Charlie's Troublesome Family
Charlie Gordon's life has been propelled in this direction because of his mother who always wanted a smarter child. She pushed him to excel. When he could not meet her expectations, she threatened to kill him.
Charlie's father realizes he is not safe and moves him to his uncle's home. He lives there until he is 17 when his uncle dies. During his stay with his uncle, Charlie had made friends with his uncle's best friend, Mr. Donner, which is how he starts working at the bakery that Mr. Donner owns.
Striving for Betterment
Charlie starts to go to Beekman University to take classes for the mentally handicapped. This is where he meets the woman that will change his life. Ms. Kinnian, his teacher, realizes how much Charlie wants to succeed, so she refers him to the psychology department at the university to see about the experimental surgery.
During the experiment, he starts to document his progress in a journal, which is how most of the story is laid out - in journal entries. As his I.Q. triples in a 9-month period, he quickly evolves, his intelligence bringing him a whole new perspective on people and life.
Intelligence and Love
As Charlie becomes more developed, he starts to see women anew and has a brief affair with a young woman named Anna but ultimately falls in love with Ms. Kinnian. Charlie's relationship with Ms. Kinnian was sweet and new but unfortunately does not last because Charlie's brief brilliance starts to decline quickly.
The Experiment's Results
At Charlie's peak of intelligence, he started to realize that the experiment was going to fail. He started to understand the formulas and scientific equations and knew that it was not a fully functional experiment. This was later confirmed when Algernon declines quickly and then passes. Due to this, Charlie starts a frantic pursuit to find the answer to make the experiment fully successful and jots all of this knowledge down in his journal before he reverts back to his old self.
The regression in intelligence is quick and sad to behold. Although Charlie loses his intelligence and his love, Ms. Kinnian also has a tragic situation, because she still loves who Charlie was and now has to see him in this slower, lower functioning form.
Charlie shows that he has brief glimpses of who he was, which is bittersweet. He feels as if he accomplished one of his dreams, yet it is something that has destroyed all the relationships around him and is a dream he can no longer reach. Charlie eventually decides to move to a home for slow adults as a way to make things easier on those around him.
Lesson Summary
Charlie Gordon, a handicapped man, is shunned by his mother and moved into his Uncle's home for safety. This starts a domino effect for Charlie, he then befriends Mr. Donner a friend of his uncle which takes him in after his uncle passes away. This allows him to start working at the bakery, and the money he earns is what gets him taking courses at Beekman University.
He achieves his dream briefly to become smart by subjecting himself to an experiment through the psychology department. The department had previously experimented on mouse named Algernon and were successful.
Charlie also gets to experience success when his intelligence increases. He also learns about love with Anna and Ms. Kinnian. Unfortunately, due to his new found smarts, he burns the bridges of his old life, making it almost impossible to revert back to it when the experiment fails. The only hope we are left with as a reader for this touching character is that perhaps he had determined how to make the experiment successful within the pages of his journal.
