The play A Clockwork Orange, written in 1962 by Anthony Burgess, is a very intriguing story about social conflicts and comic tragedy. In 1971, Stanley Kubrick directed and produced the first film adaptation of the play. The play is an emotional journey through social conflicts and tragedy. Burgess's story takes you through the life of a troubled fifteen-year-old boy named Alex. We watch Alex experience a transformation from a violent, angry, and confused adolescent, to a wise, depressed man. During his younger years, Alex dealt with many immature emotions that lead him to do outrageous acts.
Alex, is a leader of a gang who constantly steals, rapes and assaults people. During one of Alex's violent and harmful acts, his friends, or "droogs" as he refers to them, turn on him and he is sent to jail for raping and accidentally killing a young women. Through his sentence in jail, Alex is given the opportunity to participate in a new rehabilitating program called the Ludovico's technique. This technique is used to change Alex's view on violence by showing him extremely violent films after being injected by a medicine that makes him feel ill. This teaches Alex to associate violence with feeling ill, so that in the future he will become ill when faced with those situations. The play ends after Alex has been released from prison and has no idea where he fits in with society. He has matured tremendously, and nothing is the same to him. .
Anthony Burgess wrote A Clockwork Orange after his wife was assaulted during his service in World War II. She died a month later from internal bleeding, along with her unborn child that was killed during the assault. He compensated his anger by writing this play. He describes a violence-ridden future and the tragedies that come upon innocent people. His goal in writing this play was to inform people that unless one has free moral choice, he is spiritually cursed.