Flowers For Algernon

Flowers For Algernon

In “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes, Charlie Gordon is a 37-year-old man who has an IQ of 68 and attended classes to learn to read and write. Dr. Strauss and Dr. Nemur manipulated him into being the subject of an operation that could triple his intelligence; they took advantage of a clueless man to test an experiment. Miss Kinnian, Charlie’s teacher, said to Charlie “If you volunteer for this experiment, you might get smart.” This made Charlie extremely excited because he always had wanted to be like everybody else. Experiments such as the one performed on Charlie Gordon should not continue to be carried out. First of all, the experiment didn’t work, and it put him in a state of loneliness and depression. Second, based on his observations of Algernon, he knew that he would regress and eventually lose his intelligence.
After he lost his intelligence, he only became more isolated and miserable. As he became more intelligent, he noticed that all this time, he was being made fun of and imitated by his “friends,” making him feel embarrassed and tortured. Because of his sudden increase of intelligence, all of his co-workers signed a petition and got Charlie fired from his job. As he began to realize the downfall of his intelligence, he strived to stop it, but he didn’t find a way to avoid his deterioration. “P.P.S. please if you get the chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard …” Algernon was a mouse who had the same operation as Charlie; he felt depressed because he missed Algernon, one of the only friends he ever had. Once he lost his intelligence, he could no longer pay his landlady, and he lost his home.
When Charlie had a high level of intelligence, he observed that Algernon regressed. He then concluded that he was eventually going to regress as well. He did not want that to happen to himself, and as he fought to keep his intelligence, he began to lose his memory. Charlie sat at home trying immensely hard to read...