Klaus Baudelaire
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| A Series of Unfortunate Events character | |
Klaus, as drawn by Brett Helquist. |
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| Klaus Baudelaire | |
|---|---|
| Gender | Male |
| Hair color | Novel: Brown
Illustrations: Brown Film: Auburn |
| Age | 12 at the beginning of the series, 13 in The Vile Village, and 14 at the series' end |
| Film actor | Liam Aiken
appearance=The Bad Beginning |
| V.F.D. alliance | Volunteer side of the schism |
Klaus Baudelaire is one of the central characters in the popular children's book series, A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. His first name is possibly derived from Claus von Bülow.
Klaus is the middle child of the Baudelaire orphans; he has an older sister named Violet and a younger sister named Sunny. He is twelve years old at the beginning of the series, and turns thirteen in The Vile Village.
Klaus is an avid reader with an almost photographic memory. His favorite book is The Complete History of Absolutely Everything, Volume 127 - Cauldron to Caution. He remembers everything he reads, retaining information which often helps the Baudelaires to escape from dangerous situations. Also as a result of this, he speaks many languages. Klaus always seems to know the definition of words that leave others baffled, though there are certain words that even he does not know the meaning of, like loco parentis, when mentioned in The Bad Beginning by Mr. Poe, and xenophobe when mentioned in the The Ersatz Elevator by Jerome Squalor. Prior to the demise of his parents, Klaus liked to visit the Akhmatova Bokstore, where his father used to take him as a special treat, to buy an atlas or a volume of the encyclopedia, and revisited it with Jerome Squalor inThe Ersatz Elevator. While Violet is the inventor, Sunny is the biter (and later chef), Klaus is the researcher. The theme of children each having a particular skill that they are good at is also shown with other characters in the series. For example, with the Quagmire triplets, Isadora is a poet, Duncan is a journalist, and Quigley is a cartographer. The Baudelaires' volatile friend Fiona is a mycologist.
Klaus despises parsley soda, after having to drink it at 667 Dark Avenue while under the care of Jerome and Esmé Squalor, and states in The Hostile Hospital that needles make him nervous.
In the beginning of the series, Klaus loses his parents in a fire which consumes the family home. From this point onwards, the villainous Count Olaf tries to steal the enormous Baudelaire fortune that awaits Violet when she turns eighteen, using various nefarious schemes, and the Baudelaire orphans are shifted from guardian to guardian, along the way learning about a secret organization known only as V.F.D.
In The Austere Academy, Klaus and his siblings meet Duncan and Isadora Quagmire. A friendship develops between Klaus and Isadora, from whom Klaus learns the usefulness of a case book. In book eleven, The Grim Grotto, Fiona kisses Klaus before joining Count Olaf. What will become of these relationships is unknown (probably nothing, since both Isadora and Fiona were swallowed and probably killed by The Great Unknown or the question mark object). Both Fiona and Isadora have obvious elements of romantic interest in him, with Isadora constantly patting his hand and Fiona kissing him as well as having their being accused of flirting being referred to as his personal life.
In The Hostile Hospital, Klaus decodes anagrams (using alphabet soup) in order to save Violet, and in The Wide Window and The Vile Village, he finds secret messages in letters from Aunt Josephine and the Quagmires.
As mentioned in The Hostile Hospital and The End, despite all of Lemony Snicket's research and hard work, he still does not known the current location, position and status of the Baudelaire children, so Klaus's location, position and status is unknown, though due to the scene of the boat Beatrice's wreckage depicted in The Beatrice Letters, and the fact that his glasses are cracked and found among the wreckage, it is possible he was killed.
[edit] Disguises
A recurring theme in the series is the Baudelaire children's disguises. At the end of The Vile Village, they are falsely accused of murder. From this point on, they have no more guardians, and are on the run from the police. While running from the police, Klaus assumes the following disguises:
- In The Hostile Hospital, Klaus disguises himself as a doctor, and is taken to be one of The White Faced Women, associates of Count Olaf.
- In The Carnivorous Carnival, Klaus and Violet dress as a two-headed freak.
- In The Slippery Slope, Klaus poses both as a Snow Scout and as a Volunteer, although later in the series he does become a volunteer.
- In The Penultimate Peril, Klaus diguises himself as a hotel concierge.
[edit] Film adaptation
Klaus was portrayed in the film Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events by Liam Aiken.
