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Stealing, Of Course, Is A Crime, And A Very Impolite Thing To Do. But Like Most Impolite Things, It Is Excusable Under Certain Circumstances. Stealing Is Not Excusable If, For Instance, You Are In A Museum And You Decide That A Certain Painting Would Look Better In Your House, And You Simply Grab The Painting And Take It There. But If You Were Very, Very Hungry, And You Had No Way Of Obtaining Money, It Would Be Excusable To Grab The Painting, Take It To Your House, And Eat It.

-Daniel Handler

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Stealing, Of Course, Is

Daniel Handler

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Stealing, Of Course, Is A Crime, And A Very Impolite Thing To Do. But Like Most Impolite Things, It Is Excusable Under Certain Circumstances. Stealing Is Not Excusable If, For Instance, You Are In A Museum And You Decide That A Certain Painting Would Look Better In Your House, And You Simply Grab The Painting And Take It There. But If You Were Very, Very Hungry, And You Had No Way Of Obtaining Money, It Would Be Excusable To Grab The Painting, Take It To Your House, And Eat It.

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For Beatrice, When We First Met, I Was Lonely, And You Were Pretty. Now I Am Pretty Lonely.

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I Have This Fantasy That The Second Movie Would Begin With A Brief Statement By All Of The Young Actors Who Had Played The Children In The First Movie, Explaining How It Had Ruined Their Lives, So We Would Catch Up With Emily Browning Drinking Heavily In The Back Of A Burlesque Bar, And Maybe Liam Aiken Would Be Living Underneath A Bridge, And Then Instead Of The Twins Who Played Sunny, We Would Just Try To Find The Oldest Woman In The World, And Get An Interview With Her Sitting In A Trailer Park.

I Suppose I'll Have To Add The Force Of Gravity To My List Of Enemies.

I Can't Think Of A Story That Doesn't Have Something Terrible In It. Otherwise, It's Dull. So When I Embarked Into The World Of Picture Books, My First Thought Was To Do Something About The Dark.

One Of The Most Difficult Things To Think About In Life Is One’s Regrets. Something Will Happen To You, And You Will Do The Wrong Thing, And For Years Afterward You Will Wish You Had Done Something Different.

I'm Sure You Have Heard It Said That Appearance Does Not Matter So Much, And That It Is What's On The Inside That Counts. This Is, Of Course, Utter Nonsense, Because If It Were True Then People Who Were Good On This Inside Would Would Never Have To Comb Their Hair Or Take A Bath, And The Whole World Would Smell Even Worse Than It Already Does.

We Are Respecting Our Parents' Wishes....they Didn't Want To Shelter Us From The World's Treacheries. They Wanted Us To Survive Them.

Certain People Have Said That The World Is Like A Calm Pond, And That Anytime A Person Does Even The Smallest Thing, It Is As If A Stone Has Dropped Into The Pond, Spreading Circles Of Ripples Further And Further Out, Until The Entire World Has Been Changed By One Tiny Action.

My General Writing Preface Is To Write An Outline And Then Ignore About Half Of It, Both On A Micro Level With The Individual Book, And On A Macro Level With The Series As A Whole, And That's Pretty Much What's Happened.

Whenever You Are Examining Someone Else's Belongings, You Are Bound To Learn Many Interesting Things About The Person Of Which You Were Not Previously Aware.

The End Of 'the End' Is The Best Place To Begin 'the End', Because If You Read 'the End' From The Beginning Of The Beginning Of 'the End' To The End Of The End Of 'the End', You Will Arrive At The End.

I Kind Of Always Think My Work Is Unfilmable, And When I Meet People Who Are Interested In Filming It, I'm Always Stunned.

I Met [my Editor] In A Bar Where Alcoholic Beverages Are Served And I Bought Her One And I Told Her The Idea. And She Said That She Liked It Very Much, Which Embarrassed Me Because I Thought It Meant That She Was A Lightweight And That In The Morning, As So Many Women Say To So Many Men, What Seems Like A Good Idea, You Know, Turns Out Not To Be.

