The Mysterious Benedict Society

“After a few more pages of questions, all of which Reynie felt confident he had answered correctly, he arrived at the test’s final question: ‘Are you brave?’ […] Finally he gave up trying to decide and simply wrote, ‘I hope so.’” 

This question on Mr. Benedict’s test surprises Reynie, who thinks that he has never needed to be brave. In actuality, Reynie has bravely withstood the loneliness and solitude of being an exceptionally intelligent child in an unforgiving environment his whole life. Miss Perumal recognizes this and considers him very brave, but Reynie is unconvinced and unsure of his courage. Reynie is a sincere boy who truly does wish to be a good person with attributes he knows are desirable, such as bravery, so in the end he answers the question truthfully.

“Then my father—I can’t picture his face, but I can still feel his strong arms lifting me out of the water—he carried me on his shoulders back to our house. I remember asking if we could swim there again, and he said, ‘Of course we can, Katie-Cat.’” 

Kate’s life has been primarily impacted by her supposed abandonment by her father when she was very young. It is bewildering when her father disappeared and seemed to not want her, because she has this vivid memory of swimming with him and his promise that they could do it again. That such a kind and loving father would disappear from her life without a trace, especially since her mother died when she was an infant, leaves Kate with emotional scars, though she hides them behind a cheerful and outgoing personality. This passage foreshadows Kate’s reunion with her father, who turns out to be Milligan.

“As it so happens, however, I now find myself in the presence of the best possible team of children I could ever hope for—indeed, have long hoped for—and with not a minute to lose. In other words, you are our last possible hope.” 

The team learns the purpose of Mr. Benedict’s tests and the task for which they have been chosen. It is a daunting revelation, particularly because of the urgency that Mr. Benedict conveys. It is not typical for young children to be told that they are the world’s only hope for salvation. These children are not only gifted and intelligent but resourceful and courageous. Mr. Benedict puts his full confidence in the team, believing that if anyone can save them from the Sender, it is them.

“Reynie experienced a curious mixture of admiration, affection, and sympathy—curious because although he’d known the boy for only a day, it seemed as if they’d been friends for ages. And Kate, too, he reflected. He was already quite fond of her.” 

Reynie has longed for friends, other children to whom he can relate, for so long. His immediate friendship with Sticky and Kate fills him with joy, which he finds remarkable since he has only known them for a single day. Their abilities are awe-inspiring, the challenges they have faced in their young lives are heart-breaking, and their kindness makes for instantaneous and easy friendship. Constance is not as easy to befriend, but Reynie feels fulfilled by his new friendships with Sticky and Kate.

“Where adult thoughts would lumber into the mind like an elephant, children’s creep in on cat feet and find a shadowy place to hide.” 

Mr. Benedict has to convince the team that they are the only hope for combating the Sender and his plans for mind-control. It is natural for the children to expect adults to take that role, so Mr. Benedict explains that the Sender uses other children to send his hidden messages. Children’s thoughts can enter people’s minds undetected, particularly those who watch television or listen to the radio frequently. This quote is also a good example of the author’s lyrical writing style and recurrent use of metaphors and similes.

“There’s an often-repeated phrase in the hidden messages […] Dare not defy the Institute. Obviously it’s a kind of defense mechanism

The team learns that hidden messages have been broadcast for many years and that the content of some of these messages has protected the Sender from discovery and sanction. Adults who were sent to investigate the Institute disappeared. There is no regulation or oversight of the school. This is not considered suspicious by government authorities because they have been affected by hidden messages that persuade them not to question what goes on at the Institute. This is the level of power that the team must face.

“You are a team now. Whether you always agree is inconsequential, but you must take care of one another, must rely upon one another in all things. I don’t exaggerate when I say that every one of you is essential to the success of the team, and indeed, to the fate of us all.” 

Mr. Benedict strives to instill this sentiment in the children, that they are all essential members of the team. He insists they must be a cohesive group that trusts and protects each other without hesitation. This is an issue because Reynie, Kate, and Sticky find Constance difficult to deal with, and she in turn feels like an outsider within the group. The older team members need reminders to remember that each member, including Constance, is necessary to the mission’s success.

“All children get nervous on their first day at a new school, and all secret agents get nervous on the first day of a mission. Combine the two and your chances of nervousness are greatly increased.” 

