Flowers for Algernon

Charlie is a man with an IQ of 68 who works a menial job as a janitor at a plastics factory. He is selected to undergo an experimental surgical technique to increase his intelligence. The technique had already been tested on a number of animals; the great success was with Algernon, a laboratory mouse. The surgery on Charlie is also a success, and his IQ triples.

He realizes his co-workers at the factory, whom he thought were his friends, only liked having him around so they could tease him. His new intelligence frightens his co-workers, and they start a petition to have him fired. As Charlie's intelligence peaks, Algernon's suddenly declines—he loses his increased intelligence and mental age, and dies afterward, buried in the back yard of Charlie's home. Charlie realizes his intelligence increase is also temporary. He begins researching to find the flaw in the experiment, which he calls the "Algernon–Gordon Effect". When he finishes his work, his intelligence regresses to its original state. Charlie is aware of, and pained by, what is happening to him as he loses his knowledge and his ability to read and write. He resumes his old job as a janitor at the factory and tries to go back to how things used to be, but he cannot stand the pity from his co-workers, his landlady, and Ms. Kinnian. Charlie states he plans to "go away" from New York. His last wish is for someone to put flowers on Algernon's grave.

The novel opens with an epigraph taken from Book VII of Plato's The Republic:

Anyone who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eye are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of the mind's eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye.

Charlie Gordon, 32 years old, demonstrates an IQ of 68. His uncle has arranged for him to hold a menial job at a bakery so that he will not have to live at the Warren State Home and Training School, a state institution. Desiring to improve himself, Charlie attends reading and writing classes, taught by Miss Alice Kinnian, at the Beekman College Center for Retarded Adults. Two researchers at Beekman, Professor Nemur and Dr. Strauss, are looking for a human test subject on whom to try a new surgical technique intended to increase intelligence. They have already performed the surgery on a mouse named Algernon, resulting in a dramatic improvement in his mental performance. Based on Alice's recommendation and his motivation to improve, Nemur and Strauss choose Charlie over smarter pupils to undergo the procedure.

The operation is successful, and within the next three months Charlie's IQ reaches 185. At the same time, he begins recalling his childhood and remembers that his mother Rose physically abused him and wasted money on fake treatments for his disability, while his younger sister Norma resented him. As Charlie's intelligence, education, and understanding of the world increase, his relationships with people deteriorate. His co-workers at the bakery, who used to amuse themselves at his expense, now fear and resent his increased intelligence and persuade his boss to fire him. Alice enters a relationship with Charlie but breaks up with him after she realizes she can no longer relate to him and claims his intelligence has changed his personality. Later, Charlie loses trust in Strauss and, particularly, Nemur, believing that they considered him a laboratory subject and not human before the operation. While at a scientific convention in Chicago, Charlie feels humiliated when he is treated like an experiment and, in retaliation, flees with Algernon.

After moving to Manhattan with Algernon, Charlie becomes involved in a relationship with Fay Lillman, his neighbor, to sate his loneliness. After an incident with a disabled busboy, Charlie becomes inspired to continue and improve Nemur and Strauss's experiment and applies for a grant. However, he notices Algernon is beginning to behave erratically. Throughout his research, he discovers a flaw behind Nemur and Strauss's procedure indicating that he will lose his intelligence and, possibly, regress back to a primitive state. While still holding onto his intelligence, Charlie publishes his findings as the "Algernon–Gordon effect", as Algernon dies.

As Charlie begins to regress to his former mental state, he finds closure with his family. Rose, who still lives in the family's old home in Brooklyn, has developed dementia and recognizes him only briefly; his father Matt, who broke off contact with the family years earlier, does not recognize him at all. He is only able to reconnect with Norma, who is now caring for Rose in their newly depressed neighborhood, but declines to stay with them. Charlie begins dating Alice again, but his frustration with losing intelligence eventually causes him to end his relationships with her and Dr. Strauss. Unable to bear the thought of being dependent and pitied by his friends and co-workers, he decides to live at the Warren State Home and Training School, where no one knows about the operation. In a final postscript to his writings, he requests that someone put flowers on Algernon's grave in the backyard of Charlie's former residence.

The original short story won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story in 1960.[2] The expanded novel was joint winner of the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1966, tied with Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany,[3] and was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1967, losing out to The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein.[27]

In the late 1960s, the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA) decided to give Nebula Awards retroactively and voted for their favourite science fiction stories of the era ending December 31, 1964 (before the Nebula Award was conceived). The short story version of Flowers for Algernon was voted third out of 132 nominees and was published in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929–1964 in 1970.[28] Keyes was elected the SFWA Author Emeritus in 2000 for making a significant contribution to science fiction and fantasy, primarily as a result of Flowers for Algernon.[29]

Flowers for Algernon is on the American Library Association's list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–1999 at number 43.[6] The reasons for the challenges vary, but usually center on those parts of the novel in which Charlie struggles to understand and express his sexual desires.[30] Many of the challenges have proved unsuccessful, but the book has occasionally been removed from school libraries, including some in Pennsylvania and Texas.[31]

In January 1970, the school board of Cranbrook, British Columbia, as well as Calgary, Alberta, removed the Flowers for Algernon novel from the local age 14–15 curriculum and the school library, after a parent complained that it was "filthy and immoral". The president of the British Columbia Teachers' Federation criticised the action. Flowers for Algernon was part of the British Columbia Department of Education list of approved books for grade nine and was recommended by the British Columbia Secondary Association of Teachers of English. A month later, the board reconsidered and returned the book to the library; they did not, however, lift its ban from the curriculum.[32][33]

Flowers for Algernon has been the inspiration for works that include the album A Curious Feeling by Genesis keyboardist Tony Banks.[34] It also inspired the 2006 modern dance work Holeulone by Karine Pontiès, which won the Prix de la Critique de la Communauté française de Belgique for best dance piece.[35] A 2001 episode of the TV series The Simpsons titled "HOMR" has a plot similar to the novel.[36] A 2013 episode of the TV series It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia titled "Flowers for Charlie" is heavily based on the novel.[37] The name Algernon inspired the author Iain Cameron Williams to create his poetic work The Empirical Observations of Algernon[38] after Williams's father had nicknamed him Algernon as a teenager (taken from Flowers for Algernon) due to his son's highly inquisitive nature.[39]