Violet Baudelaire

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Violet Baudelaire
Image:Violet Baudelaire.jpg
First appearance The Bad Beginning
Last appearance The End
Created by Daniel Handler/Lemony Snicket
Portrayed by Emily Browning
Information
Aliases Beverly the Two Headed Freak
Concierge, Laura V. Bleediotie
Gender Female
Age 14 at beginning of series, 16 at end of series
Occupation Inventor
Children none
Relatives Mr. and Mrs. Baudelaire
Klaus Baudelaire
Sunny Baudelaire

Violet Baudelaire is one of the main characters in the popular children's book series, A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. In the film she is portrayed by Emily Browning. Violet is the eldest child of the Baudelaire orphans. Her younger siblings are her brother Klaus and her sister Sunny. When Violet is of age (eighteen years old), she will inherit the Baudelaire fortune. Violet mentioned in The Bad Beginning that she can not cook anything except toast (and she sometimes burns the toast). As explained in the movie as well as the books, appearances mean nothing to her, although she herself is very beautiful. In the movie, Lemony Snicket calls all three of the Baudelaires "reasonably attractive". In the first book she is 14 years old, and in The Grim Grotto she is 15. By the end of the series she is 16. Violet's favorite book is The Life of Nikola Tesla, and she has a strong allergy to peppermints, which she shares with her siblings, and gets from her mother, as revealed in The Beatrice Letters.

Contents

[edit] Biography

[edit] Pre-Book Series

When Violet was five years old, she won her first invention contest with an automatic rolling pin. She used a window shade and six pairs of roller skates, plus winning her a gold medal and a compliment from the judge, who bet that Violet could invent something with both her hands tied behind her back, even with substantial interference. Prior to the demise of her parents, she liked to visit the Verne Invention Museum and liked many of its exhibits there, including the one of the mechanical demonstrations that had inspired her to be an inventor when she was just two years old.

[edit] Series

Violet in the 2004 film.
Violet in the 2004 film.

At the beginning of the series, Violet loses her parents, Bertrand and Beatrice Baudelaire, in a fire which consumes their mansion. She, Klaus, and Sunny, are sent to their new guardian, the villainous Count Olaf, who tries to steal the enormous Baudelaire fortune from the orphans, using various nefarious schemes. Violet and Olaf almost get married in his play, The Marvelous Marriage, but Violet signs the marriage document with her left hand, and as she is right-handed, the ceremony is declared to be invalid. After this, Olaf and his associates go on the run as fugitives.

Her later guardians include the kind Dr. Montgomery Montgomery, Josephine Anwhistle, and Sir. In the fourth book she worked at Lucky Smells Lumbermill and got paid in coupons, which was later revealed to be illegal. In The Austere Academy, Violet and her siblings meet Duncan and Isadora Quagmire at a boarding school they are sent to; Prufrock Preparatory School. A close friendship between Violet and Duncan develops. In the tenth book, The Slippery Slope, she meets Quigley Quagmire, and they form a strong relationship. What will become of these relationships is still unknown, as Duncan and Quigley both disappeared into the "Great Unknown", referenced in The End.

In the sixth book, she is adopted by Jerome and Esmé Squalor and in the seventh the Village of Fowl Devotees. At the end of the book she and her siblings are accused of murdering Jacques Snicket and while Duncan and Isadora escape in a hot air mobile home built by Hector, they decide to run from the police. Thanks to the Daily Punctilio, the news that the Baudelaires are murderers spreads quickly. They escape with Volunteers Fighting Disease and get a job helping Hal at Heimlich Hospital's hall of records. When they are being chased by Esmé, Klaus and Sunny escape up a chute but Violet can't because she was too big. Count Olaf tries to perform a head removal on Violet (or "Laura V. Bleediotie") in an operating theatre but when Klaus and Sunny are exposed (they were wearing disguises) she wakes up and they run out of the hospital and hide in Olaf's car trunk.

