A Clockwork Orange

Mar 22, 2008

Martine rated it

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Recommends it for: people who don't mind a bit of a challenge

Shelves: british, crime, favourites, film, modern-fiction, postmodern, dystopia

A Clockwork Orange is one of those books which everyone has heard of but which few people have actually read –- mostly, I think, because it is preceded by a reputation of shocking ultra-violence. I’m not going to deny here that the book contains violence. It features lengthy descriptions of heinous crimes, and they’re vivid descriptions, full of excitement. (Burgess later wrote in his autobiography: ‘I was sickened by my own excitement at setting it down.’) Yet it does not glorify violence, nor ...moreA Clockwork Orange is one of those books which everyone has heard of but which few people have actually read –- mostly, I think, because it is preceded by a reputation of shocking ultra-violence. I’m not going to deny here that the book contains violence. It features lengthy descriptions of heinous crimes, and they’re vivid descriptions, full of excitement. (Burgess later wrote in his autobiography: ‘I was sickened by my own excitement at setting it down.’) Yet it does not glorify violence, nor is it a book about violence per se. Rather it’s an exploration of the morality of free will. Of whether it is better to choose to be bad than to be conditioned to be good. Of alienation and how to deal with the excesses to which such alienation may lead. And ultimately, of one man’s decision to say goodbye to all that. (At least in the UK version. The American version, on which Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation was based, ends on a less optimistic note.) In short, it’s a novella of ideas which just happens to contain a fair bit of violence.

It is also quite an artistic and linguistic achievement. Those who have seen the film will know that Alex (the anti-hero) and his droogs (friends) speak a made-up language full of Russian loanwords, Shakespearean and Biblical influences and Cockney rhyming slang. Initially this nadsat language was nearly incomprehensible to me, and my first response to it was bad. I found myself cursing Burgess, telling him that it wasn’t fair to put his readers through something like that. (If I want to read an incomprehensible book, I’ll read Finnegans Wake, thank you very much.) However, Burgess takes great care to introduce his new words in an understandable way, so after a few pages I got the hang of the nadsat lingo, and after a few more pages I actually began to enjoy it, because I’m enough of a linguist to go in for that sort of thing. I found myself loving the Russian loanwords, rejoicing when I recognised a German loanword among them and enjoying the Shakespearean quality of Alex’ dialogues. I finished the book with an urgent wish to learn Russian and read more Shakespeare. I doubt many readers will respond to the book in that way (not everyone shares my enthusiasm for languages and classical stuff), but my point is: you’ll get used to the lingo, and at some point you’ll begin to admire it, because for one thing, Burgess is awfully consistent about it, and for another, it just sounds so damned good. I mean, if you’re going to come up with a new word for ‘crazy’, you might as well choose bezoomny, right? Because it actually sounds mad. Doesn’t it?

Anyhow, there’s more to A Clockwork Orange than just philosophical ideas and linguistic pyrotechnics. The writing itself is unexpectedly lyrical, and not just when it deals with violence. Some of the most beautiful passages in the book deal with music. More specifically, classical music, because for all his wicked ways, Alex has a passion for classical music. He particularly adores Beethoven, an adoration I happen to share. I came away from the book thinking I might consent to becoming Alex’ devotchka (woman, wife) simply because he is capable of getting carried away by Beethoven’s Ninth and hates having it spoilt for him. He’s cultured, is Alex, and while his culturedness obviously does not equal civilisation and goodness (a point he himself is quick to make), it does put him a notch above the average hooligan. It’s the apparent dichotomy between Alex’ tastes in art and his taste for violence which makes him such an interesting protagonist and which keeps you following his exploits to their not entirely believable (but good) conclusion.

In short, then, A Clockwork Orange is an excellent book –- a bit challenging at first, but gripping and interesting and full of style and ideas. Not many books can claim as much.
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Feb 20, 2011

Paquita Maria Sanchez rated it

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Shelves: literature

This originally started out as a comment on Michael's awesome review, but then I realized that I have too frequently been writing these overly wordy responses to reviews about books I myself have yet to review, and it made me feel totally silly...as in, I should probably be keeping my rants contained to my own GR page rather than vomiting them all over all of your wonderful review threads. So! Here I am, and here is a review of a book that I read about 15 years ago, based solely on almost half-...moreThis originally started out as a comment on Michael's awesome review, but then I realized that I have too frequently been writing these overly wordy responses to reviews about books I myself have yet to review, and it made me feel totally silly...as in, I should probably be keeping my rants contained to my own GR page rather than vomiting them all over all of your wonderful review threads. So! Here I am, and here is a review of a book that I read about 15 years ago, based solely on almost half-my-life-ago memories combined with countless views of the film adaptation (in most ways similar, yet in some VERY VERY important ways, quite different.) Anyway. Ahem, ahem, huuhuummm. Ladies and gentlemen, A Clockwork Orange:

I read this in early high school, and vividly recall how much I loved it. How it opened my eyes to the beauty of not simply being a clever little wordsmith, but flat out inventing your own words and ensuing rhythms to illustrate the scenes and the characters in a new and profound way. How the novel's dark and cynical humor made me feel "understood" and less freakish. How it occurred to me that the flow of the sentence itself (rather than the specific black and white translation of what has been said) could lift a thought or picture off of the page and bounce it around in your head zapping vast numbers of subconscious thought-patterns to life. And finally, I loved how it showed me the way that you could be made to at once DEEPLY despise and sort of root for an absolutely heinous lead character (and what this says about the power of a gifted writer to conduct the reader like he or she is in an orchestra. An even better example of this delightful manipulation is Vladimir Nabokov's novel Lolita...which Kubrick, of course, also directed a film adaptation of. Sort of a theme, so it seems!)

