Nilufer Ozmekik's Reviews > Flowers for Algernon

I chose one of my favorite heart-wrenching, powerful, unconventional, and unique stories for Flashback Saturday! 10 years later, I’m rereading it to see how Charlie’s self-discovery story will affect me!

Charlie Gordon, a 32-year-old developmentally disabled man, becomes a volunteer for a surgical procedure which will result in the increasing of his mental capabilities. The procedure was already tested on mice. But the scientists are not sure the probable increase in intelligence will be permanent.

Thankfully, the procedure turns into a success. Charlie’s cognitive skills start improving, which helps him have more insight into his situation. His perception of the world dramatically changes. Because Charlie cannot remember his past relationship dynamics in his life, a sudden jump in his intelligence level makes it harder to build new relationships when he suffers from a lack of social intelligence. But he still tries harder.

He finds the courage to ask the evening class teacher for a date, as he has had a long-time crush on her. But as his intelligence level increases, he loses his interest in her and falls for a talented artist.

He also writes notes about his scientific discoveries and finds a fatal flaw in his procedure, which only means his superpower will be gone in a short time, and he will die eventually.

He leaves instructions for the people to follow the procedures before his death, and as his decline starts, he falls back into his same rabbit hole, attending to the evening classes, seeing the teacher without knowing they had a short-time intimate relationship. After he’s gone, only his notes were left behind from his scientific discoveries from his short-time genius-level intelligence.

This is one of the saddest stories I’ve read. A man is only wanting to have enough intelligence to explore the world from a different window! It was heart-wrenching, definitely thought-provoking, and also a stunning short story!

Here are my most favorite and extremely powerful quotes from the book:

“I don’t know what’s worse: to not know what you are and be happy, or to become what you’ve always wanted to be, and feel alone.”

“Thank God for books and music and things I can think about.”

“I am afraid. Not of life, or death, or nothingness, but of wasting it as if I had never been.”

“How strange it is that people of honest feelings and sensibility, who would not take advantage of a man born without arms or legs or eyes—how such people think nothing of abusing a man with low intelligence.”

“A child may not know how to feed itself, or what to eat, yet it knows hunger. “

“There are so many doors to open. I am impatient to begin. “