Language and Behavior in a Clockwork Orange The novel, A Clockwork Orange, set in a dystopian future, tells a coming of age story about the world a sociopathic fifteen year old named Alex. Alex, “your humble narrator,” narrates using an argot language called Nadsat, a Russian translation for teen, and lives a life of crime doing whatever his twisted heart desires, he might say his life is “real horrorshow.” The first half of the novel is full of rape and malicious beatings by Alex and his droogs, Pete, Dim and Georgie, until Alex is arrested for murder and subsequently subjected to the "Ludovico technique,” a scientific method to "cure" criminals of their violent desires through brainwashing. Author, Anthony Burgess combines English, Russian and Cockney to create the made up language of Nadsat. Through the use of varied language, Burgess is able to represent the immature teenage mindset of Alex during his transformation into adulthood in the vicious world in which he lives.
As with most adolescents growing up, there is a struggle to find one’s self, especially in a dystopian world where everyone is made to a mold. Alex expresses this search at the beginning of each section in the novel with the phrase, “What’s it going to be then eh?” and through his use of Nadsat. The special language of Nadsat helps create individuality from the world for Alex and his droogs. Alex explains his language to Dr. Branom, one of the doctors that gives him the “Ludovico technique,” “These grahzny sodding veshches that come out of my gulliver and my plot, I said, that’s what it is…the dialect of the tribe.” (Burgess 125) “The dialect of the tribe,” all worlds outside of the mainstream groups in life, for example, teenagers, urban poor and the prison world, create their own language to communicate amongst themselves and to protect themselves from the outside world. Nadsat allows