A Clockwork Orange

by Anthony Burgess

the kind of hound-and-horny veshch put out by Statefilm in those days.

the allusions to the soviet union are so blatant it's both very smart and baffling

the filthiest of slovos that I already knew and others he was making up.

More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me on our oddy knockies, and that self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty.

why does it have to be alex saying this

this is literally insane because yeah he's right BUT IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU. sure the government doesn't allow individuality ok yeah got that But killing and raping isn't individuality. being a criminal isn't a quirky personality trait. you're crazy

‘Never,’ I said. ‘One can die but once. Dim died before he was born. That red red krovvy will soon stop.’

And so I led my three droogs out to my doom.

thank fucking god

Boy, thou uproarious shark of heaven, Slaughter of Elysium, Hearts on fire, aroused, enraptured, We will tolchock you on the rot and kick your grahzny vonny bum.

I’d done the lot, now. And me still only fifteen.

oh

The question is whether such a technique can really make a man good. Goodness comes from within, 6655321. Goodness is something chosen. When a man cannot choose he ceases to be a man.’

It may be horrible to be good.

What does God want? Does God want woodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has the good imposed upon him?

And yet, in a sense, in choosing to be deprived of the ability to make an ethical choice, you have in a sense really chosen the good. So I shall like to think.

‘Horrorshow is right, friend. A real show of horrors.’

It’s funny how the colours of the like real world only seem really real when you viddy them on the screen.

and then you could slooshy the most gromky and agonized and agonizing screams that ever came from a human goloss.

they must have been more cally and filthy than any prestoopnick in the Staja itself.

devastating: worst person you know makes a good point

What is happening to you now is what should happen to any normal healthy human organism contemplating the actions of the forces of evil, the workings of the principle of destruction. You are being made sane, you are being made healthy.’

It opened with German eagles and the Nazi flag with that like crooked cross that all malchicks at school love to draw,

And what, brothers, I had to escape into sleep from then was the horrible and wrong feeling that it was better to get the hit than give it.

He ceases to be a wrongdoer. He ceases also to be a creature capable of moral choice.’

So I creeched louder, still creeching: ‘Am I just to be like a clock-work orange?’

You made your choice and all this is a consequence of your choice. Whatever now ensues is what you yourself have chosen.’

‘He will be your true Christian,’ Dr Brodsky was creeching out, ‘ready to turn the other cheek, ready to be crucified rather than crucify, sick to the very heart at the thought even of killing a fly.’

Minister of the Inferior or Interior.

as though it had all happened yesterday. Which to them I suppose it had.

I cried for myself boo hoo hoo. Then I got up and began walking.

making me need help and kindness now and forcing me to want to give help and kindness myself, if anybody would take it.

‘You’ve sinned, I suppose, but your punishment has been out of all proportion. They have turned you into something other than a human being.

‘But the essential intention is the real sin. A man who cannot choose ceases to be a man.’

Poor poor boy, you must have had a terrible time. A victim of the modern age, just as she was.

‘All right, all right, eh? What a superb device he can be, this boy. If anything, of course, he could for preference look even iller and more zombyish than he does. Anything for the cause. No doubt we can think of something.’

Power power, everybody like wants power.

Eighteen was not all that young an age, then. But what was I going to do?