Nobody Wants To Hear That You Will Try Your Best. It Is The Wrong Thing To Say. It Is Like Saying 'i Probably Won't Hit You With A Shovel.' Suddenly Everyone Is Afraid You Will Do The Opposite.

I'm Always Loath To Make Generalizations About What Is For Children And What Isn't. Certainly Children's Literature As A Genre Has Some Restrictions, So Certain Things Will Never Pop Up In A Snicket Book. But I Didn't Know Anything About Writing For Children When I Started - This Is The Theme Of Naïveté Creeping Up On Us Once More - And I Sort Of Still Don't, And I'm Happy That Adults Are Reading Them As Well As Children.

You Would Run Much Slower If You Were Dragging Something Behind You, Like A Knapsack Or A Sheriff.

All The Secrets Of The World Are Contained In Books. Read At Your Own Risk.

It Is Terribly Rude To Tell People That Their Troubles Are Boring.

...in Life It Is Often The Tiny Details That End Up Being The Most Important.

I Know What Is Going On," Said Sir. "i Am The Boss! Of Course I Know!

...there's Nothing Wrong With Occasionally Staring Out The Window And Thinking Nonsense, As Long As The Nonsense Is Yours.

I Stayed There Loving You, Though The Love Made Me, Not Sad But I Guess Melancholy, For A Reason I Couldn’t Point To.

There Are Some Secrets You Want To Keep To Yourself, Even If They Don't Matter. They Might Only Matter If You Keep Them Secret.

Is It Fair For The Bears To Come Down To Where Humans Live, Looking For Food? Is It Fair For The Duke's Soldiers To Shoot At Them? Is It Fair For The Bears To Crush Them With Giant Snowballs? Often, If You Point Out Something That Isn't Fair, Someone Will Reply, "life Isn't Fair." What Is To Be Done With Such People?

Troublesome Things Tend To Remain Troublesome No Matter How Many Times You Do Them.

I'm Not A Believer In Predetermined Fates, Being Rewarded For One's Efforts. I'm Not A Believer In Karma. The Reason Why I Try To Be A Good Person Is Because I Think It's The Right Thing To Do. If I Commit Fewer Bad Acts There Will Be Fewer Bad Acts, Maybe Other People Will Join In Committing Fewer Bad Acts, And In Time There Will Be Fewer And Fewer Of Them.

I Think I’ve Always Believed That There Is One Person In The Universe Who You’re Truly Meant For–for Whom You Are Truly Meant–and The Fact That Sometimes There Are Two Or Even More People On The Earth You Can Fall In Love With Really Bothers Me. It Suggests That If You Work Hard You Can Be Meant For Anyone.

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Normally It Is Not Polite To Go Into Somebody’s Room Without Knocking, But You Can Make An Exception If The Person Is Dead, Or Pretending To Be Dead.

It Looked Exhausting And Pointless, Two Things That Should Be Avoided At All Costs

E!" Klaus Cried. "e As In Exit!" The Baudelaires Ran Down E As In Exit, But When They Reached The Last Cabinet, The Row Was Becoming F As In Falling File Cabinets, G As In Go The Other Way! And H As In How In The World Are We Going To Escape?

Waiting Is One Of Life's Hardships. It Is Hard Enough To Wait For Chocolate Cream Pie While Burnt Roast Beef Is Still On Your Plate. It Is Plenty Difficult To Wait For Halloween When The Tedious Month Of September Is Still Ahead Of You. But To Wait For One's Adopted Uncle To Come Home While A Greedy And Violent Man Is Upstairs Was One Of The Worst Waits The Baudelaires Had Ever Experienced.

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We Are A Nation Of Children Letting Horrible Things Happen, And Flunking Calc.

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You May Be Right,' She Said, A Phrase Which Here Meant 'i’m Wrong, But I Don’t Have The Courage To Say So.

Hal Is On His Way." The Nurse Announced Reentering The Room.

