The Bad Beginning Study Guide

Daniel Handler is an American author, screenwriter, musician, and television producer. He is best known for his book series, A Series of Unfortunate Events, which he wrote under the pseudonym Lemony Snicket. Handler was born in San Francisco, California to a former college dean and account. He attended Wesleyan University where he studied English, later pursuing a degree in Fine Arts in Creative Writing at Columbia University. He published The Bad Beginning in 1999, the first book in a 13-book series called A Series of Unfortunate Events. Following the lives of the three Baudelaire orphans and their misadventures as they flee from the clutches of evil Count Olaf, the series become massively popular for its dark humor and gothic themes. The last installment in the series, The End, was published in 2006. Since its conclusion, the series has been adapted multiple times to both film and television, often with Handler assisting as producer and screenwriter. Under the same pseudonym, Handler also published All The Wrong Questions, a four-part prequel to A Series of Unfortunate Events which explores the backstory of Lemony Snicket. Handler has also published a number of works under his own name, including the novels The Basic Eight, Watch Your Mouth, and Adverbs, as well as several plays. Outside of writing, Handler plays accordion for the band The Magnetic Fields. He lives with his wife, illustrator Lisa Brown, in San Francisco. Together, they have one child, born in 2003, and are known for their philanthropic contributions to charitable causes.

Written in the late 1990s, The Bad Beginning belongs to the contemporary period of American literature, an era beginning in the mid-twentieth century and continuing to the present. Within the world of children and young adult literature, the late 1990s was also the beginning a second Golden Age, a movement partly spurred by the immense popularity of J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter book series, the first of which was published in 1997. The Bad Beginning and the rest of the Series of Unfortunate Events all contributed to––and benefited from––this rise of popularity. Regarding the story itself, The Bad Beginning is largely isolated from specific cultural or historic events. Lemony Snicket, the narrator, provides neither a specific date nor location for the events of the story, though certain facts can be surmised from context. Despite its gothic themes, for instance, which hearken back to the 18th and 19th centuries, the story is clearly placed in the latter half of the 20th century given the prevalence of telephones, the occasional mention of a computer, and certain other modern amenities.

The Bad Beginning is the first book of a larger, 13-part series, A Series of Unfortune Events. Continuing where The Bad Beginning leaves off, this series follows the Baudelaire children’s misadventures and struggles against Count Olaf. The series is narrated with the same dark humor as the first book, but as the children grow up and mature, so do the themes and complexity of issues explored. All the Wrong Questions, a four-part prequal to The Series of Unfortunate Events, is another series written by Lemony Snicket. This series takes place in same world as the Baudelaire children but focuses on the story of Lemony Snicket himself. Like The Bad Beginning, the series explores dark, gothic themes with a humorous, playful tone. Outside of Daniel Handler’s own works, several other children and young adult books bear similarity to The Bad Beginning that were also published in the 2000s.  These include The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stuart, The Name of this Book is Secret, and The Anybodies by N. E. Bode. Like The Bad Beginning, these books feature young protagonists thrust into challenging or mysterious circumstances, often delivered or narrated with a dark, playful humor.