Alex Timeline and Summary

The book opens with our narrator and protagonist, Alex, along with his "droogs" (that would be "friends"), Pete, Georgie, and Dim, sitting in the Korova Milkbar contemplating what trouble to get in to on this particularly dark and chilly winter evening.
Alex and his entourage are drinking "milk-plus," meaning milk laced with some type of hallucinogen or other drug. Alex describes the milk-plus experience as one that either gives you a nice fireworks-in-the-sky kind of buzz, or else a lot of courage and strength.
Alex describes his entourage as dressed in the "heighth of fashion," which, at the time, meant a pair of black tights, a big belt, a cropped jacket without lapels but with big, built-up shoulders, a hat, and great boots for kicking.
Alex observes three girls at the bar, also dressed in the heighth of fashion.
The man sitting next to Alex is quite drunk and is talking gibberish about Aristotle. Alex isn't amused at all, but finds it rather cowardly that this grown dude next to him could get so wasted.
The milk-plus starts to kick in for our boys.
"Out out out out!" Alex shouts, and the entourage leaves the bar for Marghanita Boulevard.
They turn down Boothby Avenue, looking for trouble.
Alex approaches the first victim of the night, first calling him "brother." The man has some books with him, and, flipping through them, Alex insinuates that they are books of pornography, and teases the man about it.
As the man tries to grab his books back, Alex and co. beat him up, strip off his clothes, and go through his trousers for money.
The boys are off to the Duke of New York bar on Amis Avenue to spend what money they've taken from the old man.
They come upon three or four old ladies at the bar – real drunk – and buy them drinks and snacks in exchange for an alibi.
The boys, led by Alex, leave the bar to a cigs and sweets shop on the corner of Attlee Avenue.
They put on their high-quality, life-like masks.
Barging inside the store, Alex beats up Mother Slouse, the wife of the shopkeeper, kicking her, ripping her clothes, staring at her naked breasts, and contemplating sex – until he resolves that this is for later on in the evening.
The boys clean the register, grab a few packs of the very best cigarettes (they call them "cancers") and jet back into the Duke of New York in less than ten minutes altogether.
The boys buy the alibi ladies more drinks.
Half an hour goes by before the police come to question the patrons of the bar for potential information.
The boys sneer at the police, while the ladies provide them with their purchased alibi.
Outside of the Duke of New York, the boys encounter a singing drunk.
And, of course, he too gets a bloody beating from Alex and co.
Alex's posse moves on, coming upon Billyboy and his five droogs right around the Municipal Power Plant.
Alex hates how Billyboy always smells like stale oil, and challenges him and entourage to a fight.
Alex puts his cut-throat knife to work, using it to slit down the front of one of the opponent's jackets until he's bare-bellied…
Alex and co. are of course coming out on top in the fight, until they hear sirens.
All the boys scatter. Alex and his friends run to a dark alley to catch their breath.
With the sirens gone, Alex leads his friends to Priestley Place, and then to the Filmdrome (theatre) parking lot to look for a getaway car.
They steal a new-ish Durango 95 easily.
The boys drive recklessly, running over animals large and small, and terrorizing the townspeople.
The moon is bright and shiny as Alex decides that it's time for the "old surprise visit." Driving into the countryside, he stops the car just before entering "a sort of a village," in front of a small cottage that has "HOME" on a plate hanging on the gate.
Alex knocks on the door of the cottage and a woman answers.
Speaking like a gentleman, Alex asks to use the phone to call an ambulance for his friend, who has supposedly fallen ill just outside the cottage.
Alex asks for a glass of water to soothe his friend.
Alex and co. put on their masks and barge in while the woman goes to fetch the water.
Inside the cottage, Alex picks up a pile of typewriter paper and starts to mock the writer.
Alex tears up the manuscript.
Alex orders Georgie and Pete to drop the food and grab the writer so he can watch what they're about to do.
Dim holds the writer's wife down, while Alex begins to rip off her clothes.
