Flowers for Algeron by Daniel Keyes

            At the beginning of this school year I read the book Flowers for Algeron by Daniel Keyes and it was an amazing book! This book is about Charlie Gordon who is a mentally retarded adult. He is given the chance to become smarter, based on the experiments done on a mouse Algeron. The experiment to enhance Charlie’s intelligence turns him into a genius, but then Algeron starts to deteriorate and dies. Charlie Gordon then starts understands that his great intellect might not stay. Algeron was very significant to the story because he foreshadowed what would happen to Charlie in the future. But you always have to remember that there was no proof to what the operation would do to a human being.

            Charlie, was always picked on by everyone and his “friends”. After the operation Charlie understood that his so called “friends” made him look bad so that they looked better. They played crude jokes on him and used him so they would look better. Before the operation he didn’t know that his “friends” were making fun of him. But after the operation he couldn’t trust anyone because he didn’t know if they would laugh at him as well. He also could not overcome the fact that his friends were so rude to him. Charlie’s main external conflict is that the mouse, Algeron starts to decay. Unfortunately there was no way to predict what will happen to Charlie based on the experiments done on Algeron.

            Nevertheless, Daniel Keyes’ writing style is very unique and powerful. He uses flashbacks to show the differences between Charlie’s past and present life. It also allows the reader and Charlie see how people treat people with mental retardation. I am glad that Mr. Keyes added them in because they gave more juice to the book. Daniel Keyes also used many literary devices including foreshadowing. This impacted the story because it is the main problem of the story so without the foreshadowing there would be no book. The foreshadowing was the mouse Algeron. If he had no died then there would be no stress that Charlie’s life would last.   

            Some of the story’s highlights was the unmistakable love of Charlie and Alice. Alice was the former teacher of Charlie before the operation. Charlie could never let go of her from the beginning to the end, even when she turned him down. Through this the main message of the book was that everyone is a person even if they have limited abilities. Personally, I liked the book, but it is depressing. I would definitely recommend it to each of you because it gives you a new perspective on people and the world.