'A Clockwork Orange' by Anthony Burgess - Review

‘A Clockwork Orange’ is probably one of the titles most people have heard about. Some have seen the movie but how many have read the book? I truly believe that you should always read the book before you watch the movie adaptation. The same goes for the ‘A Clockwork Orange’.

The nadsat language that Burgess has invented can make the book a bit difficult to read. The language is a mixture of Russian loanwords and Cockney rhyming slang. At first I found the nadsat quite annoying but it is very easy to get used to. I think it’s easy enough to understand the meaning of the words from the context and you’ll also find some explanations in the text. I come from Poland and Russian language has quite a lot of similarities to Polish. I have to say that this helped me a lot with understanding the text well. At times I even stop realising I am reading in two different languages. But even if you don’t have that advantage, you will get used to the nadsat words fairly quickly.

I am not going to deny that there is a lot of violence in the book and that it is quite difficult to carry on reading it at times. However the violence is not really what this book is about. There are so many questions that I have raised after finishing this book. Is there such a thing as pure evil? How much does society and upbringing affect our good/bad nature? Is being forced to be good against ones will better than being bad willingly? Does one simply grow out of ‘the fun’ of being violent? Why does one make a choice to stop committing crimes? I could carry on for a while here but I will stop and let you ask the questions yourself when you read it.
The book does not necessarily answer these questions. It forces the reader to ask them. It’s one of those books that I was itching to discuss with someone. I have been asking everyone if they have read it just so I could talk with them about it. But as it turned out, not many people have read it.

I highly recommend this book to everyone. Some say it should be read when you’re young/teenager but I don’t think it matters. Just read it and you will see for yourself what you have been missing.