"I had reached a new level, and
anger and suspicion were my first reaction to the world around me."
Flowers for Algernon is a fiction
written in a diary form. Charlie, the
keeper of the diary or progress reports, was a retardate at the beginning of
the book. Having always worked hard to
become smart, he willingly accepted a surgery to have his intelligence
increased artificially.
After first reading Higashino Keigo's
shadow novella, I am well aware that his transformation was not meant to be
permanent.
It was as if he was riding on an
elevator, going up to the height from the den, only to find himself plunging back later, and fairly soon.
With an IQ lower than 80, Charlie
considered himself a happy guy with many friends. At the bakery where he worked, and at the learning centre for
mentally disabled adults. As his IQ
lifting, he realised that those friends were actually taking advantage of him
and might not be his friends at all.
That was the moment when his mind was filled with anger and suspicion. Surprisingly, when his condition
deteriorated, those "friends" welcomed him back to the bakery and
stood up for him against bullies.
Does it mean that they were true friends
after all? Or does it simply reveal the
ugliness of human nature, that we naturally feel hostile towards people better
than us?
How is it possible to keep our wits
about us without getting too frustrated by the absurdity happening around us
every day? I do not understand what
people gain by being rude, mean, selfish and inconsiderate, but obviously most
people act in that way. When our heart
is attacked by all those negative feelings incessantly, it has more anger and
suspicion accumulated.
Charlie did not know how to diffuse the
anger and suspicion, probably because the chilling truth dawned on him so
swiftly that he was knocked off balance.
But I was not Charlie. I did not come into the knowledge in a short
span of a few months. I have learned my
lessons for my whole life, and I should have known better. People can do what they want, and they are
totally out of my control. The history
of human race is repetitive without making any progress. All I can control and protect is myself, and
my own heart. If anyone put anger and
suspicion in me, I will simply let it go.
I borrowed this book in the expectation that Algernon was a hamster. Although it turns out to be a white mouse, it is equally adorable. I can vividly imagine the way he looked into a mirror at his own reflection.
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