A Clockwork Orange Free Will Essay

It is interesting how one's free will can be so easily altered by the people around them, but also how necessary it is to have your own commitments that shape your own standards. Anthony Burgess, the author of A Clockwork Orange, revisits the theme of free will and commitments to life commonly in his novel. Fifteen-year-old Alex takes advantage of his free will until suddenly, acts of betrayal from people around him whom he used to trust, steer his life in a very different direction. If Alex was given the opportunity to choose his life path, unaffected by others, he would have never accepted what he was led to. Acts of betrayal upon Alex contribute to the overall theme of the inviolability of free will and the necessity of commitment in life.

In response to McCloskey’s question to why God did not make man to always choose what is right can be answered by studying free will. If God did not provide humans with free will they would have been what could be assumed as a biased man who always did right without hesitation. According to Evans and Manis God provided humans with free will and ultimately, “the resulting evil is due to human wickedness, not to God” (162). Overall, the thought that God could have

or wrong. Actions are the result of particular choices. People make choices for a specific reason

In 1932 Aldous Huxley’s published ‘’Brave New world’’ . The book follows set of characters and their struggle with the dystopian society he created. There is focus on a problem of society and the extension to which society has free will and to which Ford – human replacement of God, controls people. In his novel, Huxley used his satiric skills to create world that is a reflection of real world, yet dystopian, a prediction of how the society can go wrong. Huxley’s society’s God – Ford proclaimed that the sacrifice of their individualism and free will is need in order to benefit and complete the society’s stability.

as an evil trait, but his love for music symbolises his human side.  In the

A novel can stimulate different types of emotions that a reader may experience in his or her lifetime. Many people analyze books to get a deeper and better understanding. They dig beneath the surface of a book and dig deeper than the words the author has written in the novel. However, to better understand an author’s works. One must look at the events of an author’s entire life and the time period in which the novel was written. Anthony Burgess, author of A Clockwork Orange, experienced many events that reflect upon his works. There are many different aspects that are continuously analyzed throughout Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, from the plot, to the characters, and the many different criticism that are applied throughout the novel.

Gideon clung onto Aria like a small child, and she pulled away from him. He looked to her and hugged her again, placing his chin on her head. "I do...I-I remember everything..." Gideon pulled away and stared at her for a long while. He remembered her child like features, which had now developed into a beautiful young woman.

In the novel A Clockwork Orange, the author Anthony Burgess tells a story about a young man name Alex and his friends, every night they go around and start committing violent acts. In the novel Alex expresses his freedom of choice between good and evil. The freedom of choice is a decision that every person must make throughout his life in order to guide his actions and to take control of his own future. This Freedom of Choice, no matter what the outcome is, displays person power as an individual, and any efforts to control or influence this choice between good and evil will take way the person free will and enslave him. In this novel the author uses this symbolism through imagery. He shows that through the character of

In the novel, A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess argues how free will is empowered by society and the government. Through the character Alex, the author is able to explicate his ideas of how the government strips Alex’s freewill while being in presence of violence in order to force him to be good. But is Alex still considered human without choice? Is goodness considered good when it is not chosen? People have the right to choose right from wrong on their own, just like Alex did while committing his violence. Sadly he chose wrong from right, but that is what makes a person human, by having to right to decide.

Being able to choose to be bad gives you more liberty. Making your own choices can help you learn who you are as a person. In the book, Alex learned that he wanted to create a family once he was able to choose whether to be bad or good. Another good thing about choosing to be bad rather than being forced to be good is that you are a lot happier. Alex was always miserable while under the effect of Ludovico’s Technique but before the treatment was done on him he was happier making his own decisions. If you are good against your own will, you will not be able to change it if you are really unhappy.

Davis presents the anti-ethics and pseudo-family in Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange. Throughout the novel the protagonist, Alex, yearns for a functioning family that he cannot abandon. Alex’s ethical transition is also evident throughout A Clockwork Orange. In 1987, the novel’s twenty-first chapter was added to the American edition of A Clockwork Orange. Without the twenty-first chapter, the novel’s narrative excludes the protagonist’s ethical transformation. In addition, without the twenty-first chapter, readers fail to see Burgess’s own reaction of the pseudo-families that burdens the narrator during his youth. With the addition of the twenty-first chapter, readers can perceive the effects of anti-ethics and pseudo-families in A Clockwork

With this kind of characterization Burgess takes away over plus sympathy for F. Alexander and unmasks him as a traitor of his own ideals .Mr. Alexander's complacent and blasé style of writing makes his ambitions somehow suspect (16). So does his behaviour as he recognizes Alex. He promptly seems to forget his charity for mankind and the victims of supreme power (17).