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It Is Very Frustrating Not To Be Understood In This World. If You Say One Thing And Keep Being Told That You Mean Something Else, It Can Make You Want To Scream. But Somewhere In The World There Is A Place For All Of Us, Whether You Are An Electric Form Of Decoration, Peppermint-scented Sweet, A Source Of Timber, Or A Potato Pancake.

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Love Is Candy From A Stranger, But It's Candy You've Had Before And It Probably Won't Kill You.

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This Is Love, To Sit With Someone You've Known Forever In A Place You've Been Meaning To Go, And Watching As Their Life Happens To Them Until You Stand Up And It's Time To Go.

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Congratulations

Is It Useful To Feel Fear, Because It Prepares You For Nasty Events, Or Is It Useless, Because Nasty Events Will Occur Whether You Are Frightened Or Not?

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Any Playlist Without Prince Is No Friend Of Mine.

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But There Are Times In This Harum-scarum World When Figuring Out The Right Thing To Do Is Quite Simple, But Doing The Right Thing Is Simply Impossible.

...there's Not Enough Ink And Paper To Say All I Wanted.

It Was A Curious Feeling, That Something Could Be So Close And So Distant At The Same Time.

There Are Secrets Everywhere. I Think Everyone's Parents Have Secrets. You Just Have To Know Where To Look For Them.

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Just About Everybody Has Written A First Novel That They Throw Away Before Writing Their Actual First Novel.

Occasionally There Are Parents Who Say, "i Brought My Child So He Or She Could Learn What The Career Of A Writer Is Like, And You Did This Long Theatrical Performance Instead, And I'm Very Disappointed."

The Only Thing He Cares About.

Keep Anyone With Whom You Can Read In Silence.

The Sad Truth Is The Truth Is Sad.

Series Of Unfortunate Events

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Nobody Wants To Fall Into A Safety Net, Because It Means The Structure In Which They've Been Living Is In A State Of Collapse And They Have No Choice But To Tumble Downwards. However, It Beats The Alternative.

It Seems To Me That Oftentimes In Young Relationships Once There's A Problem Of Some Significance Then It's Almost Like They're Both Racing For The Dumper Buzzer.

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Death Is Something You Cannot Escape, Such As Death, Or A Cheesecake That Has Curdled, Both Of Which Always Turn Up Sooner Later.

The Way That The Stories Go In The Snicket Books Is Just The Way Stories Naturally Go To Me. They're Full Of Misery, And Yet The Misery Ends Up Being Slightly Hilarious. And In Terms Of The Warnings On The Back Of The Books, That Really Started As An Honest Assessment Of Their Marketability.

This Is My Knife. It Is Very Sharp And Very Eager To Hurt You.

It Is A Curious Thing, The Death Of A Loved One. We All Know That Our Time In This World Is Limited, And That Eventually All Of Us Will End Up Underneath Some Sheet, Never To Wake Up. And Yet It Is Always A Surprise When It Happens To Someone We Know. It Is Like Walking Up The Stairs To Your Bedroom In The Dark, And Thinking There Is One More Stair Than There Is. Your Foot Falls Down, Through The Air, And There Is A Sickly Moment Of Dark Surprise As You Try And Readjust The Way You Thought Of Things.

The World Is Quiet Here.

Hello, Freaky Peoples!

For Beatrice, I Cherished, You Perished, The World's Been Nightmarished.

I Like To Think That I Get Better And Better As A Writer, But It Seems Pretty Easy To Me To Slip On Disguises Of Various People.

I Waited Just To See You At That Kind Of Peace, I Wanted To Be Beside You, I Wanted You To Wake Up Slowly Or Startle, Or Just Half Awaken And Turn Over Or Murmur My Name. I Wanted To Watch You Forever, Or Sleep Beside You Forever, Or Sleep Forever While You Woke And Watched Me, Something Forever Anyway. I Wanted To Kiss You, Rumple Your Hair, Rest Three Fingertips On Your Hip Bone Warm And Smooth, Wake You That Way Or Hush You Back To Sleep.

