Time for UltraViolence

Alex is a 15-year-old boy who goes to school in the daytime and works as a gangster on the streets at night. The year is estimated to be like 60s or 70s. In this period, the lives of young people between the ages of 14-17 are outstanding. As Alex says, during the day time children are regular like they go to school they are suitable for the families but at night times, they are hooligans who give fear to people and attack people for no reason but in fact for a reason in their thoughts. They talk a different language called ‘Nadsat’ with their friends. During the day, streets are belong to people who work and go to school, they are really active during day time with doing daily chores. At night, the hooligans drink, attack, they commit all kinds of crimes such as rape, extortion, manslaughter and theft. They are guardians of the street if you ask. There is also an order here. Gangs have set up an order among themselves, and if there is no match, frictions may occur. There is also a police factor. Although the police seem to intervene, so many crimes are committed that makes us think that after a while, the police are waiting for the crimes to come to their feet. In the other hand parents like the parents of children like Alex. Their life is not that much different from usual. They live in apatmants, work in factories or store as workers and lead a monotonous and automated life. They think their kids are working at nights. Think that, they do good parenting by only working an earning money.

The most striking feature of the book is that it can criticize both the bad side and the good side. These young people, who called bador gangster, harm people by doing wrong things and gain unfair profits. On the other hand, those who are called bourgeois, who work in factories, stores or more qualified people live their lives monotonously, they are in the same order every day like it was taught to them. So much so that according to Alex the reason they do not go out on the street at night is not the gangsters but desire to watch the lives of other people on television or as he calls it ‘enayi kutusu’. He thinks they’ve lost their own lives, they are so automated. Names like defenders of the order or bourgeois, are often used. But even in gangs, there is a search for order, a hierarchy. Alex’s desire for leadership, his thinking that anarchy would start if he doesn’t exist as a leader, is in fact the best part that summarizing the period, even the capitalist world in general.