My Mancunian Hero (Anthony Burgess in general)

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Product:	Anthony Burgess in general
Date:	10/09/02 (531 review reads)
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Anthony Burgess was born on 25th February 1917 in a community on the outskirts of Manchester called Harpurhey. His Father was a Book Keeper and part time Pianist, his mother a dancer at the Ardwick Empire, a now demolished club that stands roughly where the Manchester Apollo now stands.
He went to Xavarian College and the University and served six years as a soldier in the Army.

All fairly standard so far, however, Burgess went on to become a literary genius after receiving the worst news of his life.
At the age of 42 he was diagnosed with a brain tumour and given only 12 months to live. He decided that in his last year of life he would write a book or two, to provide for his loving wife in his death.
The diagnosis proved totally wrong and he went on to publish 50 books and lived for another 34 years. Finally succumbing to Cancer in late 1993.

In 1962 Burgess wrote a short novel, (whilst mainly very drunk), which became famous world wide and is still widely regarded as the best book he wrote, he invented an entirely new language for it, he even based some of it’s most terrifying scenes based on his own experiences. The book of course is called, A Clockwork Orange.

The story is set in the future, (1962’s future that is), and is a story about a teenager called Alex and his unsavoury friends and gang members, the Droogs. It is a story about friendship, betrayal, drugs, murder and rape. It is much more however, it is Alex’s story and we learn he does not feel guilty or bad about the things he does, (scarily, this mirrors a lot of teenagers in society at the moment). After being set up and betrayed, Alex is incarcerated for 25 years of his life, he decides he would rather be dead and is on the verge of suicide when a treatment becomes available, if he takes the treatment he will be free from prison within the fortnight.
I cannot say anymore as it would spoil the whole story and the way the story unfol
ds is of paramount importance.

The language that Burgess uses in the book he calls Nadsat, it is a mix of Russian and English, with words which he invented because they sounded right. It takes a little getting used to but becomes every bit as important as the story.
I will not go into the Nadsat language, some have, there are even dictionaries of it. One thing I will say is look up Ultra-Violence in your own dictionary, it’s probably there as it’s world wide usage became large enough to grant it immortality in the English Dictionary.

A Clockwork Orange was only one of many master pieces that Burgess wrote, but it was put on the world stage when, in 1971, Stanley Kubrick made the film version which very closely mirrored the book. In fact it is the best ever book-to-film conversion I have ever seen, very graphic.
The film was banned only weeks after it’s release due to copy-cat attacks which started to take place. It was only re-classified recently by the British Film Board after nearly 30 years as a talked about and much rumoured video nasty. The scenes are still very distressing even by today’s standards. But the story does have a very moral tale to tell and should be experienced fully to appreciate what Burgess is trying to portray and warn of.

Burgess although a brilliant author preferred to think of himself as a musician, he once said :

"Music is a purer art because it has no direct relationship to human events. It's totally outside the field of moral judgment. That's why I prize it."

He held many titles and was thought of as a Composer, librettist, essayist, translator, (he wrote the English subtitles to Cyrano de Bergerac), and a critic. He also liked to think of himself as a comic writer, or someone who can inject humour into the bleakest subjects, this he does wonderfully in many of his novels, of which there are far too many to list.

Who would lik
e Anthony Burgess novels ? Well, he was asked the same question in a 1973 interview for “A Paris Review”, he said:

“An ideal reader of my novels is a lapsed catholic and a failed musician. A short sighted, colour blind, auditorily biased person. Who has read the same books that I have!”

To sum up, Burgess is not for everyone, only readers that can appreciate literary genius without being offended by it’s contents. It is not for morons who want some new ideas for committing violent acts. He creates, he writes, he aims to shock and engross his readers. He is a master who was around 40 years ahead of his time, he was a true Mancunian hero.

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