A Good Library Will Never Be Too Neat, Or Too Dusty, Because Somebody Will Always Be In It, Taking Books Off The Shelves And Staying Up Late Reading Them.

Thought Provoking

Why Not Rise From The Grave And Terrorize A Little Instead Of Staying Buried And Dead In The Cemetery?

Literature Doesn’t Exactly Have A Strong Mental-health Track Record.

Sometimes Even In Most Unfortunate Of Lives There Will Occur A Moment Or Two Of Good.

If You Are Allergic To A Thing, It Is Best Not To Put That Thing In Your Mouth, Particularly If The Thing Is Cats.

A Library Is Like An Island In The Middle Of A Vast Sea Of Ignorance, Particularly If The Library Is Very Tall And The Surrounding Area Has Been Flooded.

Just Because Something Is Traditional Is No Reason To Do It, Of Course. Piracy, For Example, Is A Tradition That Has Been Carried On For Hundreds Of Years, But That Doesn't Mean We Should All Attack Ships And Steal Their Gold.

I Wrote Rick Before I Was Published, And I Had No Vision Of It, Really. It Was Just A Story That Occurred To Me, And That Put Its Little Claws In My Brain, And I Wrote It, And I Showed It To A Couple People, And They All Said, "this Is Ghastly."

The Basic Eight And Watch Your Mouth Both Have First-person Voices, And I Ended Up Investigating Those Voices And Investing So Much In Them That I Think Many People Took Them More Seriously Than They Ought To Have.

In America Now There Is This Phenomenon Called Helicopter Parenting, Where You're Hovering Over Your Child For The Whole Time. Parents There View Their Job As Being To Make Sure Their Kid Never Has A Moment Of Unhappiness. Of Course, As A Parent Myself, I Can Understand The Urge, But I Don't Know Whether It Would Be Healthy Or Possible.

Never Look A Gift Lion In The Mouth.

After A Certain Age, You Couldn't Even Say Where You Were From. You Went Someplace, And Lived There. And Then You Went Someplace Else.

I Was In A Pharmacy And I Saw The Warnings On The Backs Of Poisonous Substances, And I Thought, "well, That's What I Can Do." So I Wrote A List Of Ingredients In The Book, And Warnings That They Shouldn't Consume Those Ingredients. The Editor And The Publisher Thought That It Was A Great Way To Go In Terms Of Reverse Psychology, But It Honestly Hadn't Occurred To Me That It Was Reverse Psychology. I Just Thought That It Was Sort Of An Honest Assessment Making Clear That If You Were Timid Or Easily Disturbed, You Could Turn Away.

[i]t Was The Color Of Someone Buying You An Ice Cream Cone For No Reason At All.

Of Course, It Is Boring To Read About Boring Thing, But It Is Better To Read Something That Makes You Yawn With Boredom Than Something That Will Make You Weep Uncontrollably, Pound Your Fists Against The Floor, And Leave Tearstains All Over Your Pillowcase, Sheets, And Boomerang Collection.

There Is No Easy Way To Train An Apprentice. My Two Tools Are Example And Nagging.

The Right Hand Doesn’t Know What The Left Is Doing” Is A Phrase That Refers To Times When People Ought To Know, But Don’t Know, About Something That Is Happening Very Close To Them. For Instance, You Ought To Know About The Man Who Watches You When You Sleep.

You Can Invent Things Like Automatic Popcorn Poppers. You Can Invent Things Like Steam-powered Window Washers. But You Can’t Invent More Time.

Why Haven't We Fixed Sick Yet? You Scientists There-- Put Down Those Starfish And Help Us. I Hereby Demand That All The People Who Are Good At Math Make The World Free Of Illness. The Rest Of Us Will Write You Epic Poems And Staple Them Together Into A Booklet.

It Is Easy To Decide On What Is Wrong To Wear To A Party, Such As Deep-sea Diving Equipment Or A Pair Of Large Pillows, But Deciding What Is Right Is Much Trickier.

