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A Clockwork Orange |
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A Clockwork Orange is a dystopian 1962 novel by the Mancunian writer Anthony Burgess, adapted as a film by Stanley Kubrick in 1971. It is widely regarded as a successor to earlier great British dystopian novels such as Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World.
Burgess wrote that the title came from an old Cockney expression "As queer [i.e. strange] as a clockwork orange", but that he had found that other people read new meanings into it¹. For instance, some believed that the title referred to a mechanically responsive (clockwork) non-human (orang, Malay for "person"). Burgess wrote in his later introduction, "A Clockwork Orange Reed", that a creature who can only perform good or evil is "a clockwork orange—meaning that he has the appearance of an organism lovely with colour and juice but is in fact only a clockwork toy to be wound up by God or the Devil." Rumour had it that Burgess had intended to name the work "A Clockwork Orang" and was hypercorrected to the form we know. In his essay "Clockwork oranges"² he says that "this title would be appropriate for a story about the application of Pavlovian, or mechanical, laws to an organism which, like a fruit, was capable of colour and sweetness". This title alludes to the protagonist's negatively conditioned responses to feelings of evil which prevent the exercise of his free will.
The book was inspired by an event in 1944, when Burgess' pregnant wife Lynn was robbed and beaten by four U.S. GI deserters in a London street, and suffered a miscarriage and chronic gynaecological problems.
Synopsis
Set a few years in the future, the book follows the career of fifteen year old Alex. His main pleasures in life are classical music, sex of all kinds, and random acts of extreme violence ("ultraviolence" in Alex's idiom). He tells his story in a teenage slang called "Nadsat", which mixes Russian with English slang.
Eventually Alex is caught and "rehabilitated" by a program of aversion therapy, which, though rendering him incapable of violence (even in self-defence), also makes him unable to enjoy his favourite classical music as an unintended side effect.
The moral question of the book is that Alex is now "good", but his ability to choose this has been taken away from him; his "goodness" is as artificial as the clockwork orange of the title.
Eventually Alex falls foul of some of his former victims, and the political fuss that ensues results in the state removing his conditioning; he gleefully returns to his early habits but finds he has lost the taste for it. The 20th chapter ends the original American edition on a dark note, with Alex listening joyfully to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and eagerly anticipating his return to creating havoc.
At this point some editions of the book end, but there is a 21st chapter which was dropped at the time of US publication. Burgess claims that the original American publisher dropped his final chapter in an effort to make the book more depressing. The intended book was divided into three parts of 7 chapters each, which added up to be 21, a symbolic age at which a child earns his rights (when the novel was written). There is controversy as to whether the 21st chapter makes the book better or makes the book worse. In the 21st chapter, which takes place a few years after the 20th, we find Alex realising that his violent phase is over, but that it was inevitable. A few of the old characters are reincarnated as new friends of Alex. He thinks of starting a family, while thinking that his children will be as violent as he was, for a time.
The line "What's it going to be then, eh?" recurs throughout the book, and the first chapter of each of the three parts begins with the line.
The Film
The book was adapted into a film by Stanley Kubrick in 1971, starring Malcolm McDowell as Alex and featuring a soundtrack by Wendy Carlos. It would appear, from one of Burgess' later novels, The Clockwork Testament, that Burgess himself may not have been too pleased by the adaptation that made it to the screen.
Rated X on its original release in the United States, the film was nonetheless nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture (it lost to The French Connection) and reinvigorated sales for recordings of Beethoven's ninth symphony. Later, a censored R-rated version was also released in the US; both the original X-rated and the later R-rated version are today available on VHS and DVD. Notably, the MPAA has since reclassified the X-rated version of the film to R. The film was rated C (for "condemned") by the United States Catholic Conference's Office for Film and Broadcasting because of its explicit sexual and violent content (such a rating conceptually forbade Catholics from seeing the film so rated; the "condemned" rating was abolished in 1982, and since then films deemed by the conference to have unacceptable levels of sex and/or violence have been rated O, meaning "morally offensive").
In Britain the sexual violence in the film was considered extreme at the time, with the press blaming the influence of the film for an attack on a homeless person. It was widely believed that Kubrick's annoyance at this response led to him withdrawing the film from distribution in the United Kingdom. However, in a television documentary made after Kubrick's death, his widow Christiane confirmed rumours that Kubrick had withdrawn A Clockwork Orange from UK distribution on police advice after threats were made against Kubrick and his family. (The source of the threats was not discussed.) That Warner Bros. acceded to Kubrick's request to withdraw the film is an indication of the remarkable relationship Kubrick had with the studio, particularly the executive Terry Semel. Whatever the reason for the film's withdrawal, it could not easily be seen in Britain for some 27 years, until after Kubrick's death.
In 2004 the magazine Total Film named A Clockwork Orange the eleventh greatest British film of all time.
Cast
Malcolm McDowell .... Alexander 'Alex' de Large
Patrick Magee .... Mr. Alexander
Michael Bates .... Chief guard
Warren Clarke .... Dim
John Clive .... Stage actor
Adrienne Corri .... Mrs. Alexander
Carl Duering .... Dr. Brodsky
Paul Farrell .... Tramp
Clive Francis .... Lodger
Michael Gover .... Prison governor
Miriam Karlin .... Catlady (Miss Weathers)
James Marcus .... Georgie
Aubrey Morris .... Mr. P. R. Deltoid
Godfrey Quigley .... Prison chaplain
Sheila Raynor .... Mum
Crew
Stanley Kubrick ... Director and Screenplay Writer
Anthony Burgess ... Writer (novel)
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