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Progress Report 1
Charlie Gordon, a man with an IQ of 68, begins a journal for a scientist named Dr. Strauss: "Dr Strauss says I shud rite down what I think and evrey thing that happins to me frlom now on" (371). -
Progress Report 2
"I tryed hard but I still couldnt find the pictures I only saw the ink" (372), Charlie wrote. He did not understand a Rorschach (which he misinterpereted as "raw shok") test where he was supposed to interpret ink blots. This shows that he cannot think of new, complex ideas like art on his own. -
Progress Report 3
Charlie continues to do tests after Dr. Strauss and Dr. Nemur told him the Rorschach tests didn't matter. One of the most important tests in this story is the maze test, introduced in this progress report. Charlie described it as "Algernon [a mouse] was in a box with a lot of twists and turns like all kinds of walls and they gave me a pencil and a paper with lines and lots of boxes. On one side it said START and on the other end it said FINISH" (373). -
Progress Report 4
Charlie is selected for the experiment. He is "so excited [he] can hardly write" (374). He was chosen due to his motivation (which he thought was "motor-vation") and that "not every body with an eye-q of 68 had that thing" (374). -
Progress Report 6
Charlie finally has his operation. Charlie doesn't notice the effects of the surgery at first, as it would take time to begin, although he wishes he already knew new things, judging by what he writes: "I wish I knew some fancy things already" (376). -
Progress Report
"I beat Algernon!" the ecstatic Charlie writes (379). He finally beat Algernon in the maze game, showing his boosted intelligence. He plays the game again, but lost as he was "so excited [he] fell off the chair before [he] finished" (379). Still, he does not feel smarter. -
Progress Report
Miss Kinnian compliments Charlie's intelligence. She says: "for a person who god gave so little to you done more than a lot of people with brains they never even used" (381). Charlie also notes that his friends "never did anything that wasn't nice" (381). He later learns of his ignorance after he becomes more intelligent, learning his friends were less friendly than he thought. -
Progress Report
Charlie begins by learning what a Rorschach test is. He realized he had to interperate the ink blots rather than see them for what they were, something he wasn't smart enough to do before. He begins to figure out how much smarter he's become (or how dumb he used to be): "could I have been that feeble-minded?" (385). -
Progress Report
You can see Charlie is getting smarter. "You're already a better reader than I am," Miss Kinnian says to Charlie (387). Charlie is also under the effects of the Dunning-Kruger effect. He says: "I don't feel intelligent. There are so many things I don't understand" (387). -
Progress Report
"Algernon bit me," Charlie writes in this passage (393). He continues: "He is unusually disturbed and vicious" (393). Algernon shows Charlie's future and his descent into losing his sanity and intelligence. -
Progress Report
He struggles to maintain sanity, beginning this progress report with "I must not become emotional" (395). He knows his only goal in life now is this research. The progress reports become more sporadic now. The rapid rise and fall of intellect due to the surgery is being researched by Charlie, and he has called the sharp rise and fall the "Algernon-Gordon Effect". -
Progress Report
"Deterioration progressing. I have become absent-minded," Charlie begins (396). He is rapidly losing the gifts the experiment gave him, and more. Charlie writes more: "Algernon died two days ago. . . His brain had decreased in weight and there was a general smoothing out of cerebral convolutions as well as a deepening and broadening of the brain fissures. I guess the same thing is or will soon be happening to me" (396). Algernon is like a canary in an unescapable coal mine. -
Progress Report
Charlie's mind has completely regressed. He says he will "[go] away from New York for good" (401). He is antisocial and losing sanity quickly. I'm not sure whether by 'going away' he means death or literally going away, but he says his final goodbyes to "Miss Kinnian and Dr Strauss and evrybody" (401). Finally, he leaves one last note: "P.P.S. Please if you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard. . ." (401).