Stefano should travel to Peru.

The next morning the Baudelairs found him dead in the reptile hall. Count Olaf murdered him by injecting him with the poison of the Mamba dû mal and thus faking a snakebite. The children are able to expose him when they show that the dead Uncle Monty does not have the characteristics of a snakebite by the Mamba dû mal , namely a livid discoloration of the skin, and thus could not have been bitten by the snake. In addition, in Count Olaf's suitcase you will find the tools that he used to create a new identity as Stefano and to murder Uncle Monty. But Count Olaf can flee.

Volume 3: The Lake of Sighs

Mr. Poe next brings the Baudelaire orphans to Aunt Josephine, who lives over the cliffs of Lake Sighs. Although the lady is kind to the children, she suffers from many phobias . She's afraid of the simplest things like B. to make phone calls, turn on the stove, drive the car, turn on the heater and touch the glass door handles.

The children and their aunt meet Captain Talmi (Count Olaf in a new disguise). The children, who recognized him straight away, still try to warn Josephine, but she doesn't believe them. Eventually, he forces Josephine to fake her own death and propose Captain Talmi as the next guardian so that he can have custody. Josephine escapes, hides in the Gray Grotto on Lake Sighs and leaves the children with a message in their farewell letter, which they decipher just in time. They manage to find the Gray Grotto and convince Aunt Josephine to come along and tell the police everything.

On the way back across the lake, however, they are attacked by the suckers of sighs (black leeches that are blind but have a keen sense of smell and can smell any food that has been eaten within the last hour), which almost drown the small sailing boat . Then Aunt Josephine, Violet, Klaus and Sunny see a boat in the distance and believe they are saved. On closer inspection, however, they see that Captain Talmi (Count Olaf) is sitting in the boat. Josephine gives him the children in order to be spared himself, but Count Olaf knows no mercy and, to the horror of the children, leaves Aunt Josephine with the Sighs. The Baudelaires are taken from Olaf by Mr. Poe, who is also on the lake to find them. But in the end Count Olaf manages to escape with his cronies.

Volume 4: The Eerie Mill

The new guardian of the Baudelaires is the owner of the Glück & Partner sawmill . The children have to work there under terrible conditions and are given sparse food, which consists only of chewing gum. In return, their guardian "Sir" promises them accommodation and apparent protection from Count Olaf. When Klaus gets tripped by foreman Flacutono, his glasses break and he has to go to Dr. Orwell, an ophthalmologist, and is hypnotized there. Count Olaf disguises himself as her secretary "Shirley". During the night, the foreman Flacutono, who turns out to be Count Olaf's assistant, tries to force the hypnotized Klaus to kill the guardian's partner with a saw. However, Violet can intervene in time; instead of the partner, Dr. Orwell caught by the saw. Count Olaf tries to adopt the children when "Sir" says that he no longer wants the children with him. Eventually, however, he is exposed, but is able to flee again.

Volume 5: The School of Terror

The Baudelaire orphans are brought to a boarding school by Mr. Poe, which has nothing to do with a normal boarding school. Violet and Klaus always get the same lessons, and Sunny is forced to work as a secretary for Vice Rector Nero. The children experience all kinds of harassment: They have to live in the orphanage , a shed full of mushrooms and crabs, and are verbally abused by Carmelita Späts, a classmate. But they befriend the two triplets Duncan and Isadora Quagmeir, whose parents and triplet brother were killed in a fire.

The new sports teacher Genghis turns out to be Count Olaf, which of course you recognize immediately. From now on the orphans have to run laps around the sports field every night. Count Olaf plans to weaken the children in such a way that they will be expelled from school due to poor school grades. His plan almost works. Shortly before the all-important test, Duncan and Isadora dress up as Baudelaires and run the laps instead of the Baudelaires so that they can learn while they are doing it. However, they are caught and kidnapped by Count Olaf; Olaf is exposed by the kidnapping and the Baudelaire orphans leave the boarding school.

Volume 6: The dark avenue

This time the Baudelaire orphans are adopted by the wealthy couple Jerome and Esmé Elend. Esmé who always pay attention to what is currently fashionable, the orphanage has just adopted because orphans just in are; Jerome is really fond of the children. When Esmé is planning an in-auction , they meet Count Olaf again - disguised as auctioneer Gunther - but the adults don't believe them.

The Baudelaires find out that the Quagmeirs are hidden in an empty elevator shaft and are supposed to be taken away by Olaf at the in-auction . They try to ask Esmé for help, but she is Olaf's accomplice and pushes her down the elevator shaft, where Olaf's assistants have set up a net. They manage to free themselves and they find a passage below that leads to the destroyed Baudelaire villa. They then try to get back to the auction quickly to prevent the evil plan, but they buy the wrong item. When they reveal Olaf, he manages to flee with Esmé and his helpers.

Volume 7: The Dark Village

The new guardian for Violet, Klaus and Sunny is the village of the poultry friends. There are crows flying around everywhere, the residents are dressed in black, wear crow hats and ban everything that has nothing to do with or harms the crows. Instead of being looked after by everyone in the village, the orphans are deported to Hector, who lives on the outskirts of the village under the large crow tree. Since Hector has a library with forbidden books and a workshop with forbidden technology, the Baudelaires feel comfortable there despite everything. Under the crow tree you will find encrypted messages that come from the Quagmeirs who are hidden in the crows well in the village.

