Daniel Handler: Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events

Daniel Handler is an American author, screenwriter and accordionist. He was born on 28th February 1970 in San Francisco. His father is accountant and his mother is retiree. Daniel has also a younger sister Rebecca. He is married to Lisa Brown and they have a son Otto, who was born on 2003.
His first novel, The Basic Eight, was rejected by many publishers for „its subject matter and tone“ (a dark view of a teenage girl’s life). Handler says that the novel was rejected thirty-seven times before finally being published. After that he wrote some other books, for example Watch Your Mouth and Adverbs.
As a screenwriter he produced the screenplay for movies Rick and Kill the Poor.
Although the list of his works isn’t short, he is best-known for his other works under the pen name – Lemony Snicket.

Lemony Snicket came from family of three children. His sister was called Kit and his brother was Jacques. He was born on a little cattle farm (or a milk farm) and he was kidnapped by a secret organisation called V.F.D. in childhood. He attended a V.F.D. boarding school and became full member of the organisation. After that he was employed by a newspaper called The Daily Punctilio as a theater critic. After one ultracritical critic he was fired from the newspaper and he started the search information about destiny of three miserable orphans. It was a very dangerous work and after few months he was presumed dead. This message was published in The Daily Punctilio in this way:

Lemony Snicket, author of A Series of Unfortunate Events,
the purportedly true chronicles of the Baudelaire children,
was reported dead today by anonymous and possibly unreliable sources.
His age was given as "tall, with brown eyes." He leaves-no known survivors.

Mr. Snicket himself comments this message hereby:

This obituary is filled with errors - most importantly -
I AM NOT DEAD! L.S.

In Snicket’s works, Daniel Handler is introduced as his handler (in a preamble). Snicket wrote many books, the most known is the set of stories called A Series of Unfortunate Events.

A Series of Unfortunate Events is a children’s book series of thirteen novels about the Baudelaire orphans, whose parents died in a fire. Their names are: Violet, Klaus and Sunny. I’d like to use description of the Baudelaire children written by Snicket himself:

Violet Baudelaire, the eldest, was one of the finest 14-year-old inventors in the world. Anyone who knew Violet well could tell she was invented something when her long hair was tied up in a ribbon. Klaus, the middle child, loved books, or rather, things he learned from the books. And everything he read, he remembered. Sunny, the youngest, had a different interest. She liked to bite things and had four sharp teeth. There was very little that Sunny didn’t enjoy biting.

Children are lonely and have to go to their new custodian. His name is Count Olaf and his real and only intent is to get in possesion of Baudelaire’s money. He is able to do anything to get their inheritance, even to kill. The orphans are trying to get away from his manor, and they are assigned to some other custodians. But Count Olaf doesn’t give up, he chases them wherever they go. One by one, the Baudelaire’s custodians are killed in a mysterious situations, and children find out that is all Olaf’s work. On their way they discover some information about a secret organisation whose members are part of their life, including their parents. They start to search for remaining members of the organisation and their adventure becomes more and more dangerous.
All of the thirteen books are full of mysteries, secrets and terrible realities. They seem to be set in an alternate „timeless“ version of Earth, because there are many time contradictions in the story. The world has stylistic similarities to both the 19th century and the 1930s, but you can sometimes read about using fax, the Morse code, fiber-optic cable or advanced computer. It might be the reason why the books are so interesting.
There is one more interesting thing. Lemony Snicket dedicated all of A Series of Unfortunate Events to his fianceé Beatrice, who is actually Baudelaire’s mother (but Snicket isn’t their father). Every book starts with a dedication. Here you can see some of them.





V.F.D. is a secret organization whose members are highly trained in the use of coded messages, disguises, cartography (the study of maps), library sciences, knots, etc. The V.F.D. acronym has many meanings, but official name of the secret organisation is „volunteer fire department“. Members of the V.F.D. are spread all across the world. They are determined to keeping the world quiet and extinguished.
Baudelaire’s parents were members of the organisation as well as Lemony Snicket and Count Olaf. At the end of the story, the Baudelaire orphans also become part of the V.F.D. Here you can see some of the other meanings of the acronym.

Because the books were really succesful, the movie was made very early. Here you can see the poster. The movie is based on the first three books of the series and starring Jim Carrey, Meryl Streep, Emily Browning and others. Although the movie is set mainly as a comedy, the books are more grim.

Oscar Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Oscar Wilde was born on 16th October 1854 in Irish Dublin as the second son of Sir William and Jane Francesca Wilde. His father was a surgeon and his mother was a successful writer.
In 1855 they moved to Merrion Square, where Oscar's sister was born a year after. When he was nine, he started to attend Portora Royal School in Northern Ireland. Then he studied classics at Trinity College in Dublin and after that he recieved a scholarship to Oxford.
In 1884 he got married to Constance Lloyd. Later they had two sons, Cyril and Vyvyan.
Oscar Wilde was a bisexual. In describing his own sexual identity, Wilde used the term 'Socratic', because he was inspired by Greek pederastic tradition („Greek pederasty was a relationship and bond between an adolescent boy and an adult man outside of his family.“). He was in relationship e.g. with English poet lord Alfred Douglas and in 1895 he was arrested for "gross indecency" and sentenced to two years of hard labour.
After Wilde's arrest, his wife changed her and their children's surname to Holland. She died in 1898, Cyril was killed in World War I and Vyvyan wrote memories about his father.
After he was released in 1897, he moved to Paris. For the few last years of his life, he took a pen name Sebastian Melmoth. He died penniless with only one friend by his side on 30th November 1900.
Here you can see some of his best known works. I'd like to mention his very first piece, Ravenna, furthermore The Canterville Ghost and The Happy Prince. In our country is also known The Importance of Being Earnest, which is translated as „Jak je důležité míti Filipa“.

