Have you read this story?? PLEASE HELP!?

Its called 'Flowers for Algernon'. Or the movie for it called "Charlie". I need to know some Pros and Cons of Charlie's operation. Please help if you can!!!

Have you read this story?? PLEASE HELP!?
Pros: Temporarily gained intelligence, which leads to Charlie's experience as a normally-functioning adult. He suddenly finds himself in a better position to engage in romantic relationships, appreciate arts and literature, comprehend higher-level concepts (ie. Medicine, Science, Religion), and truly experience free will for the first (and incidentally, only) time in his life.





Cons: All this is temporary. The operation is not permanent (though I believe doctors had hoped it would be). Although he was briefly able to enjoy all those things which make a well-rounded adult, well, an adult, he is quite rapidly plunged back in to the mental state of a young child. However, now he actually has seen what he is missing out on, thus he has lost a bit of his naivte, and is no longer content in his childish world. Late in the book he refers to reading a passage from his own diary (written during the period of time that he was functioning at an adult capacity) and very sadly remarks that he no longer can even understand his own words. I personally believed that he was better off before (given the outcome), rather than having known this other life existed but no longer being able to be an active part of it.





As an aside, I read this book about 11 years ago, and my memory is not great. Sorry this cannot be more in-depth. Good luck!
Reply:Daniel Keyes wrote this, and it is the only SF for which he is remembered. Movie is pretty good also.


Charlie, a high functioning retardate, is a good natured striver who understands on some level his problem. When he is given the operation which makes him considerably brighter than average he gains greater insight into his past, and, tragically, as he observes the decline of the rat Algernon on which the operation was tested, sees his own future.


One can read the story as a profound tragedy, or as a man who briefly transcends his own limitations. If you accept the latter, the operation is ethical. If you take the former, the operation was an immoral, unethical experiment carried out before the precursor with Algernon had been completed. You could also read it as in the tradition of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, there are things man should not meddle with.
Reply:Link below to the book on Sparknotes.com....lots of good summary information on many different novels, etc. Hope this helps!
Reply:read the book....





Charlie (dumb) gets smart, then gets dumb again. Tragic story. A man rises above his station and the gods punish him. Respect is earned from the process that Charlie did not have before.





Pro: ability that is not is given: hope


Con: it does not last forever