Before they can free their friends, however, a man named Jacques Snicket shows up. Because of his eye tattoo on his ankle, he is mistaken for Count Olaf, arrested by the village policewoman (Esmé in disguise) and sentenced to execution. But it does not come to that, because he is found murdered in his cell. The detective called Dupin, a new disguise for Count Olaf, accuses the Baudelaires, who are then also imprisoned. They manage to free themselves from prison and the Quagmeir triplets from the well. However, they are seen and followed by a mob of villagers, Esmé and Olaf. Hector wants to take the children with him in his self-made, self-sufficient hot-air caravan, but only the Quagmeirs manage to get into the flying balloon, as Esmé uses a harpoon to prevent the Baudelaires from climbing up the rope ladder. However, since Esmé also kills a crow with a harpoon, the villagers want to lock it up and the orphans can flee through the desert.

Volume 8: The gruesome hospital

The Baudelaires manage to find shelter with the volunteers , although they are now decried as murderers . They drive daily to Heimlich Hospital, which is in the middle of the hinterland, to cheer up the sick with a song and a balloon. The Baudelaires can hide in the hospital by working in the archive during the day and sleeping in the unfinished half of the hospital at night.

One night while searching the archives for the mysterious Baudelaire file, they are discovered by Esmé Elend, who takes Violet prisoner. The next day she is supposed to be beheaded in the operating theater, but Klaus and Sunny, disguised as doctors, manage to kidnap Violet from the operating theater. Olaf's cronies set fire to the hospital during the chase; the children manage to get out and hide in Olaf's trunk. Olaf's companion, the person who is neither male nor female, falls victim to the flames.

Volume 9: The gruesome fair

Violet, Klaus and Sunny arrive at a fair in Count Olaf's car. So that they are not recognized, but can spy on Count Olaf, they disguise themselves as monstrosities: Klaus and Violet disguise themselves as two-headed people and Sunny as a wolf child. They are allowed to work as monstrosities at the fair and have the opportunity to talk to the fortune teller, who turns out to be a member of the mysterious organization FF .

Before the Baudelaires have the opportunity to talk to her in depth, however, she is thrown into a lions' den where the orphans are supposed to fall - an idea from Olaf to make the fair more attractive. One of Olaf's accomplices also falls into the ditch. Thereupon Olaf and his companions set fire to the fair and flee. They also take the monstrosities Hugo (a hunchback), Kevin (a two-handed man) and Colette (a snake woman) as well as the Baudelaires. But Olaf has seen through the Baudelaires and lets Violet and Klaus drive in the attached caravan while he keeps Sunny with him in the car.

Volume 10: The Dark Rock

In the trailer behind Count Olaf's car, the two older orphans get to the mountains where FF is supposed to have its secret headquarters. On the way, Count Olaf lets the trailer unhitch, which forces Violet and Klaus to make the way to the summit on their own, because Sunny is still with Count Olaf. At the snow scouts they meet a mysterious boy. It turns out he's Quigley, the missing third Quagmeir triplet. Together they enter the FF headquarters, which was burned down by Olaf's acquaintances, the man with a beard but no hair and the woman with hair but no beard . There they receive a hint that a sugar bowl could help them solve the secret of FF and a secret message that indicates a meeting point on Thursday in the last safe haven.

Quigley, Violet and Klaus manage to save Sunny, but on the run they find themselves in the Bloody Brook, a river that rises in the mountains and is actually largely frozen over. The children break in while driving a sledge on the ice. The Baudelaires are also separated from the third Quagmeir as they swim away in different branches of the frozen stream. The women with the white faces turn against Olaf in this volume and disappear without a trace. Carmelita Späts, who is a member of the Snow Scouts, joins Count Olaf.

Volume 11: The Grim Grotto

The Baudelaires are drifting into the sea with their sledges in their branch of the Bloody Brook. There they meet the submarine Queequeg owned by Captain Widdershins and his daughter Fiona. The ship's cook is Phil, whom you know from the sawmill (Volume 4). The Queequeg is looking for the mysterious sugar bowl that must have been washed into the sea after the fire at the FF headquarters. Klaus calculates that the current must have carried them into the Gorgonian grotto.

When they arrived in the grotto with the submarine, Violet, Klaus, Sunny and Fiona go on a dive to look for the sugar bowl there. They do not find them, but when they are in the grotto, a poisonous mushroom begins to grow out of the ground, from which they hide in a corner. When they can return to the submarine, they find it empty. They also discover that a fungal spore has gotten into Sunny's helmet and threatens her life. Before they can act, their submarine is swallowed up by Count Olaf's Kraken submarine and the children are held there by him. However, with the help of Olaf's assistant with the hooked hands (who turns out to be Fiona's lost brother), the Baudelaires manage to flee back onto their own submarine and rescue Sunny there with the help of Wasabi.

