A Clockwork Orange

- A sociological approach -

Madalina Chiru
Facultatea de Limbi si Literaturi Straine
An I

1. Sociological Criticism
This approach examines literature in the cultural, economic and political context in which it is
written or received, exploring the relationships between the artist and society. Sometimes it
examines the artists society to better understand the authors literary works; other times, it may
examine the representation of such societal elements within the literature itself. One influential
type of sociological criticism is Marxist criticism, which focuses on the economic and political
elements of art, often emphasizing the ideological content of literature; because Marxist criticism
often argues that all art is political, either challenging or endorsing (by silence) the status quo, it
is frequently evaluative and judgmental, a tendency that can lead to reductive judgment, as
when Soviet critics rated Jack London better than William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Edith
Wharton, and Henry James, because he illustrated the principles of class struggle more clearly.
Nonetheless, Marxist criticism can illuminate political and economic dimensions of literature
other approaches overlook.

2. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

A Clockwork Orange is a dystopia and an example of fiction; the story being told by a first person
narrator called Alex who is the leader of a teenage gang settled in London, who fill their days with

stealing, beating and raping innocent citizens.

In the beginning of the novel, Alex seems to be running the town together with his mates Dim,
Pete and Georgie, scaring everyone to death with their violent acts. However, at a certain point
they plan to break into an old woman's house, but fail miserably. Alex's friends end up leaving
him to take the blame for the woman's death. He is sentenced to fourteen years of imprisonment
and during his stay in jail he takes up an interest in the Bible. In spite of the appearances, Alex
has not lost his old ways because while reading the Bible he keeps entertaining violent fantasies.
When Alex gets wind of an experimental procedure which is performed on detainees and which
allows them to reintegrate in society, he immediately signs up. The process, known by the name
of "Ludovico's Technique", is based on brainwashing and eliminates the subject's power to

choose. The doctors who lead the experiment strap Alex to a chair and force him to watch violent
films, while injecting him with fluids which induce physical illness. By force of association,
Alex feels the same illness every time he sees a violent act or hears the classical music which
accompanied the images.
He is released from prison, as human proof that the technique is successful and as a walking
billboard for the government who is trying to reduce crime in the city. However, opponents of the
authorities get their hands on Alex and they use his sensitivity to classical music and violence in
an attempt to make him commit suicide, which would be very bad publicity for the government.
To prevent this from happening, Alex is taken to hospital and doctors reverse the effects of
Ludovico's Technique in his sleep. He no longer feels nausea at the sight of violence or when he
hears classical music, but he finds that it simply does not interest him anymore. He wants to find
a wife and have children, just like his friend Pete has, and he concludes that he has just outgrown
his violent past.

3. A Clockwork Orange in relation to the sociological approach

This paper on A Clockwork Orange tries to respond to the following central sociological
questions:
What sort of society does the author describe?

What does the writer seem to like or dislike about this society?

What changes do you think the writer would like to make in the society?

What sorts of pressures does the society put on its members? How do the members
respond to this pressure?

John Anthony Burgess Wilson was inspired to write A Clockwork Orange during a visit to
Leningrad in 1961. There, he observed the state-regulated, repressive atmosphere of a nation that
threatened to spread its dominion over the world. At the time of his visit, the Soviet Union was
ahead of the United States in the space race, and communism was establishing itself in countries

as far-flung as Vietnam and Cuba. Burgess regarded communism as a fundamentally flawed

system, because it shifts moral responsibility from the individual to the state while disregarding
the welfare of the individual. Burgesss deeply internalized Catholic notions of free will and
original sin prevented him from accepting a system that sacrifices individual freedom for the
public good. A Clockwork Orange may be seen in part as an attack on communism, given the
novels extremely negative portrayal of a government that seeks to solve social problems by
removing freedom of choice. However, A Clockwork Orange shouldnt be understood simply as
a critique of the Soviet Union or of communism, because the dystopian world of the novel draws
just as much on elements of English and American society that Burgess detested. In his own
estimation, Burgess had a tendency toward anarchy, and he felt that the socialistic British welfare
state was too willing to sacrifice individual liberty in favor of social stability. He despised
American popular culture for fostering homogeneity, passivity, and apathy. He regarded
American law enforcement as hopelessly corrupt and violent, referring to it as an alternative
criminal body. Each of these targets gets lampooned in A Clockwork Orange, but Burgesss
most pointed satire is reserved for the psychological movement known as behaviorism.
A Clockwork Orange deplores the institution of government, which systematically seeks to
suppress the individual in favor of the collective, or the state. Alex articulates this notion when
he contends that modern history is the story of individuals fighting against large, repressive
government machines. As we see in A Clockwork Orange, the State is prepared to employ any
means necessary to ensure its survival. Using technological innovation, mass-market culture, and
the threat of violence, among other strategies, the State seeks to control Alex, the main character,
and his fellow citizens, who are least dangerous when they are most predictable. The State also
does not tolerate dissent. Once technology helps to clear its prisons by making hardened
criminals harmless, the State begins incarcerating dissidents, like F. Alexander, who aim to rouse
public opinion against it and thus threaten its stability.
More than anything, Burgess believed that the freedom to choose is the big human attribute,
meaning that the presence of moral choice ultimately distinguishes human beings from machines
or lower animals. This belief provides the central argument of A Clockwork Orange, where Alex
asserts his free will by choosing a course of wickedness, only to be subsequently robbed of his
self-determination by the government. In making Alex, a criminal guilty of violence, rape, and

theft, the hero of the novel, Burgess argues that humanity must, at all costs, insist that individuals
be allowed to make their own moral choices, even if that freedom results in depravity. When the
State removes Alexs power to choose his own moral course of action, Alex becomes nothing
more than a thing. A human beings legitimacy as a moral agent is predicated on the notion that
good and evil exist as separate, equally valid choices.

References

Fran Desmet, Female perspectives in the dystopian novel, Ghent University-Faculty of

Arts and Philosophy,2010

Hazirlayan Meral Harmanci, Prof. Dr. Esra Meldkoglu, Marxist Criticism of the
Postmodern Elements in Anthony Burgess A Clockwork Orange and J. M. Coetzees
Waiting For The Barbarians, Istanbul, 2005

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