---
product_id: 228183
title: "A Clockwork Orange"
price: "€ 25.67"
currency: EUR
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 13
url: https://malta.desertcart.com/products/228183-a-clockwork-orange
store_origin: MT
region: Malta
---

# Classical music motif Classic dystopian novel Mind-bending narrative A Clockwork Orange

**Price:** € 25.67
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## Summary

> 📖 Unlock the mind-bending cult classic that challenges what it means to be free.

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- **What is this?** A Clockwork Orange
- **How much does it cost?** € 25.67 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
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## Why This Product

- Free international shipping included
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## Key Features

- • **Cultural Icon:** A must-read that shaped literature and film, sparking endless debate and inspiring generations.
- • **Philosophical Depth:** Engages with profound themes of morality, free will, and the nature of goodness—perfect for thoughtful readers.
- • **Linguistic Innovation:** Dive into Burgess' unique Nadsat slang blending Russian and English for an immersive reading experience.
- • **Complete Uncut Edition:** Includes the crucial 21st chapter missing from the original American release—experience the full story.
- • **Timeless Dystopian Masterpiece:** Explore a chilling future where youth reign with violence and free will is questioned.

## Overview

Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange is a groundbreaking paperback novel blending dystopian fiction, linguistic creativity, and philosophical inquiry. Featuring the full original text with the restored 21st chapter, it explores teenage violence, free will, and morality through a fast-paced, unforgettable narrative that remains culturally and intellectually relevant decades after its release.

## Description

Presents Burgess' satire of the present inhumanity of man to man through a futuristic culture where teenagers rule with violence, and includes the final chapter deleted from the first American edition.