All the above-mentioned elements combined to make my memory of it worthy of a five out of five star rating, and I always recommend it to anyone my age who has somehow yet to read it. Then again, I did see the movie first, and have a tendency to file anything that was ever associated with Stanley Kubrick* under either brilliant or near-brilliant, lacking only in those final Kubricky sprinkles on top which he would always generously provide in the end. Therefore, I have a bias in favor of the book based on a combination of nostalgic recollections of reading it, and a boundless admiration for the film. I readily admit that I should probably re-read it before I say much more. The most important distinction to draw between the film and the novel, however, is that Kubrick was wise enough (had the balls enough?) to end the story properly and without fear of reprisal by the "romantic comedy endings only" police...which is all I can say without spoiling the book, the movie, or both. The book is (?)awesome(?) and the film is (!)amazing(!)

*One Kubrick-related exception being the film A.I. Did you know that Stanley Kubrick was supposed to direct that and had Chris Cunningham lined up to do all the robotics? DAMN. Coulda-shoulda-woulda really been a thing of great beauty, guys. Unfortunately for Spielberg, this loose association with Kubrick was not enough to mask the fact that that movie was absolute, total, 100%, unquestionable, don't you dare argue this with me, CRAP CRAP CRAP. This is not an opinion, this is a fact. Even after everything that he suffered throughout the course of his story, all the ultra-violence he had unflinchingly inflicted on others, and despite ALL that he should have generally been emotionally deadened to, Alex STILL made this face when he was forced to watch Spielberg's A.I.

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Jun 21, 2008

Annalisa rated it

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Recommends it for: r rated. be forewarned of violence with a message

Shelves: classics, movies, literary, dystopia, speculative, guy-lit, psychology

Interesting. Disturbing but insightful. Real horrorshow.

For as dark as cynical as the book is, the main point I got out of the book is that freedom of choice is more important than being good. Burgess takes the most atrocious person possible and strips him of his ability to choose until optimal vulnerability makes you agree that choosing evil is better than not choosing at all.

The obligatory warning that vague spoilers follow:

Here we have a futuristic society ...moreInteresting. Disturbing but insightful. Real horrorshow.

For as dark as cynical as the book is, the main point I got out of the book is that freedom of choice is more important than being good. Burgess takes the most atrocious person possible and strips him of his ability to choose until optimal vulnerability makes you agree that choosing evil is better than not choosing at all.

The obligatory warning that vague spoilers follow:

Here we have a futuristic society in which the night is overrun by youth gangs written from the perspective of one gang's sociopath leader using their slang which sounds like Shakespeare had he been born in modern-day Russia. You are reading along a third of the words this unknown lingo you must interpret and define to understand the novel. But by the end you not only understand but want to speak nadsat slang yourself. You viddy oh my brothers? Although at times, particularly when describing food, I found it unrealistic to have so many invented words, even if I loved the genius of them and how they defined this group.

For the first few chapters you get the general gist of the action but are a little hazy on the grahzny details, which just adds to your moral distance to this youth. Since the first section of the book is the most violent, it is enough to know that they beat a man to the pulp or raped a woman in front of her husband without the picture of what exactly happened in your head. You get a picture of the antisocial quality of "your humble narrator" as you experience Alex's need for violence and sex, his uncharacteristic obsession of classical music, and his interpretation of those around him only in terms of how they affect him (classic sociopath).

When Alex is caught and imprisoned he is chosen for an experimental technique to change the bad to good with intense aversion therapy. Here Burgess introduces universal questions of free agency and what makes a person human. "A man who cannot choose ceases to be man." I loved the poetic discussion of the clockwork orange.

What gets me is that his aversion was not just to crime, but art that provokes any emotion. Take his intense passion of symphonies and associate it with goodness instead of crippling him with it knowing he will have to hear music as he integrates himself into society. This added perversion to his therapy seems an torturous form of punishment inflicted by a government that doesn't truly care about the human in these monsters only of making them non-thinking zombies of exemplar behavior.

But does the therapy truly change Alex? It is obvious from his criminal days that he cares for nobody but himself and you see the same pattern of self preservation in latter chapters. He is not good to be good, but only to avoid pain and is left victim to the society he once preyed upon. Can't his curers be accused of assault by negligence? Is ripping a person of his will to act, his humanity, good even if it prevents widespread crime. Is crime only toward the reformed criminal worth the price?

This bezoomny government hires gang members to their millicent force because they know how to hurt young criminals. How can they hate one prestoopnik and reward another? Just because you fight for the law doesn't make you more ethical. It only gives violence unholy power making life for the common man even more uncertain. How far can a government's control extend to alleviate the fear of its citizens? And what of the doctors or anti-government cronies who manipulate for their own political gain? Granted they hurt for the greater good, but is that any less ethical than impulsive crime?

Alex states he has paid. I do not agree. His lack of remorse for his crimes and only self-pity at his own victimization shows this. Alex's parents seem to fall through the cracks of culprit too. Praised as loving parents he is unworthy to have, how much is their indulgence without discipline to blame for his youthful crime sprees? And what of Mr. Alexander who paid for intent he never had the opportunity to act upon? Caught in the middle of a political mess he becomes an unfortunate victim. Revenge is hardly a worse offender than political gain, a twisted sense of fun, or any of the other reasons characters maluse each other. His droogs never take accountability for their crimes either, particularly in the controversial last chapter that Burgess' editor smartly exempted from his first edition.

A chapter in which we are to believe that all sorts of misdeeds done by youth are just rites of passage. It dismisses punishment, accountability, and even claims as we grow older we easily shed the terminology of our youth, which anyone who has tried to render "like" obsolete in their language knows is not an easy task. Ending the previous chapter leaves one contemplating good and evil, fixed and broken, the rights of individuals vs community. This chapter tells us we should indulge all heinous crimes brought about by these psychotic youth, even murder, because in time they will outgrow it, get married, and have their own children to shake their heads at as they play with their lives and souls out on lives edge. I get the intent: good must come from within, everyone has a chance to grow up and/or change, but I think the book is better left without it.(less)

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Aug 13, 2007

hypothermya rated it

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Recommends it for: linguiphiles, students of human behavior, rights-activists

