Daniel Keyes

 Theme is the general truth behind the story.  Sometimes it is called the lesson or moral of the story.  Science has a moral responsibility to society.  Or just because we can, should we?  Learning new material increases knowledge; knowing when to use it, is wisdom.

 It is a diary or journal.  Charlie calls them progress reports.

 This is a first person narration.  This limits the reader to seeing only what Charlie sees.

 Charlie Gordon

 Charlie seems uneducated, mentally slow, and childlike.  He also seems happy and enthusiastic.

 He couldn’t see any pictures.

 He wanted to become smart.  He thought school could make him smarter.

 He cannot tell the difference between imagination and lying.  Would he be able to tell why this baby is crying?

 He is a white mouse used for a laboratory experiment in intelligence.

 He’s a white mouse.  That’s the only thing that Charlie can see that makes Algernon different from any other mouse.

 He wants to be smart.

 It will triple his intelligence.  His IQ will change from 68 to 204.

 A rabbit’s foot, a lucky penny, and a horse shoe

 He has become frustrated and angry. He does not think the operation has worked.  What he does not realize is that learning is difficult and sometimes even painful. His frustration is evidence that he really is learning.

 Getting smarter takes time.  Algernon had the operation earlier, and so he has a head start on Charlie.

 No, they are using him for entertainment.  He thinks they are his friends because they spend time with him.  They also laugh with (at) him. He sees only the laughter, not that it is at him not with him.

 He tries to sleep through it.

 They abuse him and make fun of him.

 Charlie beats Algernon.  Charlie begins to develop a sense of conscience.

 There is no longer any challenge in racing him.  He feels protective of Algernon.  He feels it’s wrong for Algernon to have to pass a test in order to earn his food.

 The experiment has ramifications beyond Charlie.  Regardless of what happens to Charlie, science has learned from him and his operation.

 It shows a deeper understanding of the world.  It leaves the concrete world and enters into the abstract.  WHY?

 She always give him a reason.  She explains things to him.  She genuinely cares about him as a person, not just as a laboratory experiment.

 There is no contest. Charlie always wins.

 He realizes that their friendship was fake.  They were making fun of him to make themselves feel more powerful and smarter.

 He now is able to use his imagination.

 He sees her as a beautiful, attractive woman.

 The people at the factory fear the changes they see in Charlie.

 Since writing proved to be too slow for his thoughts, he was learning how to type.

 He finds it difficult to communicate at their level.

 He laughs, then he sees himself in the busboy.  He realizes that others have been laughing at him right along.

 A physical disability is obvious.  A mental disability is not.

 He decides to continue on with the scientific investigation into human intelligence.

 He has become vicious and unpredictable.

 He, too, will begin to fail.  He and Algernon have followed the same path in character development.

 To work on his own special project: The Algernon-Gordon Effect.

 Intelligence will decrease at the same rate or even faster than is was increased.  The intelligence increase is only temporary.

 It creates a strange sort of déjà vu for him.  It feels like someone else wrote his reports.

 He has no understanding of what he wrote.  He is perplexed by the work.

 The format is returning to his original style.  The spelling is slipping. They are becoming shorter.

 He still loves her, but she has now become to him as before.  She is his teacher, not a girlfriend.

 They are protective of him.  They are more comfortable with him now that he has returned to his old way.