Orange is the New Black is a netflix series that covers most, if not all of the topics we’ve discussed in sociology. It’s not just a series about a woman who ends up in jail because she was transporting drug money for her international drug smuggler girlfriend at the time. It is also about individual prisoners who've somehow ended up in prison and their backstories. The five topics I felt were most displayed were sex, social interaction, religion, race, and groups.…
Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt and A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess are two books with a similar environment. The books environments are influenced by a lack of humanity, lack of civility, and human spirit. Salman Rushdie quotes, “Literature is where I go to explore the highest and lowest places in human society and the human spirit.” Salman Rushdie’s quote and the books that have been mentioned above share the idea that we can explore and learn from these fictional or nonfictional situational environments. Both of these books teach and portray the cruel parts of human society and also relates to the quote from Salman Rushdie.…
It was whilst reading The Clockwork Orange that I met a protagonist who as unapologetically evil and I was fascinated, it led me to discover more literature that dealt with the darker side of human existence; literature that explored the transgressive and subversive. My curiosity for the morbid and dark only grew through my reading of novels like American Psycho, Frankenstein, Naked Lunch and Lolita; novels which tried to describe something wholly alien yet contain something I found familiar. Unlike works such as Dante’s Inferno these works seemed to present the immoral without such didacticism which left a moral ambiguity I found intriguing.…
In the novel ‘The Outsiders’ by S.E Hinton, we see how hard times bring out the best and worst in human nature. Human nature is basically what people are like deep down. As the characters change and their life grows and gets harder, we are shown their true colours. Some of them change for the best, and some for the worst.…
"Ode to an Orange" by Larry Woiwode took place in the winter of 1940s. It was "the winters of the forties" which I felt was very important in setting the background. It was a time of war, rationing of food, limited transportation, a difficult time to import items from other states and then adjustment from war of peace. Winter did not just represent cold, snow, wind, gray sky, limited sunshine, but a limiting of the senses. With this in mind it have also been difficult to obtain an orange that would have been harvested in a usually warm place, such as Florida or California. The orange not only became a symbol of a season and the holidays but an object that turned the senses on. From the orange's color, touch of the skin, how it was peeled to the packing of "fresh wood" with the paper labels that contained the image of a "blue goose." Again the author uses our eyes, sensory impressions, all this to stimulate against the bleakness of "north Dakota winters."…
In both ‘A Clockwork Orange’ and ‘Brighton Rock’ characters are faced with choices that develop and intensify the plot, making the novels both stimulating and thought provoking to read.…
Are we to discuss to what extent the ending of A Clockwork Orange is convincing, at least three levels of viewpoint should be taken into consideration. The author’s intention in terms of the effect that the last chapter was supposed to create can be seen as one. Another one lies in the literary means the author used and their contribution to the effect intended. And the last but surely not least is the psychological level concerning the possibility of the final twist in the protagonist’s attitude towards life and its dark sides. All the levels mingle throughout the story since human personality is a complex unit and not a mere composition of separate parts arbitrarily put together. Taking a closer look at all the aspects mentioned above should help us avoid simplification and misinterpretation. It is most unlikely that the last chapter of such a creative work is a mere result of the author’s sudden lost of imagination or inspiration. In the preface to the 1986 edition, Burgess himself claims that the 21st chapter was meant to be an integral part of the story from the very first moment he decided to write it. Although the author’s reliability as a source of information about his work might be considered questionable, his viewpoint should not be ignored completely as it sheds at least some light on the issue. As regards the number of chapters, he puts it quite clearly: “21 is the symbol for maturity, or it used to be, since at 21 you got the vote and assumed adult responsibility” (Thrawn). Burgess talks about the 21st chapter as about the denouement. He adds: “There is, in fact, not much pint in writing a novel unless you can show…
Set in a dystopian near future, A Clockwork Orange shows Alex, a 15-year-old boy who roams the streets at night with his gang members, committing violent crimes for fun. A Clockwork Orange follows the utopian convention of the state attempting to create a utopia by controlling the individual, as Alex is used as an example of the states power to "rehabilitate"…
In Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, Celie leads a life filled with abuse at the hands of the most important men in her life. As result of the women who surround and help her, Celie becomes stronger and overcomes the abuse she experienced. The three most influential women in Celie’s life are her sister Nettie, her daughter-in-law Sofia, and the singer Shug Avery. These are the women who lead Celie out of her shell and help her turn from a shy, withdrawn woman to someone who was free to speak her mind and lead her own independent life.…
Demonstrate how the major events that take place in The Outsiders affect the values and attitudes of 3 main characters.…
The created patch-work language of Nadsat in the novel, A Clockwork Orange, satirizes the social classes and gang life of Anthony Burgess's futuristic society. The most prominent of these tools being his use of a completely new language and the depiction of family life from the eyes of a fifteen year old English hoodlum. Burgess effectively broke arcane traditions when he wrote A Clockwork Orange by blending two forms of effective speech into the vocabulary of the narrator and protagonist, Alex. Burgess, through his character Alex, uses the common or "proper" method of vernacular in certain situations, while uses his own inventive slang-language called "Nadsat" for others. Many experts believe that the use of these two types of language and the switching from one to another indicates a social commentary that Burgess is attempting to convey. Burgess also uses the device of the pseudo, or surrogate, family to reflect on Alex's deep rooted desire to have some place where he can feel safe and whole.…
Contrary to this, Alex in A Clockwork Orange doesn't want to grow up. He loves his life on the streets, robbing and beating people up. However, he makes a crucial mistake, he lets his ambitions get the best of him which leads to his friends turning their backs on him and Alex has to go to prison. Because of his immaturity he wants to be the leader of his gang and that is the process that starts the growing up, against his will.…
In the novel, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, the main character of Alex is used to explore the notion that…
The directors of the film “Little Miss Sunshine” satirize aspects of American society by completely humiliating and twisting the basis of many issues within American civilization. Numerous aspects are parodied throughout the film, however the angle in which the theme of personal failure and beauty contests is mimicked is particularly intriguing.…
There was a time where the smallest things seemed to be like they were the biggest. Like no problem big or small could ever be resolved. Back when getting in trouble for something you did was the worst of your problems. Back when using something that wasn’t yours was so bad that you felt like it was the end of the world. Back when orange seeds led you to such a huge problem that you felt like you couldn’t ever fix anything.…