A Clockwork Orange

[HalberMensch242]

Ok..this has been bothering for quite some time. Why does Anthony Burgess use that russian-like slang in the book? Is it to add to the cryptic atmosphere..or is there something more to it?..i gots to know the dope on this!

[Kilgore Trout]

the slang is called nadsat.

from the foreward to the 1996 penguin version:

"...in a novel which takes brainwashing as its subject, he intended his own form of brainwashing, which was to force readers to use a Russian dictionary. Though reading the novel requires some puzzle-solving, the meaning of a nadsat word is often clear from the context...
...Burgess chose his 200 or so words of nadsat because they work in English, whether as poetry, or humour (what could be more comical than policemen being millicents?), or plausible slang. Being a devotee of Finnegan's Wake, he believed the more layers of ambiguity, the better."

-Blake Morrison

[Kilgore Trout]

and do you think you'd enjoy the book as much without it?

[HalberMensch242]

Guess it didn't have the same effect on me..for i already knew russian..curse this Slavic heritage!

[Kilgore Trout]

i imagine the fact that you knew russian would allow you to enjoy nadsat in a completely different way.

i figured out the words from their context, but that didn't allow me to see the reason or the humour behind the choice of that word. you would get to.

[Johanna]

My favourite is definitely horrorshow.

(Russian khorosho, 'good').

Bowie must have dug Burgess too. In "Suffragette City" he sang: "Droogie don't crash here."

[Max Torque]

There's a big ol' list of the slang words, their meanings, and their origins here (http://home.earthlink.net/~snowboards/aco/nadsat.html).

[Kilgore Trout]

also from the introduction:

"The old American edition of A Clockwork Orange carried a glossary of nadsat words. Burgess did not approve of this."

[ElvisL1ves]

Originally posted by Kilgore Trout
the slang is called nadsat.


"Nadsat" is Russian for "-teen" - it was used only by teens in the book.

Burgess never explained why he did it, but it sounded cool.

"I'm singing in the rain (thwap), just singing in the rain (smack) ..."

[Lance Turbo]

Originally posted by ElvisL1ves
Burgess never explained why he did it, but it sounded cool.

He didn't need too. It's all explained in the story. I wish I had a copy of the book handy so I could give you quotes, but I guess I'll have to do this from memory.

The book is set in a future where the cold war is in overdrive. Late in the book someone asks the doctor why the kids use nadsat. He says, it is mostly due to subliminal (seepage, interference, or something that I can't quite remember.) It's right there in the story, the Russians are using something that affects the brains of the teens in the free world.

The four teens are in a way a model of the Soviet Union. Four guys, speaking Russian, with Russian names, go around stealing from the middle class and redistributing the wealth to the poor. Later the main character choose freewill and capitalism over violence and communism. Burgess really went out on a limb making this statement. Hooray for free will, a daring choice for the theme of a book.

[Road Rash]

Originally posted by Lance Turbo
Originally posted by ElvisL1ves
Burgess never explained why he did it, but it sounded cool.

He didn't need too. It's all explained in the story. I wish I had a copy of the book handy so I could give you quotes, but I guess I'll have to do this from memory.

The book is set in a future where the cold war is in overdrive. Late in the book someone asks the doctor why the kids use nadsat. He says, it is mostly due to subliminal (seepage, interference, or something that I can't quite remember.) It's right there in the story, the Russians are using something that affects the brains of the teens in the free world.

The four teens are in a way a model of the Soviet Union. Four guys, speaking Russian, with Russian names, go around stealing from the middle class and redistributing the wealth to the poor. Later the main character choose freewill and capitalism over violence and communism. Burgess really went out on a limb making this statement. Hooray for free will, a daring choice for the theme of a book.

Read the book some time ago. Interesting concept, but I remember it as four teens being more interested in rape and violence rather than aquiring stuff, much less redistribution of goods.

[Road Rash]

The moral aspect appeared to be in the justification of brainwashing the one kid into being sickened by violence, and the politcal manuevering involved. Remember the house they broke into which they raped and killed the lady, and crippled her husband? The man was somehow involved in an opposition political movement that was using that brainwashed kid for their own benefit. That man's political peers tried to supress him, but he locked the kid in a room and blasted Beethoven until the kid tried to kill himself. The kid survived, and was well again.

