The Role Of Happiness In Charlie Gordon's Flowers For Algernon

As a human being, each one of us goes through birth, life, and death. Charlie and Equality both had a difficult start in their life, not only did they not know proper grammar, but through their whole life they've been bullied. They didn't understand the meaning of human being until they went through solutions. In the books of Flowers of Algernon and Anthem, the kind of human being Charlie expects to be is to increase his intelligence, desire to reach an emotional maturity, and Equality wanting to be an individual as to himself, not as collectivism.

Before the operation, Charlie Gordon, from Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes, is happy. He may have a simple, pitiful existence, but he thinks his friends like him, and enjoys being with them and Miss Kinnian at the Learning Center for Slow Adults. However, Charlie wants to be smart, the one dark cloud in his sunny sky of life. Because of this, Charlie volunteers for an operation to triple his IQ of 68. With a high IQ comes awareness of the world around him, so Charlie suddenly becomes conscious of his previously pitiful existence which leads to a slew of feelings such as embarrassment, shame, and superiority. Charlie thinks that becoming smart will make him happy and well-liked, but the operation works the opposite effect. Charlie starts to look down on everyone, and cannot socialize with others because of his IQ. As a result, Charlie becomes almost depressed. His depression deepens when Charlie discovers that his intelligence will not be permanent. Soon, Charlie regresses to his former childlike mentality. Although at the end of the novel, Charlie does not find himself any worse off after the operation, the few months he spent smarter are not terribly enjoyable for him, and his changing mentality negatively impacts those he is close to, namely Miss Kinnian. Because the effects are not permanent, Charlie would be far better off without the operation.

Many people believe that achieving great intelligence will bring them great happiness. This was what Charlie Gordon imagined for himself, that if he could only get the surgery that was supposed to make him smart, then he could finally fit in and be really happy. In the end, though, was Charlie really better off after he got the surgery? No, he wasn’t. Charlie was ultimately better off before he got the surgery to make him intelligent because if he had never done the surgery, then he would never have had to experience the trauma of having to go back to not being intelligent after knowing what intelligence felt like. Also, before the surgery, Charlie didn’t realize how un-faithful his friends were, and how naïve he actually was, which ultimately caused him a lot of shame. Finally, if Charlie had never gotten the surgery, he wouldn’t have had to leave New York.

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” - Harriet Tubman. Charlie Gordon is a very welcoming, playful, and genuine man. He attends Beekman College for Retarded Adults and has a strong motivation to learn and to improve his intelligence. He dreams of being popular, and making friends. Throughout the novel Flowers for Algernon, Charlie Gordon changed in many ways. Prior to his life changing operation, he was not able to grasp that the people at Donner’s Bakery were not his friends, they only spoke to him to make fun of him. Charlie acknowledged their harsh actions, and started retaliating. Charlie is a very open

In the movie “Flowers for Algernon”, tells a story about a man named Charlie that isn’t so smart. His dream is to become a genius. He suddenly gets picked for an experimental surgery to boost his I.Q. Alice Kinnian (Charlie’s teacher) suggest him because, of his dedication to be intelligent. The surgery is a success and Dr. Strauss was the surgeon. After Dr. Nemur helps track his intelligence and how it builds. He records most of his lessons and tests. One of the tests that he did was racing a mouse named Algernon. Charlie must complete a maze before the mouse. He fails the first couple of times ,but finally gets the hang of it. While his journey of becoming a wise man is taking place, he works at a bakery named Donneans. Many of his co workers

Before the enhancing surgery, Charlie Gordon seemed to have depend and trust others, while those people didn’t have his back. This could be a problem in the future, because people have to learn to be independent so when they lose someone important, they don’t crack under pressure. In the story, Keyes writes, “Sometimes somebody will say hey look at Joe or Frank or George he really pulled a Charlie Gordon. I dont know why they say that but they always laft” (Keyes, 289). Daniel Keyes uses dramatic irony as a way of displaying Charlies perception of his friends. Charlie assumes he has very nice friends, but the audience knows that his

When Charlie was intelligent he often got irritated at the doctors because they weren’t as smart as him. He had also dealt with a lot of emotion with Miss Kinnian, Charlie was in love with Miss Kinnian. When he regressed, he was embarrassed to see her because he thought she would think he was dumb. When Charlie was at a diner, he saw a kid with disabilities, and everyone was laughing at him and so was Charlie. He was upset with himself that he laughed at him because that kid was him before he had the surgery to make him smart.

