A Clockwork Orange is as brilliant, transgressive, and influential as when it was published fifty years ago. Alex and his "Droogs" spend their nights getting high at the Korova Milkbar before embarking on "a little of the old ultraviolence," such as terrorizing a writer, Mr. Alexander, and gang raping his wife. After Alex is jailed for bludgeoning the Cat Lady to death with one of her phallic sculptures, Alex submits to the Ludovico behavior modification technique to earn his freedom; he's conditioned to abhor violence through watching gory movies, and even his adored Beethoven is turned against him. Returned to the world defenseless, Alex becomes the victim of his prior victims, with Mr. Alexander using Beethoven's "Ninth" to inflict the greatest pain of all. When society sees what the state has done to Alex, however, the politically expedient move is made.

• book
• 2012
• 10 Fans