Flowers for Algergon
By Daniel Keyes
Rating 4/5
Genres : Psychological fiction, Mental illness, 2022-read
My God! This is some pretty deep stuff. Makes me look at mental retardation from a totally new perspective. The fear and anathema the main character - who is retarded - feels towards being laughed at and ridiculed is very tangible and visceral through the text that inspired me into absolute pity for him and hatred towards his perpetrators. Its a consolation that he is not used as a guinea pig by those ruthless and self centered scientists..atleast there was some humane element to the whole plot. Most of the abusive past the main character Charlie recalls is while he is becoming smarter as a result of a brain surgery and it is handled with some detachment and in a non emotional way which I felt took the sting out of the whole past for Charlie but failed to cause a stir in me as a result..I would have liked to read the same material handled by someone else like Wally Lamb..for example.
Coming to the plot, Charlie is a mentally retarded grown up man with a life long desire to become smart..and learn how to read and write. Its a offshoot of his mother's denial and inability to handle the fact of his low intelligence..she has created some major psychological and subconscious blocks for him through abuse in childhood. He undergoes a surgery to improve him mental retention and improve his IQ. This surgery is already done on a lab rat called Algernon and it shows stability in its mental abilities. So Charlie starts becoming more and more smart..and senses his friends growing more and more distant..his past memories which were in the black coming back one after the other and despite holding the knowledge that his mother's abuse is the cause behind his psychological/mental impotency towards women, he remains a victim to it. Then it becomes evident that the surgery is not permanent..Charlie finds the mistake in the initial hypothesis and handles his return to retardation and physical degradation in his own way..
This book is definitely written by a scientific mind than a empathetic mind..or else the material is ripe for some insane soul stirring but alas I felt it only occasionally. Still..very good.
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