Ignorance of Charlie Gordon in Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes

📌Category: Books, Flowers For Algernon
📌Words: 750
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 17 February 2022

“Sometimes being ignorant is the best thing because being smart and aware can show you all the ugly things going around” (Hardik Patel). The short story “Flowers For Algernon” by Daniel Keyes, is about a man, Charlie Gordon, who undergoes an operation to triple his current IQ of 68. The story has many examples of how the operation emotionally, intellectually, and mentally hurt Charlie, showing that the operation had more negative effects than positive. 

The operation changed Charlie in several ways which led him to do things he had never imagined himself to do. When Charlie was at a restaurant, the dishwasher dropped plates and everyone, including Charlie, laughed and heckled him for doing so. The boy unknowingly joined them and was unaware that they were laughing at him. Charlie saw some of his former self in the boy and said, “I cursed myself for losing control and creating a scene. I tried not to look at the boy as I paid my check and walked out without touching my food. I felt ashamed for both of us”(65). While at his peak in intelligence, Charlie didn’t realize how much of his old honest self he had lost. When he did, it shows how much it angered him to think about his past life. He let his emotions get the best of him, and it caused Charlie to make more of a scene than the boy himself. Being reminded of his former self triggered him to spiral out of control since he had finally gotten what he had wanted all his life, to be smart. Seeing others treat the boy the way he used to be treated overwhelmed him with rage showing that he now has hardly any control over his reactions to situations like these.

Charlie’s personality also changed along with his IQ. When Charlie had arrived at the factory, he saw a petition signed to remove him from the workplace. Fanny, one of his co-workers at the factory, tells him, “You used to be a good, dependable, ordinary man - not too bright maybe, but honest. Who knows what you done to yourself to get so smart all of a sudden”(60). He had been so determined to get smarter with this operation but the people around him aren’t fond of how it changed the Charlie they used to know. They feel intimidated by how much he has been able to develop in such a short amount of time. Furthermore, his co-workers feel that it's better if he wasn’t around anymore since he now knows that they were only using him for their personal enjoyment.

Some might argue that the operation allowed Charlie to be more in touch with reality and have more experience with the world after the operation. The wearing effects of the operation allowed him to make true friends when he was forced to return to the factory. People who were using him for laughs by making him do things like fetching coffee and newspapers, and then abandon him, stood up for him when one of his former co-workers was taunting him. “I didn’t expect Joe to take my part so I guess hes really my friend. Later Frank Reilly came over and said Charlie if anybody bothers you or trys to take advantage you call me or Joe and we will set em straight”(71). Nevertheless, this is why the operation was inadequate. He lost his ignorance and could see the true reasons as to why everyone at the factory didn’t appreciate him. Charlie couldn’t stay there knowing that people didn’t want to be with him, leading Charlie to leave town and move elsewhere where he could get a fresh start. “I dont want Miss Kinnian to feel sorry for me. Evry body feels sorry at the factory and I dont want that weather so Im going someplace where nobody knows that Charlie Gordon was once a genus and now he cant even reed a book or rite good”(72). Charlie was unable to stay there, aware that others felt sorry for what happened to him. The guilt and pain of knowing people that he loved and cared about were driven away and persuaded him to set off to start a new life.

The operation had many more negative side effects on Charlie than it did positive. He lost the people he cared about and experienced a lot of pain because of it. If Charlie hadn’t gotten the operation, his ignorance would have let him lead a much happier life. Since he came to the understanding that those around him were simply using him, he had transfigured himself into an entirely different person causing them to desert him. “Flowers for Algernon”  shows how sometimes it is better to stay ignorant and happy instead of smart and aware since it can end up causing more harm than good.

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