I've heard a few statements about how intelligence doesn't always go along with happiness. This book beautifully explains why.

It opens with a very choppy, phonetic narrative style that represents the early reports of a man (Charlie) about to undergo an experiment to increase his intelligence. The text alters as the experiment takes affect, and we see the changes happening in Charlie's perspective and character.

I'm not sure how much more I can really say without risking spoiling things. I read this book because my father suggested it to me and it's also on the "staff's choice" shelf at my local indie bookstore. It's not a long book, and well worth the read, but it is sad in ways. Fair warning. ( )

Sentimentality is the book’s main draw. We feel for Charlie when he slowly realizes he was once retarded. We feel for Charlie as he remembers being bullied. We feel for Charlie when his mother can’t accept him being different. We feel for Charlie when he has trouble connecting with women. Again, making readers feel something is no mean feat at all, and Keyes deserves credit for that.

The novel’s themes by themselves are not superficial: what does intelligence do to a person? What does being smarter than most people around you do to someone? How are emotions and intelligence correlated? I’m sure lots of brainy people that read lots of books have bumped into these questions as teenagers, and possibly in their later lives as well.

But sadly this novel doesn’t show a lot of insight in the human condition – not that Keyes doesn’t have ambition, opening his novel with a quote from Plato’s Republic. Yet the end result is more philosophical soap opera than probing analysis: it seems as if the book only adds plot & emotion to the original short story, not so much ideas.

(...)

Full review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It ( )

Is This An Overview?
Charlie Gordon is intellectually disabled. Before and after having an operation that can increase Charlie’s intelligence, Charlie is asked to write down progress reports for research purposes. They act like diary entries. It is through these progress reports that the book is written. Before the operation, the researchers perform various tests on Charlie’s intelligence. Some of the tests are a competition with the mouse Algernon, to complete a maze. Charlie kept losing to the mouse. The mouse had the intelligence operation that they were going to perform on Charlie.

When they do perform the operation on Charlie, the gradual progress frustrations Charlie, but eventually Charlie becomes much smarter. Even Charlie’s memory improves. With the new found intelligence, Charlie became an expert in many intellectual fields and languages. When Charlie was intellectually disabled, Charlie had friends, but the friends had fun at Charlie’s expense. When Charlie became an intellectual, Charlie made others feel inferior and therefore lost friends. Charlie’s intelligence became so vast, that Charlie thought the researchers were inadequate compared to Charlie, that they were frauds. Charlie’s intelligence may have drastically increased, but not Charlie’s emotional intelligence. Problems for Charlie did not disappear after having the intelligence operation. The problems just became different.

Caveats?
As this book is written from progress reports by Charlie, some of the progress reports can be difficult to read. As Charlie’s intelligence improves, so does the writing. This makes the story very consistent. Giving the reader an immersive experience.

This book has psychological foundations, but psychology has advanced. Some of the ideas presented in the book might have been popular during the era, but have been proven wrong. Terminology has also gone through changes. Some of the terminology was appropriate during the era, but are no longer considered appropriate. ( )

dopo quasi 5 anni è apparso un like su questa valutazione, non ricordando cosa avessi scritto sono venuta a vedere e ho trovato il nulla! 4 parole in croce per un romanzo che ho adorato (scuoto la testa sconsolata)
cinque anni è anche il tempo che mi ci è voluto per rendermi conto che questo spazio non serve soltanto per rinfrescare la memoria a me stessa: a volte qualcun altro legge
quindi, Lettore Probabile (amico o sconosciuto che tu sia) la recensione ufficiale è questa:

impattante, potente, straniante, straziante
da leggere assolutamente

APPUNTI PER LA MEMORIA:
ritardato/genio
esperimento scientifico ( )

Other than a few problems with the way this book it's written, I really enjoyed it and will recommend it in the future.

Charlie is an interesting protagonist that seems, at times, close to being one of numerous archetypes seen elsewhere (the bubbly comedic relief, the self-tortured artist, the antisocial genius) and yet manages to never fall into one of those categories, he's layered and that makes him seem real. ( )