Author Says Social Conditions Determine Human Life Styles

Social conditions are currently forcing man to serve only the roles imposed upon him by society, whether or not he wants to fulfill these roles, Anthony Burgess, author of A Clockwork Orange said last night.

"Man defines himself through his ability to choose between good and evil, and when man's choice becomes a mechanized process, it is a sin and an abomination," Burgess said.

The Background

Burgess, 1973 James Agee lecturer, told an audience of 150 people in Lowell Lecture Hall the background and motives behind his writing A Clockwork Orange.

Burgess, who wrote the book in less than a month, said he felt compelled to express his displeasure with the direction in which man was moving. He said that he would probably never have written the book so quickly or preached so much in it, if doctors had not diagnosed that he had a brain tumor and only one year to live. "That was in 1960," Burgess added.

The Response

Burgess said that the response of youth to the book had made it possible for a film to be made. He added that before Stanley Kubrick, the director, decided to make the film, Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones had expressed a great interest in directing and acting in the film.

Burgess said that although Kubrick had created a great visual work, he failed to realize many of the philosophical ideas behind the book. "The plot that Kubrick saw occurring in the future, I saw occurring in the present or even the past," he said.

Burgess added that the film fails to explain the title to the viewer, and has a sensuous quality that he finds repulsive.

The James Agee lecture is sponsored by the Harvard Advocate and serves to honor the late James Agee '32, author of Let Us Now Praise Famous Men and many other well-known books.