Americans React to Anthony Burgess Interview from Clockwork Orange

Hey guys! This was an interesting interview where Anthony Burgess says the British hate their writers. What do you think?

Editor: James Lynch

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[sentinal]

Your face looks radiantly beautiful as an expectant mum, and not fat..love your reactions guys, great couple and good luck to both of you with the new coming baby.

[Evil-Dude]

Fantastic movie very controversial book and movie but a true masterpiece. The movie also has a very deep message that not everyone sees.

[craigmccullough]

Burgess was much more than just a scriptwriter/author. He was an absolutely brilliant linguist. Invented the language used in "Quest for Fire".

[blutey]

At the time, his comb over gave Bobby Charlton and Arthur Scargill a run for their money.

[ashikmd.rashid]

Wow, is it me or Lilian really glowing lately.😯 Don't feel bad yet, Felipe. The beard looks pretty 👌.

[TwisterMw]

It took 7 months to film, an original screenplay was written but torn up and Stanley Kubrick directed straight from the book carrying a copy on set

[diogenesagogo]

Burgess was a fantastic writer. Any Old Iron, Nothing Like The Sun, the Enderby books, Time For A Tiger, A Dead Man In Deptford, Earthly Powers ... Look him up on Wiki.

[chrisjohnson]

'Come & Get One in the Yarbles'.

[ministry]

I have only read the book once, but have seen the film many, many times. Brilliant, one of Kubrick's finest. Contains a very deep message about society and how we treat criminality and rehabilitation.

Fun fact. Malcolm McDowell, who plays the lead character Alex, also plays the baddie in Blue Thunder 😂😂

Great film and a great book my little droogies.

[toffee]

Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange played on irony. He swerved the question of wether or not it is humane to undergo social conditioning? And instead opted for bleak realism; That one can be redeemed by the state is a misnomer. For me there is a lot of truth in that and I love the film for it's honesty. I understand how some saw that as cynical but for a lot of Brits especially, we embraced that as comedy gold. Even though Kubrick was American, his sense of humour was very British.

[umbrellaman]

A Clockwork Orange was pretty much banned in UK for many years. Only after Kubrick died & his control of the films distribution rights ceased was it was promoted on DVD. Kubrick didn't like the films promotion of violence (several attacks cited the movies influence on them).

[raymartin]

"what's it going to be then, eh?"

There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, George, and Dim. Dim being really dim, and we satin the Korova Millkbar making up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening, a flip dark chill winter bastard through dry. The Korova Millkbar was a milk-plus mestizo, and you may, O my brothers, have forgotten what these mestos were like, things changing so skorry these days and everybody very quick to forget... Well what they sold there was milk plus something else. They had no licence for selling liquor, but there was no law yet against prodding some of the new vesches which they used to put in the old moloko, so you could pert it with velocet or drencrom or one or two other vesches which would give you a nice quiet horroshow fifteen minutes admiring Bog and And All His Holy Angels and Saints in your left shoe with lights bursting all over your mozg.

The opening lines of A Clockwork Orange, copied from the copy of the book I bought in 1972 (price 25p)

Although I was 14 yrs old, when I first read it, the book made a huge impression on me. Still does. I know it inside out and have taught it in several High Schools.
Firstly, Phililioe, it's not a nihilistic book (although it is a dystopian nihilistic setting) Burgess was a Christian with a deep interest in Christian thinking (he was also a polymath and linguist and wrote operas for a hobby) the question ACO asks is very simple, and revolves around the question of free will. Is it better for a person to have free will and choose to do harm, or to be denied free will and forced to do good.?

Alex, the anti-hero is a 20th century phenomenon. His name means without laws in Greek, and he is an intelligent, classical music loving sadist. How could be two contradictory things at once, I ask my students. You can't, they say, and then I point out that the book was written 15 years after the Allies discovered the Death camps, where unimaginable horrors were perpetrated by the "civilised" Master Race.

The book, which in my Penguin paperback form has six chapters an 138 pages of text, asks this question explicitly. I will let you read it yourself (you really should) to see what confusion Burgess reaches..

You should also make a point of watching Kubrick's film. It is shocking an violent, but is Kubrick's, and it's visually stunning. Despite the yobs the time taking it a an instruction book (my local thugs termed themselves "Benton Clockwork" it sticks to Burgess original very closely, and asks the questions he asks.

Sorry for the lecture, Folks, it's forty year habit.

[terryneedham]

I read it a long time ago.Burgess was asking what to him was a profound question: What is the point in making an evil man good though compulsion. Enforcing virtue is denying him that which makes him human - His free will. Burgess was a Catholic don't forget.

[jjcustard]

Its interesting to have people from a different culture talk about us in this way because I learn stuff I've never thought of.
P.s . Was good to see Donald Sinden again

[kjr]

This was nice to see! I love Anthony Burgess. An extremely clever man and a teacher by profession. I have memories of 80s of teachers smoking pipes of tobacco in class, that older generation who all smoked! I don't so no worries there. I just wanted to talk about turning 21 yrs of age. In Britain, or the empire, turning 21 yrs is a passage of rite to adulthood. Socially, it is when your parents can say to you 'Son' 'Daughter' ...'you are now your own person, you don't need us any more!'. 21 yrs is not about the legal rights, Burgess here is talking about the difference between youth and adulthood, he is talking more socially than he is talking about politics, which of course is what Orwell is talking about! But well done and keep pod casting, I like your guys!

[SuperReasonable]

I watched the film when it first came out. It was one of the most impression making experiences of my life. Kubrick stopped it not long after it came out and it was never shown again until after his death. The film used the then gang craze of skin heads in the UK with a magnificent performance by Roddy McDowell

[terry]

I’ve seen a few new Sci Fi films were they mix Chinese and English together .

[jonathanwilde]

I don't think it's a case of the British being resistant. It's more that we just know things are too good to be true haha

[royburston]

Kubrick ultimately regretted his own take on the novel and helped to have it banned in the UK after reportedly receiving death threats.

[yogibro]

I thought about about what he said of them resisting philosophical systems in relation to British comedy being kind of sarcastic or ironic, maybe cynical.