When The Author Doesn't Understand Their Own Novel

Hinzugefügt: 2026-06-05

[00:00:00]Despite A Clockwork Orange's undeniable cultural impact, influencing everyone from musicians like Blur and David Bowie to the makers of TV shows like The Simpsons and Phineas and Ferb, Anthony Burgess did not think the novel was worth remembering. In his introduction to the 1986 edition of the book, he said it ought to be erased from the world's literary memory and that he would be glad to disown it for various reasons. An author, of course, is not obliged to agree with his audience about his creation.

[00:00:28]But in disparaging A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess in some ways indicates that he does not understand the work he created.

[00:00:36]>> I'm Alex, although not that Alex.

[00:00:39]>> And I'm Eric.

[00:00:40]>> And this is Another Works.

[00:00:48]Burgess expressed that his intentions in writing the book was to titillate the nastier propensities of his readers.

[00:00:53]While it's undeniable that the book creates a sense of gruesome fascination in the reader, to dismiss those sensations with a cheap word like titillate is unfair. The violence of A Clockwork Orange is not just there for entertainment value. Alex and his droogs' criminal acts are condemnation of the society that created them.

[00:01:09]>> Oddly, Burgess spoke out of both sides of his mouth about the violence in his novel, downplaying it in the book when comparing it to Stanley Kubrick's movie.

[00:01:17]>> I was appalled because what I'd ministered in the book was now here explicitly in the film. I'd gone to great trouble in the book to hide the violence and the sexuality from the reader by using a very strange language.

[00:01:29]>> This response to the film seems disingenuous. While it's true that the book is written in a made-up Nadsat slang, it does not take the reader long to get used to it and become comfortable with the language.

[00:01:40]>> Yeah, it's unbelievable that he thought the readers would be protected by terms like ultra-violence, tolchock, and the old in and out.

[00:01:47]>> Burgess was either under-appreciating the effectiveness of his own writing or the imagination of his readers.

[00:01:53]>> When Burgess finished A Clockwork Orange, his American publishers refused to include the final chapter. This ruined the book in Burgess's mind for a couple of reasons. The first was that he intentionally wrote the book in three parts with seven chapters each for a total of 21. 21, Burgess explained, is the symbol of human maturity. At 21, you got the vote and assumed adult responsibility. While this is an interesting numerical trick and is a fact that is sure to fascinate first-year English majors everywhere, is it enough in itself to justify the final chapter?

[00:02:23]>> Hell, no.

[00:02:24]>> And that's where the second reason comes in. In the 21st chapter, Alex grows up.

[00:02:29]He outgrows his violent tendencies and starts down the road of becoming a contributing member of society.

[00:02:34]>> To Burgess, this was essential because when a fictional work fails to show change, when it merely indicates that human character is set, stony, unregenerate, then you are out of the field of the novel and into that of the fable or the allegory. The American Orange is a fable. The British one is a novel.

[00:02:52]>> If we accept Burgess's definition of what makes a novel, >> which we really shouldn't.

[00:02:56]>> Sure, but if we do, then we have to conclude that A Clockwork Orange succeeds as a fable but fails as a novel. If the point of a novel is the growth of the protagonist, then it's essential that the protagonist's experiences, aka the plot, help shape that growth. But the plot of A Clockwork Orange doesn't add to Alex's growth and maturity in any way.

[00:03:18]>> For 20 chapters, Alex is the same character he was at the beginning. The young man who takes pleasure from acts of ultra-violence in the old in and out is the same young man who volunteers for the Ludovico technique. Not out of any desire to reform, but as a trick to get out of prison early. When he returns home and discovers his parents are renting out his room, it doesn't occur to him that these are some of the consequences he has to deal with because of his crimes. Instead, he considers himself victimized by his parents. When he encounters the old man he and his friends tormented on the streets of London, Alex doesn't think at all about what he did to the man. He feels no remorse or guilt, but once again considers himself the victim when the man decides to take revenge. And of course, when he manages to break the conditioning of the Ludovico technique, he immediately returns to his old life of crime.

[00:04:04]>> But then, over the course of the final chapter, he starts to become bored with his life of violence. And by the end of the book, Alex has left his criminal ways behind to become a contributing member of society. Unfortunately, nothing in the previous 20 chapters has led us to this point. One gets the sense that if Alex had never been arrested, gone through the torments of the Ludovico technique, and never faced the abuses of a society that knows he can't defend himself, he would have ended up in exactly the same position.

[00:04:34]You might ask, "How do you know?"

[00:04:36]Maybe the events of the novel shaped him into a person who would mature and grow out of his violent adolescent ways. If that's true, the novel has left us no clues to indicate that. In fact, it has done the opposite. At the beginning of his final chapter, Alex runs into his old droog, Pete. Pete, who is a couple of years older than Alex, is now married, has a proper job, has stopped speaking in Nadsat, and has become an upstanding citizen. So, we have to ask ourselves, did Pete end up in prison?

[00:05:04]No. Did he experience the Ludovico technique? Obviously not. So, what led to Pete's reformation? The only thing that happened to both Pete and Alex is they aged. And Pete, having reached the age of maturity a little sooner, outgrew the life of crime a little sooner, too.

