Obviously, as a way of retaliating against Burgess' alleged Socialist state, Alex and his
"droogs" have adopted a very old method which has been proven highly effective in relation to obtaining and dispensing power and influence, namely, a social phalanx known as a gang, a somewhat "loosely organized group of individuals who collaborate together for anti-social reasons" (Nawojczyk, 1997, Internet). In this context, Alex occupies the position of gang leader while Georgie, Dim and Pete serve as his underlings and as a sign of their collaborative relationship, Alex and his "droogs" wear distinctive clothing-white, pseudo-combat style shirts and pants, black combat boots and black bowler hats or billycocks, almost as if "aping" a typical English businessman or stuffy accountant. They also utilize a very distinctive form of communication which Burgess calls a Nadsat dialect, a private language composed of a "stream of gibberish, pop slang, onomatopoeic expressions" (Coyle, 66) which only Alex and his "droogs" can understand and appreciate while surrounded by the sexually-charged, psychedelic motifs of the Korova Milkbar.
Therefore, Alex and his fellow gang members see the world around them as a place overflowing with hypocrisy, a post or perhaps pre-apocalyptic society that is "incredibly imperfect (and) lacking the harmonious and egalitarian qualities" ("Dystopia and Science Fiction," Internet) so often depicted in
In other words, Alex, Georgie, Dim and Pete view the world in which they are forced to live as a sort of playground where mayhem and "Ultra Violence" reigns supreme and in which the classical music of Ludwig Van Beethoven, Alex's trigger mechanism for the joys and raptures of hooliganism, serves as a kind of ruthless and brutal leitmotif, "the crowning glory of Kubrick's satirical attack on a world gone mad" (Ciment, 1995, Internet).
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Ciment, Michel. "Kubrick on a
Clockwork Orange. 1995. Internet. Accessed November
19, 2009 from http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/interview.aco.html.
Civelekoglu, Funda. "Hell's on Earth from Different Points-of-View: A Clockwork
Orange and the Handmaid's Tale. 2003. Internet. Accessed November 19, 2009
from http://www.gradnet.de/papers/pomo01.paper/Civelekoglu01.htm.
Coyle, Walter.
Stanley Kubrick: A Guide to References and Resources. Boston: G.K.
Hall, 1989.
"Dystopia and Science Fiction." 1990. Internet. Accessed November 19, 2009 from http://dc- mrg.english.ucsb.edu/WarnerTeach/E192/bladerunner/
Dystopia.Blade.Runner.Hoffpauir.htm.
Kael, Pauline. "Stanley Strangelove." New Yorker Magazine. January, 1972. Internet.
Accessed November 19, 2009 from http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/0051.
html.
Mainar, Luis M. Garcia. Narrative and Stylistic Patterns in the Films of Stanley
Kubrick. NJ: Camden House, 2000.
Nawojczyk, Steven. "Street Gang Dynamics." 1997. Internet. Accessed November 21, 2009
from http://www.gangwar.com/dynamics.htm.
