107 pages • 3 hours read
Trenton Lee StewartThe Mysterious Benedict Society
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2007A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 1-3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Pencils, Erasers, and Disqualification”
The story begins in Stonetown. Eleven-year-old Reynard “Reynie” Muldoon, a brilliant orphan, is reading a newspaper. Headlines about the Emergency don’t catch his interest, as it has been “the main subject of the news programs every day, as it had been for years” (3). Instead he notices a newspaper advertisement asking, “ARE YOU A GIFTED CHILD LOOKING FOR SPECIAL OPPORTUNITIES?” (3). His tutor, Miss Perumal, encourages him to apply.
When Reynie goes take the test, there is a long line of children waiting, all with their parents. The first part of the test is predictable, with typical mathematical problems. The second section is curious, starting with “Do you like to watch television?” (9) and ending with “Are you brave?” (10).
The test is administered by a woman who announces that Reynie is the only child who will advance to the second phase of testing. She indicates the rules for pencils, erasers, and disqualification. The other children cry and complain bitterly as they leave.
Reynie goes to the second day of testing. He meets a girl named Rhonda who offers him the answers to the test, but he declines. As the children receive their tests, they cry or otherwise panic. Reynie finds the questions impossible to answer and he despairs. As he reads the test, Reynie realizes that it is a puzzle and all the answers are contained within the other questions.
Reynie is again the only one to advance to the next phase of testing.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Buckets and Spectacles”
Reynie sits alone in the test room. A boy named Sticky Washington enters, saying he was told to wait with Reynie. Sticky says another child, a tiny girl, also passed the first test in his group, but he did not see her in the second test. Both boys realize that they were offered the test answers by Rhonda.
Sticky ran out of time answering the questions, but he knew the answers to the others. Reynie is amazed. Sticky’s given name is George Washington, but he goes by “Sticky” because everything he reads sticks in his head.
A blond girl named Kate Wetherall bursts into the room, carrying a bucket. Reynie is curious about her bucket, which she fastens to her belt. Kate pulls out an astonishing number of things from her bucket, saying she used some to help a girl who offered her the test answers.
Kate has a special ability to judge distances and weights by looking at things. Though she did not pass the test, she was allowed to advance because she used quick thinking to help the test administrator deal with angry parents after the test.
The children are sent to next testing room.
Chapter 3 Summary: “Squares and Arrows”
The new friends find the next room. A tall man with a sad expression named Milligan sends Sticky into the room first. He tells Reynie to go in next. Reynie finds himself in an empty room with a pattern of black-and-blue rectangles on the floor. A sign on the wall reads: “CROSS THE ROOM WITHOUT SETTING FOOT ON A BLUE OR BLACK SQUARE” (45). Reynie realizes that it is not forbidden to step on rectangles, so he walks across the room.
Kate enters the room next. She creates a tightrope from a rope in her bucket and walks across the room. Milligan tells her to try again without her rope. She hops up on her bucket and uses it to roll across the room. Milligan takes away all her items and tells her to try again. Kate walks on her hands across the room, and Milligan announces that she passed the test. Sticky tells Reynie that he crossed the room on his hands and knees, so his feet did not touch the floor.
Milligan walks the children to the final testing place. Rhonda turns out to be an adult who had been disguised to look like a child. She instructs the group to enter the house one at a time, hurry to the back stairs, and ring the bell at the top.
Each of the children get through the dark house maze in their own way. Reynie finds a pattern of symbols on the wall. Kate goes through the heating ducts to find the stairs. Sticky stumbles upon the stairs, but when he is required to go through the maze again, he remembers the route. They all pass.
Chapters 1-3 Analysis
These first chapters introduce Reynie Muldoon and the peculiar testing he undergoes. Reynie is an exceptionally intelligent boy who was assigned a special tutor by the orphanage director. Both Miss Perumal and Reynie see the newspaper advertisement as the perfect opportunity for Reynie, since he belongs in a place where his intellectual talents will be appreciated and nurtured.
The first level of testing is not what Reynie expected. In addition to the typical intelligence questions, there are assessments for personality and honesty. This worries Reynie, who is habitually unsure of himself because he is so different from the other boys at the orphanage. Reynie easily answers most of the questions but worries that “perhaps he was such a strange bird that he had misunderstood everything” (12).
The second part of the testing is even more challenging, as the questions seem far beyond the knowledge of children, even very gifted ones. Reynie’s particular talent for recognizing patterns allows him to pass the test.
The tests are structured to ensure the children problem-solve on their own. In addition to assessing their honesty when offered the answers by Rhonda, it seems that helping her becomes another test. They had been instructed to bring only one pencil, but each child encounters a girl who loses her only pencil. How each child deals with the problem of helping Rhonda is weighed in with the rest of their test results.
Reynie is delighted to meet Sticky and Kate, two other interesting and talented children. Sticky is extremely anxious and lacks self-assuredness, while Kate is brash and brimming with self-confidence. Each child passes the tests due to their own unique styles and gifts.
Kate is happy to tell the boys about her life. Sticky seems reluctant to talk about private matters. At first Sticky enjoys being with Reynie, and the two joke and laugh “like old friends” (35). But when the subject of parents arises, Sticky becomes uncomfortable again and changes the subject.
Reynie is interested to learn that Kate is also an orphan, that her mother died when she was a baby and her father disappeared. She was sent to an orphanage, then ran away to join the circus. Reynie is always curious about how other orphans feel about their situation. While he does not know his parents, and so doesn’t miss them, does sometimes yearn for them. Kate claims she does not miss having parents in the least, preferring the entertaining life she has led.
One of the most important themes of these chapters is that Reynie, Sticky, and Kate meet as strangers but quickly become friends. They are bound together by their uniqueness and quick thinking. This is a revelation for Reynie, who longs for friendship.
Of interest at the beginning of the novel is the mention of the Emergency. The Emergency fills the headlines of the newspaper and is viewed as a constant threat. There is a sense of urgency, though talk of the Emergency has been going on for years. “‘Things must change NOW!’ was the slogan plastered on billboards all over the city (it was a very old slogan), and although Reynie rarely watched television, he knew the Emergency was the main subject of the news programs every day, as it had been for years” (3).
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