Rating: 
Summary: A fantasy response to society's problem with crime
Review: Because I have spent virtually my entire adult life in prison, I'm always interested whenever I hear about a book suggesting a different response to crime. Locking people in cages for decades at a time fails to prepare prisoners for the challenges they will face upon release. Several years ago I heard a fellow prisoner talking about Anthony Burgess's novel, A Clockwork Orange. He said that Burgess wrote about the state 'reprogramming' prisoners in a way that would ensure the offenders would no longer break the law. I decided to read the book if ever I came across it, and was happy to see it last week. Burgess tells his story through the first-person accounting of Alex, his teenage protagonist. Alex is a juvenile delinquent who catches his thrills by hurting people and destroying property. Eventually, one of his robberies turns into a homicide, and Alex finds himself in prison. He becomes part of an experimental project where prison doctors cause Alex to experience severe pain and nausea whenever he witnesses or contemplates the possibility of crime. When Alex's mind is completely reprogrammed, he is considered 'cured' and released from prison as a free man. I found the book somewhat difficult to read because Burgess tells the story in the vernacular of a British teenager. Many words are not Standard English, so it's like reading a book in patois. Fortunately, the volume I had included a glossary in the back that I was able to turn to frequently, and through that translation, I was able to understand the book. Like George Orwell, Burgess uses satire to expose the government's efforts to control all aspects of its citizen's lives. During these Bush/Cheney/Ashcroft/Rumsfeld times, we're seeing more and more of this governmental intrusion. In A Clockwork Orange, the government tinkers with the thought patterns of criminals in order to bring them into compliance. Once the government perfects its methods, those in control may use those methods to program everyone to think and live in accordance with the government machine. Freedom becomes threatened as citizens become numbed into the New World order. Although I'd like to see the criminal justice system reformed in way where individuals could earn their freedom after they achieved some clearly identifiable objectives, the onus should be on the individual, rather than the government, to make the change. This book was not an easy read, but one that the politically cynical might enjoy.
Rating: 
Summary: Clockwork Orange
Review: Clockwork Orange is an unusual, but great book. Some of the language is hard to understand because the characters use slang from England in the 60's. Alex, the main character who narrates the book, is very interesting. He is the leader of a gang of his friends called the Droogs. Alex and the Droogs go on their missions nightly to drink milk laced with drugs, beat people up, steal from people and rape women. Parts of the book are somewhat disturbing, especially when he beats up an old man, but it keeps the reader riveted to the book. Once some one starts the book and figures out all the crimes Alex has committed you almost have to keep reading to see what he does next. This book has a lot of twists and turns and is very unpredictable. Clockwork Orange is a book that is great if you aren't scared to read it.
Rating:
Summary: Frightening...
Review: Burgess writes in 1962 a very disturbing book, taking Alex through the experience living as a youth, committing as a member of a gang, burglaries, rapes, and finally being caught by the police. Alex Suffers more than he believes he should have, his friends as traitors, the government experiments, and the crimes he committed in his previous years. Everytime he sees a break, everytime it backfires on him and takes him to more sickness and suffering.
Burgess gives his idea of how the future could be, he draws an ugly, may be a reastic picture, of how things work in the modern world. The book could be disturbing from time to time, but it keeps you glued to see how the future would unfold itself. You should have the heart to read such a book, it could be that real.
Rating:
Summary: Timeless philosophical novel on free will/good and evil
Review: Right, right, right, Amazon droogs, let me bend your ookos about something for a minoota. This malchick here's got a couple of bolshie slovos to shazat to you all. One of the many books in my biblio is A Clockwork Orange written by that Anthony Burgess veck. It's the story of Little Alex and his droogs who go about shopcrasting, tolchocking other gang members with britvas and nozhes, as well as going on the surprise visit and having a bit of the old in-out, in-out with some hapless devotchka or what not. His tyrannical ways becomes his undoing and his droogs turn on him. He is sent to the Staja (state jail) on a murder charge, but that sentenced is commuted in exchange for taking part in "this new treatment that gets you out of prison in no time at all and makes sure that you never get back in again." But is that better than the traditional eye for an eye, as the prison Governor says? The debate between good and evil is the bolshy theme here as explained in this passage comparing goodness and badness as different shops: "If lewdies are good that's because they like it, and I wouldn't interfere with their pleasures, and so on to the other shop. And I was patronizing the other shop. More, badness is of the self, the one, the you or me on our oddy knockies, and that other self is made by old Bog or God and is his great pride and radosty. But the not-self cannot have the bad, meaning they of the government and the judges and the schools cannot allow the bad because they cannot allow the self. And is not our modern history, my brothers, the story of brave malenky selves fighting these big machines?" The self against the machines. Yes, we saw in the 1960's, my brothers. But the quote also explains that we are all so full of what Christians call original sin, we want to go into that shop of badness, we enjoy seeing scenes of ultraviolence, people being tolchocked. After all, it's easier to destroy rather than create, so it's no surprise despite having a decent pee and em raising him up, that our humble narrator dishes and gets dished the tortures of the damned. Another bolshy theme pops up when the prison charles has a govoreet with Alex, who has just gotten the opportunity to undergo this Ludovico vesch that turns a malchick like himself good. The charles says, "What does God want? Does God want goodness or the choice of goodness? Is a man who chooses the bad perhaps in some way better than a man who has the good imposed upon him?" Or still, "in a sense, in choosing to be deprived of the ability to make an ethical choice, [is to have] in a sense really chosen the good?" The number of chapters also plays a significant role, like it did in Dante's Divine Comedy. This book is divided into three sections, each of 7 chapters each. Seven times three is twenty-one, which is the age at which someone reaches adulthood, and that last chapter was originally taken out of the American release of this book. That's how the film directed by that Stanley Kubrick chelloveck ended. And that's where I too end, oh my brothers, for a bit of spatchka. I finish with a tall glass of the old warm moloko, "before getting my passport stamped...at sleep's frontier.", to spat perchance to sneety, but that's another work altogether
Rating:
Summary: a horrorshow novel
Review: One of the most ingenius and clever novels I have ever read, "A Clockwork Orange" will definitely be read again. Anthony Burgess creates a disturbing, futuristic setting to convey his thoughts on many different ideas of youth, government, and free will. Reading this will definitely make you think. I know there are aspects I have yet to think about embedded within the writing. The novel is saturated with many themes, and is for certain a literary work of art. Definitely read this masterpiece.
