in "a series of unfortunate events" what was so special about the sugar bowl?

Answer 1

The Sugar Bowl (occasionally known as the "Vessel for Disaccharides" or V.F.D.) is a mysterious plot device from A Series of Unfortunate Events.

It was first mentioned by name in The Hostile Hospital in which Lemony Snicket ponders whether it was necessary to have stolen it from Esmé Squalor. It is indirectly mentioned in The Ersatz Elevator by Esmé Squalor. In Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography, it becomes apparent that it contains an object of great power or danger, and is the target of both sides of V.F.D. It is also possible that the sugar bowl contains an unknown object that has the power to possibly overthrow V.F.D enemies when acquired. There are many mentions of the sugar bowl and Count Olaf seems to be pursuing it for an important reason and so are the Baudelaires, although they have no idea why it's so important.

Lemony Snicket's narration has been pivotal in exploring the sugar bowl's relevance to the overall plot. He has indicated that he and his lover Beatrice stole the sugar bowl. According to Esmé Squalor, it was hers and Beatrice stole it from her, a statement no one contradicts and is even supported by Lemony Snicket.

In Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography, on pages 84 through 85, there is a letter from the Vineyard of Fragrant Drapes to Mr. Snicket, congratulating him on his wedding with Beatrice; however, there is a secret encoded in the letter by use of the Sebald code, and it states:

Hello. If you are alive do not come here. The Count will burn you and Beatrice. Stay away.

The letter mentions that the sugar bowls will all be in place at their wedding.

Then, on pages 87 through 88, there is a very similar message to Jerome Squalor congratulating him on his marriage to Esmé Squalor, but the words that were used to display the message to Snicket were gone, and it was just an ordinary letter. It also stated that the Vineyard, sadly, could not supply the sugar bowls Esmé requested. This could explain why Esmé said the sugar bowl was hers and Beatrice stole it from her, however she said the sugar bowl, singular, not plural, and the Vineyard mentioned multiple sugar bowls.

When listing the objects in the V.F.D. disguise kit, it mentions Optional: Sugar Bowl. This could mean that the sugar bowl is used in disguising oneself.

In Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography, in a breakfast menu of a very "in" restaurant, as deemed by Esmé, called Veritable French Diner (also the place where Jerome Squalor has breakfast every morning, at least before he married Esmé, and where Esmé and Jerome first met, due to the researching of Geraldine Julienne at the request of Esmé), the Lunch Special of the menu there includes a sandwich, a salad, a soup, a beverage seved in a glass, a small napkin and a sugar bowl, which is probably the sugar bowl crucial to the story, because of Esmé deeming the restaurant serving it "in".

In The Slippery Slope, on page 101 when, in a letter to his sister, Kit Snicket, Lemony tells her that her "suggestion...that a tea set would be a handy place to hide anything important and small...has turned out to be correct." A sugar bowl is one of the parts of a tea set.

It is also mentioned in The Dismal Dinner that a sugar bowl was passed around at the Baudelaire Parents' fourth-to-last dinner party and it may be possible that it was somehow linked to the fire that destroyed their home.

During the burning of the V.F.D. headquarters in the Mortmain Mountains in The Slippery Slope, a brave volunteer threw the bowl out the window into the Stricken Stream, knowing it would wash away and be saved from the villains. With this action the volunteer hoped the sugar bowl would be in safe hands.

In The Grim Grotto, Klaus Baudelaire and Captain Widdershins believed it to have washed into the Gorgonian Grotto, but when the grotto was explored, the bowl was found to have already been removed.

In The Penultimate Peril, the sugar bowl was brought to the Hotel Denouement by V.F.D. crows. The plan, on the villains' part, was to capture it by harpooning the crows, but due to the quick actions of Dewey Denouement, a plan was put in place to prevent the villains from securing it. The volunteers and villains originally thought it had fallen into the laundry room, but the Baudelaires later conclude that the sugar bowl had fallen into the pond. However, in a twist, Snicket implies that someone - possibly himself - has retrieved the bowl from the pond and carried it away by taxi shortly before the destruction of the hotel, saying the mysterious person in question possesses a small, damp object. Esmé Squalor, in the confrontation with the Baudelaires, Dewey Denouement and the others, she emphasized the difficulty of finding a container that could hold it safely, securely, and attractively and stated many lives were lost in the quest to find it and it means very much to the Baudelaires and the Snickets.

At the conclusion of the final book in the series, The End, it is still not known what has happened to the sugar bowl or why it is so important. It is hinted that it may contain horseradish, as Klaus, when reading A Series of Unfortunate Events, finds out that his mother is keeping a small amount of the horseradish in a "vessel", or some other antidote to the Medusoid Mycelium, but even if that is the case, it still remains a mystery why it is so important to V.F.D. and the villains. In the confrontation against Count Olaf in The Penultimate Peril, Dewey says that Olaf "would not dare" unleash the Medusoid Mycelium if Dewey possessed the sugar bowl, implying that the contents of the sugar bowl may be more than just an antidote to the deadly fungus, as it is rather unlikely that horseradish would strike such fear into Olaf that he "would not dare" unleash a deadly poison-infected fungus that is capable of killing with ease within the hour.

In the rare edition of The Bad Beginning, Lemony Snicket mysteriously and unfathomably mentions a "small bowl of apple cores" in one of his notes. This may be related to the sugar bowl significant to the books.

Finally, it is altogether possible that the sugar bowl is merely a MacGuffin plot device, meaning that the contents of it are actually completely irrelevant, and that its function is simply to be a much sought-after object that motivates characters and drives the story along. It may contain simply sugar.

Answer 2

See, that's one of those things Lemony Snicket did. He built it up with an air of mystery and importance, but never really explained it. You're supposed to use your imagination.. it's a mystery that, for us at least, will never be solved.

I for one was really angry that he didn't explain everything in the last book.. but that series was and is amazing. =D

Answer 3

If i remember correctly, it was a way to communicate with VFD. I'm not 100% positive but i am about 98%.

Hope that helped