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Flowers for Algernon
The novel Flowers for Algernon primarily revolves around a 32-year-oldman named Charlie Gordon is originally with mentally disabled with an intelligence of a child. He wants to become clever, so he attendsattended an experiment that could grant him a high intelligence. Like the highly-intelligent mouse called Algernon, Gordon undergoes surgery, and his IQ doubles. The pity is, though, he regresses back to being a man with low intelligence only after three months.
This is an excellent novel for young readers. At first, I was slightly confused when I was reading it, because it is full of strange words unfamiliar to my vocabulary knowledge. However, I later understood that this is because Charlie is a person who had just experienced the experiment at the beginning of the book; he is still a disabled man then. Then, things become different.
Before this experiment, Charlie was a happy man since he could make friends with everyone. He even believed that his parents still loved him after they had sent him away. He had an easy and enjoyable life. He had his own ambition, which to be smart, and he paid most of his attentions on it, though he often forgot things. His life was full of hope.
However, after the experiment, even though he truly becomes smart (you can see this due to fewer mistakes made in his reports), his happy view of his world shatters. He discoversthat his “friends” were actually making fun of him and the professors, who he originally believed were generous and kind, are actually selfish people. Gordon also realizes his parents hated him, were afraid of him, but did not love him. He sees that he was treated as an object, not a human being.
In addition to this eye-opening change in perspective, this novel also tells us about life and love. Charlie falls in love with his teacher, Alice. However, they break up eventually, because of Charlie’s outcome. In addition, Charlie achieved great success when he finally finds out the truth about why his intelligence would go back before he became disabled again. In the end, he returns to the place where the disabled are taken care of, and he writes down a request that requests others to put some flowers on Algernon’s grave.
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