[00:05:20]>> So, that leaves us to wonder what the point of the novel was in the first place. If Alex was bound to end up where he was at the end, no matter what happened before, why did we bother reading the story? If the events of a novel have no real effect on the protagonist, then we can't really expect it to have an effect on the audience. If Burgess thinks a novel is a failure because the character doesn't change, then a novel which has not earned its character change should be considered just as much a failure.

[00:05:44]>> But, if we look at A Clockwork Orange as what Burgess defines as a fable, then it actually is effective. It is not a fable to teach individuals a moral lesson, but rather one that teaches a moral lesson to the society as a whole. Alex is a thief, a rapist, and a murderer, but it is not his wrongdoing that we can learn from. Instead, we need to look to the adults around him, those who have built the culture in which Alex has grown up.

[00:06:09]>> After his night of violence, drugs, and alcohol in the first four chapters, Alex decides to stay home from school. He complains of a headache, and his parents, without even a hint of argument or questioning, let him stay in bed.

[00:06:20]It's obvious that Alex has grown up in a home without any discipline. But, it isn't a lack of discipline that comes from spoiling and coddling a child, rather it's one that comes from neglect.

[00:06:30]His mother's response to the news that her son isn't feeling well is simply to say, >> Here, here, I'll put your breakfast in the oven. I'm about to be off myself now.

[00:06:39]>> There's no expression of concern or worry about Alex's health. She just takes in the news and gets on with her day. Later, Alex reveals that he can get away with going out at night because he has told his parents he has a job.

[00:06:49]Eventually prompted by a nightmare he had about Alex, his father asks him what his job is. Alex avoid giving his father a direct answer by giving him some money.

[00:06:57]>> Imagine having a son who lives in your house and has gotten into trouble with the law in the past telling you that he has a job and you don't even bother to find out what that job is. Again, this shows the extent to which his parents neglect him.

[00:07:09]>> We also meet Alex's post-corrective advisor, P.R. Deltoid. He is basically his parole officer, and he shows up to talk to Alex about his apparent concern for him. Worried that Alex might soon get into trouble with the law again.

[00:07:21]But, he quickly reveals that his concern isn't really for Alex, but for himself.

[00:07:25]"If you have no consideration for your horrible self," he tells him, "at least you might have some for me, who has sweated over you. A big black mark, I tell you in confidence, for everyone we don't reclaim."

[00:07:35]>> Once Alex is apprehended by the police, we witness the justice system in action.

[00:07:40]It is more concerned with dehumanizing the incarcerated than it is with reforming them. Even the prison Charlie or chaplain who seems to have some genuine concern for Alex refers to him as 6655321 instead of his name.

[00:07:54]>> Alex is a product of the world he lives in. When your own parents neglect you and every member of the society you encounter seems more invested in themselves than they are in you, it's not surprising that you would grow up with a complete disregard for others.

[00:08:05]>> When Alex receives the Ludovico Technique, we get to the point of the novel. By causing a Pavlovian response, the technique makes it impossible for Alex to act violently. Even thinking about doing something violent makes him debilitatingly ill. In effect, the justice system is attempting to make Alex into a model citizen by taking away his free will. Burgess is making the point that a person cannot really be good if they don't have any real choice in how they act. A human being without free will is as useless as a clockwork orange. We can't ignore the importance of this idea. A society with people who are good because they don't have a choice in the matter cannot be a healthy society. Moral choice is a key part of what it means to be human.

[00:08:47]>> But Burgess's final chapter contradicts this idea. Alex has no moment of realization, no growing sense of guilt, and no desire to report his past behavior. His urges to commit violence were just the effect of immaturity. He doesn't make an active choice to stop doing violence, he simply matures, gets bored of it, and moves on. In Alex, Burgess unintentionally created a character who has never made a moral choice. Rather than being programmed by the Ludovico Technique, Alex is just programmed by his biology.

[00:09:14]>> When I first read A Clockwork Orange as a teenager, I assumed the 21st chapter was there for the exact opposite reason that it was. It was so out of place with the rest of the book, I assumed an overly concerned publisher insisted he put it in in an attempt to tone down any moral outrage it might inspire in his readers. The chapter's lack of connection to the rest of the novel and the implications of the dismissal of everything that came before it, convinced me that it couldn't possibly be the idea of the author of the first 20 chapters.

[00:09:45]>> So, if we consider that the final chapter was a part of Burgess's plan, then it makes sense that he didn't think the ending was suitable because he's a hack. A hack that happened to write something that for most of the book was brilliant. And then Stanley Kubrick saw that brilliance. He understood what was so brilliant about A Clockwork Orange.

[00:10:04]And then frankly, he made a movie that's better than the book. Despite how much I love the language of the book, despite how great the first 20 chapters are.

[00:10:12]That final chapter just really leaves you with a sour taste in your mouth.

[00:10:16]>> Thanks very much for watching. Like, subscribe, comment down below.

[00:10:20]>> And all those other things YouTubers tell you to do. Bog be with you.

[00:10:29]>> [music]