Daniel Keyes
Daniel Keyes was an American author best known for his groundbreaking science fiction work, particularly the short story and later novel "Flowers for Algernon," first published in 1959. This poignant narrative follows Charlie Gordon, a man with a low IQ who undergoes an experimental surgery to enhance his intelligence. Told through Charlie's journal entries, the story explores themes of human dignity, intelligence, and the emotional complexities of personal growth and decline. Keyes's innovative storytelling earned him critical acclaim, with "Flowers for Algernon" winning the Hugo Award in 1960 and the Nebula Award for best novel in 1967.
In addition to "Flowers for Algernon," Keyes penned other notable works, including "The Minds of Billy Milligan," which examines a man with multiple personalities, and various crime novels. Despite his diverse portfolio, none reached the same level of recognition as his work about Charlie Gordon. Keyes, who also worked as an educator, drew inspiration from his experiences with students facing intellectual challenges, which informed his empathetic portrayal of low intelligence. His contributions to literature remain influential, particularly in discussions surrounding the nature of intelligence and humanity.
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Subject Terms
Daniel Keyes
Writer
- Born: August 9, 1927
- Birthplace: Brooklyn, New York
- Died: June 15, 2014
- Place of death: Boca Raton, Florida
Author Profile
Daniel Keyes began writing science-fiction stories in 1952, during a brief career as an editorial associate with a fiction magazine. He began to write soon after receiving his college degree at the age of thirty-three. None of his stories gained critical notice, however, until his short-fiction piece “Flowers for Algernon” was published in 1959.
“Flowers for Algernon” tells the story of Charlie Gordon, a thirty-year-old man with an IQ less than seventy. Charlie has, however, an intense desire to learn and to become more intelligent. He is chosen to be the first human subject in an experiment aimed at surgically correcting the brain in a way that is hoped will triple Charlie’s IQ. The same technique appears to have been successful on a white laboratory mouse named Algernon. The entire story is told through the journal written by Charlie, documenting his feelings and experiences as he increases in intelligence to genius level, then slowly and tragically returns to his former intellectual abilities.
The story brought immediate attention to Keyes, earning a Hugo Award as the best short science fiction in 1960. The story was innovative in style and content. The challenging technique of telling the story entirely in Charlie’s words is extremely effective. In addition, Keyes’s portrait of the nature of intelligence differs greatly from those in numerous previous science-fiction stories. Keyes portrays low intelligence in a sympathetic manner, effectively arguing that intelligence is only one of the things that makes people human.
Keyes wrote “Flowers for Algernon” while working as an English teacher, where his experiences with educationally challenged students may have formed much of the basis for the story. In 1961, Keyes earned his Master of Arts degree and became an instructor in English at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. After moving to Ohio University, Athens, he attained his professorship in 1972.
In 1966, Keyes published an expanded version of his story, detailing Charlie’s intellectual rise and fall and adding startling details about Charlie’s tragic early life with his parents and sister, who abandon him. The novel Flowers for Algernon was also very well received, earning Keyes the Nebula Award for the best science-fiction novel in 1967. In 1968, a film titled Charly was made, with the title character played by Cliff Robertson, who won an Oscar for best actor for his performance.
Keyes wrote several other novels, including The Touch (1968), about psychological stress after an industrial accident, and The Fifth Sally (1980), based on a true case of a woman with multiple personalities. None of his other fiction, however, achieved the success and critical notice of his stories about Charlie Gordon.
Keyes also wrote nonfiction books, including The Minds of Billy Milligan (1981) about a rapist who successfully used his multiple personality disorder diagnosis as a defense, and the follow-up book, The Milligan Wars, which chronicled Milligan's claim that he was inadequately treated. Unveiling Claudia (1986) told of the real-life woman, Claudia Yasko, who was so obsessed with the Ohio murders in the late 1970s that she confessed to them. He also wrote crime novels, including Until Death Do Us Part (1998) and The Asylum Prophecies (2009). Keyes published his autobiography, Algernon, Charlie and I: A Writer's Journey in 2000.
Keyes’s moving and effective “Flowers for Algernon” remains, perhaps, the best story on the nature of human intelligence and what it means to be human.
Bibliography
Clute, John, and Peter Nichols. The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1993. Print.
Gunn, James. The New Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. New York: Viking Penguin, 1988. Print.
Pederson, Jay P. St. James Guide to Science Fiction Writers. Detroit: St. James Press, 1996. Print.
Slotnik, Daniel E. "Daniel Keyes, Author of 'Flowers for Algernon,' Dies at 86." New York Times. New York Times, 17 June 2014. Web. 27 Mar. 2015.