[Author’s Name]
[Institution’s Name]
Essay on Flowers for Algernon
In the book, Flowers for Algernon, Charlie Gordon, and a mentally retarded 32 year old is chosen for an experiment that will make him smarter. Charlie chooses to go through with the experiment, but his only reason for doing it is so that he will have more friends. After the operation, Charlie lost the one that he loved, lost his job, and learned the reality of life. After the operation, Charlie lost the one that he loved, Alice Kennian, who was Charlie’s teacher before the operation. After the operation, when Charlie became smarter they grew close to each other and soon their friendship turned into a relationship. But as Charlie began to regress and soon went back to the “Old Charlie” and forgot that he loved Alice.
The quote, “Is it better to of loved and lost then to never of loved at all?” comes into play when Alice makes the decision to love Charlie, even though she knew the experiment was only temporary. Before the operation, Charlie had worked at a bakery where he made enough money to make it through each week. At the Bakery, Charlie was always getting made fun of because he had a lower intelligence than others. They would play jokes on him, but Charlie wouldn’t get mad or yell at them because he thought they were his friends and he thought that was what friends did to each other. Charlie never realized that people were laughing at him instead of with him. After the operation he began to realize that what they did to him was wrong and he was able to handle larger jobs around the bakery that he had never been able to do before.
The people who he worked with began to get suspicious and thought Charlie had been playing a joke on them the whole time, not knowing about his operation......
