Book Review: Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes

All Charlie Gordon wanted was to be smart.

As a 32-year old man with an IQ of 68, working as a janitor at a bakery, all he wanted was to be like everyone else. All he wanted was to go back and make his mother proud.

His dreams come true when he becomes the first-ever human to undergo surgery to increase his intelligence (the only other individual ever to have had this surgery is a mouse named Algernon), successfully blasting his IQ to a shocking 185. Yet after copious gains of knowledge and exploration in many fields and discussions with scholars and months of writing progress reports and drunken parties and extensive research, Charlie realizes that he is not happy. His relationships with people, such as his co-workers and the professors studying his change and an attractive woman, Alice, rapidly deteriorate, and he feels angered by the fact that others view him as merely a subject of a scientific study, not as a human being. While he was once ridiculed as nothing more than a silly animal, he is now avoided because of his detachment from others. Things take a sudden, heart-wrenching turn, however, when both Charlie and Algernon rapidly regress, losing all that they once had.

Daniel Keyes’s award-winning science fiction novel, Flowers for Algernon, criticizes society’s view and treatment of the mentally disabled, explores the conflict between intellect and emotion, scrutinizes ways that one’s subconscious can uncover traumatic memories later in life, questions the morality of artificially enhanced intelligence. Is it ethical to treat a human being as a scientific experiment? And at what point does human life begin this decrease in value?

Do we choose to compensate the value of human life for the progress of science, or compensate the progress of science to preserve the value of human life?

The thought-provoking and incredibly sad story has been adapted many times into films and television shows, including the Academy Award-winning 1968 film, Charly, and a 2000 television movie, Flowers for Algernon, both of which offer new perspectives on the original story.

3rd Quarter Independent Reading Reflection

Books I read this quarter:
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Pet Sematary by Stephen King
Tomorrow There Will be Apricots by Jessica Soffer
If I Stay by Gayle Forman

This quarter, I met my goals of (1) finishing The Scarlet Letter, which took me FOREVER because it is such a hefty read, and (2) reading at least 5 books (close.. I read 5.5 because I’m halfway through Pet Sematary). Meeting my goals was something of a struggle this quarter because the combination of Scioly and other classes (cough aphuge cough) and social pressures and other sundry struggles literally drove me to my wit’s end, but I managed to pull through by forcing myself to sit down and read. It actually helped relieve my anxiety from my stress sometimes.

During 4th quarter, I want to (1) read Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, which my mom recently read and thought I would like, and which is also a classic, and (2) read at least six books, more than I read this quarter. Also, Goodreads told me that I need to read at least 2 books a month to keep up with my 2016 reading challenge, so 6 books seems to be a good bottom-line estimate for March-April-May.

Point of View - Sheila Moss

Home on the Kitchen Range 

I'm a Mosquito Banquet 

Sheila Moss’s point of view in her columns can best be described as humor. In “Home on the Kitchen Range”, Moss uses a slightly annoyed and self-deprecating tone to tell readers about her terrible luck with kitchen appliances, using low diction to help her connect with her readers, repetition, and sarcastic comments inserted with parentheses. In her other column, “I’m a Mosquito Banquet”, she again uses purposeful diction and repetition as well as simile and rhetorical question to complain about the fact that mosquitoes seem to be very attracted to her. She also uses an alternating fact-opinion structure in this column to state a fact or theory about the behavior of mosquitoes or how to repel them, followed by sarcastic, self-deprecating ideas of her own.

Moss’s use of low or funny diction is especially effective in helping her establish a relaxed, self-deprecating tone that allows readers to laugh both with and at her unfortunate circumstances. For instance, she starts off one of her columns with a very conversational voice: “I give up, I tell you. I give up” (“Kitchen Range”). This instantly establishes the author herself as the column’s object of ridicule. In addition, Moss also concludes her column with the same opening sentence; this repetition again reinforces her main idea and indicates her frustration that she has still not reached a solution to her appliance problems by the end of the column. By maintaining low diction throughout the column, using words and phrases such as “coughed up” and “whatever that is” to describe her problems with kitchen appliances, Moss puts readers at ease to join her in mocking her and to not take her comments too seriously. In the other column, “I’m a Mosquito Banquet”, Moss again stays true to the purposeful diction that characterizes her writing style and a self-deprecating tone. Her main problem in this column is that she is “a casserole on the mosquito smorgasbord” (“Mosquito”). A “smorgasbord” is a buffet meal featuring a varied number of dishes. This diction, while not exactly low, is certainly very interesting. It stands out in the column and is also intertwined with a metaphor to help make a point: Moss is extremely popular among mosquitoes, much like a casserole is a popular dish at a buffet. Overall, Moss’s low or unusual diction helps her make her points clear and allows readers to laugh along with her at her misfortunes.

Things I Learned Last Year

Things I Learned Last Year

Sweat drops and teardrops are both salty.

Every cell in your skin 

is replaced every four months.

Hangnails don't go away

unless you cut them.

A violin hickey

is a badge of honor

that gets you places.

Scars heal from the inside out.

The more you pick at split ends,

the more of them you get.