Rating:
Summary: a must read
Review: One of the most unforgettable novels I've ever read. Anthony Burgess' predictions of the future (written in 1962) have not come far from the truth. This novel is a disturbing reflection on the basic structure of our society, on our government and on what it means to be good and evil. In a world where science has the power to turn flawed human beings into perfect machines, one must wonder whether it is moral to turn sadistic individuals into a good doing robots for the sake of preventing crime.
Those of you who have seen Kubrick's film, read the novel just for the sake of finding out what the title means!
If you do chose to read this book, make sure to read the European version, which contains the 21st chapter. Personally, I found the chapter to be unnecessary and unfitting to the dark tone of the novel. It seemed like a forced happy ending to a very dark story. It almost contradicts all the statements Burgess makes about the human race throughout the book. Nevertheless, I recommend that you read it anyway so you could make up you own mind.
Rating:
Summary: excellent
Review: I love A Clockwork Orange. I'm so glad i read it. It really isnt like anything ive ever read before. Totally in a class by itself. It is a terrifying book that shows how horrible the world could be. The vulgarity and blatant violence only add to the appeal. The message of independence, choice, and maturity hit hard and make the book one of the best. Shocking at times, for some it may be a little hard to take, but give it a try. The slang used and they way you have to figure it out as you read make you feel an attachment to the book and it feels like your own. read this book!
Rating: 
Summary: A cruel novel
Review: It was really difficult to read for me.
I think the novel told me a wonderful story that could never exist in reality, because all young men were brutal and killed people. It was thrilling. First little Alex was a cruel and crazy young man and he learnt nothing until he was in custody and when he was a victim of his state, he became an adult. This was a wonderful turning of his life at the end.
There were serious moral problems in this book about free will. Should all people have a perfect and well-mannered characters or it's better to live in a world with some villains and criminals of their own making?
Rating:
Summary: A brutal novel
Review: It's really a good book I think. I always wondered what Alex would do next, and I really enjoyed reading about his attempts to come through all his adventures getting as few problems as possible. Burgess imagined some really smart steps with which Alex tried this. On the other hand the book made me think about "friends". How many "friends" in this world are there like Alex's? Or the other way around: what did Alex do that his friends thought they were right to do such things? I mean they betrayed him as they broke into the house of the old lady with the cats. Of course Alex wasn't exactly right playing the leader of the gang without knowing that his friends don't absolutely agree with him. But is this really enough to betray him in such a way? Or is it just the character of his friends to act this way? Still, it made me also think about the way they wanted to cure the criminals. Is this really a reasonable way?
Rating:
Summary: One of the most important books of Century 20!
Review: Forget that stupid, overrated movie! This book is where it all began, and it's just as poignant now as it was when it was first published. When addressing the problems of crime, evil and violence, most people (conservatives and liberals alike), would prefer the "pop-the-pill" remedy of making people conform to the standards of "good". Unfortunately, it's not that easy, and this book proves that. Alex, the murderous droog, is put through a program that will remove the "evil" from him. But as we eventually see, he's worse off without the ability to choose good. Without his free will, he has become "a clockwork orange", because he does good not because he wants to, but because he has to. Simply brilliant! One problem is the "Nadsat" dialect it's written in. Sure, it's ingenious use of language, but it gets old fast. It does not detract from the book, however! But the best thing in here is the fact that Alex, who commits rape, murder, assault, and theft, is a huge fan of classical music, especially Beethoven. That oughta show "in-your-face" to those bozos who think rock and metal cause violence. Read this book: prepare to be shocked. And enlightened!
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