Excited, Alex gets undressed and starts to "plunge."
Alex finishes, and Dim takes his turn with the woman while Alex holds her down.
Alex howls, "Out out out out!"
The tired Alex lets Georgie take the wheel of the waiting car. The gang heads back to town, running over the odd animal here and there.
Running out of fuel, the boys abandon the Durango, pushing it into the wasteland waters. They catch the train.
The boys get off at Center station, and walk back to Korova Milkbar.
Tired, they realize they should get home soon, since they are still growing boys and have school the next day.
Opera music is playing, and Alex, being very sensitive to classical music, shivers upon hearing it.
Dim interrupts Alex's moment with a bit of vulgarity, causing Alex to cuss him out.
Not enough, apparently, Alex leans over Georgie to punch Dim in the mouth.
Alex chastises him for being a "bastard with no manners."
Dim says he doesn't want to be Alex's brother and friend anymore.
Asserting his authority, Alex challenges Dim to a fight outside.
Alex retorts that Dim has to learn his place, since Alex is the leader.
An impassioned Alex re-asserts his leadership and authority, stating that even among friends, somebody has to be in charge.
Alone now, Alex walks back to his parents' flat at 18A, Municipal Flatblock, between Kingsley Avenue and Wilsonsway.
He takes the stairs, finally arriving on the 18th floor to a dark and quiet apartment.
Alex gulps up the milk and dinner that have been laid out for him.
After brushing his teeth, he enters his bedroom.
He looks proudly at the flags and manners on the walls, his many music discs and stereo. He puts on some classical music, which gives him instantaneous bliss. He finally drifts off to dreamland to some J.S. Bach, with thoughts about a clockwork orange.
Alex comes to at 8am and feels pretty bad physically.
Alex has a headache and wants to sleep it off instead.
Alex drifts back to dreamland and has a nightmare.
The doorbell rings.
It's P. R. Deltoid, Alex's Post-Corrective Adviser, stopping by to check up on him.
Alex explains that he has ditched school because of a rather intolerable pain in the head, and offers P. R. Deltoid some tea.
Alex denies that he's done anything worthy of worry. Yeah, right.
Confronted by P. R. Deltoid, Alex continues with the "I don't know what you're talking about" approach.
After P. R. Deltoid leaves, Alex dismisses his warnings as silly. He now muses over the concepts of goodness and badness, wondering out loud that modern youths like himself commit crimes for the sheer fun of it. Alex then waxes philosophy and concludes that if his government does not allow bad behavior, then it denies its constituents a life to live and ceases to be a government at all, by definition.
Alex has his breakfast and reads the paper.
Alex gets dressed with the radio on. A familiar string quartet plays and Alex is overjoyed.
On his way out to the record store to pick up a copy of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9, Alex notes that the day is very different from the night.
Alex gets to Melodia, the record store, at Taylor Place, and eyes the two ten-year-old girls in there, also playing hooky.
He asks the storekeeper, old Andy, for Beethoven's Ninth.
While paying for his new record, one of the pop music girls flirts with Alex. Alex gets an idea in his head, and promptly flirts back, promising food and music if they would leave with him.
Alex buys the girls, named Marty and Sonietta, spaghetti, sausages, cream-puffs, banana-splits, and hot chocolate. Then he orders a taxi to bring them back to Municipal Flatblock 18A.
At his parents' flat, Alex gives the girls a lot of Scotch and plays for them the pop music they have brought. He encourages them to drink more and quickly.
Alex puts on Beethoven's Ninth, and he leaps on the girls, raping them to the sweet sounds of Ode to Joy.
Alex lets them gather their things and kicks them out of the flat. He promptly dozes off to more Ode to Joy.
It is almost 7:30pm when Alex comes to.
Putting on his coat, he peers out, bidding his parents hello, as their only loving son.
Alex takes a shower, then joins his parents at the dinner table.
His father asks about his night job; Alex responds that it's just odd things, here and there.
