Recently in class we read a short story called "Flower's for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes. Daniel Keyes wrote "Flower's for Algernon" in 1959 and the novel has not gone out of print since that time. The novel has been turned into a TV movie and adapted for a screenplay. The story "Flower's for Algernon" belongs to the science fiction genre. The story has won the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award.
             Daniel Keyes joined the U.S. Maritime Service when he was seventeen. After his stint, he went back to school at Brooklyn College where he received a degree in psychology. Later on, he received a license to teach English and wrote on weekends. He taught creative writing at Wayne State University.
             The story is told through Charlie Gordon's point of view as he writes in his journal. This story takes place in New York in the late 1960's. Most of the story takes place at the University where Charlie goes for testing. The main character, Charlie, is 37 years old and works in Donnegan's Plastic Box Factory. He goes to classes at the Beekman Institute and is chosen for an experiment that will triple his IQ of 68. He undergoes the experiment and his IQ starts to increase. Charlie quits his job at the factory because people feel threatened by his growing intelligence and they sign a petition to make him leave. At the peak of his intelligence, he decides that he will devote what time he can to finding a way to increase human intelligence. This is when he discovers that the effects of the experiment are only temporary. Algernon, the lab mouse dies as a result of the experiment. Charlie then writes a letter to Dr. Strauss explaining his discovery that the results of the experiment were only temporary. Charlie's intelligence starts to decrease. He basically regresses back to the intelligence level he had at the beginning of the story. He moves away from New York so that people will stop feelin...