Shelves: speculativefiction, literature

I had been avoiding this book for several reasons. The first of these was perhaps the weighty reputation this book has for being shocking and controversial. I was slightly afraid that the book wouldn't be as monumental as it had been built up as. The second was my initial exposure to the Kubrik film based on this book. Even the most blase 14 year old will have a strongly negative reaction to the film; the exact response it was intended to elicit, I'm sure. Finally, this book seemed to be a ...moreI had been avoiding this book for several reasons. The first of these was perhaps the weighty reputation this book has for being shocking and controversial. I was slightly afraid that the book wouldn't be as monumental as it had been built up as. The second was my initial exposure to the Kubrik film based on this book. Even the most blase 14 year old will have a strongly negative reaction to the film; the exact response it was intended to elicit, I'm sure. Finally, this book seemed to be a poltergeist that haunted my English teachers --- every time it was mentioned, those same teachers would take on a mask of otherworldly horror and admiration. They would then praise and condemn, in equal parts, its author for his demoniacally confounding use of slang. Several of my friends had even admitted to being unable to read the book. All in all, it wasn't a strongly alluring portrait of a book. It more closely resembled the challenge of a craggy cliff, with signs saying, "Do not climb -- 20,000 dead this year."

I was deeply surprised when I began reading this (during a brief jaunt as a member of the Panic! At The Disco reading club) and found it to be easily digestible and more thought-provoking than shocking. I think that in part this is due to my being a context-based vocabulary learner. I used to loathe putting down a book just to drag out a dictionary, and oddly enough this habit helped me here. However the majority of the thanks I can lay at the author's feet. This book was well paced and well written. It avoided lagging, like so many other literary classics. The central character was surprisingly easy to relate to, despite his inhumanity towards others. And this, paired with an insightful and meaningful plot, drove home the message of the book painfully well. And the final chapter, which was omitted in initial publications of this book, cinched the story shut in a way that the Kubrick film missed entirely.

Not only did I enjoy reading this book, ripping through it in only three nights, but I enjoyed sitting and thinking about it afterwards. I enjoyed discussing it. It stirred my brain in the same way that Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep did. It hit its mark where other speculative fiction books aim wide or fall short.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes to be challenged and who likes to ponder their own nature.(less)

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Sep 06, 2008

Sandi rated it

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Shelves: 2008, sci-fi

Well, what can I say about "A Clockwork Orange"? Maybe I should first suggest that anyone who wants to read it should print out this glossary: A Nadsat Glossary. I will be eternally grateful to Matt (Tadpole316) for sending me that link. My printout is looking a little rough.

I had seen the movie about 15 years ago. It was disturbing and many of the images were already so much a part of our cultural consciousness that it was at once familiar, yet disturbing. Many of...moreWell, what can I say about "A Clockwork Orange"? Maybe I should first suggest that anyone who wants to read it should print out this glossary: A Nadsat Glossary. I will be eternally grateful to Matt (Tadpole316) for sending me that link. My printout is looking a little rough.

I had seen the movie about 15 years ago. It was disturbing and many of the images were already so much a part of our cultural consciousness that it was at once familiar, yet disturbing. Many of the images are permanently etched in my brain. I recently realized that I had never read the original novel, so I picked up a copy. As most books written before the age of user-friendly word processors, it's very short, only about 200 pages. But, it's not a quick read. The first of the three parts is rather difficult to get through. The language really slows down reading and there are so many disturbing scenes that I just had to stop when I finished one and go back later. The movie actually changed some of the scenes to make them more palatable. For example, in the movie there is a scene where Alex takes two women back to his room and they have some rather raucous consensual sex to the tune of the William Tell Overture. In the book, Alex takes two ten-year-old girls to his room, gets them drunk, and rapes them. It was horrific, but it illustrated just how amoral Alex and his fellow malchicks were. The real surprise is the last sentence where you find out just how young Alex is for someone who has been doing the things he does for as long as he's been doing them.

The book gets easier to read in part two and part three is very comprehensible. According to the author's introduction, the original American edition of "A Clockwork Orange" left out the last chapter. It was put back in with the 1986 edition. I'm glad the last chapter is included now. I think the book would have been very dissatisfying without it.

The themes of "A Clockwork Orange" are pretty clear. What is the role of society in the morality of youth? How far should government go to rehabilitate criminals? What is the nature of violence and what is its effect on the perpetrators? Can anyone truly be redeemed?

I can't say I'd recommend "A Clockwork Orange" to everyone. It is a tough book to read. It's extremely violent and disturbing. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect is that the reader is in Alex's head as he's committing the most atrocious acts and, somehow, Burgess manages to write the scenes in a way that the read feels the adrenaline rush that comes from ultra-violence. It made me feel dirty and voyeuristic. But, I like literature that puts me in someone's head and feel what they feel, even if it's ugly. To me, that's the mark of great writing.(less)

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Oct 04, 2007

Maggie rated it

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I am the sort of person who can't watch very violent movies without covering my eyes or burrowing into my husband, who is kind enough to tell me when the gore has ceased.

However, I loved this book, for all the red, red krovvy and in-and-out and the ultraviolence. The dialect of Alex, your Humble Narrator, can be somewhat off-putting at first, which is something that Burgess himself admits in the introduction. But slowly you find yourself understanding the nonsense flowing so easily ...more

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Jan 23, 2009

Charity rated it

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Recommends it for: lovers of dystopias

Shelves: 1001books, brit-lit, ml100, radcliffe, wtf, tunes, faves

If you're worried that you don't have the full edition of this book, let me break down the formula for you. A full-content edition will have:

3 sections, each containing 7 chapters, for a total of 21 chapters.

The 21st chapter was only omitted from American editions published prior to 1990, so if your edition was published after that, you should be golden.

Well, maybe golden is a subjective term because I personally found the 21st (final) chapter to be the weakes...more

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Jan 11, 2012

Absentminded Scientist rated it

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That starry chelloveck Anthony Burgess had some sodding guttiwuts to write such a horroshow piece of ultra-violent fiction. And the lingo. My, oh my! All the starry lewdies won't even pony what us molodoys are gavoreeting about, O my brothers and sisters! If only my droogs would join in this bezoomy cal.

