A Clockwork Orange (G K Hall Large Print Perennial Bestseller Collection)

Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: I have a peculiar trait of not reading what i am told to read. When the teacher tells us to read sheakspeare for homework, that is the one thing i dont do. I read quite often, and I DO IT FOR PLEASURE AND ENJOYMENT. This book was one of those books that I would pick up apposed to doing my calc. I enjoyed this book very much, It tickled my mind more than whatever I wasnt reading in school would have, I guarentee it. This book brought to the light issues of free will, governemnt, humanity, and morals, or lack there-of. Kindof funny isnt it. Morals. I read this around election time and morals seem to be the hot topic, especially with the right wingers. People seem to think government can improve peoples morals, what a load. Lets take a look at alex's world. His government is the epitomy of controlling ones feeling and morals, but lo and behold is Alex a nice person? What about his droogies? NO. Even with alex's transformation at the end he is miles from what we would call acceptable today. Let us not forget that the goal of being "moral" is to provide an enviornment where an alex must change, not to change an alex. I think we are forgetting that, and this book is a good reminder. And if you disagree with me then you are wrong.

Rating:
Summary: A Spectacular Book.
Review: Due to the absolutely amazing film by Stanley Kubrick I had to read Anthony Burgess's "A Clockwork Orange" and I wasn't dissapointed.
There is a rarity bewtween these two works as well.The first being that the movie is actually better than the book. The movie is a little more graphic,when the main character Alex pulls the old in-out,in-out on a poor victim there is no details about it and it is left to your imagination. In Kubrick's film nothing could be more farther from the truth.The language Burgess uses in the book is spectacular and the structure of the book is well done as well.
Alex and his band of "droogs" sit at the Korova Milkbar (also something that isn't really mentioned in the book but comes to life in Kubrick's film) plotting what to do with the evening,and eventually end up at a house where they beat and rape a woman
while they forced the husband to watch.Well this goes on for a while before Alex is caught and sent to prison. He's there for two years and he learns about a new form of technology and which they make you "viddy" films which depict violence while they hold
his glazzies open so he is forced to watch.An amazing book,have to read. A+.

Rating:
Summary: Marvelous, Simply Marvelous
Review: This is a striking peak into the future faintly paralleling the worlds that Orwell and Huxley foretold. The narrator and main character, Alex, leads his droogs (friends) to vandalism and anarchical acts. Burgess uses a slang language derivative of Russian that creates a strange futuristic tone. At first, the language made it hard to understand and read, but as one begins to indulge themselves in the story, the language is nearly non-existent. Burgess puts this group of kids against all the best wishes of society and they survive society's grasp. Burgess also uses parallelism of his future with our reality to show what might happen. Strangely enough, and quite ironic, Alex, the leader of a vicious group of street hooligans, finds favoritism in classical music such as Beethoven, Handel, and Bach. This contrast was obviously intentional to show the influence of the past in the near future. It is a great story that I quickly started reading and enjoyed every slash of Alex's britva and every beating of innocent bystanders. To enhance every brutal scene, Burgess uses a mix of dialog and narration. Burgess' use of strong language, a pioneer of his time, helps create an atmosphere of anarchical lunacy. I would highly recommend this book to anybody that can take a good old graphic novel filled with suspense and fun.