Everything you see on a person's exterior 

is dead.

The faster you rip off a band-aid,

the less it hurts, but first you have to 

be brave enough.

2015. What a year. Filled with the starkest of contrasts: success and failure, forgiveness and revenge, defiance and conformity, pride and guilt, passion and regret, a few steps closer to finding myself—2015 saw it all.

My poem focuses on a few specific aspects of my life the past year, using skin or hair to symbolize something different in every stanza. The first two or three stanzas simply sound like statements with a matter-of-fact tone, but this progresses into slight arrogance in the fourth stanza, pain and remembrance in the fifth, regret in the sixth, reflection in the seventh, and reflection and empowerment (the only positive stanza!) in the last. Only after reading through the last few stanzas does it become apparent that each statement, even the ones in the beginning that seem like simple facts, have a symbolic meaning. Overall, the tone of the poem is reflective and melancholy/slightly regretful.

I sort of tried to mirror Stafford's poem structure by using run-on lines and only one thought per stanza. I also paid attention to the number of lines in each stanza (something I do not normally like to do), which is a 1-2-2-3-1-2-2-3 pattern. I did not really use any of the other features in his poem, like sentence structures or the topics he used. Mine was less about what I learned about the world in general, and more about a specific, personal reflection about how I have grown.

2nd Quarter Poetry Journal Reflection ｷｬｯ♪o((〃∇〃o))

Cake

I am half a sparkle on the gilt edge,

the flesh of a living charm.

We knit our warmth with needles,

the sweater that wraps

around the circle of our touching shoulders like a shawl.

 

I live in a land

of three-letter acronyms

we juggle back-ack and forth-orth like a game.

 

I am zapped to life by the swish of the baton,

jitter-itter and chug like a wind-up toy,

but the gears and springs inside me,

they’re silver and gold.

 

I used to be one of Them, sputter-uttering,

on the outside,

pointing, dry cracked lips,

faces tinted chartreuse,

pounding bloody cracks in the fiberglass windows

wail-wailing-ing please let me in-in--

 

But the sweater muff-uffles the voices of Them now,

sympathy drained.

It’s warm and snug in here,

No room for more.

Jitter-itter-chug, it’s all that matter-atters.

 

Let them eat cake.

This is kind of a weird poem. I forget what it was inspired by. (Of course it was inspired by me. *round of applause*) I do remember I pulled the lines "knit warmth with needles" and "wraps around shoulders like a shawl" from a poem we read (I don't quite remember which one), and "they're silver and gold" from a Lorde song, because, Lorde.

I dreamed up the idea for this poem during orchestra class (because, we all agree, I never pay enough attention when playing violin wrong notes WHAT ARE THESE WRONG NOTES YOU SPEAK OF). I was thinking about how people who get what they want (or are in the upper crusts of society), being content and unconsciously self-absorbed, pay no attention to those below them, who would give anything to be in the same situation. People are so blinded by the fulfillment of their own wants that they do not realize that there is a world outside of that little gilt edge, that little inner circle in orchestra where the conductor waves the baton into their faces, when that outside world is where they themselves had previously been. I was am was guilty of this too.

The last line is an alleged quote from Marie Antoinette, spoken when a herd of irascible peasant women stormed into the Palace of Versailles wail-wailing-ing for bread. I thought this would tie in well, because she showed indifference for the peasant's suffering, much as the elite in society (or school) today are indifferent toward the suffering of others who get it rougher. (I crossed that out because I think it's self-explanatory but Mrs. Leitsch wants me to elaborate on specific decisions-isions I made during the writing process so I'll spell it out.)

Something else new I tried during my revision process with this poem is I added a bunch of repeated syllables in selected words, set off by hyphens, such as "back-ack and forth-orth" and "jitter-itter-chug". These were meant to be kind-of-but-not-really-onomatopoeia, like we saw with that one poem called "Interchange", except a little differently. I guess what I wanted to show was the constant, repetitive nature of the cycle of nonchalance, and plus it sounds cool, so I decided to go with it.

2nd Quarter Independent Reading Reflection

This quarter, I finished 4.5 books (2.5 books more than last quarter, that’s a 125% increase) *fist pump*:

The Color of Water by James McBride

Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson

Room by Emma Donoghue

The Scarlet Letter, although pretty rigorous, was not as difficult as I had expected it to be! I understood basically all of what I read, and found it pretty interesting too. A lot of the language and sentence structure in classics is really different from modern YA novels, so it was kind of tough going (and that’s GOOD because I wanted to challenge myself :D), but I think I grasped it well enough.

I decided that I was working very hard gnawing my way through Hawthorne, so I sort of binge-read Wintergirls and Room, two books I would not normally have indulged in, because I thought, after all those aerobics with a classic, I deserved a treat. Rationalizations tsk tsk tsk *shakes head* 

However, I’m actually super glad that I gave myself such rationalizations because these two books turned out to be two of my favorites (I kind of have a lot of favorites but still. They’re awesome.) Wintergirls is a heartwrenchingly vivid (and, strangely, relatable!) story of a teenage girl struggling with anorexia, along with grief and guilt from the death of a close friend. The story is one of strength and recovery, but I particularly loved the beautiful writing style and haunting metaphors, such as:

“The voices swim around her insides and multiplied, charred, tinny echo voices that made a permanent home inside the eggshell of her skull.” 