What is the author’s purpose for writing a novel? To make a point? To make money? The case for Anthony Burgess’s novel, A Clockwork Orange is much larger: to lend insight into human nature, most specifically, moral development. Burgess stacks the entirety of this concept in a single chapter, the controversial twenty-first, using it to transform the entire meaning of the novel. When first published in 1961, the American edition of A Clockwork Orange omits this critical part, making it more to the likes of an allegory or fable rather than a novel. Burgess was understandably very displeased with his American publisher, and expresses his indignation in his revised 1983 introduction, stating that there is “not much point in writing a novel unless you can show the possibility of moral transformation” (Burgess xii). When a work fails to show change (as the American first edition does) it merely portrays the human character as cold, rigid, unregenerable, not at all what Burgess intended. But would this be such an inaccurate portrayal of humanity? Yes. As circumstances change, so make people. Why? Free will. Free will is what allows one to choose between good and evil, and as circumstances change so do the choices, and with each decision, a step further into one's moral development, for the better or for the worse. Though in Alex’s case he is stripped of his ability to choose under the Ludovico technique. Without his free will, any chance of moral development is, in turn, essentially impossible. But Alex did have free will at the start of the novel, so what major factors were at play in his halted moral development? The influence of his surrounding family structures (or the lack thereof) are to blame. Family structures can serve as both catalysts and hindrances for interpersonal development, unfortunately the latter is true for Alex (at least for the first twenty chapters). By looking into the circumstances for Alex’s moral predicament, one will find that true moral principles are best developed of one’s own accord, by being exposed to positive influences.

What is the author’s purpose for writing a novel? To make a point? To make money? The case for Anthony Burgess’s novel, A Clockwork Orange is much larger: to lend insight into human nature, most specifically, moral development. Burgess stacks the entirety of this concept in a single chapter, the controversial twenty-first, using it to transform the entire meaning of the novel. When first published in 1961, the American edition of A Clockwork Orange omits this critical part, making it more to the likes of an allegory or fable rather than a novel. Burgess was understandably very displeased with his American publisher, and expresses his indignation in his revised 1983 introduction, stating that there is “not much point in writing a novel unless you can show the possibility of moral transformation.” When a work fails to show change (as the American first edition does) it merely portrays human character as cold, rigid, unregenerable, not at all what Burgess intended. But would this be such an inaccurate portrayal of humanity? Yes. As circumstances change, so do people. Why? Free will. Free will is what allows one to choose between good and evil, and as circumstances change so do the choices, and with each decision, a step further into one's moral development, for the better or for the worse. Though in Alex’s case he is stripped of his ability to choose under the Ludovico technique. Without his free will, any chance of moral development is, in turn, essentially impossible. But

Morality, by its very nature, is a quite fickle and subjective thing. What is often defined as morally good is typically characterized by altruism and generosity, whereas immoral acts are defined as the antitheses to such behaviors; however, when arbitrating the moral nature of an act, the motive behind said act must also be considered, and it is at this point that the typically stark dichotomy between moral and immoral becomes quite unclear. If, out of a gesture of good will, somebody were to inadvertently harm or wrong another, is said person guilty of an immoral act? Moreover, if someone helps another simply out of a selfish or malevolent interest, is the person in question still able to be considered moral? These are the difficult questions that define Anthony Burgess’s novel A Clockwork Orange, in which anti-hero Alex, after a spate of heinous and objectively immoral acts, is forced by the government to undergo a treatment rendering him unable to commit such acts. The acts of murder, larceny, and rape that Alex commits prior to his treatment portray him clearly as an objectively immoral character. After his treatment, he is rendered incapable of committing such acts. This, however, begs the question: Is an individual moral if they do not have the free will to choose to be moral and instead must be coerced?