• Meet the Author •

Nick Glass of TeachingBooks.net inter- Grades viewed from his home K–2, 3–5 Lemony Snicket in , California.

I sensed on the shelf, and I Did you grow up liking thought I would fill it. word games and playing with words? Had you written books LS: I grew up reading and writ- before? ing fairly obsessively. My favor- LS: I was always interested in ite place to be was a library. writing, and so even when I There were certain bookstores was child I wrote small things that I admired very much. But on folded-up pieces of paper any place where people could that were occasionally stapled leave me alone where I could together. Whether that’s a book read was my idea of a good or not, I feel, is a long debate. time. It still is. Some people say, yes, of course, Photo courtesy of TeachingBooks.net that counts as a book. Other Did you like to write? people say, no, don’t be ridicu- LS: When I was a child, I was Who is Lemony Snicket? lous, that doesn’t count as a very, very interested in books. LS: I am Lemony Snicket. I am book. And other people say, I kept many near my bed so the author of a great number of why are you bothering me? that I could read well into the books, and I recommend none Why are you coming to me evening, or so I would have of them. with this question about pieces something heavy to throw at a of paper stapled together? Don’t burglar. I was very interested in Why did you write the you have something better to literature, both for reading and series of books called A do with your time? for warding off predators. Series of Unfortunate Events? How would you describe Why don’t you recom- your books? LS: Once I was in the library mend people read your and I was looking at all the LS: If I had to sum up all of books? books that were on the shelf, my work in a single word, LS: Despite my best efforts, I’ve and there were no books I think the word would be heard that some people, even *that were written about the “egad.” “Egad” is a four-letter children, accidentally pick up Baudelaire orphans. There word, but you’re allowed to these books and read them. were no books that were writ- use it. If you see a book by Lemony ten about Violet, Klaus, and Snicket, react the way you Sunny, and the terrible fire that What was your childhood would if you saw a scorpion. consumed their home and the like? Step slowly away and read dreadful man, Count Olaf, with LS: When I was a child, I was something else. No one picks whom they were forced to live, much shorter than I am now. up a scorpion and tries to read and all of the terrible things it. No one says, “I have a few that kept happening over and minutes before bed, I think over again. So it was a void that I’ll try to read a chapter of this

December 2012 Web Resources • LibrarySparks • 1 Meet the Author

scorpion.” Nobody says that. How did The Series of How does editing your That’s also how you should Unfortunate Events get books work? behave with books about started? Did you know LS: Because my books are so Lemony Snicket. that there were going to depressing and even dangerous, be 13 books? when I’m done with a book, I Don’t you want to sell LS: Well, when I began to can’t just mail it to an editor. If your books? research into the tale of the she opened a package, and was LS: No. I’m not interested in Baudelaire orphans and I began surprised by such a horrible selling these books to people. to take notes on the case, the manuscript, she might fall into I wrote these books because notes filled 13 volumes, and a coma. I usually wrap it up in I think the story is crucial. I so it seemed appropriate to me a package and put it someplace think that it’s a story that hadn’t that they would be published safe, then send her a note say- been told before. I think no sequentially in 13 volumes. I ing where the package is so one had known about what also think 13 is just a perfect that she may go and retrieve it. had happened to the Baudelaire round number. Then she looks over the book orphans, that it was very very, very slowly, because if she important that I write it down. What was your sequence looks at it for any long length But it’s like the phone book. for writing your books? of time, she usually faints dead It’s important information, but LS: Well, my process for writ- away. no one should take it down ing is fairly simple. First I do She might read two words, and read it. So I’ve never been research, I read as much as take a long five-day vacation, interested in finding readers for I can about the relevant set- come back, finish the sentence, my work. I’ve been interested tings and characters. I write etc. If she has any questions, she in finding readers and turning down a whole lot of notes. tries to reach me by telegram or them away from my work. I drink a great deal of tea. I fax. pace around my room. I slowly You have called your get distracted and read other How did you know when books “grim” and other books. I get depressed about the final book was over? depressing words. Why the state of the world and I cry How did you know when do you suppose they have a little bit. I take a long walk was the end? those manifestations? and cry harder. I get home and LS: When I wrote the last vol- LS: I would describe these wash the mud off myself from ume in A Series of Unfortunate books as grim, dreadful, my long walk. I take to bed. I Events, which was called The printed on paper, illustrated. drink a little bit more tea, and There are many horrible terms eventually a book gets written. for these books. The books tell a dreadful and depressing Do you journal or outline? story. Most people who read LS: I think when you are writ- them find themselves getting ing a book, particularly a book distressed and unnerved. Many about terrible things, it’s very people end up tearing out their important to make an outline. own hair, and that’s why when So, for instance, if there’s a you wander the streets you see dead person on the sidewalk, so many bald and sad people. take a piece of chalk and draw It’s because they’ve read books an outline around him, so if the by Lemony Snicket and they’ve dead person is removed, you lived to regret it. can remember where the dead person was, and that will help you write your book. Always use an outline. 2 • LibrarySparks • December 2012 Web Resources Meet the Author

