Flowers For Algernon By Daniel Keyes

The novel Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes brings our reader’s attention immediately to the main character Charlie Gordon. Charlie is a 32 year old mentally challenged man. Charlie attends night school at the Beekman College Center for Retarded Adults. His teacher and mentor throughout the novel is named Alice Kinnian. Alice recommends Charlie to a team of scientists to undergo an experimental surgery that will hopefully help Charlie’s intelligence grow drastically. After much thought Dr. Strauss and Professor Nemur accept Alice’s proposal for Charlie to be experimented on and they ask Charlie to keep a journal of progress reports. These reports make up the whole novel and show how Charlie’s grammar and content become more intellectual. In the beginning of
So he goes into surgery in hope of his intelligence improving drastically. After the operation Charlie notices that their is no immediate change. But with Alice’s help Charlie starts to improve his grammar and learn quicker. Once time is passed Charlie notices that he is picking up information quicker and is able to study from many academic fields. His employees at his work are astounded and he is able to invent a process designed to improve productivity. Later in the novel Charlie realized his attraction towards Alice; and Alice notices the same attraction towards Charlie. Charlie has now been let go from the bakery for turning in his co-worker who was stealing. Dr. Strauss and Professor Nemur take Charlie and Algernon to a scientific convention in Chicago. Charlie’s anger built up at Nemur because he feels he is being treated more like a lab animal then a human. So, Charlie lets Algernon out of his cage on stage and flees as the scientists fail to find Algernon. Eventually Charlie finds out the devastating news that his intelligence is only temporary. Charlie is worried that the things happening to the mouse will soon happen to