Clockwork Orange There have been many books published solely on philosophy, and many more than that solely written about human nature, but very infrequently will a book be published that weaves these fields together as well as A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess. In this Book Burgess speculated on the fact “the significance of maturing by choice is to gain moral values and freedoms.” He achieved this task by pushing his angsty teenaged character, Alex, through situations that challenge the moral values of himself and his friends. In the novel, A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess, Alex himself, must choose good over evil in order to gain moral values which will allow him to mature into a “man” in the latter of his two transformations. Anthony Burgess was born in Manchester, England on February 25, 1917. When he was a child of one-year-old his mother and sister passed away due to the influenza epidemic. He continued living with his father who soon was remarried to the owner of a pub. Anthony’s father played piano at the pub and Anthony began composing his own music at the early age of fourteen In 1940 Burgess joined the army and was put in the medical corps. Two years later he married Llewela Isherwood Jones. Burgess, soon after his marriage, left the army, started writing and teaching English. In 1968 Llewela died and Burgess was remarried to Lilina Macellari. They left England in 1968 and Werner 2 settled in Monaco, where Burgess remained a prolific writer through 1980. Burgess’ writing career was at its peak while Llewela was in the hospital. Durring this emotional time he was able to write such books as A Clockwork O... ... middle of paper ... ...erson of increasingly reputable morals. Now Alex wants to break away from the group and adopts more the philosophy that “Madness is rare in individuals—but in groups, parties, nations, and ages it is the rule” (Neitzsche 90). In conclusion it is seen that Alex has effectively changed into a man and has become a morally sensitive individual. He, for himself has chosen good Werner 7 over evil and needed no treatment to help him do so. It is realized that in being unable to choose, one is not at liberty, and free will is taken away. Also if one has no say whether good or evil is chosen, it is of no importance because such a decision could be made by a machine. Alex was able to make two evolutions. He evolved from a machine into a human, and the evolved from a human choosing evil, to a human choosing good.
Mary Shelley wrote the classic story, Frankenstein, in 1818. Throughout the novel Frankenstein, there were numerous elements that could be categorized as Gothic Romanticism. Elements that really stand out this particular novel are the appreciation of nature, the appreciation of the supernatural, and the amount of madness that is seen in the story.
I think that A Clockwork Orange is a book worth reading because it is relatable, makes you think, and is interesting. The author, Anthony Burgess, was born February 25, 1917. At the young age of two his mother passed away. He was brought up by his aunt and later his stepmother. Even with such an unstable childhood Burgess continued on to enroll in college and major in English. He had a passion for music, which he expressed in the main character of A Clockwork Orange. Burgess wrote several accomplished symphonies in his day, as well as over fifty books. He was diagnoses with a brain tumor at about age 40 but well outlived his doctor’s expectations continuing his artistic output until his death from lung cancer at age 76.
If all of these events did not happen, Alex would still be a static character. Through all of his courage, he found what he was looking for. He dug deep and went to the extremes that were not normal of himself. All of his work lead to his dynamic
All Alex knew was to be violent due to the failure and lack of family structure, the school system and the law. The lack of these assertive institutions Alex couldn’t properly generate proper moral values and social norms. According to Mead he analyzed that a child gets some sort of understanding of how to act properly by how others act toward the child. Later on in the child’s development he/she learns and understands “the generalized other”, values and cultural rules (textbook). Alex was never pressured into going to school, there is one scene where his mother wakes him and tells him to get ready for school and Alex tells her “he doesn’t feel like going today” and that was the end of it. With Alex missing out on school he never really self-aware and knowledgeable. His family is absent also. Again with Alex telling his mother he doesn’t feel like going to school and his mother just lets it go shows the carelessness of his parents. Alex can pretty much do whatever he wants when he wants. With their lack of parenting he never truly gained proper values and morals and instead he created his own by the morals and values his “droogs” know. He had many run in’s with the police even before he was
Yet, Alex is the one that would panic if he acted upon the truth of his life. He becomes so obsessed with protecting what he believes to be his mother’s ideology that he becomes part of the system he has created: in living a certain way, his consciousness has come to believe it as well. He knows that without his input and work, the system he has created will fall apart. Yet instead of letting it fall apart once it becomes too difficult, he comes up with more and more creative lies to keep it in place. His mind’s inability to let go of something that everyone else is telling him is pointless, and is pointless once his mother knows the truth, shows Alex’s inability to realize that his ideology that he has formed is his alone, and that he is a subject of it just as much as his mother is.
