A Clockwork Orange' as a Voice of Social Commentary

A Clockwork Orange is a voice for social commentary as Burgess picks up on the discourse of juvenile delinquency and its causes, like state manipulation, the untouchable pureness of free will, the fear of being powerless, and the desire of power.

Burgess analyzes social commentary in different ways, but more specifically the comments on juvenile delinquency when he writes about an “old veck” that is being beaten up by Alex and his gang. The old man shouts in agony 'It's a stinking world because it lets the young get on to the old like you done, and there's no law nor order no more.' This is a clear example of social commentary because we can see Burgess reflected in the old man. He is explicitly giving out his opinion about juvenile delinquency, this being that there is no law nor order that stops the youth from committing crimes and no one really cares.

We can also analyze another quote from this old man, 'What sort of a world is it at all? Men on the moon and men spinning round the earth like it might be midges round a lamp, and there's not more attention paid to earthly law nor order no more. So your worst you may do, you filthy cowardly hooligans.' although in this quote he comments on a lot of things, the one that attracts my attention the most is state manipulation. The old man states that there is no one paying attention to these crimes and that the state is making the population believe that they live in a utopian world when they clearly don't.

Alex lives in his own world, he is completely frightened by the idea that of being powerless affected by someone. He has no desire to open up to anyone and as the novella moves on we can see how he closes up to his friends and family. When he is by himself he dedicates his time to listen to music, and when he does that he does a weird comparison to his crimes and the beautiful art of Beethoven, this shows that even if he wanted to change, deep inside him violence is his passion and this is a comparison to the real world, even though people insist that they want world peace our society moves around war and violence. Alex represents the global issues, and the lies we think about our society.

In conclusion, Clockwork Orange is a voice of social commentary because the author, Burgess expresses his most intimate feelings about society and how he thinks there will never be a perfect world without taking away people's ability to choose between wrong and write. He says that the government has manipulated us in such a way that we are not able to decide and analyze what we truly think that is right and wrong.