Flowers for Algernon: Life is a Maze in a Box

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Flowers for Algernon is a cornerstone and pinnacle of soft science fiction. Published in 1966, the American author Daniel Keyes adapted his Hugo Award-winning short story into a novel, which later won the Nebula Award.

The breakthrough of a scientific experiment that could enhance intelligence is demonstrated through a mouse named Algernon. After undergoing surgery, Algernon is able to maintain his intelligence while learning complex mazes. Following the success with the mouse, human trials begin, with Charlie, a low-functioning adult, becoming the first subject. The story unfolds through Charlie’s first-person narrative, in the form of progress reports, offering a deeply introspective view of a person’s mental transformation as his IQ doubles. This approach is pioneering in its exploration.

Through Charlie’s written reports, we witness the life of a unique yet universally relatable individual, compressed into a few months of rapid growth and tragic loss. Behind the swift and intense intellectual expansion, problems accumulate.

This rare work, which won both the Hugo and Nebula awards, is as cruel as it is tender, as lonely as it is warm. Reading it stirs up emotional ripples in the heart, only to gently smooth them over.

The Price of Becoming Smarter: Is it Losing Happiness?

As Charlie’s intelligence increases, his sense of happiness plummets.

Before the experiment, everyone around Charlie was his friend. They were his good friends. He happily cleaned the bakery, chatting with people and finding joy in the simplest tasks. Although his IQ was low, his world was filled with positivity, as his mental limitations acted as a shield, preventing him from seeing the malicious side of things. His lack of intelligence became a protective layer, filtering out negativity and leaving him surrounded by encouragement. Though he was clumsy and foolish, he was hardworking and kind.

However, as his IQ doubled, that protective shell melted away, and painful memories long buried resurfaced. Things that once made sense now felt confusing, and words that were once encouraging turned into mocking insults. The friends who had once been friendly now appeared as cruel tormentors. Faced with this dramatic shift, Charlie was overwhelmed with shame and frustration, even embarrassed to acknowledge that the person he had once been was still a part of him.

The book is structured around Charlie’s "Progress Reports," written in the first person. But after undergoing the intelligence-enhancing surgery, Charlie starts writing in the third person when recounting his memories. "Charlie" is the naïve and ignorant person from the past, while "I" represents the smarter person he has become. The two are now separate, as if the person he once was no longer exists in the present.

He reflects, “Wisdom has separated me from everyone I love and even got me kicked out of the bakery. Now, I am lonelier than before.” His teacher, Miss Kinnian, says to him, “You want to be an adult, but inside you, there's still a scared, lonely child.”

Let the Faces Fading in Memory Set Me Free

Is the source of all psychological trauma rooted in our original families? Charlie tries to trace his memories but finds himself unable to see the faces clearly. He can’t recall their expressions, nor can he understand the unexplained fear and trembling that stem from certain past events.

Miss Kinnian guides him, saying, “All the levels are like steps on a giant staircase, and as you climb higher, you begin to see more and more of the world around you.” So, Charlie begins to analyze his past with his newfound intellect, dissecting how he was hurt, until he can see it clearly and understand it. He holds onto fragments from his dreams and subconscious, pulling out pieces of cloth and curtains, stacking them at his feet, and then continuing to climb the steps.

While we know that death waits at the end of the maze, I now believe the path I’ve chosen within it has shaped who I am today.

Isn’t that how everyone’s growth works? Each step up the ladder brings us a part of ourselves—wisdom, emotional intelligence, and courage—but it also costs us something in return: happiness, passion, and kindness.

I believe I’m growing. Each day, I learn more about myself. Memories that once seemed like mere ripples now surge at me like a tidal wave.

I can still hear my mother’s screams. But perhaps I’ve already been set free. Maybe that fear and disgust are no longer an ocean I can drown in, but just a pool reflecting the past. Am I free now?

A Person Who Charges Straight Ahead Can’t Learn to Turn

After his IQ increases, Charlie shifts from looking up at the world to seeing it at eye level. He catches up to, and even surpasses, many people—ordinary bakery workers, his special education teacher who taught him to read, and even the doctors who performed his surgery. Once he masters a wide range of knowledge and develops logical and analytical skills, nearly achieving omniscience, he starts to realize that the university professors he once admired are just ordinary people. These "ordinary" people are terrified that others might see them for what they truly are—that they are merely human and not infallible.

The mere increase in intelligence is just one side of the scale. Charlie hasn’t learned to understand, tolerate, or develop empathy. He once believed his fate was in the hands of the intellectual giants, but now he sees them for what they are—people who don't have all the answers. His natural tendency to look down on "ordinary" people slips out without him realizing it, completely forgetting that he was once the "ordinary" one with an IQ of 68. He doesn't feel the slightest bit of humility for the fact that he has become a genius.

The Comfort of Alcohol: A Temporary Escape from the Maze

Alcohol might help you feel better, or it might shake off the stiffness that comes with living a life in straight lines. Your troubles come from this: everything is too clean, too direct, trapping you inside, unable to move, just like Algernon in the maze sculpture.

Every person Charlie has now surpassed reacts with rejection, desperately trying to hide their envy behind a mask of false kindness. In the past, when Charlie was intellectually limited, they wore this mask, tolerating and indulging him. Now that he’s become smart, he unintentionally strips away that mask with his lack of emotional intelligence, exposing their superficiality and hypocrisy.

The Coexistence of Who I Was and Who I Am Now

After his intelligence boosts, Charlie learns to read and write like an average person. He begins making his own decisions and learns to let go of seeking his father's approval, as well as stop worrying like a child about how others perceive him. He starts reading literature, politics, math, and eventually philosophy. Then he confronts the ultimate question: Who am I?

"I used to be an idiot, but now I’m a genius. But in the eyes of others, I’m no different from the experiment mouse, Algernon. We are both just subjects in an experiment, and outside of that, we don’t truly exist. I could never be seen as an independent person."

"But I’m not a real person. Charlie lives not only in the past but also in the present, inside my body, and all around me." The surgery may have covered Charlie up with layers of education and culture, but deep down, Charlie is still there, watching and waiting.

The entire story is filled with metaphors. The mouse Algernon and the subject Charlie, the fool and the genius, the wisdom and intellect on opposite sides of the scale, and the search for self and the loss of self.

This is a hymn to the human search for the soul, as well as a record of the soul’s gain and loss.

Without the Balance of Human Emotions, Intelligence and Education are Worthless

Can intelligence and emotions coexist? Or, to put it another way: Can intellect and love coexist?

The protagonist seems to lose the ability to love others just as he gains intellectual power. But the "bouquet for Algernon" was already placed at Algernon’s grave when Charlie was at the peak of his intelligence. Whether this act of caring comes from a sense of pity for another experimental subject or from a deeper, innate human empathy that transcends intellect, the flowers were respectfully laid on Algernon’s grave.

At the end of the Progress Reports, Charlie leaves a message for anyone who might read his report in the future: "If you get the chance, please place some flowers on Algernon's grave in the backyard."

And one day, when Charlie reaches the end of his maze, he, too, will receive his flowers.