There is a message there. But not redistribution of wealth.

[HalberMensch242]

"Four guys, speaking Russian, with Russian names"

How are Alex, George and Dim russian names..alex could be on, but george..and dim..me thinks not. This book in now way took on the political ascpect of communism, it was basically written to portray the dangers and hypocracies of "brainwashing". Ok, for the guys who read the book, what did you think of the "newly" added new chapter. I personally thought it closed out the story quite nicely without seeming to "corny".

[Lance Turbo]

Dim is short for Dimitri.

When they robbed people, they were always middles class people, then they took what they stole to where the poor people hung out, and bought them drinks and snacks and whatnot. That's redistribution of wealth.

And I think the phrase I was trying to remember earlier is "subliminal penetration".

The book was written at the height of the cold war and contains many capitalist v. communist themes.

[Cartooniverse]

Oye. Mr Burgess is in fact IN his own story. The "Writer" assaulted early on? The one whose wife is raped and subsequently dies, is in fact Burgess. I read an OLD copy of it, since I bought my copy, replete with bright orange cover- around 1975.

There is indeed a glossary of words in it. I fail to see the strong Soviet/Cold War analogy, but then I was born in 1962 and therefore do not see what others may insofar as that subtext goes.

Small hijack: In Stanley Kubrick's film of "A Clockwork Orange", the actor who played "Julian", the houseboy of the Writer (post assault, of course) is David Prowse. Discovered working as a doorman, he was a bodybuilder even then....and went on to be the man in the Darth Vader Suit in all three "Star Wars" films. Additionally, one cannot purchase a copy of "A Clockwork Orange" in England. Subsequent to it's release, there were copycat crimes of violence, and Kubrick was sufficiently horrifed at his role in said crimes, that he barred it's showing. ( His company owns domestic distribution rights to it, Warner Brothers owns the rest of the world rights as will do as it pleases in that regard ).

Cartooniverse

[HalberMensch242]

Ok, i see your point Lance,as all great books there ae many interpritations, so there really isn't a point in arguing them. So..hopefuly..my message is as "clear as unmudded lake , clear as the azure deep blue sky of a early summer day"..hehe

[mipsman]

Anthony Burgess was (I think he is dead now) one hell of a linguist. If I recall correctly, he wrote 4(?) distinct, consistent "languages" for the movie "Quest for Fire".

[Rysdad]

Think I'll cruise down to the old Korova Milk Bar for a malenky bit of the spiky Moloko Plus.

It musn't have been banned until after 1973, because that's when I saw it in London.

BTW, here's a link to some Clockwork Orange stuff:

http://www.kubrick-web.co.uk/clockwork.htm

[Chas.E]

Many years ago when the book was in its first release, I had the pleasure of attending a lecture on the topic of A Clockwork Orange, presented by Anthony Burgess in person, at the Iowa Writer's Workshop. This question was a central topic, and he answered it directly, and at length. And alas, since it has surely been 20 years since that lecture, I cannot remember a damn thing he said. So the best I can say is, I once knew the definitive answer to your question, but I forgot it.

[HalberMensch242]

Well..damn it all to hell then..

[Phobos]

Originally posted by Chas.E
Many years ago when the book was in its first release, I had the pleasure of attending a lecture on the topic of A Clockwork Orange, presented by Anthony Burgess in person, at the Iowa Writer's Workshop. This question was a central topic, and he answered it directly, and at length. And alas, since it has surely been 20 years since that lecture, I cannot remember a damn thing he said. So the best I can say is, I once knew the definitive answer to your question, but I forgot it.

I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry.

[pluto]

I agree that there are many interpretations of a book as complex as A Clockwork Orange, but I think the "dangers and hypocrisies of brainwashing" interpretation needs a little elaboration. IMHO, this is one of the central themes of the book but it is more subtle than simply a condemnation of brainwashing.

