Flowers for Algernon

by Daniel Keyes

The idea seems to be: use an expression only as long as it doesn’t mean anything to anybody. Exceptional refers to both ends of the spectrum, so all my life I’ve been exceptional.

A child may not know how to feed itself, or what to eat, yet it knows hunger.

the path I choose through that maze makes me what I am. I am not only a thing, but also a way of being—one of many ways—and knowing the paths I have followed and the ones left to take will help me understand what I am becoming.

“There are a lot of people who will give money or materials, but very few who will give time and affection.

each had found a fulfillment in giving away a part of himself to those who had less.

Whatever happens to me, I will have lived a thousand normal lives by what I might add to others not yet born. That’s enough.

There is no greater joy than the burst of solution to a problem.

It’s as if all the knowledge I’ve soaked in during the past months has coalesced and lifted me to a peak of light and understanding. This is beauty, love, and truth all rolled into one. This is joy. And now that I’ve found it, how can I give it up? Life and work are the most wonderful things a man can have.

How many great problems have gone unsolved because men didn’t know enough, or have enough faith in the creative process and in themselves, to let go for the whole mind to work at it?

Intelligence without the ability to give and receive affection leads to mental and moral breakdown, to neurosis, and possibly even psychosis. And I say that the mind absorbed in and involved in itself as a self-centered end, to the exclusion of human relationships, can only lead to violence and pain.

I know I should sleep, but I begrudge every second of waking time. It’s not just because of the nightmares; it’s because I’m afraid of letting go. I tell myself there’ll be time enough to sleep later, when it’s dark.

There was something about you that made us respect you—yes, even as you were. You had something I had never seen in a retarded person before.” “I don’t regret the experiment.” “Neither do I, but you’ve lost something you had before. You had a smile . . . ” “An empty, stupid smile.” “No, a warm, real smile, because you wanted people to like you.”