Editor Horace Gold’s Advice to Daniel Keyes on “Flowers for Algernon”

Holy crap. Worst editorial advice EVER.

I’d never heard this story before (or if I had I’d forgotten), but here’s Daniel Keyes talking about his short story “Flowers for Algernon.” This anecdote was mentioned on StarShipSofa, and I tracked down the quote at Locus Online:

“…So I wrote the story. I called Horace Gold, and he said, ‘Bring it over. I’ll read it while you’re here. Have a cup of coffee, read a magazine.’ Horace was an agoraphobic who ran poker games Friday night to Saturday dawn in his First Avenue apartment, and his office for Galaxy was there too. I was kind of nervous, because Horace was an important editor, and that was only my fifth short story I was submitting for publication. Horace came in from the other room and said, ‘Dan, this is a good story, but I’m gonna tell you how to make it a great story: Charlie does not lose his intelligence; he remains a super-genius, and he and Alice fall in love, they get married, and live happily ever after.’…”