Alex assures him that he's not up to no good. He reaches in his pockets and puts some money on the table, offering it to his parents and telling them to buy some Scotch at a bar with it.
By the time Alex gets to the bottom of the stairs Municipal Flatblock, his droogs are already waiting…yes, dressed in the heighth of fashion.
The entourage lets Alex know that it got worried when he was late.
Alex recounts his day, both the headache and the visit from P. R. Deltoid, but conveniently leaves out the girls.
Georgie gets sarcastic with Alex, or so Alex charges.
Alex goes on a rant about leadership and sarcasm, and insults Dim meanwhile.
Georgie defends Dim, asking Alex not to pick on him again, staying that there is a "new way" that the posse has agreed to.
Alex gets flippant. New way? No way.
Seeing that he is outnumbered, Alex smiles and plays along, asking Georgie about his plan.
Alex hears Beethoven's Violin Concerto on the radio of a passing car, and felt a violent surge in his veins. He draws his knife on Georgie.
Georgie draws his knife, and the two have at it until Alex cuts Georgie's hand.
Now Dim uncoils his chain and lunges at Alex. Alex gets hit on the back, but manages to get back up and slash Dim's left wrist.
Alex challenges a worried Pete. Pete is afraid that Dim's going to bleed to death.
The emerging leader, Alex, now binds Dim's wrist with some cloth in his pocket. Declaring himself master and leader again, Alex gets his friends to the Duke of New York for a calm time.
They see the alibi ladies, who are ultra-friendly with them.
Alex confirms with Georgie that all is forgotten.
Georgie suggests that his "mansize" plan for the night is to rob the Mansion (or the Manse) where a very old woman lives with her cats and valuables.
Alex agrees that it's a great idea.
Alex promises the alibi girls more drinks when they get back in ten minutes.
Foreshadowing: Alex says he "led [his] three droogs out to [his] doom."
Alex and co. arrive at the Manse, or the site for the night's job.
Alex, anxious to prove himself as a worthwhile leader, runs with the plan.
Alex pleads with her to help his ill-fated friend.
Alex pretends to retreat, all the while narrating how the woman's suspicions are well-founded, since the streets are a dangerous place.
In the dark, the gang reconvenes. Alex, still anxious to show them who's who, suggests that he stand on Dim's shoulders to open a window for all of them.
The plan works! Alex cracks the glass and hops into a room full of beds, cupboards, boxes, and books.
Once inside, Alex decides that he'll do the job (which includes robbing, raping, and possibly killing) alone, to impress his droogs…so they can really learn all about leadership when he opens the front door bearing all the valuables.
Eyeing the stairs going down to the hall, Alex waltzes down there and startles the cat-lady.
Alex gets distracted by a stone bust of Beethoven.
Not seeing the milk saucers on the floor, he trips.
WHACK! Cat-lady cracks his head with her stick.
Alex grabs her stick and pulls her down on the floor, still holding onto the table-cloth.
More struggling ensues. Tripping on another milk saucer, Alex is down, being scratched by the cats and whacked on the head by their owner's walking stick.
Fed up, Alex takes a silver statue and bashes the cat-lady across the head with it.
Police sirens sound in the distance. Alex runs for the front door.
He is met with Dim and Dim's chain.
Dim whips Alex in the head with his chain, blinding him momentarily, and then runs off.
Alex stumbles in the hallway, groping at things blindly, until the policemen come upon him.
He realizes that Dim and co. have sold him out.
Alex yells at the police that his friends – his former brothers – forced him to do this.
Alex is taken away in the squad car.
He insists that his friends put him up to the test with this last job.
Alex is dragged into a brightly lit office with whitewashed walls.
Alex demands a lawyer, but gets laughed at and punched instead.
Alex almost throws up, but holds it back.
He retaliates with a kick and punch.
After that, the four policemen gang up on him and beat him until he cries apologies.
P. R. Deltoid comes to visit Alex.
Alex tries to explain that he was influenced by his no-good friends.