I know not all of you would get what I just said. But don't worry, no one does in the beginning. You slowly start to get the hang of it as you progress through the story narrated by the...moreThat starry chelloveck Anthony Burgess had some sodding guttiwuts to write such a horroshow piece of ultra-violent fiction. And the lingo. My, oh my! All the starry lewdies won't even pony what us molodoys are gavoreeting about, O my brothers and sisters! If only my droogs would join in this bezoomy cal.

I know not all of you would get what I just said. But don't worry, no one does in the beginning. You slowly start to get the hang of it as you progress through the story narrated by the 15 year old juvenile delinquent protagonist. Alex is a strange mix of sophistication, charm, violence and sadism. He enjoys classical music and beating helpless people to pulp. The book starts with Alex and his 'droogs' setting out in the night to hit their favorite hangout and do drugs. They go on to mug an old scholar, a convenience store owner and establish a strong alibi by bribing some old ladies with free booze. Later that night, the four steal a vehicle and end up at a little cottage on the outskirts of the city. The cottage belongs to a writer by the name of Alexander and his wife. Alexander seems to be working on a manuscript titled "A Clockwork Orange". Alex and the droogs gain entry into Alexander's cottage by force and beat him up while taking turns to rape his wife. They leave the couple battered and bruised without showing an ounce of remorse. Alex even admits to feeling a little "fagged" after "the old in-out-in-out" and wonders how he might attend school the next day owing to the lateness of the hour and his inability to get enough sleep.

They again make an appearance at the "milk bar" where Alex and one of the droogs named Dim get into an altercation; this is eventually broken up by the other two members of the group - Georgie and Pete. Although being cautious, both Gorgie and Pete show their displeasure at Alex's high-handed behaviour.
The next evening, Alex and the droogs decide to break and enter into an old woman's mansion in the posh part of the city. And though Alex finds this venture a little too fishy, he agrees when the others insist. Unbeknownst to him, Dim, Georgie and Pete set him up and Alex alone is caught by the police who arrive at the crime scene to catch him red-handed. The old lady later dies of her injuries and is tried for murder. He is sentenced to a long term in prison.

While there, Alex beguiles the prison chaplain (who he calls "Charlie" in his slang) into thinking that he has changed for good. He finds a great opportunity to escape early when he gets to know about the Ludovico Technique which can "cure" criminals of their criminal tendency. These ex-criminals are then considered "safe" to go back into normal society and are hence released early from prison. The chaplain does not consider Alex's request until he is blamed for the death of a cell-mate. Alex is then carted off to the building where this technique is put into practice. He is made to watch violent films while being injected with severe nausea-inducing drugs. As a result of this, he develops a profound abhorrence for any form of violence. Also, as a side-effect of it, he becomes unable to listen to his belove classical music as well (which was a soundtrack to one of the films shown to him. He is then let out into the outside world, apparently all "cured" of the criminal illness.What happens next is the crux of the story. But for that, you'll have to read the novel, won't you? ;)

I personally thought the Nadsat slang used by the narrator keeps the characters from sounding dated or obsolete in today's world. Remember, this is supposed to be set in a dystopian future, so the characters need to sound so too. And since the novel was written in the early '60s, that could have been a problem; which was very cleverly solve by Burgess (a multilingual man himself). The way the violence is portrayed could be a tad too much for some people, but maybe it was necessary to be so over-the-top to make us realize the extent of Alex's delinquency. The way he feels no remorse whatsoever after having raped a young woman and beaten her husband within an inch of his life points to a very messed up way of thinking. I personally HATED Alex for all his charm and sadism.

But the Ludovico technique was another extreme altogether. It indicates the extremes that society would go to so as to make an individual conform to the standards generally termed "normal or acceptable" by everyone. A complex teenager like Alex is hard to handle, no doubt about that. But to take away a person's right to free will is a total and complete violation. But then, condemning someone to a life in prison violates their right to free will too, doesn't it? So, faced with a choice like that, what would today's society choose? The lesser of the two evils, obviously. They'd rather lock a man up against his free will than play with his mind and brainwash him to abhor violence. But really, is that any better?

The edition that I read was the one with a different ending than that showed in the film. And in my honest opinion, I liked it better than the film version. It showed Alex in a more human, a more mature light; as a man who was hopeful, as well as worried, about what the future held for him and those around him. That is a much better prospect to imagine than one where there is no hope and no way of knowing whether he really was "curable" in the first place. Overall, I liked the novel, but I can't say I'm in LOVE with it. It is hard for me to identify with situations that seem too extreme or too hopeless. That is just how I am. But as far as the writing goes, Burgess was a GENIUS!

Verdict: Love it or hate it, it's a classic and will remain that way.
Rating: 3/5
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Jun 11, 2007

علی rated it

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Shelves: world-literature

Years after watching the film by Stanley Kubrick and reading the book, I read somewhere about the title, that Anthony Burgess chosed a combination of a Cockney expression and the word ”orange" which in Malay means ”person”!(Burgess has been serving in the British Colonial Office in Malaysia, for a while).
The new understanding made me excited as I got the chance to reread it years after, I understood why it’s been divided to 3 parts, what’s the philosophy by passing from one part to a...moreYears after watching the film by Stanley Kubrick and reading the book, I read somewhere about the title, that Anthony Burgess chosed a combination of a Cockney expression and the word ”orange" which in Malay means ”person”!(Burgess has been serving in the British Colonial Office in Malaysia, for a while).
The new understanding made me excited as I got the chance to reread it years after, I understood why it’s been divided to 3 parts, what’s the philosophy by passing from one part to another, how Alex gets weaker, fearing of lonliness and death, etc.
The experience was frightening, as we all could be a ”clockwork orange” in one or another way! Reactioner? We have no idea whose idea we follow when we feel sincer by heart …
روایت الکس از آنچه به اتفاق دوست روسی اش انجام می دهد، بی هیچ قضاوت شخصی بیان می شود، به گونه ای ترسناک که هر لحظه این توهم به خواننده دست می دهد که یک الکس دیگری ست، در شرایطی دیگر و زمان و مکانی دیگر. کسی که ناخودآگاه به پیروی از این یا آن تفکر، سیاسی یا اجتماعی، حرکتی را پیش می برد بی آن که بداند به چه کسی، چه جناحی و چگونه دارد خدمت می کند. آدمک کوک شده ای که نه تنها دشمنی و کینه بر نمی انگیزد، بلکه گاه علاقه و حتی ترحم دیگران را به خود جلب می کند و با این کشش، گروهی را نادانسته به خدمت خود و تفکری که به آن خدمت می کند، جذب می کند! دریافت این مساله آنقدر می ترساند که دست کم تا مدتی آدم را وادارد به هر عمل خود عمیقن بیاندیشد. آیا آنچه بالاخره و همراه تفکر و تعمق انجام می دهیم، همان است که می خواهیم، یا با این همه تبلیغات که از طریق رسانه ها بر ما تحمیل می شود، در انتها بی آن که خود بخواهیم، به این یا آن تفکر که لزومن به آن اعتقاد نداریم، یاری رسانده ایم؟
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Mar 09, 2011

