The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5)

by Lemony Snicket

It is truly awful that this keeps happening, but that is how the story goes.

“Get out of my way, you cakesniffers!”

Mr. Poe meant well, but a jar of mustard probably also means well and would do a better job of keeping the Baudelaires out of danger.

“‘Memento

Memento Mori’ means ‘Remember you will die.’”

“there is no worse sound in the world than somebody who cannot play the violin who insists on doing so anyway.”

When they first approached the heavy wooden door, it sounded like a small animal was having a temper tantrum. But as they listened more closely, the children realized it was somebody who cannot play the violin insisting on doing so anyway.

“Aregg?” Sunny asked incredulously. “Incredulously” is a word which here means “not being able to believe it,” and “Aregg” is a word which here means “What? I can’t believe it.”

Now, the vice principal of Prufrock Preparatory School did not actually say the syllables “hee hee hee,” of course. Whenever you see the words “hee hee hee” in a book, or “ha ha ha,” or “har har har,” or “heh heh heh,” or even “ho ho ho,” those words mean somebody was laughing.

It is always cruel to laugh at people, of course, although sometimes if they are wearing an ugly hat it is hard to control yourself.

wherever you are hiding out, read the words “hee hee hee,” you should know that “hee hee hee” stands for the worst sound the Baudelaires had ever heard.

plop!ing

Mr. Remora had a dark and thick mustache, as if somebody had chopped off a gorilla’s thumb and stuck it above Mr. Remora’s lip, and also like a gorilla, Mr. Remora was constantly eating bananas.

They finished one lap, and then another, and then another and another and then five more and then another and then seven more and then another and then three more and then two more and then another and then another and then six more and then they lost track.

You can see, with that last sentence, just how tired Violet really was, because “if we’re lucky” is not a phrase that she, or either of her siblings, used very often. The reason, of course, is quite clear: the Baudelaire orphans were not lucky. Smart, yes. Charming, yes. Able to survive austere situations, yes. But the children were not lucky, and so wouldn’t use the phrase “if we’re lucky” any more than they would use the phrase “if we’re stalks of celery,” because neither phrase was appropriate. If the Baudelaire orphans had been stalks of celery, they would not have been small children in great distress, and if they had been lucky, Carmelita Spats would not have approached their table at this particular moment and delivered another unfortunate message.

There was that phrase again, “if we’re lucky,” coming out of the mouth of a Baudelaire, and once again it felt about as appropriate as “if we’re stalks of celery.” The only difference was that the Baudelaire orphans did not wish to be stalks of celery. While it is true that if they were stalks of celery they would not be orphans because celery is a plant and so cannot really be said to have parents, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny did not wish to be the stringy, low-calorie vegetable. Unfortunate things can happen to celery as easily as they can happen to children. Celery can be sliced into small pieces and dipped into clam dip at fancy parties. It can be coated in peanut butter and served as a snack. It can merely sit in a field and rot away, if the nearby celery farmers are lazy or on vacation. All these terrible things can happen to celery, and the orphans knew it, so if you were to ask the Baudelaires if they wanted to be stalks of celery they would say of course not. But they wanted to be lucky.

I discovered this myself when I was woken up in the middle of the night and chased sixteen miles by an angry mob armed with torches, swords, and vicious dogs, and the Baudelaire orphans discovered it as they ran laps, not only for that night but also for six nights following.

if you are a student you should always get a good night’s sleep unless you have come to the good part of your book, and then you should stay up all night and let your schoolwork fall by the wayside, a phrase which means “flunk.”

“Who knows what any of those people or fish would do in our shoes?” Violet said. “It’s impossible to know.”

Making assumptions simply means believing things are a certain way with little or no evidence that shows you are correct, and you can see at once how this can lead to terrible trouble.

You can see that it is better not to make too many assumptions, particularly in the morning.