End, I wrote the last paragraph I began to tell the tale of the Snicket: The Unauthorized and the last sentence and the Baudelaire orphans, and then I Autobiography. There was no last word, and then I ended it got very depressed. other explanation for so many with a dot, which is known as small babies crying in a clean a period, I took a great sigh of How do you treat your room. relief and a great sigh of dread. depression? LS: I found that the best cure Please share some Please describe the for getting depressed while examples of infor- premise of A Series of being associated with my own mation covered in Unfortunate Events. work is to curl up into a ball The Unauthorized Autobiography. LS: A Series of Unfortunate and to rock back and forth Events tells the story of Violet, until you feel better, like this. LS: Contained in The Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire. You should do this until it Unauthorized Autobiography are They are three siblings. They becomes irritating. diary entries, obituaries, strange are charming. Violet has a very photographs, maps, questions, strong mechanical mind. Klaus How do you know your answers to things that the ques- is a very strong reader, and representative, Daniel tions weren’t asking, questions Sunny is a baby and likes to Handler? that don’t have any answers bite things. The three of them LS: is a very that relate to the answers that go to the beach where they talented and handsome man were given for the first set of hear almost immediately that, who has agreed to represent me questions, and more and more while they were at the beach, when there are circumstances confusing items. The more peo- their parents perished in a ter- that prevent my appearing ple dive into The Unauthorized rible fire. They’re then sent to on camera, on television, at Autobiography, the less satisfied live with an obscure relative a library, at a bookstore, at and the more unhappy they whose name is Count Olaf, a school, walking down the become. who proves to be most unpleas- street, going into a restaurant, ant. He’s a treacherous person. going on a roller coaster, going Please talk about He’s dishonest. He’s greedy. He into an automobile, on a ship, the movie A Series of Unfortunate Events. has poor grooming habits. He’s on a plane, and other situations bossy. He’s all of the unpleasant that prove unnatural for me. LS: I’ve watched parts of the characteristics we’ve all come to movie, and it made me weep. hate in various adults we know. Please talk about your It’s very upsetting. I think it’s unauthorized autobiogra- always upsetting to see a movie How did you research phy. in which terrible things hap- these stories? pen. LS: The Unauthorized LS: I tried to follow the trail Autobiography was a book that I think everyone’s idea of a of the Baudelaire orphans as I wrote about my own life that good movie would be a movie best I could. So I conducted was compiled without my per- about happy people who would interviews with people, asking mission and published. It is be unthreatened, who would if they knew anything about full of information that most be having a lovely day, perhaps the Baudelaire orphans. I read people find very confusing and making animals out of yarn, eat- about terrible things that had distressing. I was recently visit- ing something delicious, such happened to orphans in vari- ing a hospital where there were as a piece of dry toast. That’s ous parts of the world. And I some newborn babies. The what people like in a film. And took voluminous notes on all of newborn babies were crying, instead, what they made was a the books that I had read, until and I concluded that the babies film that adopted my work into they began to tell the story of had been reading Lemony a nonstop parade—a carnival of the Baudelaire orphans. Then horror and dismay.

