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A new, hardback edition of the classic novel, published to celebrate its 50th anniversary. One of the most influential novels of the 20th century, this edition is freshly edited from Burgess's 1961 typescript, and restores the text to its original state. Also includes interviews, articles, reviews and previously unpublished material. 'A terrifying and marvellous book.' Roald Dahl
Synopsis
First published in 1962, this edition is compiled and edited by the author's biographer, who restores the text of the novel as the author originally wrote it. It includes a selection of interviews, articles, reviews and other materials.
Book Details
Publisher:
William Heinemann
Publication Date:
06-Sep-2012
ISBN:
9780434021512
Observer review
A Clockwork Orange 50th Anniversary Edition by Anthony Burgess review
Lucian Robinson the observer Sat 13 October 2012
Anthony Burgess once wrote that the novel's literary singularity lay in "the tension between heroic form and unheroic content". In A Clockwork Orange, published in 1962, Burgess pushed this heroic tension to its limit. Set in a dystopian future where teenage gangs maraud nocturnally, carrying out random acts of "ultra-violence" at will, the novel relates the criminal exploits of Alex and his droogs (or friends) in a mock-heroic form reminiscent of Fielding's Jonathan Wild. Narrated entirely in the first person, the first half of the novel spools by in a tickertape stream of rape and murder before Alex is caught by the police and subjected to "Ludovico technique" a scientific method to "cure" criminals of their violent urges through emetic brainwashing and Burgess turns his satirical spotlight on the state's gelid violence.
The novel, and Stanley Kubrick's bravura 1971 film adaptation, were controversial for their supposed amoralism towards the sadistic violence depicted in the narrative, yet, as Burgess emphasised, his intention "had been to put language, not sex or violence, into the foreground". This he accomplished through inventing a polyglot patois called "nadsat" a virile concoction of cockney, Romany and Russian in which the entire novel is written. Thus, Alex sets the scene for a gang brawl by declaring: "This would be real, this would be proper, this would be the nozh [knife], the oozy [chain], the britva [razor]."
Burgess's most ingenious inversion of the "youth in revolt" cliche is contained in his decision to endow Alex with a passion for classical music, especially Bach, Mozart and, above all, Beethoven. Ironically, though music spurs his protagonist to ever greater bloodlust, it is when depicting Alex's tonal transcendence that Burgess's prose attains an almost Joycean euphony. Alex's vision while listening to a violin concerto of "a bird of like rarest spun heavenmetal, or like silvery wine flowing in a spaceship, gravity all nonsense now" stands as sufficient testament to Burgess's preternatural ability as a linguistic stylist.