This is Wilde's house in Chelsea. You can see a blue tablet on the right side of this picture.







The most widely known theory of his death says that Wilde died of meningitis. His tomb is situated in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, where many famous people are burried, for example Honoré de Balzac, Jim Morrison and Edith Piaf. As you can see, there are many lipstick stamps on his tombstone.





This is a statue of Oscar Wilde. It stands on Merrion Square in Dublin, in Archbishop Ryan Park.






And now let's talking about The Picture of Dorian Gray. This book was first published as the opening story in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1890. Later Wilde rewrote this book and added some chapters. A new version was published in 1891.
Main characters are:
Dorian Gray, very handsome and innocent young man. After his familiarization with Lord Henry Wotton, Dorian becomes cruel and selfish.
Basil Hallward, a painter, adoring Dorian's beauty. He paints the picture of Dorian Gray.
Lord Henry Wotton, a decadent nobleman with bizzare world view. He is rapt in Dorian's youth, beauty and naivety. He changes Dorian's nature very much.
Sybil Vane, young, talented and beautiful actress with whom Dorian falls in love. After one unsuccesfull performance, Dorian starts to conspue her.
James Vane, Sibyl's brother and a sailor. He loves his sister very much and swears to kill Dorian, if he hurts his sister.
Alan Campbell, Dorian's old friend. Their friendship ends when Dorian's reputation starts to be doubtful.
The story begins in Basil's studio, where the painter and his friend Henry debate Basil's new picture. There is a young boy at the picture and he is very handsome. Henry tells Basil to show his picture at an exhibition. Basil rejects, because there is so much of himself in the picture. Henry wants to meet the boy from the drawing so Basil introduces him an innocent young man called Dorian Gray. Henry and Dorian go to the garden, where Henry reveals his world view to Dorian. He talks about youth, beauty and admiration as if they were the most important things in the world. Dorian is fascinated, because he has never thought about the world this way. When they come back to Basil's studio, Dorian expresses a wish, that his picture would age instead of him, offering his own soul in return.
Lord Henry and Dorian Gray become friends. Henry takes Dorian to a club, introduces him to new friends, changes him. Dorian starts to realize, that his beauty has an amazing effect on the others.
Once Dorian visits some little theatre, where he takes notice of a young and beautiful actress Sibyl Vane. He falls in love with her, and soon proposes marriage. He is enchanted by her ability to change herself into dramatic characters. So he invites his friends to her performance but this time she plays terrible. Dorian is disappointed. He upbraids Sibyl for her play, but she defends herself. She says that she can't play well anymore, because she is so much in love. Dorian cancels their engagement and leaves her. Sibyl's heart is broken so she commits a suicide.
When Dorian comes home, he finds that his picture has changed. His face is full of cruelty. Dorian immediately controls his real face, but it is without any changes. Next day he finds out that Sibyl is dead. Dorian blames himself but Lord Henry persuades him that is not his fault. He gives him a book.
The book 'poisons' Dorian. It totally affects his life. Dorian becomes a cruel, selfish man, who unobstrusively destroys his friends. He lives wild life full of drugs, sexual pleasures and partys. But all the same he still looks like a young innocent boy, even he is almost fourty. His age and sins are displayed at the picture.
Basil visits Dorian the day before his departure to Paris. He begs Dorian to tell him the truth about his life. Everyone in London knows Dorian Gray as a dangerous and a false man. Basil doesn't want to believe them. Dorian shows him his picture. The painter is horrified, but still hopes that Dorian could redeem his soul by prayer. Dorian suddenly feels a huge hate for Basil so he kills him. Then he compels his old friend Alan Campbell to destroy the body.
Once, when he visits one of port opium dens, he meets James Vane, brother of his old love. James once swore to kill „Prince Charming“, as Sibyl called Dorian Gray. But Dorian gets away thanks to his young face.
Few days after, Dorian takes part in hunting. There, a beater is killed by accident. Later Dorian finds that the man was James Vane, who wanted to kill him. Danger passes away.
But when Basil starts to be missing in public and a press informs about Alan Campbell's suicide, Dorian decides to tell Henry the truth. He doesn't believe Dorian could kill someone and once again enthuses about his luck and youthfulness. Dorian decides to change himself. He wants to be a better person. He hopes that destruction of his picture could be the best first step. He takes a knife and cuts the canvas... (end of the story)

A topic of The Picture of Dorian Gray is very popular. Even so popular that there is one illness called Dorian Gray syndrome. "The Dorian Gray Syndrome (DGS) is characterized by a triad of symptoms combining diagnostic signs of dysmorphophobia, narcissistic character traits, and arrests in psychic maturation often seen in paraphilias. Dorian Gray patients frequently are excessive users of "medical lifestyle" products."

I'd like to show you some previews of movies. First is a trailer of The Picture of Dorian Gray film from 1945.

The next one is from 2006.

And the last one is Behind the scenes from a film called just Dorian Gray, which will come to our cinemas next year.