From the Bookshelf of Sci-fi and Heroic Fantasy…

A Clockwork Orange

Anthony Burgess

Start date: January 11, 2016

Finish date: February 8, 2016

Discussion: Book Discussions

Discussion leader: Alesandra

Why we're reading this: Group Novella discussion January 2016.
#30 on NPR's Top 100 SF/F novels of all time (2011 poll) http://www …more
[close] Group Novella discussion January 2016.
#30 on NPR's Top 100 SF/F novels of all time (2011 poll) http://www.npr.org/2011/08/11/1390858...
#68 on Locus Magazines Best Fantasy novels of the 20th century http://www.locusmag.com/2012/AllCentu...

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What Members Thought

Mar 12, 2024 Nina rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy, philosophie, 2024-aty

I have viddied Stanley Kubrick’s film prod of this book more times than I care to count. It is real horrorshow, oh my sisters, and, as it unspools in the sinny, it always makes a starry ptitsa like myself feel all the little malenky hairs on my plott standing endwise and shivers crawling up like slow malenky lizards and then down again. Your humble narrator felt like it was well past time to read the book for herself so she ittied her way to the old biblio to skvat herself a copy.

The fact that I have viddied Stanley Kubrick’s film prod of this book more times than I care to count. It is real horrorshow, oh my sisters, and, as it unspools in the sinny, it always makes a starry ptitsa like myself feel all the little malenky hairs on my plott standing endwise and shivers crawling up like slow malenky lizards and then down again. Your humble narrator felt like it was well past time to read the book for herself so she ittied her way to the old biblio to skvat herself a copy.

The fact that the whole book is written in Nadsat (teen slang) is what makes it equal parts fascinating and frustrating to read. If I struggled to write even one short paragraph in Alex’s juvenile lingo while stealing phrases whole cloth from the book, I can only imagine how difficult it was for Anthony Burgess to write a whole book in it, even though he invented the thing. Most of the words can be deciphered in context, but I’ll confess that I found an online dictionary to refer to when I was extra confused. It also helped that Kubrick captured the spirit of the thing so very well in his film that most of the scenes were already quite familiar to me. If you’ve never seen the film (which you really should because it’s amazeballs), you might get a bit lost from time to time.

The biggest difference between the book and the film, which distressed the author greatly, was that Kubrick used the American version of the book, which is one chapter shorter than the original British edition, leaving out the denouement that the author felt was of utmost importance to the story he wanted to tell. I was very curious to see what that chapter contained so I made sure to find an edition that included it. The author spoils it a bit in his introduction, but I’ll try not to spoil it too much here. Suffice it to say that, on the whole, I agree with his American editor and, by extension, with Kubrick. From a philosophical perspective, I can see why the author felt as strongly about it as he did. However, from a psychological perspective, it didn’t ring true for me and I also felt that this is a case where having a more ambiguous ending is much more powerful than settling it in a way that feels forced. Call it 4.5 stars rounded down to 4 because I didn’t like the author’s approved ending. ...more

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