As noted, Alex is brainwashed and is no longer capable of deciding for himself about right and wrong. Alex is, of course, the "clockwork orange" -- the thing that seems, externally, to be organic, natural, but when you open it up it turns out to be full of gears and mechanisms. It is morally wrong to turn a human being into a machine. The subtlety enters in when you realize that the society in which Alex grew up exerted a very different but just as pervasive type of brainwashing on him. Raised as he was, he really had no choice but to embark on the life of crime which is so gruesomely illustrated in the first part of the book. So after "recovering" from his brainwashing, everyone is relieved at his return to his "natural" state, but, ironically, he is no less a clockwork orange than he was while under the influence of the more formal brainwashing. It is doubly ironic that forcing him to do good is so roundly condemned while forcing him to do evil is regarded as correct and natural.

Finally, I thought that one additional reason for using the peculiar slang was to take off some of the edge of what is, by design, a very violent book. A slang description of a mugging or a violent robbery and rape is less immediately troubling than a straightforward telling. Mr. Burgess was taking the edge off a little bit by making it "other-worldly", but still including the violence, which, though important, is slightly peripheral to his point.

[CalMeacham]

A curious detail I was not aware of until recently -- the American edition of "A Clockwork Orange" until recently lacked the last chapter (!) So my copy (from circa 1962 -- it has the glossary in the back) is incomplete, and I have never read the whole thing. Apparently the last chapter was first published in this country in The Rolling Stone. Now every edition has the full text.

[Hello Again]

yep, according to what I read the american publishers thought that the US audience wouldn't like the "soft" ending of the errant 21st chapter. (since Americans are a hard-bitten cynical lot, apparently). For those who haven't read it, Alex grows tired of the old ultra-violence of his own accord, and backs away from his hooligan friends, and starts thinking about starting a family.

Needless to say, the movie is based on the American edition.

[HalberMensch242]

He sees his hooligan friends take on a more civil lifestyle, thusly he questions his behavior and goes on to adopt a "normal" life.

[Marvel]

"Many years ago when the book was in its first release, I had the pleasure of attending a lecture on the topic of A Clockwork Orange, presented by Anthony Burgess in person, at the Iowa Writer's Workshop. This question was a central topic, and he answered it directly, and at length. And alas, since it has surely been 20 years since that lecture, I cannot remember a damn thing he said. So the best I can say is, I once knew the definitive answer to your question, but I forgot it."

Someone MUST have taken notes and/or taped the lecture! Was this workshop held at a university? Try getting a hold of that site's address from your local library (the reference librarian should be able to dig up something) and writing to someone about an article or a video tape copy of the event. I'd be shocked if there were no reporters or video recorders there.

Patty

[Lance Turbo]

The book illustrates the point that freewill can not be forced on people. The last chapter shows that freewill is the natural state of humanity and people will eventually come around if you let them. This is Burgess's prediction for the outcome of the cold war. Totalitarian communism can be forced on people. Freewill can't. However, eventually totalitarian communism will burn itself out, leaving freewill and capitalism behind.

[Kilgore Trout]

Needless to say, the movie is based on the American edition.

this is one of the reasons that burgess is not a fan of kubrick's creation.

he kinda missed the point.

[Derleth]

Orange is a play on the Indonesian word orang, meaning man (as in orang hutan, old man of the forest). Clockwork Orang-Clockwork Man. Just another in-joke Burgess played right under our noses.

[GKittridge]

Originally posted by Derleth
Orange is a play on the Indonesian word orang, meaning man (as in orang hutan, old man of the forest). Clockwork Orang-Clockwork Man. Just another in-joke Burgess played right under our noses.

I've heard the title comes from a Cockney expression, something along the lines of "queer as a clockwork orange."

I'm sure it's explained in the book. It's the name of the book the Writer is working on, and I think he explains it when the forcibly-reformed Alex meets up with him. I'd look it up, but I'm not sure where my copy of the book is anymore.

[sqweels]

My interpretation of the Russian slang: If the Cold War is still raging, the teens are expressing their rebelliousness by embracing the very culture the straights are fighting against. Perhaps this echoes 60's fears that the youth culture was being subverted by the Soviets.

[jb_farley]

re: the last chapter

the book is a tryptich (sp?), divvied up in groups of seven. with the last chapter misssing, the concept of growth in the book was severely shortchanged.