45 pages 1 hour read

Lemony Snicket

The Bad Beginning

Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 1999

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Symbols & Motifs

Eyeballs

Count Olaf’s decrepit home contains an omnipresent design theme: Everywhere inside, emblazoned on its walls, are depictions of eyes. The front door has one that stares outward, the Count sports an eyeball tattoo on his ankle, and his office walls are covered in eyeball sketches. A framed picture of an eye watches over the Baudelaire children in their bedroom.

This motif suggests that the Count is intensely paranoid and wants to dominate all those who visit or live there. Spying on others is a way of controlling them, and Olaf wants to impress upon the Baudelaires that he’s in charge and that they cannot escape his awareness or control. Though the eyeballs clearly were there long before the children arrived, they suit the Count’s needs as tools of enforcement and intimidation. The eyes symbolize oppression and Count Olaf’s never-ending, ever-present wickedness. They are, however, balanced by authorial omniscience. Due to the framing device of narrator Lemony Snicket, there is a sense that Count Olaf is not the only one watching over the children.

Related Titles

By Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Austere Academy

Lemony Snicket

The Austere Academy

Lemony Snicket

Study Guide

logo

The Ersatz Elevator

Lemony Snicket

The Ersatz Elevator

Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Grim Grotto

Lemony Snicket

The Grim Grotto

Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Miserable Mill

Lemony Snicket

The Miserable Mill

Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Penultimate Peril

Lemony Snicket

The Penultimate Peril

Lemony Snicket

Study Guide

logo

The Reptile Room

Lemony Snicket

The Reptile Room

Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Slippery Slope

Lemony Snicket

The Slippery Slope

Lemony Snicket

Plot Summary

logo

The Wide Window

Lemony Snicket

The Wide Window

Lemony Snicket