Imagine existing in a world run by sadistic and insane street gangs who reek havoc on innocent civilians, and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it. Anthony Burgess created this world through his novel, A Clockwork Orange. Anthony Burgess was born in 1917 and died in 1963. A lot of social changes occurred during this period of time, such as: the roaring twenties, prohibition, the Great Depression, World War II, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and many more. Burgess not only lived through those changes, but also helped influences some social changes in literature and music. Anthony Burgess was a jack-of-all-trades throughout his 76-year-old life. He was a novelist, composer, children’s book writer, play writer, essayist, critic, and poet. Burgess is most famously known for his controversial novel, A Clockwork Orange. Anthony Burgess pushed the boundaries of what the “norm” was throughout his lifetime.
John Anthony Burgess was born on February 25, 1917, in Manchester, England. He was born to Catholic parents (mom died early). Anthony’s mother died when he was only two years old from an illness, so he was brought up and raised by his aunt. A few years later when his father remarried, his stepmother primarily raised Burgess. Anthony’s father was not around much and frankly didn’t care much for Anthony. Burgess’s upbringing was rough and somewhat traumatizing, which reflect in some of his works, including the novel, A Clockwork Orange. Burgess married at a young age and had only one child, Paolo Andrea Burgess. In a review article about Anthony Burges, Thomas Horan said, “As Burgess acknowledged, he was a neglectful parent, too preoccupied with his writing and composing to take much notice of the high-spirited urchin who often r...
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...d a lot of things throughout his 76-year-old life, but he is most famously known for his controversial novel, A Clockwork Orange.
Works Cited
Burrow, Colin. "Not Quite Nasty." London Review of Books. LRB Ltd (1997-2004), Nov. 2005. Web. 1 Jan. 2014.
Covert, Colin. "Anthony Burgess." Hutchinson's Biography Datbase 2011: 1. Ebscohost.com. Web. 8 Jan. 2014.
Criticism, Contemporary Literary, and Carolyn Riley. Contemporary Literary Criticism. Detroit: Gale Research, 1973. Print.
Horan, Thomas. "A Clockwork Counterpoint: The Music and Literature of Anthony Burgess." Academic Search Premier. Studies in the Novel, Apr. 2011. Web. 8 Jan. 2014. .
Liukkonen, Petri. "Anthony Burgess." Anthony Burgess. Ari Pesonen, 2008. Web. 22 Jan. 2014.
"Movie Spotlight: "A Clockwork Orange"" Review. Newspaper Source Plus (2013): 1-2. Ebscohost.com. Web. 8 Jan. 2014.
There are many books that have been banned or challenged, but the one that is being presented in this paper is Anthony Burgess’ A Clockwork Orange. The topic of this paper is to inform you of many things and when you have finished it will have you leaving asking yourself one question. First, a summary of A Clockwork Orange will be shared with you, so that you can have an insight as to how the rest of the paper relates to the book. Second, you will find out where, why and when the book was banned and/or challenged and you will discover what the book contains that would “offend” people. Finally, you will discover the literary merit of this book, which means you will discover if is a work of quality.
Greenblatt, Stephen, and M. H. Abrams. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 9th ed. Vol. A. New York: W.W. Norton, 2012. Print
At the start of A Clockwork Orange, you are introduced to Alex and his droogs. They are at a milkbar drinking milk-plus. Milk, plus types of drugs that enhance Alex and his droogs ultraviolence, which is the main backdrop to the story that leads to other psychological events. Drug addiction is a complex disorder that is compulsive and often uncontrollable. This is a chronic relapsing disorder, and treatment for drug addiction is about as effective as treatments for chronic medical conditions.
Stillinger, Jack, Deidre Lynch, Stephen Greenblatt, and M H. Abrams. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: Volume D. New York, N.Y: W.W. Norton & Co, 2006. Print.
Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange describes a horrific world in an apathetic society has allowed its youth to run wild. The novel describes the senseless violence perpetrated by teens, who rape women and terrorize the elderly. The second part of the novel describes how the protagonist, Alex, is "cured" by being drugged and then forced to watch movies of atrocities. The novel warns against both senseless violence and senseless goodness - of the danger of not being allowed to choose between good and evil.
Anthony Burgess integrates many social issues today between the Government and People into Clockwork Orange. Many of the issues that Alex faces along with the government are relatable in today’s society. Within the story Anthony Burgess teaches us how people act and how the government works in a more brutal way, The Clockwork Orange expresses this through free-will, maturity and karma, and treatment of people.
