Anthony Burgess’s novella Essay

Anthony Burgess’s novella â€Å"A Clockwork Orange†, written in 1962, explores the destruction of the lives of the protagonist’s private worlds and presents a potential nightmarish society. The reader sees the mindless violence preformed by Alex and the Droogs during the scene in which they destroy the writer, F Alexander, and ravage his wife. The lives of the gang seem to create a contradiction as they are trying to create an alternative society with those who he decides are acceptable, it appears to the reader as a dystopian one. A question seems to arise as to whether the protagonists have free will, or whether their actions are pre determined by fate. Alex believes that every one is born evil and therefore capable of wicked things. The evilness in the world is inevitable; he does not view this of his own actions. Burgess’ novella poses the question; is a man who chooses the destruction of others perhaps in some way better than a man who has the traditional ways imposed upon him? This is a dilemma that is never solved in Alex’s private world. Burgess created a character that has to go to the furthest extent to feel free; it seems that he was made evil by the government, perhaps presenting an artist, as he approaches the ultra violence as though it was a piece of art to be admired, the â€Å"malenky cri ches† from the wife with the beating of â€Å"Dim’s fisty work† seem like music to Alex, Emphasised by the â€Å"dancing around† Dim did at the same time. This scene can be eluded with the real life experience of the author’s wife’s brutal attack, where she was beaten and raped in the early 1940†². Burgess states -â€Å"it was certainly no pleasure to write†. Burgess uses the experience of his wife to the destruction of the protagonist, â€Å"While I ripped away at this and that. † shows the violence. Even if it was in simple words, make the act itself seem like a simple one to Alex. The act of rape itself is a primitive, atavistic act, a nightmarish vision celebrated by Alex and the Droogs and it is more like an animal act as they were â€Å"roaring like some animal† before it began While the book itself is a prophetic tale where bands of adolescent hooligans roam, and rule over the towns at night. Although this is ironic due to the violent nature of the protagonists and it shows Alex as an atavistic There seems to neither be aspects of the bystander effect especially in this scene, as the violence is known but the government does not get in the way to prevent from happening. Alex has a robotic quality, like the title he is also â€Å"clockwork,† linking to the â€Å"malenky toys. † toys usually being for children, showing Alex’s young age of 15 when he describes the crime in this passage. We can say Alex exercises his free will here. He choose to some extent evil, and is then robbed of his free will when sent to prison and used as an experiment, thus making him nothing more then a shell of who he was. It’s not free will as the drugs enhance their experience showing it as bought on by drugs within the milk instead of his decisions although we can see he would want to commit the violence anyway although it makes it difficult to view his actions as free. He does think he is choosing to be free by not conforming to the government and doing what he wants as he tries to rebel against this society. This is viewed as more of a rebellion to free him as is felt to be based on Russia’s political state which had a communist government and this scared most western countries giving the novel poor reviews when it was originally published and it became banned from many countries. The title originated from an English pub, from the phrase â€Å"As queer as clockwork orange† presenting something as natural, organic on the outside nevertheless working as a mechanical object. Indicating the twisted actions performed by Alex. Also through the Russian political movement at the time, it is present as nihilistic as Russia sought to bring a new society by destroying the old one through terrorism and assassination. â€Å"Oh Brother† is repeated, Alex acknowledges the reader, this cohesive device links Alex’s destruction he even shows this through the passage, making it more emotive to the reader with â€Å"and I began to feel like in distress, o my brothers†, To show us his discomfort, here is a dystopian theme of humiliation which also features when he is in prison he is the figure of everyman, there are many more like him in this society and this is where they will end up sooner or later. Burgess intentionally put 21 chapters as a subtle nod that this was the age of adulthood as he looks back on his life, reflecting on what he wants his child to then be like. The violence seems to be part of a dystopian fantasy and is mirrored to the violence of the sixties, the â€Å"Mods and Rockers† giving the book relations not only to the Russian revolution but to English problems around the time. He also writes the book in such a way that he adds words that have no relation to the English language called Nadsat which is a mixture of cockney English and Russian. This in effect provides us the choice as to whether or not we wish to engage and understand the violence actions as the words make it seem less violence. In this nightmarish vision the protagonist has lost something, due to monstrous force, additionally in the sacrifice of Alex later in the book where the government use him in the experiment for a new treatment, Or when F Alexander uses him as a guinea pig for his own exploits to hold against the government, and having the feeling of displacement as they can not overcome why this is happening in their place of safety, and in ruining the home. It also suggests there is a lack of justice, Alex views his way of living as Utopian â€Å"dream† from the effects of Milk Plus and â€Å"Cancers†. Emphasising how Burgess uses the word â€Å"Cancers† instead of cigarettes to emphasize the negative connotation of the word, implying that it always brings death in the end, also it makes Alex seems uncaring that he can use the word so often, not caring about what is actually means. A society itself is meant to change over time but as this is a dystopian one it has no progression. Burgess didn’t like the idea that society could become mindlessly totalitarianism where the â€Å"laws and conditions appropriate to the mechanical creation† and the mechanical creation being the â€Å"Clockwork Orange. † He expresses that one of the main themes in the book is the danger of a totalitarianism society in the belief that Alex and the Droogs are trying to create a new society through destruction. In conclusion, the rules of the government dehumanise Alex, and others of his age to the extremes they go to so they can feel free. In this extent they deliberately dehumanise others. The passage presents this horror with a scene in which there is a death but no justice making the dystopian theme for a place lacking justice ring true. Burgess set out in this iconic novella to express a system of social disarray through the eyes of a protagonist, immersed in a world of double standards and duality.