Introduction
The Reptile Room is the second A Series Of Unfortunate Events book. Like The Bad Beginning, it was published in 1999, and has also been adapted twice, both as part of the 2003 movie and as the next two episodes of the Netflix show. This book is the first which will truly start to follow a pattern which will, at its core, remain consistent for the next several books.
Summary
Some time after we last saw them, we catch up with the Baudelaires on their journey to go and stay with another relative, a man named Dr. Montgomery whom they’ve never met. When they get there, they are greeted by Dr. Montgomery, a cheerful, friendly man who is a herpetologist. He welcomes the children with open arms, insists that they call him Uncle Monty (yeah, his first name is also Montgomery) and generally seems to be the opposite of Olaf in every way.
The children quickly settle into their new home, and start to believe that this could be the start of a great new life for them. They know that the pain of losing their parents won’t go away any time soon, but they also know that they have a real chance to be happy in this new home. Monty tells the children he plans on taking them on an exhibition to Peru to study snakes, and sets them all tasks to prepare for the trip which are based around their interests. Violet works on snake traps, Klaus researches all things Peru and Sunny bites a longer piece of rope into smaller pieces. Sunny also befriends one of Monty’s snakes, the deliberately misnamed Incredibly Deadly Viper, a very friendly black snake.
It’s all going great until Monty’s new assistant, Stephano. Straight away, they know something is up. Because while this man may look like a stranger, there’s something about him that is all too familiar to the Baudelaires, and they realise the truth- he’s Count Olaf in disguise. To make matters worse, he manages to convince Monty that he is who he claims to be, and proceeds to spend the rest of the day ensuring that they are never alone with him, meaning they can never tell their uncle the truth.
The following day, Uncle Monty turns up dead in the reptile room, and the children know that Olaf is responsible. Once again, they try to go to Mr. Poe for help, but once again, he’s useless, taken in by Olaf’s disguise and convinced that Monty’s death was purely an accident. It’s a race against time to prove that Olaf is guilty, before he takes them away- and again, while they win this fight, Olaf escapes, and it’s only a matter of time before he shows up again.
Analysis
This week, I wanna talk a bit about literary allusions and establishing patterns. First, let’s talk some literary allusions and references. There’s a couple that are ongoing throughout the series- for instance, the Baudelaires are named after the French author Charles Baudelaire, and Beatrice, the mysterious woman to whom Lemony dedicates each novel, is a nod to Beatrice Portinani, the love of poet Dante’s life. There are other overarching references and allusions, but we’ll get to them when we get to them.
In terms of stuff that’s specific to The Reptile Room, however, a few names jump out. First, there’s Monty himself. There’s a couple of possible explanations for where his name comes from, or why he’s called Monty Montgomery. One, his name is a reference to a character from The Island of Doctor Moreau, a story about a mad scientist who creates human-animal hybrids. Montgomery is the name of his assistant, who rescued the protagonist, Edward Prendick. Alternatively, the dual name could be a nod to Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita, which is narrated by a man named Humbert Humbert. These are just two possibilities, though.
A couple more quick-fire references in the book include the Virginian Woolfsnake, a nod to the author Virginia Woolf, and the S.S Prospero, a nod to one of the main characters from Shakespeare’s The Tempest.
The other thing I wanted to talk about here was establishing patterns. I touched on this in my Bad Beginning review, but there is something quite formulaic about the first six books in the series, and this becomes especially clear in this book. The Baudelaires arrive at their new location, meet their new guardian, or guardians, and are allowed some time to get comfortable before Olaf shows up in disguise. They attempt to convince the adults around them of the truth, to no avail. Olaf seems to get them backed into a corner after a while, and it seems like all hope might be lost- and then they finally expose his true identity and evil plan, after which he promptly escapes and we’re right back to square one. The variables do change, but the overall formula remains the same.
Final Thoughts
Admittedly, The Reptile Room isn’t my favourite in this series. I don’t hate it or anything, especially because it lets the Baudelaires have a bit of a reprieve before things go to shit, something they don’t really get anywhere else in the series. (Apart from possibly The Austere Academy, but we’ll get there when we get there) It’s just… not really as interesting as other books in the series, at least not to me. I do still enjoy reading it, however.
That’s all for this week! Sorry I haven’t posted in a couple weeks, hopefully this’ll mark a return to a somewhat normal posting schedule and I’ll have a show review up next week!
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