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lynxpardinus's review against another edition
dark
reflective
tense
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Suicide attempt, Sexism, Misogyny, Murder, Sexual violence, Police brutality, Sexual assault, Confinement, Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, Torture, Suicidal thoughts, and Rape
Moderate: Sexual content, War, Genocide, Alcohol, and Drug abuse
Minor: Antisemitism and Cancer
michuverde's review against another edition
5.0
Literalmente mi libro favorito, muy adelantado a su tiempo, te muestra a un protagonista con el que simpatizas sin empatizar.
amber_mars's review against another edition
dark
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Weirdest book I've ever read, and I've read quite a few weird books. It's literature about a dystopia, but at the same time includes many nonsense words and vocab
sidharthvardhan's review against another edition
2.0
"When we are healthy we respond to the presence of the hateful with fear and nausea."
In his classical conditioning experiments, Pavlov makes animals respond to a stimulus towards which they were initially neutral. The experiment in the book does same. The stimuli in question was presence of violence and response repulsion.
A lot of parenting and education involves an innocent use of this strategy on children. So parents tell their children that monster will take them if they won't remain good, thus trying to prompt, often with out much of effect, fear as response to will to bad behaviour. The carrot and stick approach is almost always with a wish to condition children into good habits.
The trouble is the doctors in novel chose to use the presence of violence as stimuli rather than cases where Alex was causing violence and thus rendering him unable to defend himself. It is more a case of choosing wrong stimuli rather than wrong experiment.
Some people will say that it will be choice inhibitory. But aren't we all slave to our instincts anyway. The freedom to Will is limited to will, which is itself an accident of nature - was it Schopenhauer who said "we can do what we will, but we can not will what we will." Education and other socialising forces are always countering the instincts dangerous or averse to what society likes. The promise of Christmas gifts is hardly more choice promoting. Same with imprisonment.
Suppose an ideal method of conditioning was created - where he felt repulsed but only at idea of being violent to innocent people. What would be ethical issues than? Now here is something to wonder about. If there are choice issues here, what about child-raising techniques then? Thus, it is not so much a choice between 'ability to chose Vs conditioning' but rather 'socially-enforced Vs natural conditioning'.
Your humble reviewer did like Nadsat (hence second star) and I didn't charge book for being full of violence (I did charge movie for that because it was graphic) but overall I think the centeral argument was weak ... and the conclusion worse. No, not the part where Alex gets away with everything (which to me is only circumstances not author's reaction), not when he turns criminal again, and not when he leaves those evil ways again. But where all the violence, murders and rapes are seen to be part of youth, growing up - wow, people died, ten year old girls got raped; but the important thing is that kid grew up.
In his classical conditioning experiments, Pavlov makes animals respond to a stimulus towards which they were initially neutral. The experiment in the book does same. The stimuli in question was presence of violence and response repulsion.
A lot of parenting and education involves an innocent use of this strategy on children. So parents tell their children that monster will take them if they won't remain good, thus trying to prompt, often with out much of effect, fear as response to will to bad behaviour. The carrot and stick approach is almost always with a wish to condition children into good habits.
The trouble is the doctors in novel chose to use the presence of violence as stimuli rather than cases where Alex was causing violence and thus rendering him unable to defend himself. It is more a case of choosing wrong stimuli rather than wrong experiment.
Some people will say that it will be choice inhibitory. But aren't we all slave to our instincts anyway. The freedom to Will is limited to will, which is itself an accident of nature - was it Schopenhauer who said "we can do what we will, but we can not will what we will." Education and other socialising forces are always countering the instincts dangerous or averse to what society likes. The promise of Christmas gifts is hardly more choice promoting. Same with imprisonment.
Suppose an ideal method of conditioning was created - where he felt repulsed but only at idea of being violent to innocent people. What would be ethical issues than? Now here is something to wonder about. If there are choice issues here, what about child-raising techniques then? Thus, it is not so much a choice between 'ability to chose Vs conditioning' but rather 'socially-enforced Vs natural conditioning'.
Your humble reviewer did like Nadsat (hence second star) and I didn't charge book for being full of violence (I did charge movie for that because it was graphic) but overall I think the centeral argument was weak ... and the conclusion worse. No, not the part where Alex gets away with everything (which to me is only circumstances not author's reaction), not when he turns criminal again, and not when he leaves those evil ways again. But where all the violence, murders and rapes are seen to be part of youth, growing up - wow, people died, ten year old girls got raped; but the important thing is that kid grew up.
shelbymarie516's review against another edition
3.0
Violent teen, re-education, violent people. I like the setting of a future dystopian and the re education sci fi aspects but over all this was a beat off for me (and not in a good way).
meheher's review against another edition
4.0
At the beginning of the book I didn’t like the writing but as I kept reading I started to like it more and more. I feel it adds character and helps further separate Alex with the adults or just non gang members in the book. I like how Alex and members of his gang talk in “Nadsat” but in the end when Alex meets Pete years later he no longer talks in that way. I felt it showed his growth as a person by leaving behind his ultra-violence life behind him. Despite all the violence he commited I still felt bad for Alex, in certain parts of the book, and that made it really interesting. The question whether Alex had really been "cured" since he was physically unable to commit immoral but still wanted to stayed with me. Has a person really changed if they no longer commit violence, but deep inside still want to?
laylaaxr's review against another edition
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual violence, Violence, and Torture
erinastin's review against another edition
5.0
I put off reading this book for so long because the language intimidated me, and honestly I'm an idiot for doing so. This book is SO GOOD. It took a while for my reading experience to feel "fun" because I was having to constantly reference the Nadsat dictionary, but after about 50 pages I was fluent and hooked! The fact that you are able to oscillate between loathing Alex one moment, then feeling utter sympathy for him the next, is truly a literary feat. I will be thinking about this book for a long time.
anaffpereira's review against another edition
3.0
A little hard to follow at first, due to the nadsat, but it's worth the effort. A food for thought type of reading.
vishnu_'s review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25