Stacie rated it

Shelves: 1001books, audio-books

There should be a choice for "currently listening to"...just picked this up to listen to during my commute to work. Second go at an audio book - so far I am enjoying being read to.

DONE READING...Y'all need to excuse my language for a minute.

Holy Fuck! This is the most fucked up coming of age story I have ever read. Fucked up, but fan-fucking-tastic!

I have always figured I was not an audio book kind of girl. I am not an auditory learner, so often have...more

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Oct 02, 2007

Brooke rated it

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Old review scrounged from my blog:

I borrowed A Clockwork Orange from Bill. I have been wanting to read this book for years, mainly because I also want to see the movie, but couldn't bear to watch it until I'd read the book. By doing so, I have left myself out of a social loophole, missed many jokes, wondered at costumes, and never knew the cryptic sources of certain band names. But despite all that I've missed in life because of it, I am still glad I read the book before I saw the mo...moreOld review scrounged from my blog:

I borrowed A Clockwork Orange from Bill. I have been wanting to read this book for years, mainly because I also want to see the movie, but couldn't bear to watch it until I'd read the book. By doing so, I have left myself out of a social loophole, missed many jokes, wondered at costumes, and never knew the cryptic sources of certain band names. But despite all that I've missed in life because of it, I am still glad I read the book before I saw the movie (and still haven't even though I finished the book way before Christmas).

What I never knew about the book, except in vague references, was the deeply innovative way in which Anthony Burgess used the evolution of slang and culture to create a language of the youth. It was fascinating that he could create and maintain such a language throughout an entire novel (or novella as I've heard it referred to, but I don't think it's really that short). But was even more fascinating was the way that my brain learned to read this new form of slang and interpret it by inferring from sentences what it must mean. There is no glossary, and the character rarely deferrs to explain words. So the reader is just sort of carried along in this new world of words. It's a whole new vocabulary of slang words for body parts, new swear words, etc. After a few days of reading, I was honestly catching myself thinking in this manner, and even had a dream in which somebody was saying things like "red red krovvy" and "gulliver". I think the whole thing was derived from a mixture of british slang and then some germanic/slavic words. I found myself wondering if somebody who hadn't studied German would have been able to guess at some of the meanings. (Just like I wonder how much harder it would be to read certain novels, especially some of the British classics, without being able to read French).

So, that was a really interesting aspect of the book. Also, there is the ever-controversial bit about "ultra violence." I'll never forget when I was a freshman in college and some guys I knew told me I wouldn't like A Clockwork Orange ( the movie) because it was so violent. I'm still assuming I won't like the violence, but I am much less sensitive to these things than I was then. But, I did notice that reading about violence is so much different that seeing it up on a screen. And the language it is written in also helps to downplay what is really going on (ie. referring to rape as "the old in-out-in-out").

Another aspect of the book I hadn't anticipated was the brainwashing. Yeah, if I knew anything about the movie this probably would have been obvious to anyone, but I was thankfully free from knowing too much about the story ahead of time. So in the end, it was an incredibly innovative and interesting book, and I'm looking forward to the movie.

There was an "extra" chapter in this edition of the book. The "extra" chapter is actually how Burgess wanted it to end, but the American editors cut it out. So it is included in the British version, but not the American version of the book. And the movie was based on the American version. One chapter might not seem like a big deal to some people, but it completely changes the way the book ends!! The American version leaves you thinking that the main character has gone back to his original ways before prison and brainwashing. But the final chapter actually ends with the main character having a spontaneous change of heart, and a believable one at that, occurring as a natural part of growing older and a shift in desires. Not to mention, the author intended to have 21 chapters as a symbol of this acquire maturity. It really bugs me that some stupid American editors thought they could just cut out a chapter without completely changing the novel. I personally think that the artist/author's original intention should be more important than anything else, although it's true that he allowed them to make the cut. (less)

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Mar 10, 2009

Tara rated it

· review of another edition

Wow - a great book. I'm probably pretty lucky that I've never seen the film adaptation, nor even glimpsed pieces of it, but had only 'heard' that the movie was tremendously violent and of course there's the posters and all that. I wanted to read the book before seeing the movie, and I'm super glad I made that decision because a lot of this book came as a surprise to me. The middle part where Alex is conditioned, especially (the psychology classes from college kicked in and made my brain burn wit...more

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Apr 22, 2009

Sana rated it

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Shelves: favorites

The first thing that hits out at you is the slang dialect that makes up most of this book. I was put off at the beginning by this nadsat slang, but a few pages later I pretty much got the hang of it. I didn't like the idea of using a guide, as it was a lot more fun to make sense of the slang through context. It wasn't bezoomny, on the contrary quite horrorshow!

A Clockwork Orange is about Alex, the protagonist and our Humble Narrator, and his love for violence and classical music. Dre...more

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Oct 02, 2008

David McCann rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: linguists and philosophers

When I opened up this book and began to read Burgess' narrative, I was completely and utterly lost. When I closed this book, I was completely and utterly amazed.

