Flowers For Algernon

Charlie is highly motivated to gain a higher IQ and overcome his intellectual disability. The lab team at Beekman takes note of his motivation, the leading reason they choose Charlie for the experiment. Later, Charlie realizes his motivation is tied to a long-held desire to please his mother. The novel’s initial progress reports, with their simplistic style and intentional spelling and grammatical mistakes, portray Charlie’s intellectual challenges. Their shifting style emphasizes the dramatic transformation that Charlie undergoes after the operation. The first report, for instance, includes sentences such as “I am 32 yeres old and next munth is my birthday” (1), while by Progress Report 10, he is capable of sentences as complex as “[n]ow I understand one of the important reasons for going to college and getting an education is to learn that the things you’ve believed in all your life aren’t true, and that nothing is what it appears to be” (71). Very soon after the operation, Charlie makes rapid intellectual gains in areas as diverse as foreign languages, math, and economics. Again, his motivation comes into play. He notes: “This is what I wanted to do—go to college and hear people talk about important things” (71).