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A successful villain should have all these things at his or her villainous fingertips, or else give up villainy altogether and try to lead a life of decency, integrity, and kindness, which is much more challenging and noble, if not always quite as exciting.

Daniel Handler

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Daniel Handler
Age: 54
Born: 1970
Born: February 28
Accordionist
Author
Musician
Novelist
Screenwriter
Songwriter
Writer
San Francisco County
California
Lemony Snicket
Things
Quite
Villain
Life
Successful
Challenging
Else
Noble
Give
Integrity
Villainous
Giving
Kindness
Villainy
Trying
Exciting
Fingertips
Much
Lead
Decency
Always
Challenges
Altogether

More quotes by Daniel Handler

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If you don’t care about something, one way to demonstrate your feelings is to say the word and then repeat the word with the letters S-C-H-M replacing the first letters. Somebody who didn’t care about dentists, for instance could say ‘Dentist, schmentists.
Daniel Handler
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It is always tedious when someone tells you that if you don't stop crying, they will give you something to cry about, because if you are crying then you already have something to cry about, and so there is no reason for them to give you anything additional to cry about, thank you very much.
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For obvious reasons, I never told you about my notebook, with a cover as green as mansions long ago, which I use as a commonplace book, a phrase which here means 'place where I have collected passages from some of the most important books I have read.
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It is so rare in this world to meet a trustworthy person who truly wants to help you, and finding such a person can make you feel warm and safe, even if you are in the middle of a windy valley high up in the mountains.
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Mostly, it's flattering to meet fans. As long as it's in a planned, professional meeting, rather than, say, someone dropping by my home, which is not as pleasant.
Daniel Handler
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It was darker than a pitch-black panther, covered in tar, eating black licorice at the very bottom of the deepest part of the Black Sea.
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I often can't remember which scenes are and aren't in the final product, because I saw so many different versions of the Lemony Snicket that I forget which ended up on the cutting-room floor.
Daniel Handler
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The difference between a house and a home is like the difference between a man and a woman-- it might be embarrassing to explain, but it would be very unusual to get them confused.
Daniel Handler
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The whole thing of what I’ve been trying,” you said, “is that you’re different, and you keep asking about the other girls, but what I mean is that I don’t think about them, because of the way you are.
Daniel Handler
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If you have ever slept in a covered casserole dish on the highest peak of a mountain range, then you know that it is an uncomfortable place to lay one's head, even if you find a dish towel inside it that can serve as a blanket.
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Count Olaf sounds like an awful person. I hope he is torn apart by wild animals someday. Wouldn't that be satisfying?
Daniel Handler
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Assumptions are dangerous things to make, and like all dangerous things to make - bombs, for instance, or strawberry shortcake - if you make even the tiniest mistake you can find yourself in terrible trouble.
Daniel Handler
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A mystery is solved with a story.
Daniel Handler
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The story of the Baudelaires takes place in a very real world, where some people are laughed at just because they have something wrong with them, and where children can find themselves all alone in the world, struggling to understand the mystery that surrounds them.
Daniel Handler
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Get out of my way, you cakesniffers!” said a rude, violent, and filthy little girl, shoving the Baudelaire orphans aside as she dashed by.
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One of the world's most tiresome questions is what object one would bring to a desert island,because people always answer a deck of cards or Anna Karenina when the obvious answer is a well equipped boat and a crew to sail me off the island and back home where I can play all the card games and read all the Russian novels I want.
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Miracles are like meatballs, because nobody can exactly agree on what they are made of, where they come from, or how often they should appear.
Daniel Handler
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The way that the stories go in the Snicket books is just the way stories naturally go to me. They're full of misery, and yet the misery ends up being slightly hilarious. And in terms of the warnings on the back of the books, that really started as an honest assessment of their marketability.
Daniel Handler
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It is almost as if happiness is an acquired taste, like coconut cordial or ceviche, to which you can eventually become accustomed, but despair is something surprising each time you encounter it.
Daniel Handler
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Figuratively, they escaped from Cout Olaf and their miserable existence. They did not literally escape, because they were still in his house and vulnerable to Olaf's evil in loco parentis ways.
Daniel Handler