flowers for Algernon

chapter 21: progress report 18 April 30

April 30
I've quit my job with Donnegan's Plastic Box Company. Mr. Donne-
gan insisted that it would be better for all concerned if I left. What did I do
to make them hate me so?
The first I knew of it was when Mr. Donnegan showed me the petition.
Eight hundred and forty names, everyone connected with the factory, except
Fanny Girden. Scanning the list quickly, I saw at once that hers was the only
missing name. All the rest demanded that I be fired.
Joe Carp and Frank Reilly wouldn't talk to me about it. No one else
would either, except Fanny. She was one of the few people I'd known who set
her mind to something and believed it no matter what the rest of the world
proved, said, or did-and Fanny did not believe that I should have been fired.
She had been against the petition on principle and despite the pressure and
threats she'd held out.
"Which don't mean to say," she remarked, "that I don't think there's
something mighty strange about you, Charlie. Them changes. I don't know. You used to be a good, dependable, ordinary man-not too bright maybe, but
honest. Who knows what you done to yourself to get so smart all of a sudden.
Like everybody around here's been saying, Charlie, it's not right."
"But how can you say that, Fanny? What's wrong with a man becoming
intelligent and wanting to acquire knowledge and understanding of the world
around him?"
She stared down at her work and I turned to leave. Without looking at
me, she said: "It was evil when Eve listened to the snake and ate from the tree
of knowledge. It was evil when she saw that she was naked. If not for that
none of us would ever have to grow old and sick, and die."
Once again now I have the feeling of shame burning inside me. This
intelligence has driven a wedge between me and all the people I once knew
and loved. Before, they laughed at me and despised me for my ignorance and
dullness; now, they hate me for my knowledge and understanding. What in
God's name do they want of me?
They've driven me out of the factory. Now I'm more alone than ever
before...