Benito

Ronald Conrad is a professor of English at the Ryerson Polytechnical
Institute in Toronto.

Not often does a writer in either of Canada’s official languages
produce a work that seems natural when translated for readers of the
other language. Although Fischman has done her usual good work in this
translation (from the 1987 French-language original), the novel itself
will be appealing, perhaps even familiar, to anglophone readers.

Benito is a sly little comic novel, with none of the angst and
explosions of most Quebec fiction but a great deal of whimsy and farce.
In its many reductions to absurdity, deftly rendered, it recalls nothing
so much as the work of Stephen Leacock—of whom Gravel is, in fact, an
admirer.

We follow the life story of Benito, an almost total innocent who knows
nothing of life’s corruption, but whose gaze has the power to elicit
confession from the most hardened bully, the most devious lawyer. In his
life’s work as “counsellor” Benito fulfills a priestlike role,
listening to all who seek him out, and helping them through that act of
listening. As with the wise fools of Shakespeare, his apparent innocence
overcomes the ravages of experience.

Between the lines of this fast-moving narrative, Gravel throws sly
punches at those who maintained the “great darkness” of Quebec under
Maurice Duplessis. Police, lawyers, priests, and politicians all take
their knocks. When the action moves to Miami, those who control American
society fare even worse. Through it all we laugh at stupidities, and
come to admire the naiveté, the direct and uncluttered vision, of a man
who grows old without ever ceasing to be a child.

Benito is Gravel’s third novel; let’s hope there are more to come.