The team is thrust into an intimidating situation without much time to prepare themselves mentally. Reynie feels overwhelmed with anxiety as they approach Nomansan Island and the Institute, so he recalls Mr. Benedict’s words of encouragement. Merely starting a new school is cause enough for nervousness, but the team is expected to conduct a secret mission as well, one with dire consequences should they fail. This is a lot to expect from a group of children, even ones with exceptional abilities.

“But Kate had spent all her life—ever since her father abandoned her, which affected her more than she cared to admit—trying to prove she didn’t need anyone’s help, and this was easiest to believe when she was doing what she was good at.” 

One of Kate’s primary characteristics is her need to exhibit self-sufficiency. She refuses to ask others for help, since the person she most depended on, her father, abandoned her at a young age, which makes her loathe to rely on anyone again. Her bucket is full of objects that allow her to perform an extraordinary number of tasks on her own. Kate is happiest when performing tasks she excels at, because that is when she feels most secure in her sense that she does not need anyone’s assistance.

“There followed another great round of applause, but Reynie was still thinking, ‘Everything’s backward.’ And gazing at the circled letters on the chalkboard, he felt a sudden, terrible chill. For LIVE, spelled backward, is EVIL.” 

Reynie and the others are shocked and bewildered when Mr. Curtain makes his first appearance, since he looks exactly like Mr. Benedict. Reynie thinks with dismay that this person who looks like Mr. Benedict behaves as his exact opposite, and the world feels turned upside down. Reynie’s analytical mind latches on to the fact that LIVE (the acronym for the Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened) spelled backward is EVIL. Mr. Curtain’s menacing presence gives the team the distinct feeling that the Institute is an evil place.

“But Reynie found her behavior more sad than irritating. He knew she must never have had anyone to teach her better manners.” 

Kate and Sticky regularly lose patience with Constance, who behaves terribly much of the time. She sticks her tongue out when asked questions, has awful table manners, and chews with her mouth open. Rather than thinking her unbearably bothersome, Reynie generally tries to accommodate Constance. Being an orphan himself, he is understands her situation, living alone without parents to guide her. She is also so small and vulnerable that Reynie often feels sorry for Constance, though it infuriates her when she thinks he is trying to reason with her out of sympathy.

“‘Like a poison apple’—here Reynie’s ears perked up—‘our governments look beautiful, shiny, and wholesome from a distance, but once you’ve partaken of them, they prove quite deadly. What’s more, they shelter more than one wicked official—like poison worms in that poison apple.’” 

The team attends their first lesson at the Institute, given by Jillson. Like all the class lessons it sounds nonsensical, but at its heart is a “packet” of propaganda designed to be a hidden message. The trigger word in this one is “poison apple,” which Reynie recognizes from the hidden message the team heard through Mr. Benedict’s Receiver. Mr. Curtain sows distrust of current governments so the populace will be prepared to accept his own take-over of society.

“He imagined the special recruits’ futures as they themselves must imagine them: With nowhere else to turn, no parents or grandparents begging for their returns, they would devote themselves entirely to the Institute.” 

Reynie is curious about the special recruits, who had appeared so miserable and dazed when he first saw them but who now look eager to rise up in the ranks and become Messengers. He thinks of them in relation to himself, an orphan with no family, though he at least has Miss Perumal in his life. Reynie is projecting his own ideas about the allure of belonging onto these special recruits to explain their transformation to himself.

“Children despise superior minds, you know, especially in leaders, who must often make unpopular decisions.” 

Reynie attracts the attention of Mr. Curtain, who sees himself in the boy. In his self-absorption and lack of empathy, Mr. Curtain thinks that Reynie is a natural leader like himself. Mr. Curtain leads by fear and intimidation, not to mention a great deal of deceit and trickery. Reynie is nothing like that, as he leads naturally by considering the feelings and ideas of others. The rest of the team does not resent Reynie for his superior intellect, but Mr. Curtain cannot understand how some leaders invite devotion and loyalty through positive rather than negative means.

“He had finally come to understand something that would have seemed obvious had it not seemed impossible: Milligan, the missing agents, Mr. Bloomburg—they had all had their memories stolen.” 

This is a decisive moment in which Reynie realizes Mr. Curtain caused the amnesia suffered by Milligan and now Mr. Bloomberg. The scope of what Mr. Curtain has perpetuated is overwhelming to Reynie. The sadness and sense of loss that is visible in the eyes of the Helpers and Milligan is a testament to what has been taken from them: their lives, their families, and their very senses of self. The Helpers are programmed to say that everything is as it should be, but Reynie can see that they do not truly believe it.

