Quagmire triplets
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Duncan, Isadora, and Quigley Quagmire are fictional characters in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. Isadora's and Duncan's first names are derived from that of the dancer Isadora Duncan, and Quigley's first name is derived from Lillian F. Quigley, author of The Blind Men and the Elephant.[1] Their last name, "Quagmire," literally means a swamp, but is to be interpreted here metaphorically as "a difficult or precarious situation." [1]
[edit] Isadora and Duncan
| Isadora and Duncan Quagmire | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| First appearance | The Austere Academy |
| Last appearance | The Vile Village |
| Created by | Lemony Snicket (aka Daniel Handler) |
| Information | |
| Gender | Female and Male respectively |
| Age | 13 when they first meet, 14 in the Slippery Slope |
| Relatives | Quigley Quagmire |
Duncan and Isadora first appear in The Austere Academy, when the Baudelaire children, Violet, Klaus and Sunny, meet them at Prufrock Preparatory School. The five instantly bond.
Count Olaf kidnaps the Quagmires at the end of the book. The Baudelaires find them in The Ersatz Elevator, but fail to rescue them. At the end of The Vile Village, the Quagmires escape from the Village of Fowl Devotees with Hector in a large self-sustaining hot air balloon. The Baudelaires try to climb up the ladder connecting to the balloon, but fail when Esmé Squalor destroys the ladder with a harpoon gun.
It is strongly implied that Isadora and Duncan are part of the good side of V.F.D.. Kit Snicket reveals in The Penultimate Peril that they were flying over the sea, but were apparently attacked, and the narrative later reveals that these attackers are the V.F.D. Eagles. In the final book it is revealed (by Kit Snicket) that while she met up with Captain Widdershins, Fiona and Fernald, Quigley managed to reach the hot air mobile home and aided his siblings against the eagles. Then Kit and the rest show up to help the Quagmires and Hector, but the eagles pop the balloons holding the home in the air into the sea and the Queequeg, leaving them all castaways. Then the question mark thing appeared below them. Kit and Ink were able to leave on the raft that she built, but the others took their chances, and did not hear Kit shouting. Either Duncan or Quigley scream Violet before being taken. They are not heard from again.
Snicket states that the triplets are older than Klaus (who is thirteen years old since The Vile Village) but younger than Violet (fourteen years old), so the triplets must be around thirteen years old. In the course of the series, Violet turns fifteen, and Klaus thirteen, so the triplets might now be fourteen.
Duncan and Isadora carry commonplace books with them. Duncan's is dark green and Isadora's is black. Duncan used his to write interesting facts, while Isadora used hers to write couplets in. In The Vile Village Duncan and Isadora attempt to give their notebooks to the Baudelaires, but Esmé Squalor, disguised as the village's Chief of Police, shoots the notebooks with a harpoon gun, which contained secrets about Olaf and his plots and V.F.D
Duncan's favorite book is The Portable Dorothy Parker, and his sister Isadora's favorite book is Les Fleurs du mal by Charles Baudelaire.
[edit] Quigley
| Quigley Quagmire | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| First appearance | The Slippery Slope |
| Last appearance | The Slippery Slope |
| Cause/reason | Lost at Sea |
| Created by | Lemony Snicket (aka Daniel Handler) |
| Information | |
| Gender | Male |
| Age | 14 in the Slippery Slope |
| Relatives | Isadora and Duncan Quagmire |
Quigley Quagmire was thought to be dead until Violet and Klaus Baudelaire met him in a cave with the Snow Scouts in The Slippery Slope. He and Violet Baudelaire clearly have some romantic interest in each other, as it was implied at a point when they decided to take a rest that they had kissed.
His mother hid him in a trapdoor during the fire to protect him. He was under there for a few hours, then he found that it was a tunnel. It took him to Dr. Montgomery Montgomery's house, after the Baudelaires had been there. The house was empty, so the Baudelaires had already left and Dr. Montgomery was already dead. This also implies that the Quagmire house burned down after the Baudelaire mansion. Then, Jacques Snicket arrived, but left for Paltryville.
At the end of the book, The Baudelaires and Quigley escaped Olaf but the icy Stricken Stream melted, and Quigley got washed away by the current of the river into a separate tributary. He apparently survived, as he sends the Baudelaires a telegram with a hidden message in it in The Grim Grotto, telling them to go to Briny Beach. He is on the "good" side of the schism.
Like his siblings, Quigley has an interest related to writing, in his case cartography.
In The Penultimate Peril, Kit Snicket tells The Baudelaires that Quigley and Kit were planning to meet up with the three children, but he received word from his other two siblings that they were being attacked in the sky. Kit says that he stole a helicopter to help them and Hector, and would do this by constructing a huge net.
At the end of the series, Kit informs the Baudelaires that Quigley did indeed manage to meet up with his siblings, shortly before the eagles popped the balloons holding them up. Everyone inside the mobile home was sent toppling downwards, destroying the Queequeg directly below them. Duncan, Isadora, Kit Snicket, Captain Widdershins, Fiona, Fernald, Hector, Ink, and Quigley were all left stranded in the water, before the large question-mark shaped object, The Great Unknown, appeared below them. Kit and Ink managed to escape, while everyone else was pulled under, either to their deaths, or to their rescue. It is unknown if they are alive or not, but in The End it mentions that the Quagmires are "in circumstances just as dark ... as the Baudelaires'", which could be suggesting that they are still alive.
[edit] References
- ^ Quigley, Lillian F., The Blind Men and the Elephant, Scribner, New York, 1959.
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