An early turn-off in "A Clockwork Orange" is the dialect of the narrator, Alex, who uses a set of nadsat slang that any modern reader is likely to find confusing at first. However, readers, don't just put the book down--read on, and soon you'll find yourself understanding the words, and the experience becomes much m...more

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Sep 18, 2008

Sarah rated it

· review of another edition

Recommended to Sarah by: Adam Page

Shelves: classics, social-commentary

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Before you continue onto the rant portion of this review, please note that I enjoyed reading this book, I thought the language was brilliant and a fun adventure, and I found the plot to be original and insightful.

Having said that...

I feel like there are other books that do what "A Clockwork Orange" tried to do, but better - even other Burgess books.

Most of what was revolutionary about this book came from shock value. There is so much violence, so muc...moreBefore you continue onto the rant portion of this review, please note that I enjoyed reading this book, I thought the language was brilliant and a fun adventure, and I found the plot to be original and insightful.

Having said that...

I feel like there are other books that do what "A Clockwork Orange" tried to do, but better - even other Burgess books.

Most of what was revolutionary about this book came from shock value. There is so much violence, so much sociopathy, that of course this book feels new and different. But when it comes down to it, that was all that was really there.

I believed for a while that the theme of the story was important and valuable. But then I read the last chapter - the chapter that Burgess so vehemently defends in the preface to this book. For those of you who have clicked on this link but actually read an earlier edition of the book, Burgess laments throughout his entire preface that in previous American editions, the publishers cropped out the last (21st) chapter.

After reading to the end of the 20th, stopping, and giving a thought to what the book would have said to me had it ended there, I moved on. And by the end of the 21st chapter, I was disgusted. The 21st chapter of this book is a complete cop-out that reduces the entire message of the book to a condescending, parental attitude of "Don't worry, they'll grow out of it."

The implications of this are twofold, the first being that the root of the evil in this book, which was in earlier chapters suggested to be a morally bankrupt society, is actually nothing more than teenage impetuousness. The second is a facet that Burgess completely ignores: even if youth is the root of all evil, how can we be so nonchalant about it? Will there not always be youth? Do we then not have a responsibility to make youth something other than what Burgess asserts that it is - violent, rebellious, and worthless? The moral responsibilities we as a society have to combat this sort of thing are never addressed, and I closed the book feeling like a child who received a pat on the head, an empty reassurance, and an "And they all lived happily ever after" at the end of a bedtime story full of wicked witches and horrible villains.

I suppose it's a matter of opinion. I'm sure the modern age must have made me less content with stories written solely for the purpose of a happy ending and I am predisposed to authors who take the risk of ending on an unsatisfactory note. But whatever the reason, I was extremely dissatisfied after finishing the 21st chapter, whereas after finishing the 20th, I was merely nonplussed.(less)

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May 16, 2010

Paul rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: modern-classic

In 1960 Anthony Burgess was 43 and had written 4 novels and had a proper job teaching in the British Colonial Service in Malaya and Brunei. Then he had a collapse and the story gets complicated. But I like the first cool version AB told, which was that he was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour and given a year to live. Since as you know he lived a further 33 years, we may conclude the doctors were not entirely correct. However - the doctor tells you you have a year to live - what do you d...more

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Nov 14, 2007

Lindsay rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: British lit fans, Anthony Burgess fans, people who've seen the movie, scifi fans

Shelves: european-lit

It's an interesting plot and the way it's written is really what makes it worth reading. Everything else is just kind of shitty, though. Our antihero, Alex, commits horrific acts of violence with impunity, is caught and subjected to experiments which make him incapable of being aggressive, is beaten up by his former victims, manages to undo the scientific conditioning, goes back to being violent, then gets tired of it and decides he wants to have a son. All the while reminding us that nothing...more

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Feb 01, 2012

Ian Graye added it · review of another edition

The Cover

A black hole within a white zero within a black cog.

Darkness, nothingness and insignificance.

How It Came About I

The following account is from an article here:

http://www.creativereview.co.uk/cr-blog/...

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess.
Cover by David Pelham (1972)

This has become quite a well-known image. However, something that none of these images [can] convey is the urgency and speed at which s...more

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Dec 11, 2008

Sara rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 20th-21st-century-fiction

A Clockwork Orange is not a morality play, but it bears enough of a resemblance to one that it seems worthwhile to consider it, provisionally, in those terms. The morality play is a medieval form of drama that utilized allegory to instruct its audience on moral questions. The protagonist in a morality play usually represented humanity as a whole, or a portion of humanity (upper classes, clerics, etc.). All of the characters with whom protagonist came into contact were equally symbolic figures...moreA Clockwork Orange is not a morality play, but it bears enough of a resemblance to one that it seems worthwhile to consider it, provisionally, in those terms. The morality play is a medieval form of drama that utilized allegory to instruct its audience on moral questions. The protagonist in a morality play usually represented humanity as a whole, or a portion of humanity (upper classes, clerics, etc.). All of the characters with whom protagonist came into contact were equally symbolic figures, often personifications of abstract qualities, virtues or vices. A morality play was supposed to serve as a kind of ethical tool; a set of points on which to meditate for one's own moral good.

First, while not a stand-in for all of mankind, Alex is certainly more representational than he is idiosyncratic. In Burgess' pseudo-communist, authoritarian and lawless future (present? alternate universe?), Alex symbolizes autonomous and unguided male adolescence. We discover that Alex, though self-appointed leader of his small gang of friends/thugs, is not a rare creature in this brave new world. For one thing, bands of violent male gangs ("the teaming up was mostly by fours or fives," we are told) roam all over the city after dark and, for another, a couple of Alex's own gang members covet his power as leader as much as he revels in it. The only thing that sets Alex apart for the reader is that he is our narrator...and that he has a pristine sense of aesthetics, albeit one intimately woven into his appreciation for violence.

The other characters who populate Burgess' novel also seem symbolic and not literal. Our Humble Narrator interacts with types more than with distinct personalities - old drunks, young girls, maniacal prison doctors, disgruntled intellectuals - and with abstract concepts more than with people - authority, obedience, revenge, pain. Few of these characters actually come across as individuals and, accordingly, many of them do not have names but are simply referred to via a relevant characteristic (a physical feature, age, and so forth), for example, "young ptitsas" or "starry prof type". Most characters in the book are interchangeable with any other characters of their type and Burgess (via Alex), in fact, treats them this way. The old man whom Alex and his droogs harass at the novel's outset might be any old man. In fact, once the Ludovico Technique foils Alex's will to destruction, this former victim, along with a host of other irate old people, assault Alex at the public library. The individual victim's anger becomes the group's communal anger, his vengeance becomes their vengeance and, conceptually, they symbolize the weak and helpless seeking vengeance on the cruel and strong.