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Taking One’s Chances Is Like Taking A Bath, Because Sometimes You End Up Feeling Comfortable And Warm, And Sometimes There Is Something Terrible Lurking Around That You Cannot See Until It Is Too Late And You Can Do Nothing Else But Scream And Cling To A Plastic Duck.

The Difference Between A House And A Home Is Like The Difference Between A Man And A Woman-- It Might Be Embarrassing To Explain, But It Would Be Very Unusual To Get Them Confused.

But One Type Of Book That Practically No One Likes To Read Is A Book About The Law. Books About The Law Are Notorious For Being Very Long, Very Dull, And Very Difficult To Read. This Is One Reason Many Lawyers Make Heaps Of Money. The Money Is An Incentive - The Word "incentive" Here Means "an Offered Reward To Persuade You To Do Something You Don't Want To Do - To Read Long, Dull, And Difficult Books.

I Often Can't Remember Which Scenes Are And Aren't In The Final Product, Because I Saw So Many Different Versions Of The Lemony Snicket That I Forget Which Ended Up On The Cutting-room Floor.

One Cannot Spend Forever Sitting And Solving The Mysteries Of Oone's History.

To Hear The Phrase "our Only Hope" Always Makes One Anxious, Because It Means That If The Only Hope Doesn't Work, There Is Nothing Left.

Tea Should Be As Bitter As Wormwod And As Sharp As A Two Eged Sword Kit Snicket (a Series Of Unfortunate Events)

Goodness! Golly! Good God! Blessed Allah! Zeus And Hera! Mary And Joseph! Nathaniel Hawthorne! Don't Touch Her! Grab Her! Move Closer! Run Away! Don't Move! Kill The Snake! Leave It Alone! Give It Some Food! Don't Let It Bite Her! Lure The Snake Away! Here, Snakey! Here, Snakey Snakey!

I’m Happier Than A Pig Eating Bacon!

When I Wrote Rick, I Had The Idea That I Would Take The Plot Of Nearly Every Opera And Turn It Into A Dark Film, Which Is Something I Still May Do.

I'd Made Pretty Clear To The People At Paramount And Dreamworks That, If They Wanted Lemony Snicket To Comment, He Would Be Completely Horrified By The Entire Film. And As Long As They Understood That, It Was Okay. I'm Not Much Of A Fan Of Dvd Commentaries Myself, So This Was My Way Of Getting Revenge, In A Sense, For All The Puffed-up Directors And Stars Who Talk Endlessly About The Self-aggrandizing Minutiae Of Making A Movie.

Of Course I'm Trying To Trick You! That's The Way Of The World, Baudelaires. Everyone Runs Around With Their Secrets And Their Schemes, Trying To Outwit Everyone Else.

In Times Of Extreme Stress, One Can Often Find Energy Hidden In Even The Most Exhausted Areas Of The Body.

There Are Some Who Go Through Life With A Shadow Hanging Over Them, Particularly If They Live In A Building Which Has Long Wide Awnings.

He Looked Like The Sort Of Person Who Would Tell You That He Did Not Have An Umbrella To Lend You When He Actually Had Several And Simply Wanted To See You Get Soaked.

But I Must Admit I Miss You Terribly. The World Is Too Quiet Without You Nearby.

Having A Personal Philosophy Is Like Having A Pet Marmoset, Because It May Be Very Attractive When You Acquire It, But There May Be Situations When It Will Not Come In Handy At All.

People Worry More About Girls, For A Good Reason: I Don't Think My Parents Thought I Was Going To Be Raped By A Classmate Or Attacked When I Was Walking Alone In Some Neighborhood. So It's Not Just Paranoid Parents.

I Like To Give People Novels I Think They Would Like, On No Particular Occasion - Just When We're In A Bookstore Together. I Like To Receive Reference Books On My Birthday.

When You Say, "history Is Written By The Winners," You Like To Think About Someone Who Isn't You. You Want To Think, "oh, That's The Juggernaut I'm Standing Against." But You're Probably Part Of It.