In the The Carnivorous Carnival they disguise themselves as "freaks" (Violet and Klaus as a two-headed person) and get jobs at Caligari Carnival. At the end of the book they pretend to decide to join Count Olaf, although since Olaf knows they are the Baudelaires, unhooks the caraven Violet and Klaus from the one with him and his other associates (and Sunny). In the next book she disguises herself as a Snow Scout and meets Quigley Quagmire, and learns about V.F.D. Now lost in the water, the Baudelaires board the Queequeg, captained by Captain Widdershins, in the next book. They then go in a taxi Kit Snicket is driving and go to the Hotel Denouement, where the Baudelaires disguise themselves as concierges. At the end of the book they burn down the Hotel Denouement and escape with Olaf in a boat and wash up on an island in the final book. In The End, Violet and her siblings adopt Kit Snicket's child, Beatrice, after Count Olaf dies, but the fate of her and her siblings is ambiguous. As mentioned in The Hostile Hospital and The End, despite all of Lemony's research and hard work, even he still does not know the current location, position and status of the Baudelaire children. However, it is stated in a special version of "The Bad Beginning" that Violet returned to Briny Beach a third time, implying her survival.

[edit] Inventions

While Klaus is the researcher, Sunny is the biter (and later chef), Violet is the inventor. 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. Violet is depicted as being extremely skilled at inventing devices. She often invents devices to help herself and her siblings in dangerous situations, using only simple objects such as rubber bands and tin cans. Whenever Violet invents something, she ties her hair up with her ribbon to keep it out of her eyes.

[edit] Violet's inventions

  • In The Bad Beginning, Violet makes a grappling hook, from metal rods and torn clothing.
  • In The Reptile Room, she makes a lockpick, from two prongs from an electrical socket, a thumbtack, and some soap.
  • In The Wide Window, she makes a signaling device, from a piece of cloth, fishing pole, a metal bucket, and a burning hairnet.
  • In The Austere Academy, she makes a staple-making device, using a small crab, a potato, metal rods, creamed spinach, and a fork. She also makes a few pairs of tap shoes by attaching pieces of metal to the soles of normal shoes.
  • In The Ersatz Elevator, she makes rope out of extension cords, curtains, and neckties. She also makes welding torches, from heated fire tongs, and crowbars, from bent fire tongs.
  • In The Vile Village, she makes a battering ram, using a wooden plank, water, and spongy bread. She also assists Hector in constructing a Self-Sustaining Hot Air Mobile Home using various mechanical devices.
  • In The Hostile Hospital, she makes an intercom system, using an empty soup can with a hole. She also makes an escape device, from rubber bands.
  • In The Carnivorous Carnival, she tries to make a cart as an escape vehicle, using vines, roller coaster parts and a piece of rubber.
  • In The Slippery Slope, she makes a drag chute, using hammocks and a mixture of sticky condiments, and a brake, using a wooden table. She also makes climbing shoes using forks, fake fingernails, ukulele strings, and a candelabra.
  • In The Penultimate Peril she makes a drag chute using dirty laundry sheets.
  • In The End, Violet invents a water filter in order to make salt water drinkable. She also makes a sling for her and her siblings to use to carry baby Beatrice.
  • In Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events (video game), Violet invents various things, such as the Smasher, the Lobber, the Lockpick, the Sprayer, the Lever Yanker, the Reptile Retriever, the Brilliant Bopper (Klaus's weapon), the Fruit Flinger (her own weapon), the Baby Booster (which helps Sunny jump), the Steady Stilts (so that Violet can reach high places) and the Levitating Loafers (which can make Klaus fly).
  • In The Dismal Dinner, Violet invents a very cold, very hard device made from a silver pie server and the ear of the snowman ice sculpture to lessen Sunny's pain from "teething" as soon as Sunny stopped looking out the window and sucked on it.

[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, Violet assumes the following disguises:


[edit] Film adaptation

In the 2004 film Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, Violet is played by Australian actress Emily Browning.

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