December 2012 Web Resources • LibrarySparks • 3 Meet the Author

Did you have a role in the often very excited and dis- LS: The last I heard, the making of the movie? turbed people. And so if you’re Baudelaire orphans were in LS: My role in the filming of ever curious what a letter to no position to complain about A Series of Unfortunate Events Lemony Snicket looks like, their story being told. I hope was begging them to stop. And usually at various parts of the that I have done right by them when it became clear that they page a long line and then a dot by trying to write down the weren’t going to stop, I sug- at the end of it, at the end of story as faithfully as possible. gested that they use the title an upsetting sentence, such as, As for Count Olaf or any of his “This Theater is Closed,” so “This book is ghastly,” or, “I associates who would read my that when you saw it on the couldn’t put it down,” or, “I’m account, I can only hope that marquee of a movie theater you having trouble sleeping,” or, it inspires them to lead better wouldn’t go inside. They never “Won’t you help me,” which, lives thereafter. took my advice. of course, really should have a question mark at the end. Did you need their permis- Do you ever talk to your sion to write their stories? readers? And if so, what do Do you have any advice LS: I don’t think anyone needs you tell them? for students on their writ- anyone’s permission to write LS: Well, I have had occasion to ing skills? down a story. If you’re inter- correspond with various people LS: My advice to anyone who ested in writing a story about who have read A Series of wants to be a writer is to carry somebody, you should do it. If Unfortunate Events. We usually a notebook with you so that you’re interested, for instance, correspond via post, although you can write down anything in writing a story about some- some of them use the electronic that you ever hear or any idea one you know because you mail. And I sympathize with that you have so you might think they’re up to something them. They often write and tell be able to use it later. When suspicious or deadly, you me how upset they are about you’re eavesdropping on some- should definitely do it. You the stories they read. And I say, one and taking notes on their shouldn’t ask their permission. “I tried to warn you the best I conversation, the important could. I’m sorry that my warn- thing is to have an excuse ready Did you ever feel threat- ings weren’t strong enough.” I so that when you are caught ened writing the story of take personal responsibility for eavesdropping, you’ll be able to the Baudelaire orphans? their unhappiness, and then I explain. LS: I faced two big obstacles suggest that they do something An excuse I like to use is, while writing the story. One else with their time, such as “I thought I dropped a pencil was the threat that the people learn how to imitate the lope of somewhere around here.” So I was writing about would a gazelle. that it’s good to have a note- come after me and that I would book, a pen so you can write be beset upon by an army of Can you imitate the lope notes, and a pencil that you can enemies who would cause me of a gazelle? put down on the floor, so when great physical harm. The other LS: No. I don’t have the faintest you’re caught eavesdropping, obstacle was paper cuts. I find idea how to imitate the lope of you can say, “Oh, there it is. paper cuts very irritating. a gazelle, but I’m sure someone There’s that pencil. That’s why I can figure out how to do that. was crawling outside your bed- Do you have any paper room, Mother.” cuts on your hands now? What else is in the letters LS: I can’t tell. My hands are that readers send you? How do the Baudelaire scarred with years of literary orphans and Count feel work. LS: The letters I receive from about your books? readers of my books are full of exclamation points. They’re

4 • LibrarySparks • December 2012 Web Resources Meet the Author

Did you ever feel that you Beginning, the Baudelaire Snicket, am. They’re as real as were writing for children orphans learn that their par- anything. It’s true that the books or was it just coincidence ents have been killed in a fire are often filed in the fiction sec- that the children became and are sent to live with Count tion, which is a mistake. The the readers of A Series of Olaf. In the second volume, books, whenever I see them in a Unfortunate Events? The Reptile Room, they’re living library or a bookstore filed in the LS: Many people ask me what with another relative, but Count fiction section, I go and I find a age is appropriate to read A Olaf pursues them. In the third person who’s in charge and I say, Series of Unfortunate Events? volume, The Wide Window, “These books should not be in My answer is always the same: they go to live with their Aunt the fiction section. They should no age whatsoever. Perhaps Josephine, and trouble ensues. be in the dumpster behind the if you are 109 years old and In , they’re library or bookstore.” you’ve had a terrible life and forced to work at a lumber mill. been beaten down by numerous In The Austere Academy, they are tragedies and you don’t mind forced to go to school, and it’s a that if you pick up a book that terrible place. might upset you so much that In the sixth book, The Ersatz you would drop down dead, Elevator, they end up falling perhaps that’s an appropriate down an elevator shaft. In the age. But if you’re under 109, I seventh book, The Vile Village, don’t recommend them. they are chased out of town by an angry mob. It goes on and What are some differences on and on. In the eighth, The in writing for adults versus Hostile Hospital, there are medi- children? cal experiments … no one wants to know about those. Nine, The LS: I haven’t noticed any dif- Please talk about The Carnivorous Carnival, lions, I ference in writing for adults Composer Is Dead. compared to children, really. I’m don’t really want to talk about LS: began just interested in an interesting that anymore. as a piece for narrator and story told in an interesting way. Ten, , lost orchestra, not unlike Peter and A Series of Unfortunate Events in the Arctic. It’s terrible, ter- the Wolf, where a narrator tells started as a novel that I thought rible business. Number 11, the tale of a murder, of a suspi- was for adults, and it gradually The Grim Grotto, in the depths cious death of a composer, and grew into what it became. I’ve of the ocean where darkness each instrument in the orches- never understood the difference and trouble ensue. Twelve, The tra is questioned. This piece between writing for children or Penultimate Peril, they’re in a for narrator and orchestra was for adults, kind of like I don’t hotel. I don’t really like to talk turned into a recording by the really understand the difference about that at all. And then finally San Francisco Symphony, and between talking to children or The End, which was full of death the recording is tucked into talking to adults. and destruction and despair, and anyone who reaches it usually the back of a book contain- ing the text of The Composer Is Please talk about the indi- has already collapsed of mental Dead with some illustrations by vidual titles in A Series of and physical exhaustion. Carson Ellis. I like to think that Unfortunate Events. Since your books are true, the music is a butterfly and that LS: A Series of Unfortunate the recording of the music is a Events is a 13-volume series. why are they located in the fiction area of the library? pinning down of the butterfly, In the first book, The Bad and that the book is a box in LS: The stories in A Series of which the pinned butterfly can Unfortunate Events are real. be preserved for display. They are as real as I, Lemony

