Is there some kind of name for the bizarre speech patterns and slang that Alex keeps using in that movie? Anyone who’s seen it will know what I mean. A lot of it sounds Russian. What gives?
Nadsat. It was created for the book. You’re right that it draws heavily on Russian (‘nadsat’ itself meaing ‘teenage’), but parts of it were pure fabrication, and parts were vaguely lifted from common speech at the time.
Some editions of the book have (IMO rightly) not included any explanation of the dialect. As with the film. I prefer this approach, presenting the alienating language as something to be grappled with, the gradual understanding we gain being both an achievement, and also an unpleasant integration with people we have no desire to acknowledge.
A lot of it was Russian - “a real horror show” was used, I believe, to describe something the speaker liked or enjoyed. “Horror show” sounds identical to the Russian term for OK, all right, good. I think the idea was to show how alienated and segmented society had become - people were in their own separate worlds, and did not care about or even try to understand each other.
A Nadsat dictionary. With etymologies and things.
The Russian word that became “horrorshow” is khorosho.