I JUST LOVE THAT. Why can’t I write so beautifully??? Or actually maybe I can. I need to start doing that.

Room is an equally dark and potent story written from the perspective of a five-year old boy, Jack, whose mother was kidnapped and confined into a one-room garden shed seven years ago and finally explores the outside world for the first time in his life. Jack’s innocent and childishly positive outlook on life and his dependence on his Ma are what make this story so warm and sad at the same time.

The battle for my favorite book this quarter is tight between Wintergirls and Room, but I think the gorgeous writing style gives Wintergirls the final tug on the rope.

Many of the books I read this quarter (namely, Girl, Interrupted; Wintergirls; and Room), while not all that challenging in terms of comprehension, were very eye-opening and disturbing. Yeah, disturbing more than anything else: I met a suicidal girl in a mental facility, a girl who starved herself to the brink of death and sliced open her bag of skin and bones, and an adorable little boy with his aching mother who lost seven years of her life. I’ve grown to have a big sort of empathy for the characters, and learned that, these people actually do exist, and they are so incredibly strong. I need to read more such disturbing books in the future (I LEARN SO MUCH MORE THIS WAY). Also I need to give myself more rationalizations to read books that aren’t necessarily that challenging, like the two I binge-read this time. Because look how much I’ve learned from and enjoyed them!! (wow, was that a rationalization FOR a rationalization? *gasp*)

I read so much (125%!) more than I did last quarter, met my goal of four books including one classic, AND pulled myself through half of Hawthorne. *really swaggy motion that guys do after a sweaty workout* I’m proud, right there. (My friends are also proud of me because they’ve started getting annoying Goodreads notifications from me again.) I think I met my goals this time because I binge-read really hard WITHOUT the guilt. I loved it. I picked pleasurable, disturbing (was that an oxymoron? *gasp*) books, and I loved it.

My goals for next quarter’s reading are (1) finish The Scarlet Letter, obviously, because it’s challenging and I’m already halfway through so there’s no turning back *mwahahaha* and (2) read FIVE books, so I can read MORE than I did this quarter, especially with winter break and plenty of binging time (except still being realistic since third and fourth quarters are when most Science Olympiad competitions are so I need to mete out time for that too). *thumbs up thumbs up*

Oh and also, I can't figure out how to add a Pinterest button widget to my blog (it's been a long day), but nevertheless follow my Pinterest!! (It's actually good, I promise. Followers, this is the part where ALL 9 of you testify.)

ElizabethanLife: Hourglasses are In!

The summer of 1571 is rolling to a close, ladies and gentlemen, and hourglasses are in! 

Men, get a headstart boosting your masculinity this fall with a designer doublet, an armor-like breastplate extending to the shoulders and covering the back and chest, embellished with intricate lacing and stuffed with horsehair, wool, or rags. (You think that's uncomfortable? Suck it up—try putting on a corset.) Complement it with boots, a shirt, hose, ruff, long cloak, and hat on a special occasion, and you're ready to hit the floor! Breeches should reach the knees and be joined by a codpiece in the front. Beware of beards and/or mustaches—keep them trimmed nicely and they can be a definite yes. In an outfit like a suit of armor, you can always be a gallant knight in the eyes of that special someone.

Peasant men can look forward to homespun garments of wool, canvas, fustian, or leather, knitted hose, and hobnail shoes. Appropriate field clothes include tunics, loose breeches, canvas leggings, and thrummed hats. (You'll never be royals...sorry not sorry.)

Richard Sackville, 3rd Earl of Dorset

Ladies, flaunt your fabulous figure in a stylish dress suited to your socioeconomic status. The royal family sports crimsons and other bright hues trimmed with ermine, but that kind of lux just ain't for the lesser nobles, who've got to settle for fox or otter trim on velvet, silk, and satin. Peasants in the nearing autumn weather can expect to don homemade cotton, leather, or wool garments in pastel colors. 

Broad shoulders, wide hips, and a sleek waist are the way to go, girls, via a separate bodice, sleeves, and kirtle reinforced with wire or whalebone farthingale. For the less curvaceous, a bumroll can add an extra boost to your hip volume. (Most importantly, don't forget the ruff!) Peasant women, keep chugging along in petticoats with front-laced bodices with blue or black kirtles. (Bloodstains, ball gowns, trashing the hotel room...)

The paler the skin, the higher your (apparent) social rank! Pamper your face and neck with ceruse: a makeup base of white lead and vinegar, cheek dyes of cochineal or vermilion, drawn-on beauty spots, red lipstick, and plucked eyebrows.

Mary Queen of Scots

Queen Elizabeth of England

At ElizabethanLife, we can't decide who looks more ravishing in her noble ruff and elegant updo: Mary Queen of Scots or Queen Elizabeth of England. Tell us, ElizabethanLifers, who wore it better?