The most potent characters in the novel (and the ones most likely to bear actual names) are the figures of authority. Yet they are still representational. From prison guards to the Minister of the Inferior Interior, authority is symbolized by relatively flat characters who primarily serve to represent normalizing forces of a repressive society. They pursue the imposition of order at all costs, including the elevation of one-time hooligans to law enforcement officers. Authority, in A Clockwork Orange, exhibits no altruism or interest in ethical subtleties, but instead is bent on perpetuating its own power and enforcing capitulation with that aim. Tellingly, even the would-be revolutionaries, who at first seem so sympathetic to Alex's plight, seek merely to employ him as an instrument in their own quest with no regard for his own wellbeing. And therein is a central theme to A Clockwork Orange in its capacity as a sort of inverted morality play - the narrow margin between the just and the wicked. As hoodlums become authority figures, perpetrators become victims (and likewise victims become perpetrators) with alarming ease.

Then comes the ending. I read the complete version; the one with 21 chapters; the one that was not truncated by the American publishing industry and then preserved forever in film my the esteemed Mr. Kubrick. Without this ending, A Clockwork Orange feels like a bleak, but daring meditation on violence. With the ending, it feels considerably less daring, no longer bleak, and it really takes on this "morality play" aspect I've been toying with. [SPOILER WARNING] In Chapter 21, Alex-as-unguided-youth finds guidance within himself that he did not find in the state's medical manipulation of him. He grows spiritually tired of violence, realizes he's growing up, and decides he wants to stop beating up people and have a child. So the violence in this young man does fizzle as he discovers a desire to release productive rather than destructive energies. After this revelation, characters remain stand-ins for larger groups or ideas and do not grow into people: "But first of all, brothers, there was this veshch of finding some devotchka or other who would be a mother to this son." It is completely irrelevant to Alex who he finds to mother his child, because who would "everyman" want? "[S]ome devotcha or other," naturally.

And what do we learn here? A morality play does not mean supplying a moral, as in a fable, where the lesson you're supposed to have learned is spelled out. Rather the morality play presents a set of situations where abstract concepts interact in personified forms and questions arise regarding the rightness, wrongness, or consequences of a given act. As with a morality play, one gets the feeling that Anthony Burgess wants us to use the piece as an object for consideration more than he seeks to entertain or necessarily enlighten us. We are not supposed to identify emotionally with anyone in this story, but to react mentally to the substance of the story. At least I'm hoping that's the case, because the final resemblance of A Clockwork Orange to a morality play is that it feels so aloof and distant and (ironically for such a violent book) bloodless. It feels didactic.
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Sep 26, 2011

Petra rated it

· review of another edition

Free will: good or bad? If a person exercises their free will to do bad, should they be stopped? At what cost?
If one’s free will is removed, what remains of the person? How important is free will to a person’s make-up? When is the line crossed between an individual’s right to be themselves and society’s right to protect itself?
I listened to the audio version of this book and found the Nadsat slang to be lyrical and rhythmic and truly added to the context and reality of this story. ...moreFree will: good or bad? If a person exercises their free will to do bad, should they be stopped? At what cost?
If one’s free will is removed, what remains of the person? How important is free will to a person’s make-up? When is the line crossed between an individual’s right to be themselves and society’s right to protect itself?
I listened to the audio version of this book and found the Nadsat slang to be lyrical and rhythmic and truly added to the context and reality of this story. It kept the reader in mind that these people are teens. Their acts of violence are so hard-core that it’s easy to forget this fact.
Now to the story: This story is freaking awesome. Set in a futuristic world, it’s at the same time timeless. This could be any group of disconnected teenagers in any year. It shows the effects of recreational drugs on thought and perspective. Alex could be any teen in any year in any country.
Truly a great story. Until the final chapter. According to the introduction, American publishers did not publish the final chapter. They viewed it as a cop-out. Although I don’t see it as a cop-out, it does weaken the story. There’s too much of a shift between the end of Chapter 20 and what happens in Chapter 21. The chapter made this story very much a “regular” coming of age book with nadsat and ultraviolence being nothing more than a passing fad. No more and no less than today’s “hot” colour or fashion. It means nothing tomorrow.
Also, the character of Alex hasn’t developed throughout the book. He still thinks only of himself on the last page. (view spoiler) This selfish “me, me and only me” attitude shows that at 19 Alex is the same self-centered and disconnected teen as he was at 15 with his droogies, milk-plus and ultraviolence and his trendy platties. There’s no connection with people and society.
Oh well, it’s still a great story. Highly recommended.
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Feb 12, 2010

