Hasn't anybody read "Flowers for Algernon"?

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Other than being an analogy to the Cure topic, I don't see too much similar between Asperger's and NT in this story. The rapid change in intellect (and its subsequent relationship complications) is akin to someone's rapid change in income. I don't see the (hypothetical) change from AS to NT bringing about the same types of complications.
Charly was always an outsider, whether he was "retarded" or "genius". He just didn't seem to know it until people acted angry at him.

Outsiders or underdogs are received well on screen because they end up succeeding in popular ways. They prove the point, they win the game, they play the piano well. Whatever it is that endears them, is socially acceptable and meant to manipulate the public into liking them.

Snowflake doesn't seem popular, Charly was seen as a tragedy, Temple Grandin was apparently approached for a movie deal but she lacked romance, so it was abandoned. (I believe in favor for A Beautiful Mind, which its romance was doctored and sanitized)

Charly Gordon became angry toward the end not because of cognitive dissonance, but because that was one of the symptoms of his oncoming deterioration (you may recall that Algernon became irritable, and even bit his handlers, before his mind dissolved).

The short is a definite classic, and won a Hugo (also a Nebula, I think, but right now I'm too busy being harassed by a two-year-old who skipped his nap to look it up myself).

I've read that book in 10th grade. I've found it, very interesting.

I read the book. I chose it for summer reading when I was going into 7th grade. I understood it and thoroughly enjoyed it. I think it could be interpreted as an anti-cure argument, an argument for leaving things in their natural state, but this is up to the reader.

As I remember in "Flowers For Algernon," the mouse died at the end. Would this have been the eventual outcome for Charly as well? Neither the book nor the movie addresses this, but the consequences of the operation they did seem to point to this result.

I read part of it in eighth grade English. I'd like to read the full book.

Charlie became stressed out and aware of the classic AS complaint "Say what you mean!"

Who knows why the mouse became angry. Perhaps it couldn't handle the change. Perhaps his increased intelligence scared away the other mice? Clearly Charlie was'nt a mouse and the procedure didnt affect him in the same way because in the end, he didnt die.

I see the relation as with AS as Charlie graduated from being " Retarded "to being Aspergers. I could really relate to that peroid in the story.

I'm not sure who Snowflake is.

So you're saying that if Napoleon Dynamite had not " been suscsesful" in the end the movie and character would not been as well recieved?

I can not remember a Hollywood story that was'nt about a learning disabled person who didnt have "a heart of gold" This sort of thing bothers me. I first heard about Autism like most people, "rainman" and yes I thought it meant being Autistic meant you automatically was a savant.
I'd like to see a film that does not focus on the tragedy of a disorder nor make those out to hve it to be angels. Not that I do'nt want them to be demonized either. It's a life like any other with ups and downs.
But I guess thats not "sexy" enough for Hollywood.

Haven't seen the movie, nor read the novelization, but I did read the short a large number of times. Algernon's death resulted because after the deterioration, his mind slipped to below the normal rat level, to the point that he could not remember to eat. It's strongly implied that this would be Charly's fate, too; he slipped away into the night after realizing (when he showed up to his old job at the bottling plant) that his newfound intellect had already gone, leaving behind a note explaining what had happened, and asking that someone "plese put flowrs on algrnon's grave"...

Snowflake is a movie starring Sigourney Weaver as an autistic woman who deals with the accidental death of her daughter. You haven't heard of it because "it isn't sexy enough". Although it's a very good movie with co-stars, Alan Rickman and Carrie Ann Moss.

Snape in a movie about Autism? I'll have to needle someone I know about that...

I read it a good 40 years ago, in grade school. That, and 'the Lottery' (loser gets stoned to death or something... was the sort of 'now' type stuff teachers wanted us to read...

The Lottery was very good. Shirley Jackson wrote some great stuff. Its hard to find it online though. I remember one story of hers about a couple that took daily turns being evil and nice to people. I wish I could remember the title!

That was Shirly Jackson? I thought it was whats her name . . . Ursla K LeGuin. I think she wrote "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" very good story!

Read it.
Loved it.

Charlie's behaviour seems somewhat autistic in both his states: in his retarded state, he is too innocent to realise that his co-workers are making fun of him. When he gains intelligence, he realises this. However, his mind still has a flaw that many of us have- the inability to see the human side of things, so to speak, to understand that there is more to the world than cold facts and his own mind.

Here is the "The Lottery" for anyone that hasnt read it. Its a short story.

http://www.americanliterature.com/Jacks ... ttery.html

"An Ordinary Day, With Peanuts".