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Category: flowers-for-algernon
Quotes of Category: flowers-for-algernon
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  1. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    Am I a genius? I don't think so. Not yet anyway. As Burt would put it, mocking the euphemisms of educational jargon, I'm exceptional-a democratic term used to avoid the damning labels of gifted and deprived {which used to mean bright and retarded} and as soon as exceptional begins to mean anything to anyone they'll change it. 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.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  2. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    Strauss again brought up my need to speak and wrtie simply and directly so that people will understand me. He reminds me that language is sometimes a barrier instead of a pathway. Ironic to find myself on the other side of the intellectual fence.
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  3. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    The most important thing had always been what other people thought-appearances before herself or her family. And righteous about it. Time and again Matt had insisted that what others thought about you wasn't the only thing in life. But it did no good. Norma had to dress well; the house had to have fine furniture; Charlie had to be kept inside so that other people wouldn't know anything was wrong.
    book-quotecharlieflowers-for-algernon

  4. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    The feeling of cold grayness was everywhere around me-a sense of resignation. There had been no talk of rehabilitation, of cure, of someday sending these people out into the world again. No one had spoken of hope. The feeling was of living death-or worse, of never having been fully alive and knowing. Souls withered from the beginning, and doomed to stare into the time and space of every day.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  5. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    Downhill. Thoughts of suicide to stop it all now while I am still in control and aware of the world around me. But then I think of Charlie waiting at the window. His life is not mine to throw away. I've just burrowed it for a while, and now I'm being asked to return it.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  6. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    Here look at me. I'm Charlie, the son you wrote off the books? Not that I blame you for it, but here I am, all fixed up better than ever. Test me. Ask me questions. I speak twenty languages, living and dead; I'm a mathematical whiz, and I'm writing a piano concerto that will make them remember me long after I'm gone.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  7. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    No, you don't understand because it isn't happening to you, and no one can understand but me. I don't blame you. You've got your job to do, and your Ph.D. to get, and-oh, yes don't tell me, I know you're in this largely out of love of humanity, but you've got your life to live and we don't happen to belong on the same level. I passed your floor on the way up, nad now I'm passing it on the way down, and I don't think I'll be taking this elevator again. So let's just say good-bye here and now.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  8. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    You want these back, don't you? You want me out of here so you can come back and take over where you left off. I don't blame you. It's your body and your brain-and your life, even though you weren't able to make much use of it. I don't have the right to take it away from you. Nobody does. Who's to say that my light is better than your darkness? Who's to say death is better than your darkness? Who am I to say?...
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  9. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    Because I want to see. I've got to know what's going to happen while I'm still enough in control to be able to do something about it.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  10. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    I may not have all the time I thought I had...
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  11. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    All the barriers were gone. I had unwound the string she had given me, and found my way out of the labyrinth to where she was waiting. I loved her with more than my body.
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon

  12. Daniel Keyes _ Flowers for Algernon

    The only question now is: How much can I hang on to?
    book-quoteflowers-for-algernon
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