Entry 1

Alex and his droogs (Nadsat - teen slang - for "friends") prowl the streets at night and prey on the elderly, weak, and naive. I was intrigued by how little he thought of all the heinous acts he'd done. He starts off the night at the Korova Milk Bar drinking alcoholic drinks (at the age of 15) and then decides that he and his friends should go out and look for someone to mess with. They end up finding a starry (Nadsat for "old") prof with some library books. I was very mad at Alex and his droogs at this point, for they beat the poor old man and ripped up all his books. I think this was a very nasty thing to do, since the man was so old. The night carries on with more brutal acts of violence - robbing a store, trashing a writer's house and harming his wife, all topped off with getting into a knife fight with another group of thugs. So far I'm intrigued and shocked at Alex's casual stance on violence, and impressed by Burgess's linguistic abilities; the use of Nadsat in this book really sets the tone of a disconnect from the youth and old.





Page I left off on: 49
Burgess, Anthony. A Clockwork Orange. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1962