A Clockwork Orange

I read Anthony Burgess' venerable novel yesterday. The rest of this post is about that, and probably useless unless you also happened to spend your evening with the book.

I was struck by the way the language of the nadsat, the teens. It's mostly based on Russian, and by the end of the book, after a word or two each sentence, I was drawn in and reading it easily. A strong effect in a book about brainwashing.

The rest of this entry may spoil the book if you haven't read it, or movie, or whatever.

After living a life of crime, Alex is forced, through strange procedures to his psyche, to obey the law. So his morals haven't changed. His free will has just been taken. A pragmatic result, I suppose. My curiousity lies with his final transformation (in the chapter apparently not originally released in the U.S.) where he seems to bore of crime of his own volition.

Is this when Alex will finally approach a life of moderation, after a lifetime of seemingly pure evil, and then (though forced) pure good? I might be overstating it. Are we to believe that a psychopathic youth can suddenly tire of a life of violence? Not that any of that is stated, or even implied.

I know some people who were fairly awful to be around growing up that have shed ignorance, angst or insecurity to become amazing people. Hope!

I Way

Driving home from Pawtucket last night, HJY was playing Stairway to Heaven.

I realize that this song's reputation has diminished some, some say it's the most requested song ever, which can only be negative in some minds. Anyway, we've all heard this song many many times. I don't hear it much these days though, as we all seem to have more control over the music we listen to. This entire aside is not meant for the sake of exalting Zeppelins tune, but rather to explain that the song was on, I hadn't heard it in many months, I was enjoying and possibly hearing new things as is often the case in such situations.

So I-Way construction, or rather demolition, was underway on the Pine Street Bridge. Just a spring clean. Bright orange sparks cascaded down from a workman's tool to the closed lanes below. I was struck.

I contemplated getting off the highway and watching. I thought maybe I could stare at it until some new meaning in my life percolated to my mind. I could then write somethin very insightful in this very blog.

But I was already over the river at that point, as we wind on down the road. So I found no insight, my life didn't seem any more orderly and this entry has little purpose.

I saw a Dodge truck with a sticker portraying Calvin peeing on the Volkswagen logo, whatever that means.

Books and travel

I haven't slept well tonight. Now it's 615, most people are awake now anyway but for a bum liked it's early. I've finished "The Pillars of the Earth," a historical fiction. It was odd to find myself rooting for the Catholic Church, both figuratively and literally. Not that I was literally rooting, but that a physical cathedral is the framework of the story. My Uncle Bill recommended it to me, and I was a little surprised to see it was on Opran's book club. I won't make fun of that anymore because this novel was masterful.

Coincidentally, I'm also reading a historic account of the second battle at Bull Run lent to me by my other Uncle Bill. Inthink it might mean more to someone who has a little more knowledge about the American Civil War. Perhaps I'll seek out an overview at the Library. It has been some years since American history on high school.

I've given up on Kafka. That's not entirely true, I've read about 300 pages and almost all of his longer stories. I don't think I'll get through the anthology, but more significantly I just don't feel I understood it all as much as I could have. I'm not a dim-witted guy but I need more context.

It's that time of year when I yearn to get in my car and drive south on 95 until it's warm enough for a T-shirt and shorts. This wild be the year to do it, I've crafted an existance that enables more mobility than most. If only I knew where the key to drop the back seats down in the Honda.