Senseless violence is a prerogative of youth, which has much energy but little talent for the constructive. Its dynamism has to find an outlet in smashing telephone kiosks, derailing trains, stealing cars and smashing them and, of course, in the much more satisfactory activity of destroying human beings. There comes a time, however, when violence is seen as juvenile and boring. It is the repartee of the stupid and ignorant.
Anthony Burgess, Introduction (“A Clockwork Orange Resucked”) to a later, restored version of his 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange. The American publishers of the novel elided the 21st and last chapter to his novel of futuristic “ultra-violence,” and in this introduction the author explained the publication history.
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Anthony Burgess
