Algernon is a mouse. He’s a special mouse, Charlie Gordon is told, and it must be true, because whenever Charlie and Algernon run a race (Algernon is in a real maze; Charlie has a pencil-and-paper version), Algernon wins. How did that mouse get to be so special, Charlie wonders? The answer is that Algernon’s IQ has been tripled by an experimental surgical procedure. The scientists who performed the experiment now need a human subject to test, and Charlie has been recommended to them by his night-school teacher, Miss Kinnian.
Charlie’s a good candidate for the procedure, because even though he currently has an I. Q. of only 68, he is willing, highly motivated and eager to learn. He’s convinced that if he could only learn to read and write, the secret of being smart would be revealed to him. Charlie wants to be smart because he works as a janitor in a factory where he has many friends, but even as he goes along with their hi jinks, he suspects his friends mock him. The opportunity to be made smart — really smart — is irresistible, even though there’s a chance that the results of the operation will only be temporary.
Because Charlie wants his co-workers to accept him. And therein lies the tale. Charlie does indeed get smarter. He struggles to absorb as much knowledge as he can in whatever time he has. He suggests a new way to line up the machines at the factory, saving the owner tens of thousands of dollars a year in operating costs, and the owner gives him a $25 bonus.
The Essay on Charlie Algernon People Time
... on a mouse called Algernon. He is much smarter than other mice because he has had an operation. Charlie agrees to ... have the operation and his intelligence almost triples. Charlie and Algernon ... of the conventions where Charlie and Algernon are on display, Charlie takes Algernon and runs away. Charlie knows that the consequence ...
But when Charlie suggests to his factory friends that he could use his bonus to treat them to lunch or a drink, they have other things to do. Charlie’s too smart for them now. He’s even smart enough to assist with the research on intelligence enhancement. He’s smart enough to suddenly perceive Miss Kinnian with newe yes… and fall in love. Everybody is Charlie Flowers for Algernon is such a beloved classic that it has remained in print since 1959 and is now in its 58 th edition.
It has received science fiction’s highest honors, the Hugo and Nebula Awards. It’s been translated into dozens of languages, adapted for TV, and performed on stage. Cliff Robertson won an Oscar for his performance in the 1968 movie version, Charly. Everybody loves Charlie’s story because Charlie is so vulnerable, so representative of readers’ internal desires to fit in, to be smart, to have friends, to love. Everyone carries the ancient baggage of childhood, a time when others (adults, older children) were the keepers of the secret knowledge of the world. The revelation of Charlie’s raw hopes and dreams through his laborious ‘progr is reports’ works so well because the arc of his progress is apparent in his spelling, grammar, and word choices, as well as in what he chooses to record about his life.
Readers are made clearly aware of the tragic arc from the start. The sense of impending doom makes Charlie’s achievements all the sweeter, as he begins to put together the pieces of his former life. At the very moment that his essential nature emerges, as he defends a mentally retarded boy from a laughing crowd and resolves to use his new intelligence to contribute to human knowledge, Algernon bites him. Human beings have a finite life span, and part of being human is having to contend with the loss of abilities toward the end. Charlie’s time in the sun is brief, and, like an Alzheimer’s sufferer, his grieving scarcely fades even when he can no longer comprehend his losses. He is not able to accept the new, sincere friendship and protectiveness shown by his factory friends — he thinks they ” re sorry for him and feels shame.
Yet he intends to start a new life, and keep trying to learn. His determination exemplifies the heroism and resilience of the human spirit.