December 2012 Web Resources • LibrarySparks • 5 Meet the Author

Please talk about your holiday books. LS: I’ve written two books for the holidays. One is called and the other is called The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming: A Christmas Story. Both of them take place toward the end of the year when the days are very short, when the nights are long, when the weather is cold, and when people start to worry that they Are you a musician? What is it with all your need to buy many voluminous LS: I play the accordion but weeping? presents for people they hardly I’m, at best, a gifted amateur LS: I weep every day for two know and might not even like. musician. I enjoy listening to reasons. One, because the I have also written a book music very much, and I enjoy stories that I write are very with , a fantastic people who enjoy listening to depressing and they upset me, painter who has illustrated many music, and I enjoy musicians. and the other is that I often books of her own and many of Therefore, I stand around near have excess saltwater near my other people’s books, and then musicians in the hopes of being eyes and weeping is the only decided after many years to taken for one of their own. way I know to get rid of it. wreck her entire career by work- ing with me on a book called 13 Does Daniel Handler play Do you have any advice for Words, which tries to explain the in a band? teachers and librarians? entire universe in a short story. LS: My associate, Daniel LS: I think teachers and librar- ians are among the noblest peo- Were there thirteen words Handler, also plays the accor- in your book, 13 Words? dion—a little bit better than I ple on earth. They work very, do—and plays in some quasi- very hard for very little com- LS: There are more than thir- professional ensembles. pensation. It’s a terrific job, and teen words in 13 Words, but 13 it’s very, very difficult. If you are Words is about thirteen words. Do you have a typical a teacher or a librarian, I com- But it takes more than thirteen workday? mend you for your efforts, and words to describe 13 Words in For me a typical workday I suggest that you take the day thirteen words, and that’s what LS: begins with early, early rising off. In fact, if you’re standing in 13 Words is about. in the morning, a little bit of a library or a school right now, breakfast, weeping, reading, why don’t you just walk out? What’s it like to collabo- Why don’t you just leave the rate with Maira Kalman? waking up again because I seem to have fallen asleep, a light young people there to do what- LS: Collaborating with Maira lunch, research, taking notes, ever they can do best alone, and Kalman is quite a delight getting the slow feeling that life just go out into the world and because Maira has a very well- means nothing, falling into a have a good time. guarded and safe apartment. depression, experiencing sheer When I go there, I feel very unhappiness, more weeping, How does your family safe, and I indulge in cake and panic, hysteria, dinner, bed. feel about the books that piano playing and tea drinking. you’ve written? LS: My family is ashamed of me, but I think most families are ashamed of the writer in their family. 6 • LibrarySparks • December 2012 Web Resources Meet the Author

Why are most families How are you handling suc- ashamed of their writing cess? relatives? LS: Well, it is true that many, LS: I think writing usually car- many copies of A Series of ries a disreputable air with it. Unfortunate Events have sold, It’s almost as if it has the smell and sometimes this endeavor of misery. When you become is described as a success, but a writer, you know that you’re I would see it as a deep, deep going to become the sort of per- failure. I wish that these books son who spoils family gatherings were available to hardly any- by being gloomy and literary. one. I wish that no one at all was interested in them, and I’m Do you have a new series grateful for the opportunity to of books? beg people to stay away. When LS: It’s true there’s a new series. I think of my failure to warn The new series is a secret, so people away, I tend to get very I’m not mentioning it to anyone shaky. except librarians and booksell- ers and book readers and men, ❖ ❖ ❖ ❖ ❖ women, and children. The new www.TeachingBooks.net pro- series is called All the Wrong duces comprehensive author pro- Questions. It is in four volumes. grams that enable every school Each volume is a question. The and library to virtually host first question is, Who Could That favorite authors and illustrators Be at This Hour? The series is of books for children and teens. about my own apprenticeship Programs include original five- in a secret organization, so, for minute movies filmed in their obvious reasons, I can’t tell you studios, in-depth written inter- anything about the books. views, and relevant links around the Web. For more information, contact Nick Glass, Founder, at [email protected].

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