Jacob rated it

· review of another edition

You’re probably thinking why a bookworm like me is reading a book like A Clockwork Orange. Like with most books my friendship with a book begins with the title. I'm not one of those types who need a picture on the cover for me to be drawn to the innards of a book. The title is well enough for me. My imagination already begins to show something just with the title. As with A Clockwork Orange I had only heard of the title and never heard of the author. This book was the Harry Potter's, Wicked, an...moreYou’re probably thinking why a bookworm like me is reading a book like A Clockwork Orange. Like with most books my friendship with a book begins with the title. I'm not one of those types who need a picture on the cover for me to be drawn to the innards of a book. The title is well enough for me. My imagination already begins to show something just with the title. As with A Clockwork Orange I had only heard of the title and never heard of the author. This book was the Harry Potter's, Wicked, and Twilight of its time. It is my suspicion though, my proof only coming from the author himself, that it became so popular because it was made into a film.
Unfortunately I experienced only half of nostalgia mentioned above when I picked up A Clockwork Orange for I found it, of all places, at a church. It was mixed in with books like Christian Doctrine, Raising your Child in a Christian Home, and old hymnbooks. And then it happened. I saw the title ' A Clockwork Orange' written by an author I never heard of. I found out later that this was the book that Anthony Burgess was most known for, which explains why I was trying to make a mental connection to Burgess to the House of Burgess's. A stretch I know. On the thin binding there was the author’s name in black and the title in white. I grabbed it at once. Again, I will remind the reader that the title was familiar and but it still brewed vague images in my mind. I think this was not because of what I knew about it as a book but because of the movie that was made. I was getting it mixed with another shoot'em up, were everybody dies at the end, type movie called Reservoir dogs. There was a picture on the cover. It showed a faceless man who had only one eye that was encapsulated be a clock wheel, like the kind you can find inside a mechanical clock. His skin tone was white and he wore a black cravat and a green shirt with blue suspenders. The title and the author’s name was colored with yellow. Below this was written in black capital's ' A TERRIFYING NOVEL...NOW A TERRIFYING FILM'.
When I first tried to read the book I stumbled over almost every other word. The author meant for the language to be this way. i guess it was Burgess' way of bringing the reader into Alex's world. The language is a rendering of English called Nadsat. This is what most impressed me about this book.
Sadly I didn't finish reading the book. This was not so much the ultra violence but the sex and rape. I made it to when Alex had two very young girls into his room. I stopped when he had got them drunk. I don't what happened to the poor girls and I'm very happy not to.
I wonder if A Clockwork Orange had a similar effect on someone else. I usually finish books even if it is boring. This I had to stop. I thought I was really saving my mind from some real hurt.
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Oct 07, 2011

h. rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: someone prepared to read at there own risk

Recommended to h. by: Eric Hendrixson

Shelves: my-fives-exceptional-reads, they-assign-this-in-hell

Like Lolita, I'm horrified to find that I read this novel. The house-breaking, beating scene honestly disturbed me.

I like to be disturbed in a Modest Proposal or Bucket of Face kind of way --- by satire that wields over-the-top, impossible violence. The kind that makes you bust a gut. The violence depicted in this novel is real, so I don't go back there. I looked into the heart of man's darkness once in Dachua and got it totally. To look again seems sickly voyeuristic, and I'm determ...more

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May 18, 2011

Bill Ward added it · review of another edition

Shelves: sf-review

Oh my brothers, viddy well this like review of a horrorshow dobby book called A Clockwork Orange, written by this real oomny chelloveck Anthony Burgess. In it, this molodoy young malchick Alex, or Your Humble Narrator, goes around with his droogies drating and shop-crasting and the like, all for a bit of pretty-polly and some of the old in-out in-out. But poor Alex snuffs a starry old ptitisa one nochy, mistaken-like, and is caught by the grahzny millicents, bog blast them, and sent away to the ...more

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Feb 11, 2010

Kaput rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: really-enjoyed, 2010

A book that can still leave a feeling of distaste. Far easier to read than I expected, you soon get in to the swing of the way it is written and I really enjoyed the onomatopoeia that made it seem like everything being said was spat out as quickly as possible.

Under all the grotesque, gleeful horror there is a serious message being posed by this book about the nature of free will. Free will has a dark dimension because people will not always choose good. When they choose 'bad' society...more

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May 12, 2009

Marcus rated it

· review of another edition

I haven't seen the movie and don't plan on it, but the book is great. Before reading it, I didn't know much about it except that it was "crazy" and apparently something that teens read in High School then immediately put down and go out and either form a punk band or get a tattoo or dedicate their life to writing. Generally books with that reputation (On The Road, Atlas Shrugged, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance etc.) just don't appeal to me that much (OK so I liked Atlas Shru...more

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Jul 10, 2010

Julia Boechat Machado rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: books-i-own, british-literature, bildungsroman, 1960s

Burgess disse: "We all suffer from the popular desire to make the known notorious. The book I am best known for, or only known for, is a novel I am prepared to repudiate: written a quarter of a century ago, a jeu d'esprit knocked off for money in three weeks, it became known as the raw material for a film which seemed to glorify sex and violence. The film made it easy for readers of the book to misunderstand what it was about, and the misunderstanding will pursue me till I die. I should not...more

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Oct 10, 2008

Beth F. rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: almost anyone but especially those who can appreciate a book that plays mind games

Shelves: 1001-books, vile-rapists, dystopia-and-apocalyptica, dude-lit, 2008, banned-books

I had a set of preconceived notions about this book that have been completely blown out of the water by my first reading. I feel like a shmuck for not having read it sooner. Clearly, I’ve just joined the Clockwork Orange fan club.

There were a couple kids from my high school who loved this book—one guy in particular I could not stand. We were in a lot of the same classes and almost always ended up in an argument about one thing or another that usually ended with him saying, “OMG!...more

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Sep 06, 2008

M.C. rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 2008-2009

"In a mad world, only the mad are sane," said Akira Kurosawa.

To the fellow droogs of A Clockwork Orange, this quote must ring out as an out-of-trend veshche of the forgotten yesterdays.

An epic dystopian tale, A Clockwork Orange traces the latter part of the teenage life of Alex, the ringleader of a company of four that is solely immersed with committing acts of violence that ranged from assault, robbery, to "ultraviolence."

Though filled w...more

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Jul 08, 2008

Maureen rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: everyone

Shelves: experimental, novel

I find this book almost as impossible to review as it would be to look away from the violence that unfolds in its pages. Inside the mind of Alex is a murdering fifteen year old who paradoxically loves classical music. Along with his mates, the droogs, Alex wreaks havoc on random people who cross his path, meting out vehement brutality against a largely unsuspecting population.

When he is caught and submitted to brainwashing, the story moves into an even higher gear, speculating as...more

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Apr 16, 2008

Pierce rated it

· review of another edition

Emmm... MILD SPOILERS ahead I guess.

I'm glad I read this but I don't think I have anything particularly significant to say about it. Except that it seems like people have been declaring an inexorable slide in the morals of young people for a hundred years and yet there are still many decent young people. So I just don't know, whether it's true or whether it's fear of the generation rising beneath you. Nobody of any age or class exhibits particularly moral behaviour in this dystopia, so...more

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