A Clockwork Orange, written by Anthony Burgess, is experienced differently as a novel than it is as the movie directed by Stanley Kubrick. The heart of the difference between the two forms is expressed by Bakhtin: "The potential for [‘double-voiced discourse’ between the author and narrator] is one of the most fundamental privileges of novelistic prose, a privilege available neither to dramatic nor to purely poetic genres" (Bakhtin, 320).1 An entire dimension of the novel’s story is lost in the movie when Alex’s role is reduced from narrator to commentator. The ability of Burgess to speak indirectly to the audience through Alex is removed, and the perspective on the Clockwork world revealed through Nadsat, the language Alex speaks, is lost. However, this does not mean that the movie is less effective than, or an inferior medium to the novel. The main drive of the story remains in the movie form: Kubrick utilizes the means, such as a musical score and the visual dimension, unique to the dramatic genre to find ways around the loss of Nadsat and first person narration. He also tries to maintain the twisted sense of humor found in the book while working to promote the audience’s understanding of Alex’s universe. Kubrick preserves the unusual opportunity A Clockwork Orange offers the audience—a chance to immerse itself in Alex’s character and actions, and have its "nastier propensities titillated" (Burgess ix)2 by Alex’s "ultra-violence", instead of being frightened away.
A Clockwork Orange’s twenty-first chapter is an important symbolic representation; however, it was not published in the American edition. Although, the twenty-first chapter was available in the British and international versions. The original version
conscious and subconscious mind. In a novel, the emotions of an author are manifested as a story of a protagonist and his world. The protagonist is created as the author’s persona, and the setting of the story parallels events from the author’s past. In Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, the protagonist Alex DeLarge is a direct projection of Burgess’s psyche. Analysis of Burgess’s childhood confirms the psychoanalytic theory that Alex and his fictional experiences within A Clockwork Orange are the result of thoughts, fears, and desires that were suppressed by Burgess’s conscious mind throughout his life. Just as Burgess did, Alex struggles with developing and maintaining healthy relations, the choice between what is “right” and what is “wrong”, and the challenge of growing up.
Aside from the strange language that is found on the pages of this novel, one of the most obvious modernistic features is Burgess's ability to shock. There are many different scenes that are quite disturbing and violent. Alex's propensity to rape young girls (ten years old), and his absolute joy in the sight of blood and pain. ' ...while I ripped away at this and that and the other...and real good horrorshow [good] groodies [breasts] they were that then exhibited their pink glazzies [eyes], O my brothers, while I untrussed [undresses] and got ready for the plunge. Plunging I could slooshy [hear] the cries of agony' ( Burgess 23). This ties in with the fact that, as readers, we tend to follow the actions of Alex and his droogs and it is easy to get caught up in all this violent action and loose sight of the real meaning of Burgess's novel. Burgess writes this novel from and to the "ID". Alex and his droogs embody all animal or primal instincts and the tale that has been set before the reader has little respect for realism. We are presented with a world in which the teenagers rule the nights, keeping all real people in their houses. A world where there are milk bars (moloko kordova) in which fifteen year olds can be served with milk that was laden with drugs.
Banned for social reasons in many conditions and in many school systems, Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange first seems to pierce the mind with its bizarre linguistic orgy of debauchery, brutality, and sex, and for some, refuses to affect them above the level of pure voyeurism and bloodlust (either for reveling in it or despising it). Sadism seems to twist the male protagonist; his mind becomes alive with brutal fantasies whilst listening to seemingly innocuous classical music ( “There were vecks and ptitsas, both young and starry, lying on the ground screaming for mercy, and I was smecking all over my rot and grinding my boot in their litsos.”). Many arguments have been made about the censorship of this novella which “glorifies sex and violence;” however, these elements are clearly manipulated for plot development and character development, and ultimately, the story does pose a moral lesson.
John Anthony Burgess was born February 25, 1917, to Joseph and Elizabeth Wilson in Manchester, England (“Anthony Burgess’s Biography” 1). In 1918, his sister and his mother dies. As a result, he was sent to be raised by his maternal aunt, which led to a strained father-son relationship. Burgess was raised a faithful Catholic and influences of this can be seen in his later works. In addition, he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in English language and literature from Victoria University of Manchester (“Anthony Burgess’s Biography” 3).
The behavioral scientists at the prison, including Dr. Brodsky and Dr. Branom, emphasize the significance of free will on humanity in A Clockwork Orange. The protagonist, Alex, is characterized by his violent tendencies. After they subject
Abrams, M.H., ed. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 6th ed. Vol. 2. New York: Norton, 1993.
Existentialism as a mid-20th century philosophical trend introduced the idea of an absolutely free individual into the scheme of modern and postmodern individualism. A Clockwork Orange is a novel that raises a wide range of ethical questions from the definition of free choice and goodness to methods of punishment. Existentialism in the form presented by Jean-Paul Sartre and the German phenomenologists does not provide an ethical nor a psychological perspective to the novel. Applying 'existentialist thought' to Anthony Burgess' work will, however, give understanding of the narrator Alex as a case of a free individual who attempts to construct his world and relate to it authentically. Hence the main issue to be examined is the necessity of self-definition and the extent of its discouragement in Alex's social environment.