title: Flowers for Algernon
author:  Daniel Keyes 
description: <DIV>Oscar-winning film Charly starring Cliff Robertson and Claire Bloom-a mentally challenged man receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache.<br></div>
zlib_text: 
  
  
  Flowers for Algernon
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Daniel Keyes
  
  
  
  
  
    
  
  
  * * *
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  >
  
  
  >
  
  
  >
  
  
  For my mother  
  
  
  And in memory of my father
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  * * *
  
  
  
  
  
  Any one who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eyes
  are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the
  light or from going into the light, which is true of the mind's eye, quite as
  much as of the bodily eye; and he who remembers this when he sees any one
  whose vision is perplexed and weak, will not be too ready to laugh; he will
  first ask whether that soul of man has come out of the brighter life, and is
  unable to see because unaccustomed to the dark, or having turned from darkness
  to the day is dazzled by excess of light. And he will count the one happy in
  his condition and state of being, and he will pity the other; or, if he have a
  mind to laugh at the soul which comes from below into the light, there will be
  more reason in this than in the laugh which greets him who return