Review: I'm struck by literary genius - And so I sit here, struck by literary genius, O my brothers. I must tell you I have indulged in this book perhaps more than any of you, unless you're Russian also. My native language intertwined with this astounding work of brilliant horror, coloring it rich and scary and crazy at the same time, with me imagining it as it was spoken, properly. Brrrrr. I feel like there is the voice of Anthony Burgess in my head, reciting as Alex. I must tell you one more thing, before I go on. I have read the version with the 21st chapter, the very end that's been cut off in the original American publication, but was kept in the British, hence the review might differ from the version that didn't have it. You see, Alex changed, as impossible as it might have seem, he did change in that last 21st chapter, and indeed it changed the story itself. There is hope, after all, for the Alexes of the world. Makes you wonder, doesn't, what kind of decision made it cut from the American version in the first place. But I'm getting carried away into mundane. Now, I must say, this will be the book to re-read and to re-read and to re-read, among such works of genius as Lolita, War and Peace, and the like. I've never read Burgess before, and I plan on indulging more and more in his work in coming years, because, oh well, because the explosion of the beautiful and the appalling, the sophisticated and the primitive strikes such a fine balance, that you feel it, you smell it, you taste it, you hear it, you see it like it's unfolding around you, and you unfold around it, and inside it, and all is in and out and together, and you raise your head from the book to answer that call and you no longer know who you are or why or where. Last time a new writer had such an impact on me it was Haruki Murakami with 1Q84. I can't say wow, because it sounds boring. Let me try. It will deposit fireworks in your brain. It will skin you and pin you with sharp words all real proper. It will put you in a mind of one you don't want to be yet feel for by the end of the book, unsure how it happened. Namely, little Alex. Little Alex. Little Alex has a proper mum and pop, lives in a proper flat, in a proper block, all good. But it's not enough for little Alex. Little Alex likes to perform a bit of ultra-violence every night with his droogs, but it's just simple bloodletting, oh no. It's more sophisticated than that. Alex has wit, Alex is fond of classical music, Alex adds the disturbing twist to his crimes, and that, only at 15. He does everything there is to try, the beating, the cutting, the raping, the stealing, until one day he stumbles on killing, and that's a slippery slope that leads him to an institution where some very interesting new curing methods are tried on him, and lo and behold, I can't tell you no more as otherwise I will spoil it for you, in case you happened to have been untouched by this story, wether in book or film shape. Anyway. It all turns around, of course, as things do in life. Those who do crimes, pay for their crimes, but who is to judge what is fair? How much do you pay, and when can we stop the punishment? I know there have been horsed of scholars who said smart things about this book and about life and people at large and how it relates, but on my level I can tell you that the coin has always two sides, and we may forever wonder if what the author was trying to say, but I have a feeling that is wasn't simple glorifying of sex and violence, as it might seem. Oh no. It's about "Why?", and about "Why not?" Why do we have violence and those who enjoy it? Because those who do it can tell you, why not? When we're blind as to why we shouldn't, we do it just because we can, don't we? We do until we get caught. That's how we learn. Some earlier, some later. Alex does learn, eventually, but at a cost. Okay, I need to shut up now otherwise this will turn into an essay. Go read it. It will, literally, blow your mind.
Review: Freedom of Mind, Freedom of Choice - "The question is whether such a technique can really make a man good. Goodness comes from within, 6655321. Goodness is something **chosen**. **When a man cannot choose he ceases to be a man**." When I reached this passage in Anthony Burgess' *A Clockwork Orange*, I immediately recognized it as one of the most (if not the most) important message among the many in this intriguing, fast-paced novel (it is then reinforced later on in the novel by the author/victim F. Alexander). Also present in Kubrick's film, but not stated with the same emphasis and strength, it comes from the 'rot of the Staja's charlie' (or, translating from Nadstad--the slang used by teenagers in Burgess' futuristic dystopian England--"the prison's chaplain's mouth") and tells everything: this book is about free will. To be honest, I've never been much interested in the fortuitous, ultra-violent concept behind Kubrick's film (which I had never seen before finishing the book this week), but decided to give the book a shot after learning about its intricate linguistic complexities, by incidentally reading the 'Translator's Notice' in the most recent Brazilian translation (Fabio Fernandes for publisher Aleph). There, Fernandes enthusiastically go over each of the main devices used by Burgess to create a sense of strangeness in the dystopic future of ACWO and how he as a translator dealt with them: the Russian-derived words in nadsat ('horrorshow'/хорошо for excellent, 'rot'/рот for mouth, 'rooker'/руки for hands, 'litso'/лицо for face, 'malenky'/маленький for little or tiny, 'devotchka'/девочка for girl, 'veshch'/вещь for thing and so on), the childish rhyming slang (like kids talking cute in words like 'skoliwoll', 'gutiwutis', 'eggiweg') and the pompous sort-of-shakespearean discourse (filled with thus's, thou's and thine's). All of that made me start reading the Brazilian translation in Portuguese and the original English version simulteaneously. But soon I felt comfortable moving on only with the original, having a nadsat glossary at hand just not to lose track of anything. Actually, as soon as I made it through the surf of the nadsat, just like in Joyce's *Ulysses* (and Burgess as a linguist was a devoted Joycian), ACWO turned into a very entertaining journey because it is so fast-paced. However, the comparison with Joyce's can't go much beyond the surface of the linguistic mimicking, because Burgess himself admitted in life that he wrote ACWO in a hurry (scholars now say he wrote the book in 18 months, but Burgess himself used to brag he did it in just three weeks because he needed the money). Actually, all Nadsat, the childish rhyming slang and the sort-of-shakesperean discourse seemed to me to be rather gross stylistic shortcuts, like finding a solution to create this sense of strangeness of the dystopic future quickly (it certainly makes it easier to establish that all Nadsat comes from anglicized Russian, but why would it be that way?--was there a time when England was under Russian command?). The same can be said about Alex's pompous Shakespearean tone--it is cool, but it is there just because it is cool, no matter how hard it is to explain in the context of the novel why is that. Differently from the Kubrick's film, 'Your Humble Narrator' Alex is, at the beginning of the novel, only a 15-year-old violent teenager who actually comes from a (presumably) stable family--which maybe could help explain how he had the chance to know so much about classical music and develop his devotion to "Ludwig van", although all references to classical music in the novel seem to be, as Nadsat and Shakespeare, stylistic shortcuts as well. In any event, Alex's story goes on for more or less three years, and that is what makes the whole difference with Kubrick's movie (and indeed caused Burgess himself to depricate it), as clearly Malcolm McDowell was not only much older (isn't that something that happens with all adaptations of Hamlet to the screen as well?) but also out-of-placedly immature. I must confess I was completely 'nagoy' about the controversy surrounding the last, 21st chapter. All I can say is that, at first, it really came to me as a blatantly sarcastic detour. It was like the book was moving in one direction and all of sudden it moved almost 180 degrees around. Until the end, I was eagerly waiting for a plot twist that would put it back on track, but that was a hope slowly vanished as the unread pages diminished. So all I had as a console was the prison's chaplain's phrase: if Alex couldn't choose, he wouldn't be free, so he had to learn by himself what goodness was really all about. It is a sort of naïve idea that maybe was needed in the 1960s when Burgess wrote the book, but an idea that didn't age well. That is not what you could say about the rest of the book, which not only didn't age, it became so fluid with our own reality that it has, sadly enough, fallen almost into our everyday triviality.

