Emotions in The Mysterious Benedict Society
(I wrote this essay for a class but I'm so proud of it so I figured I should share it with you)
Emotions are powerful, both in the real world and in the media we consume. In the book The Mysterious Benedict Society (Stewart, 2007), emotions drive the plot. The emotions in the story make it realistic and the characters relatable. Emotions like fear and sadness that are pushed by the villain and the news broadcasts are prevalent but also, in direct opposition to that, joy and empathy from the heroes. The rest of the world is under the influence of the broadcasts. Within The Mysterious Benedict Society, the impact of these emotions, from the perspective of the general public, can be explained by the Agenda Setting Theory.
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart is a children’s novel about four gifted children who are recruited to a secret society and sent on a mission to save the world. The people in their world are under an onslaught of negativity and panic in the news. This state of the world, dubbed the Emergency, is ever-present in the people’s minds. The society’s leader, Mr. Benedict, has discovered that the Emergency is a deliberate attempt to cause fear and anxiety amongst the general public, organized by the villain, Mr. Curtain.
There are two distinct groups. The people who know about the truth, and those who don’t. There is some overlap in the emotions of the groups, but they each have a unique combination. For the people in the secret society, their mood is nervous but hopeful. Their affect occasionally becomes more fearful in tense situations and improves to joy and belonging near the end of the story. In the story, the public’s emotions are commonly described as feeling like “no one is behind the wheel.” Emotions are what make a story dynamic. No emotions means no conflict, and no conflict makes a story boring. No reader wants to read a boring story. Emotions affect the character of Mr. Benedict in a more direct way than the rest of the characters. He has narcolepsy. This is a disorder where sufferers suddenly fall into a deep sleep and, in Mr. Benedict's case, this is triggered by immediate, strong emotions. Mr. Curtain also has this disorder, but his trigger is specifically feeling intense anger. Emotions often increase the reader’s connection and empathy for characters. Relatability and immersion make the characters more likeable. For example, at the climax of the story, the children cause Mr. Curtain to feel vulnerable, which makes him angry. As he is lying on the floor, asleep, the children look at him with pity and compassion, eliciting similar feelings in the reader. These emotional situations and aspects run deep in the plot. The book would not exist without emotions, and audiences would not feel or learn anything in reading it.
There are a few theories that could explain emotions’ impact in this story. Agenda setting theory, and its subtheory framing, are integral to understanding the general public’s emotions. In the article, “Reframing the Debate” by Salman Amin, Ghulam Habir, and Saqib Riaz, they explain, using agenda setting theory and framing, how the news content choices made can influence media consumers. Agenda setting theory is the concept that the news tells people what to think about and what is important (Amin et al., 2020). Additionally, news networks tend to focus on negative things that spark controversy and tension because negative emotion tends to create more discourse in the media than positive emotion. This is certainly the case in the context of The Mysterious Benedict Society. “...the Emergency was the main subject of the news programs every day, as it had been for years,” Stewart wrote (2007, p. 3). Mr. Curtain directly caused the Emergency to cause fear, hopelessness, and other negative emotions. He ran broadcasts everyday that told the general public exactly what to be thinking about. He fed the narrative that there was “no one behind the wheel.” Amin et al. (2020) wrote, “Media frames reality in a patterned and predictable way and thus forms social reality.” The social reality for the public in the book created a culture of fear. After so many years of panic and uncertainty, Mr. Curtain knows the public is desperately searching for an answer. As the perpetrator of the unrest, he also has the solution. His ultimate goal is to step in as the savior of their world.
In the conclusion of the book, the children destroy the machine assisting Mr. Curtain in his pursuits and the Emergency ends. The media starts picking up other stories, focusing on the good and the bad alike, and the minds of the public are no longer manipulated. Stewart writes, “...the Emergency was fading, and minds long closed to truth were opening again, like flowers craving sunlight.” (Stewart, 2007, p. 474). The Mysterious Benedict Society shows the importance of analysing the media we consume and, to prevent similar emotional turmoil, have a powerful, irrevocable love of truth.