Everyone tells Alex that she is something that she is not. Alex is just like any normal teenager. She fights with her parents and has a hard time in school. But things are a little different for her, or him? In the beginning of the book Alex enrolls herself into a new school without her parents knowledge. We then follow her quest to obtain a birth certificate, and be accepted by her parents who continue to call Alex ‘he’. We learn why she left her old school and we see new obstacles come through at her new one. Both at school and at home Alex has a hard time just being her. We see through Alex’s point of view, but once in a while the other Alex comes through, the boy Alex. She is desperate to rid herself of him, and does everything in her power
To begin, Alex is one out of the four characters that reveals self-awareness broadly. Alex begins by stating, “What’s it going to be then, eh” (Burgess 1). The use of this quote explains to the reader that Alex is not only self-aware of himself, but he is careless, and he is an outlaw. Another quote that Alex states throughout the novel is, “O my brothers” (Burgess 5). “O my brothers” reve...
Alex is put on stage where he is to be used in a demonstration. A man walks out, toward Alex. He begins to yell at Alex, then gets violent.
the early days through to the end of the war and explain how the texts
Mary Shelley’s world renowned book, “Frankenstein”, is a narrative of how Victor Frankenstein, a brilliant chemist, succeeds in creating a living being. Although Frankenstein’s creation is benevolent to begin with, he soon turns murderous after being mistreated by humans. His anger turns towards Frankenstein, as he was the one who brought him into the world that shuns him. The Monster then spends the rest of the story trying to make his creator’s life as miserable as his own. This novel is an excellent example of the Gothic Romantic style of literature, as it features some core Gothic Romantic elements such as remote and desolate settings, a metonymy of gloom and horror, and women in distress.
A society’s individual liberties such as freedom of speech and expression are crushed.” (Novels for Students 7) According to this quote, it can be seen that evil is indeed a necessity. It is a necessity for the ruling government in a dystopian society. As Alex was introduced the to the Ludovico Technique, he did not know it was an experiment. The government chose Alex because he accidentally killed a prison inmate. However, the government did not want to actually change Alex’s evil nature, they wanted to manipulate everyone under their rule through a brainwashing system. So, this was the main reason Alex was used as an experiment, and when Alex tried a suicide attempt, he regained his evil nature back even after the Ludovico Technique
A Psychological Analysis of Alex in A Clockwork Orange & nbsp; In A Clockwork Orange, Alex is portrayed as two different people living within the same body of mind. As a mischievous child raping the world, he was as seen as filth. His actions and blatant disrespect towards society are categorized under that of the common street bum. However, when he is away from his evening attire. he is that of suave.
Dickens' view of poverty and the abuse of the poor can be seen in Oliver Twist, the novel about an orphan, brought up in a workhouse and poverty to demonstrate the hypocrisy of the upper class people. Oliver Twist shows Dickens' perspective of society in a realistic, original
His condition was handled in ways many would likely view as inhumane and counterproductive. His autonomy as a human being was overturned, and what the governor of the interior felt would have beneficial for the society resulted in a failure at the expense of one person. The final outcome was that Alex was not “cured” of his immoral actions, but was burdened with actions that masked his current condition, to include depression paired with suicidal tendencies, followed by a relapse. Although he had awful and inhumane tendencies, he should not have been used as a human guinea pig, or as a means to win a political race. Psychology is a topic that evolves as drastically as anything else in the medical world, but the mind is a powerful thing that should be approached with the utmost care, especially in the experimental
In this novel Alex shows his freedom of choice between good and evil, which is that, his superiority over the innocent and the weak. In the beginning of the novel he chooses to be evil, he shows us that by committing violence act like stealing, raping, and also murdering an innocent person which he got arrested for and put into prison for about 12 years. The amount violence he commits shows his abuse of power and his decisions toward evil. The violent acts that are described in this novel are very graphical and are intended to shock the reader but they also show that the suppression of others is wrong, because it is destructive to the natural rights of humans. Alex consistently chooses evil and violence to show his freedom of choice, ?Now I was ready for a bit of twenty-to-one . . . then I cracked this veck" pg 7. Alex beats, rapes, and robs the weak and ...