## Features

- Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange, paperback

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #867,741 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #666 in Literary Fiction (Books) |
| Customer Reviews | 4.4 out of 5 stars 11,171 Reviews |

## Images

![A Clockwork Orange - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61iDJVkRqdL.jpg)

## Available Options

This product comes in different **Media Language, Media Format** options.

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ I'm struck by literary genius
*by K***E on January 11, 2014*

And so I sit here, struck by literary genius, O my brothers. I must tell you I have indulged in this book perhaps more than any of you, unless you're Russian also. My native language intertwined with this astounding work of brilliant horror, coloring it rich and scary and crazy at the same time, with me imagining it as it was spoken, properly. Brrrrr. I feel like there is the voice of Anthony Burgess in my head, reciting as Alex. I must tell you one more thing, before I go on. I have read the version with the 21st chapter, the very end that's been cut off in the original American publication, but was kept in the British, hence the review might differ from the version that didn't have it. You see, Alex changed, as impossible as it might have seem, he did change in that last 21st chapter, and indeed it changed the story itself. There is hope, after all, for the Alexes of the world. Makes you wonder, doesn't, what kind of decision made it cut from the American version in the first place. But I'm getting carried away into mundane. Now, I must say, this will be the book to re-read and to re-read and to re-read, among such works of genius as Lolita, War and Peace, and the like. I've never read Burgess before, and I plan on indulging more and more in his work in coming years, because, oh well, because the explosion of the beautiful and the appalling, the sophisticated and the primitive strikes such a fine balance, that you feel it, you smell it, you taste it, you hear it, you see it like it's unfolding around you, and you unfold around it, and inside it, and all is in and out and together, and you raise your head from the book to answer that call and you no longer know who you are or why or where. Last time a new writer had such an impact on me it was Haruki Murakami with 1Q84. I can't say wow, because it sounds boring. Let me try. It will deposit fireworks in your brain. It will skin you and pin you with sharp words all real proper. It will put you in a mind of one you don't want to be yet feel for by the end of the book, unsure how it happened. Namely, little Alex. Little Alex. Little Alex has a proper mum and pop, lives in a proper flat, in a proper block, all good. But it's not enough for little Alex. Little Alex likes to perform a bit of ultra-violence every night with his droogs, but it's just simple bloodletting, oh no. It's more sophisticated than that. Alex has wit, Alex is fond of classical music, Alex adds the disturbing twist to his crimes, and that, only at 15. He does everything there is to try, the beating, the cutting, the raping, the stealing, until one day he stumbles on killing, and that's a slippery slope that leads him to an institution where some very interesting new curing methods are tried on him, and lo and behold, I can't tell you no more as otherwise I will spoil it for you, in case you happened to have been untouched by this story, wether in book or film shape. Anyway. It all turns around, of course, as things do in life. Those who do crimes, pay for their crimes, but who is to judge what is fair? How much do you pay, and when can we stop the punishment? I know there have been horsed of scholars who said smart things about this book and about life and people at large and how it relates, but on my level I can tell you that the coin has always two sides, and we may forever wonder if what the author was trying to say, but I have a feeling that is wasn't simple glorifying of sex and violence, as it might seem. Oh no. It's about "Why?", and about "Why not?" Why do we have violence and those who enjoy it? Because those who do it can tell you, why not? When we're blind as to why we shouldn't, we do it just because we can, don't we? We do until we get caught. That's how we learn. Some earlier, some later. Alex does learn, eventually, but at a cost. Okay, I need to shut up now otherwise this will turn into an essay. Go read it. It will, literally, blow your mind.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Freedom of Mind, Freedom of Choice
*by R***S on March 2, 2024*

