Yesterday, my mom and brother were discussing how we all probably think
we're freaks at one time or another. We all have something
distinguishing ourselves from others, and ultimately it's up to us to
decide whether that is a blessing or a curse. In The Carnivorous Carnival,
the ninth book in the Series of Unfortunate Events, the Baudelaire
orphans encounter three people who definitely view their differences in a
negative light. It seems the idea of putting "freaks" on display at
carnivals thankfully went by the wayside many years ago, but the
practice is alive and well in whatever ambiguous time period Lemony
Snicket is writing about. So it is that we meet Hugo, the complacent
hunchback (perhaps named in honor of Victor Hugo?); Colette, the gentle
contortionist; and Kevin, the Eeyorish ambidextrous fellow. But I'm
getting ahead of myself.
Just how do the orphans find
themselves in such curious company? After smuggling themselves into
Count Olaf's trunk, they find themselves at a carnival in the middle of
nowhere, where they must disguise themselves in order to evade Count
Olaf's attention. They have little hope that their freakish costumes
(Violet and Klaus posing as a two-headed person, Sunny as a half-wolf)
will fool their would-be captor, but it seems their only course of
action. Surprisingly, neither Olaf nor his associates recognize them
when they present themselves to Madame Lulu, the fortune-telling
carnival owner whose accent is remarkably similar to that of Gunther,
the auctioneer Olaf pretended to be in The Ersatz Elevator. So it
is that they meet the sad trio who have resigned themselves to a life
of getting laughed at day after day without pay because they are
convinced their unusual attributes prevent them from being productive
members of society. Ironically, one of Olaf's own henchmen is
hook-handed, yet he gleefully ridicules the Baudelaires and their
companions for their so-called deformities, recoiling in anger when it
is suggested that he might be a freak himself.
We have never
spent this much time with Olaf and his associates before, and it's
interesting to see them off-duty. I almost feel a little sorry for Olaf
here, as he seems confused and hen-pecked. In fact, his girlfriend Esme
is probably worse than the series' most famous villain. The others are,
for the most part, bumbling and impolite but probably not really evil,
though years of bad company have made them willing to do unpleasant
things. After seeing what happens to certain characters by the book's
finale, one can't help but wonder about the earlier lives of Olaf's
buddies. How did they fall into such a dastardly line of work? Madame
Lulu is an intriguing character, particularly once it is revealed that
she, too, is wearing a disguise. She possesses the potential to provide
the Baudelaires with the information they crave and us with a more solid
grasp on how Snicket's story intertwines with the orphans'.
Tantalizing, no?
The mob mentality that was demonstrated in The Vile Village and to a lesser extent in The Hostile Hospital
comes to the forefront again here as we observe the repugnant antics of
the carnival's visitors. Here are people who are all tingly with
excitement at the prospect of throwing a freak to the lions, thereby
allowing them to experience violence and sloppy eating all at once. This
strikes me more as behavior exhibited at the Colosseum hundreds of
years ago than something a semi-contemporary crowd would resort to. But
then, one of Snicket's trademarks is presenting situations that are
unrealistic and over-the-top.
This is an especially perilous
book, with danger so near all the time. The Baudelaires are forced to
violate their consciences several times in favor of surviving, and they
begin to wonder whether they might end up in league with Count Olaf,
which would be a far worse fate even than being ridiculed daily by
uncouth visitors. But as always, Snicket breaks up the tension with
heaps of laugh-aloud absurdity. Like this discussion of what part of a
lion is most dangerous and upsetting: "Some say the teeth of the beast,
because teeth are used for eating children, and often their parents, and
gnawing their bones. Some say the claws of the beast, because claws are
used for ripping things to shreds. And some say the hair of the beast,
because hair can make allergic people sneeze." This is Snicket's way of
building up to the phrase "the belly of the beast," about which he
woefully warns, "I'm sorry to tell you that this book will use the
expression 'the belly of the beast' three times before it is over, not
counting all the times I have already used 'the belly of the beast' in
order to warn you of all the times 'the belly of the beast' will
appear."
The Baudelaires conclude this adventure in even more
upsetting circumstances than before, still with no sign of the elusive
Mr. Poe. Things don't look good for the intrepid threesome, but we can
be assured that they won't be biting the dust just yet. In fact, they
have reason to be hopeful, and that is a very powerful motivator -
perhaps enough, when combined with their ingenuity, to help them defeat
Count Olaf once and for all.
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