Everyone Tells You It's All Right To Cry, But Not Enough People Say It's All Right If You Don't Want People To Know.

I Stand Entwined In Fire On The Inextinguishable Bonfire Of Inconceivable Love.

I'm Not Very Good At The Accordion. If I Played Guitar, I Wouldn't Be On Anyone's Album. But Because I Play The Accordion And No One Else Does, I End Up Doing Strange Things.

What Should We Call Him?" Klaus Asked. "you Should Call Him Dr. Montgomery," Mr. Poe Replied, "unless He Tells You To Call Him Montgomery. Both His First And Last Names Are Montgomery, So It Doesn't Make Much Difference." "his Name Is Montgomery Montgomery?" Klaus Said, Smiling. "yes, And I'm Sure He's Very Sensitive About That, So Don't Ridicule Him," Mr. Poe Said, Coughing Again Into His Handkerchief.

There Is A Pair Of Snakes Who Have Learned To Drive A Car So Recklessly That They Would Run You Over In The Street And Never Stop To Apologize.

I Find Reading Screenplays Difficult, As They're Only A Roadmap For What A Movie Might End Up Being.

For Beatrice- When We Were Together I Felt Breathless. Now You Are.

Off With You" Is A Phrase Used By People Who Lack The Curtesy To Say Something More Polite, Such As, "if There's Nothing Else You Require I Must Be Going" Or "i'm Sorry But I'm Going To Have To Ask You To Leave, Please" Or Even "excuse Me But I Believe You Have Mistaken My Home For Your Own And My Valuable Belongings For Yours And I Must Ask You To Return The Items In Question To Me And Leave My Home After Untying Me From This Chair, As I'm Unable To Do It Myself, If It's Not Too Much Trouble.

Your Initial Opinion On Just About Anything May Change Over Time.

First Impression

A Man Of My Acquaintance Once Wrote A Poem Called "the Road Less Traveled", Describing A Journey He Took Through The Woods Along A Path Most Travelers Never Used. The Poet Found That The Road Less Traveled Was Peaceful But Quite Lonely, And He Was Probably A Bit Nervous As He Went Along, Because If Anything Happened On The Road Less Traveled, The Other Travelers Would Be On The Road More Frequently Traveled And So Couldn't Hear Him As He Cried For Help. Sure Enough, That Poet Is Dead.

I Opened My Mouth And Kissed You Then, The First Time All Night, Attacked You And Surrendered Completely, And Let’s Get Out Of Here. I’m Ready, I’m Finished, Let’s Not Break Up, No, No. Take Me Home, My Boyfriend, My Love.

We Are All Told To Ignore Bullies. It's Something They Teach You, And They Can Teach You Anything. It Doesn't Mean You Learn It. It Doesn't Mean You Believe It. One Should Never Ignore Bullies. One Should Stop Them.

It Was A Secret Time And Place, You Next To Me, Untraceable And Out Of This World

Are You Who I Think You Are?

Desperation Is Like A Spilled Drink; Even If It's Delicious, No One Will Get Near It. Cultivate An Aura Of Glamorous Unapproachability.

Money Is Like A Child—rarely Unaccompanied. When It Disappears, Look To Those Who Were Supposed To Be Keeping An Eye On It While You Were At The Grocery Store. You Might Also Look For Someone Who Has A Lot Of Extra Children Sitting Around, With Long, Suspicious Explanations For How They Got There.

Reading Is One Form Of Escape. Running For Your Life Is Another.

Anyone Who Thinks The Pen Is Mightier Than The Sword Has Not Been Stabbed With Both.

This World Is Suchier Than We Are, And The Best Thing To Do Is Keep Moving And Find Your Keys.

I Will Love You As The Iceberg Loves The Ship, And The Passengers Love The Lifeboat And The Lifeboat Loves The Teeth Of The Sperm Whale, And The Sperm Whale Loves The Flavor Of Naval Uniforms.

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