"The question is whether such a technique can really make a man good. Goodness comes from within, 6655321. Goodness is something **chosen**. **When a man cannot choose he ceases to be a man**." When I reached this passage in Anthony Burgess' *A Clockwork Orange*, I immediately recognized it as one of the most (if not the most) important message among the many in this intriguing, fast-paced novel (it is then reinforced later on in the novel by the author/victim F. Alexander). Also present in Kubrick's film, but not stated with the same emphasis and strength, it comes from the 'rot of the Staja's charlie' (or, translating from Nadstad--the slang used by teenagers in Burgess' futuristic dystopian England--"the prison's chaplain's mouth") and tells everything: this book is about free will. To be honest, I've never been much interested in the fortuitous, ultra-violent concept behind Kubrick's film (which I had never seen before finishing the book this week), but decided to give the book a shot after learning about its intricate linguistic complexities, by incidentally reading the 'Translator's Notice' in the most recent Brazilian translation (Fabio Fernandes for publisher Aleph). There, Fernandes enthusiastically go over each of the main devices used by Burgess to create a sense of strangeness in the dystopic future of ACWO and how he as a translator dealt with them: the Russian-derived words in nadsat ('horrorshow'/хорошо for excellent, 'rot'/рот for mouth, 'rooker'/руки for hands, 'litso'/лицо for face, 'malenky'/маленький for little or tiny, 'devotchka'/девочка for girl, 'veshch'/вещь for thing and so on), the childish rhyming slang (like kids talking cute in words like 'skoliwoll', 'gutiwutis', 'eggiweg') and the pompous sort-of-shakespearean discourse (filled with thus's, thou's and thine's). All of that made me start reading the Brazilian translation in Portuguese and the original English version simulteaneously. But soon I felt comfortable moving on only with the original, having a nadsat glossary at hand just not to lose track of anything. Actually, as soon as I made it through the surf of the nadsat, just like in Joyce's *Ulysses* (and Burgess as a linguist was a devoted Joycian), ACWO turned into a very entertaining journey because it is so fast-paced. However, the comparison with Joyce's can't go much beyond the surface of the linguistic mimicking, because Burgess himself admitted in life that he wrote ACWO in a hurry (scholars now say he wrote the book in 18 months, but Burgess himself used to brag he did it in just three weeks because he needed the money). Actually, all Nadsat, the childish rhyming slang and the sort-of-shakesperean discourse seemed to me to be rather gross stylistic shortcuts, like finding a solution to create this sense of strangeness of the dystopic future quickly (it certainly makes it easier to establish that all Nadsat comes from anglicized Russian, but why would it be that way?--was there a time when England was under Russian command?). The same can be said about Alex's pompous Shakespearean tone--it is cool, but it is there just because it is cool, no matter how hard it is to explain in the context of the novel why is that. Differently from the Kubrick's film, 'Your Humble Narrator' Alex is, at the beginning of the novel, only a 15-year-old violent teenager who actually comes from a (presumably) stable family--which maybe could help explain how he had the chance to know so much about classical music and develop his devotion to "Ludwig van", although all references to classical music in the novel seem to be, as Nadsat and Shakespeare, stylistic shortcuts as well. In any event, Alex's story goes on for more or less three years, and that is what makes the whole difference with Kubrick's movie (and indeed caused Burgess himself to depricate it), as clearly Malcolm McDowell was not only much older (isn't that something that happens with all adaptations of Hamlet to the screen as well?) but also out-of-placedly immature. I must confess I was completely 'nagoy' about the controversy surrounding the last, 21st chapter. All I can say is that, at first, it really came to me as a blatantly sarcastic detour. It was like the book was moving in one direction and all of sudden it moved almost 180 degrees around. Until the end, I was eagerly waiting for a plot twist that would put it back on track, but that was a hope slowly vanished as the unread pages diminished. So all I had as a console was the prison's chaplain's phrase: if Alex couldn't choose, he wouldn't be free, so he had to learn by himself what goodness was really all about. It is a sort of naïve idea that maybe was needed in the 1960s when Burgess wrote the book, but an idea that didn't age well. That is not what you could say about the rest of the book, which not only didn't age, it became so fluid with our own reality that it has, sadly enough, fallen almost into our everyday triviality.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ The Best Dystopia Ever (...wait! is there such a thing?)
*by T***T on September 29, 2013*