They also get a telegram from Quigley telling them with a secret code to get into a taxi at the beach on the bare coast on Tuesday. They steer their submarine out of Olaf's Kraken submarine and even arrive at the beach on time. After first meeting Mr. Poe there and rejecting him, they get into Kit Snicket's taxi.

Volume 12: The Hair-raising Hotel

The pregnant Kit Snicket drives the Baudelaires to the Hotel Denouement, the last safe refuge, which is the place of the FF meeting point. The orphans work there as bellboys and get to know Frank and Ernst, the hotel managers, who are so identical that you cannot tell them apart. They later learn that there is a third brother, Dewey. The Baudelaires help hotel guests when they are called and meet many old friends, such as B. their teachers from the boarding school (Volume 5), the bosses of the sawmill (Volume 4), the hospital librarian (Volume 8) and also Esmé Elend and Carmelita Späts. They find out that a trial against Olaf is to take place on Thursday, to which many people are traveling. In addition, the sugar bowl is believed to be brought to a hotel laundromat by a crow. Dewey shows them the lake by which the hotel is located and tells them about an underwater library that collects information about Olaf's misdeeds. When they return to the hotel, Olaf threatens Dewey with a harpoon. When Mr. Poe catches Olaf, he puts the gun in the hands of the Baudelaires. They drop them, causing Dewey to be accidentally shot.

The Baudelaires will therefore be convicted of murderers on Wednesday, but the adage "Justice is blind" is taken literally and everyone, except the judges, is blindfolded. During the trial, the judge Strauss (Volume 1) is kidnapped by the other judges, who are Olaf's accomplices. The orphans notice and pursue the criminals. You go down to the basement with Olaf to get the sugar bowl from the laundromat, but it's not there. According to Olaf's instructions, the orphans set a fire and flee with him on the roof to get into a boat with which they flee from the roof onto the sea.

Volume 13: The Amazing End

The Baudelaire children and their mortal enemy Count Olaf are on a small boat until they are caught in a terrible storm. The boat is destroyed, but all four are stranded on an island. You meet a colony of shipwrecked people who receive the Baudelaires in a friendly manner. In contrast to the other adults, they immediately recognize Count Olaf's evil being. The castaways want to reveal all the riddles to the Baudelaires, but Count Olaf wants to prevent that. Finally, almost all of the Baudelaires' secrets will be revealed. However, it remains unclear how the children can be certain of the death of their parents.

Alternative title

The volumes have been published by the Beltz & Gelberg publishing house in hardcover under the title Die schauige Geschichte von Violet, Sunny and Klaus . The following titles were used for the individual volumes:

• Volume 1: The Bad Beginning
• Volume 2: The Repitilensaal
• Volume 3: The Broken Window
• Volume 4: The Eerie Mill
• Volume 5: The boarding school of horror
• Volume 6: The Dark Elevator
• Volume 7: The village of the black birds
• Volume 8: The diabolical hospital
• Volume 9: The gruesome fair
• Volume 10: The Slippery Steep Slope (Volume 10 was announced at the end of the ninth volume under this title, but never appeared.)

The paperback edition of Beltz & Gelberg was published under the title Schauriger Schlamassel . The following titles were used for the individual volumes:

• Volume 1: The nightmare in the beginning
• Volume 2: The dazzling snake hall
• Volume 3: The Wrong Window
• Volume 4: The buzzing saws
• Volume 5: The Terrible School
• Volume 6: The Dark Elevator
• Volume 7: The Dark Village
• Volume 8: The Horror Hospital

writing style

The dark plot is loosened up by Lemony Snicket's writing style.

• Lemony Snicket keeps telling readers to put the book aside and read something nicer since the story contains so much misfortune.
• Chapters don't always start directly with the plot, but rather with a certain aspect or saying that Snicket ultimately relates to the plot.
• The books contain a number of foreign words, which the author always explains in a child-friendly manner. Poems by famous writers are also reproduced.
• Lemony Snicket himself is involved in the story: he knows the parents of the Baudelaires and was a member of FF (see Lemony Snicket )

Adaptations

The first three books ( The Terrible Beginning , The House of Snakes and The Lake of Sighs ) were made into a film under the title Lemony Snicket - A Puzzling Event (2004). Comedy star Jim Carrey played the terrible Count Olaf, Billy Connolly played the avid snake researcher Dr. Montgomery Montgomery and Meryl Streep the anxious aunt Josephine. The film was nominated for four Academy Awards.

In January 2017, Netflix released the first season of the television series A Series of Unfortunate Events , which is adapted from volumes 1 to 4. A second season, which adapts volumes 5 to 9, appeared on March 30, 2018. The third and final season, which adapts volumes 10 to 13, appeared on January 1, 2019. Each book in the series has two episodes in the series only one episode is dedicated to the last book.

Audio book

The audio books for volumes 1 to 3 have been published by HörCompany . The reader is Stefan Kurt .

The audio books for volumes 4 to 13 have been published by Random House Audio . The reader is Rufus Beck .

Trivia

In the music video Other World by Capital Bra , Clueso and KC Rebell , which has been clicked a million times , an actress holds the twelfth volume in the book series in her hand (at minute 2:32).

Individual evidence