One of the reasons Charlie is better off after the experiment is because he becomes more self-aware. One part of the story that shows this is when Charlie goes to a party with his friends Joe and Frank, and everyone laughs at Charlie trying to dance. Charlie is now smart enough from the experiment to realize Joe and Frank just keeps him around for some entertainment, and not as real friends, so now he knows “what it means when they say ‘to pull a Charlie Gordon’” (7). Here, Charlie is benefiting from the surgery because he is now intelligent enough to be able to tell whether he has real friends or not. He realizes that they are just making fun of him, because he knows he used to be very unintelligent, which is why they say he can pull a Charlie Gordon. Now, Charlie can be more aware of who he chooses to be with, and know whether or not they are actually caring of him. He has become more self-aware in his choice of friends, and by doing so, improve his emotional situation. Another

He wears glasses but only for watching T.V. and movies. Charlie has a great motive because all he wants is to be smart for example, "After the operashun I'm gonna try to be smart. I'm gonna try awful hard. (p.11)". Charlie, being intellectually disabled, doesn't understand things, making him constantly happy. This is because he doesn't think about life. Charlie gets bullied but thinks they're being nice to him when they do things like "He really pulled a Charlie Gordon that time. I don't know why they say it but they always laff and I laff too. (p.23)". After the operation, he had a different outlook on life. He wanted to become smart so that he could talk with his coworkers about intelligent things like politics. Although, the operation made him too smart. His way of thinking was based on facts and intelligence, rather than emotion, feelings and instinct. Charlie was a genius and they weren't. He didn't know how to control his emotion because he never knew he had them, often making him go into depression and be

Charlie Gordon has faced isolation his entire life. His family had given up attempting to increase his intelligence. His coworkers laugh at him, but Charlie doesn’t understand that he is

I believe that Charlie is happier when he is less intelligent before the operation. You know the saying ignorance is bliss? That's what I think this is. Sometimes when I get bored I think about things. This is one of them. Would you rather be happy and not know something bad is happening? Or would you rather be unhappy and know that something bad is happening. Charlie was happiest before the operation. He didn't know that his "friends" weren't really his friends. He didn't know that his whole work place was making fun of him. He was happy though. Then he was intelligent, and knew what everyone was doing, he wasn't happy. He knew his "friends" weren't his friends. He knew everyone makes fun of him. He wasn't happy. In fact, he was so upset that

Every day, people go through operations and sometimes experience unpredicted and unwanted outcomes. The story, Flowers for Algernon, is exactly like that. In this story, a 37 year old man, named Charlie Gordon, has a mental disability and participates in an operation/experiment to increase his knowledge. After taking part in the operation, Charlie’s intellect gradually escalates to a genius status. Charlie, the man who had an IQ of 68, was slowly maturing mentally and he started seeing the world with a whole new different perspective. However, near the end of the story, his brain regresses back to where he started from. Charlie shouldn't have taken part in the operation: he started seeing the world in a different perspective, he

Ray Bradbury defines happiness as intelligence and portrays this in his book Fahrenheit 451 through the main character, Montag, and his experiences on his quest for knowledge. Since most people have so little knowledge in the beginning of the book, the overall happiness in the world is minimal. After coming home from work, he finds his wife, Mildred, overdosed on sleeping pills and he has to bring her to the hospital. While he is there the highly unqualified “doctors” explain to him that they “‘get these cases nine or ten a night. Got so many, starting a few years ago, we had these special machines built” (13). This is one of the first events in the book which makes Montag realize how unhappy the world is because even with so little knowledge,

Someone changing their point of view on a problem allows them to see the situation from both sides. In the story Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes, the character Charlie starts to change his views for a lab mouse named Algernon. Charlie goes from disliking the mouse because he outsmarted him to showing he was upset that Algernon had to pass a test to eat his food. Both Algernon and Charlie are in the same boat and are being experimented on for science. Now that Charlie can realize reality his views will drastically change for the mouse Algernon.

Flowers for Algernon A man named Max who is 38 years old, and thinks that happiness comes to those who are smart so he tries to learn lots in a short period of time, only to learn that happiness comes to those who try. In the short story “Flowers for algernon” the author Daniel Keyes portrays the theme, Intelligence doesn’t define a person's Happiness. Charlie Gordon is a 37 year old man with the IQ of a 5 year old, and thinks that being smart brings happiness, that’s when he meets Algernon a very smart mouse who is always caged and this mouse soon dies, then he learns that that’s not what really brings happiness. In the story Charlie finds out there is a surgery that can make him smarter.