“I can’t say for sure, because I have no experience, but—well, is this what family is like? The feeling that everyone’s connected, that with one piece missing the whole thing’s broken?” 

This passage comes from one of the mental letters that Reynie composes to Miss Perumal. Seeing Mr. Bloomberg and realizing that his memory has been swept affects Reynie profoundly, since he knows that Mr. Bloomberg has a wife and family. This makes Reynie contemplate ideas of loss and family, though as he says to Miss Perumal, he does not have a family himself. Yet Reynie has bonded to the rest of the team and already cannot conceive of losing any of his new friends. This shows how Reynie has come to regard his friends as part of a whole, to which he also belongs.

“If Mr. Curtain knew the truth, by tomorrow Reynie might become someone else entirely—a mixture of mysterious pain and forgotten purposes, forgotten dreams. His friends’ faces would blur, like photographs somehow being undeveloped, then disappear entirely. The mission would fail. All would be lost.” 

The threat of brainsweeping terrifies Reynie. He fears what will happen to him if his secret mission is discovered. Having seen the pain and confusion on the faces of those who have been brainswept, Reynie knows that everything that makes him who he is could be taken away. He would no longer be Reynie, the person he has known himself to be.

“Once my modifications are complete, the Whisperer will become a wondrous healing device, boys—a device capable of curing maladies of the mind.” 

Mr. Curtain frames his project in positive terms as a device to heal the world’s troubled minds by assuaging their fears. In truth he plans to rule the world by appearing to be a savior, eliminating a crisis of his own making. The malady of the mind that Mr. Curtain refers to is actually the mental resistance shown by those who opposed him, which he will “cure” by brainsweeping. According to his plan, the rest of the populace will feel indebted to him for alleviating their fear and will elevate him to the highest level of authority.

“Reynie didn’t think he was capable of more, not since the Whisperer. He was worried, deeply worried, that the Whisperer had revealed to him who he truly was.” 

Reynie is ashamed of the Whisperer’s effect on him. Exposure to the machine has made him as ambivalent as an addict, desperately seeking another encounter but knowing that it is wrong. Reynie feels that he can no longer function as the group’s leader or be relied upon to make good decisions. He is mentally and emotionally exhausted and doubts his ability to keep fighting Mr. Curtain. Reynie wants Mr. Benedict to save the day without requiring any more effort from him.

“The only way fears truly disappear is if you confront them. But who in the world wishes to confront his or her worst fears?” 

The cornerstone of Mr. Curtain’s plan to take over the world is his belief that fear drives people’s personalities and behavior. He is sure that people will follow anyone they believe can eliminate their fear. He knows this is an illusion, for eliminating fear requires confronting it, but he thinks people will choose this illusion over doing the hard work of facing their fears. Mr. Curtain is a weak person who thinks he is strong, so he underestimates the abilities of truly strong people.

“The effect of those words, and of all his friendships, had grown stronger and stronger, until—though he couldn’t say why he didn’t feel mixed up now—at the most desperate moment yet, he knew it to be true.” 

Sticky is the embodiment of fear, and avoidance of his fears has driven his behavior for as long as he can remember. Yet the love and trust that his friends have shown him opens up parts of himself that he did not know existed. Deep down Sticky has a reservoir of bravery, and the desperation of their mission brings it to the surface. He is still almost paralyzingly afraid, but he pushes past his fear and volunteers to go into the Whisperer.

“He had confronted his worst fear, and now it was gone. No need for the Whisperer to deny it—there was nothing left to deny!” 

Reynie proves Mr. Curtain wrong, as he confronts and overcomes his fear of being alone. Reynie’s absolute conviction that no matter what happens, he will remain part of a group of friends who love each other like a family, gives him the strength to resist the Whisperer. The Whisperer can no longer relieve his greatest fear because Reynie has dispelled it. The genuine feeling of well-being that Reynie experiences once he understands that he is not alone is so much more powerful than the false sensation the Whisperer gave him.

“This was Constance’s great gift—the gift of stubborn independence—and she was bringing it to bear with all her might.” 

Constance finally proves what she has to contribute to the mission, and her particular strength saves the day. The Whisperer, with Mr. Curtain behind its power, defies mental resistance, but it is no match for Constance’s obstinance. Mr. Curtain orders her to bend to his will, but Constance refuses. This solves the mystery of why Constance was included in the team and why Mr. Benedict insisted every member was necessary to the mission’s success.