One of the most fascinating dystopian novels on the par with George Orwell's "1984." Although the superficial perusal may reveal simply a complex plot involving evel-ish protagonist -- "Little Alex," a somewhat deeper look at the author and social issues involved at the time of the novel's writing will reveal a complex lace of multiple subplots and ideas. Something to consider: for a long time Anthony Burgess was a member of Her Majesty's Secret Service. Despite long assignments to Far East and Middle Eastern countries, Anthony Burgess' specialty was Eastern Europe and Slavic languages. Hence the language of the "hood" in this novel: "Nadzet" -- translated as "teen." (e.g. triNADZAT' " = 13; chetirNADZAT'= 14, etc...). Why do the major characters speak this lingo? Well the simple answer is that they are teenagers themselves. Hence the angst, aggressiveness, unbridled sexuality, the ugly behaviour, etc... Something else to consider: why pepper the novel with Slavonic root-words? Why not use Arabic, French, or German? Possible answer: To those "in the know," it may have looked as if there may have been a small but real chance that good old England may go Red (Philby, Burgess (different and unrelated Guy Burgess), and McLean have just defected [not in that order, of course]; the students and the unions are taking over the streets; Soviets are going into space and are arming every anti-colonial movement possible; etc, etc, etc.) As a specialist on Eastern Europe, Burgess had deep knowledge of miserable life behind the Iron Curtain, which he masterfully recreated in and transposed upon Great Britain in the "Clockwork." Trivia 1: it is rumored that while posted in Egypt, Burgess had a nervous breakdown. This led to his resignation from working for the Crown and the beginning of his literary career (this was brought up in several media interviews with the author later in his writing career). Trivia 2: the original printing of the book differed greatly between the US and the UK versions as the American Version lacked the final chapter of the book! It is unclear why, but the readers in the U.S. had to wait until 1972 to read the book in full. Trivia 3: the superb film adaption of the plot by Stanley Kubrick (the one that stars young Malcolm McDowell in the title role) was based on the American and NOT UK version, therefore it (the movie) lacks an absolutely key point of the book obvious to the reader in the last chapter of the original "Clockwork Orange." Trivia 4: No connection was ever made between Guy Burgess (the Secret Service man who defected to the USSR) and Anthony Burgess (Secret Service man who had a nervous breakdown and then wrote this book). As far as I know not even the most paranoid counterintel John Bull has ever raised that question. Hm... Now that I see it written down,,, I wonder... Overall, this is one of my most favourite books ever!

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*Last updated: 2026-09-16*