P. R. Deltoid spits in Alex's face, then wipes his wet lips with the back of his hand. Alex thanks P. R. Deltoid, who leaves promptly.
The police now push Alex to make a statement that would then be turned into a signed confession. So, Alex gushes on about the ultra-violence and the rape for pages on end, making sure to include his so-called friends.
Alex is then kicked, punched, and bullied off to a holding cell with ten or twelve other criminals, most of them drunk. Two of these criminals are "queer" and immediately try to molest him. Alex manages to fight them off with the help of a cop.
Exhausted, Alex drifts off thinking about Beethoven's Ninth.
A cop comes to wake Alex up from the other end of the holding cell. Reluctantly, Alex goes to him.
But before the cop can open his mouth, Alex knows the scoop: the cat-lady has died in the hospital; apparently, Alex cracked her a bit too hard.
Alex thinks about all the cats, now orphaned, having no mistress who will feed them.
Alex realizes that he has committed murder, and reveals that he has done so at the ripe old age of fifteen.
Alex narrates from cell number 84F in Staja.
Alex has been sentenced to fourteen years.
Alex reflects upon the two hard years in the human zoo. On a daily basis, he has dealt with wardens that kick and beat him, perverts who wish to rape him, all the while toiling away in the factory making matchboxes and doing exercises in the courtyard. Sometimes, he has to suffer through guest speeches on beetles or the Milky Way for "education" purposes, but during these speeches, he keeps himself entertained thinking about happier, ultra-violent days.
One day, Alex is informed that his friend Georgie died while involved in some ultra-violence with Dim and Pete. The news pleases him.
More time passes, and Alex adjusts to prison life. He has a new job playing the stereo for the prison chaplain during Sunday worship. He likes his new job.
Alex reveals that the chaplain likes him because of his interest in the Bible. Alex especially delights in all the sex and violence he gets to read about in the Old Testament.
Alex is not so partial to the New Testament because it gets a bit preachy for his taste.
Alex excels at his new job, always ready with the record or the disc on queue.
Alex takes the chance to ask the chaplain about a certain new "treatment" that gets one out of prison in no time at all, ensuring that one stays out of prison as well.
Ludovico's Technique, answers the chaplain thoughtfully. He hesitantly cautions Alex that the program is just in its infancy.
Alex answers that it must be starting to get used, because he sees the new white buildings they've been putting up adjacent to the Staja.
Alex goes back to his cell after lunch to find that he has a new cellmate.
Alex muses that his new cellmate marks the beginning of his getting out of jail.
That night, Alex wakes up to find the guy lying next to him in his bed, snoring and masturbating. Alex punches him as a part of a reflex.
Alex punches the guy and the rest of his cellmates join in. Alex ends the fight by kicking the new prisoner in the head.
Alex goes to bed, dreaming about Beethoven and Handel until the prison buzzer wakes him up.
Alex touches the stiff body of the guy he kicked, now dead.
The prisoners panic a bit, but decide that Alex is the main person responsible for his death.
Alex retorts that everyone joined in on teaching the guy a lesson, so why should he take the fall?
At 11am, the Governor and the Chief and other important-looking officials come for Alex. They chat among one another about whether the Government should move away from outmoded theories of dealing with criminals and embrace the a theory based on a "curative" view.
Alex tries to butt in, but is shut down quickly.
One of the official-looking people turns to the Governor and suggests that he take Alex to Brodsky, because Alex is young, bold, and vicious…and ought to be transformed out of recognition.
To Alex, those words taste like freedom.
That evening, the guards drag Alex down to the Governor's office.
The Governor tells Alex that he is to be "transformed" starting tomorrow by enrolling in a two-week program which will end in his release.
Alex expresses his gratitude.
Alex signs a waiver granting the State the power to "reclaim" him.
The next morning, Alex is brought to the new white building adjacent to Staja.
Alex feels lucky upon seeing his own room.
Alex asks what he'll be doing.
Dr. Branom decides that Alex seems a bit under-nourished, probably due to the poor prison food.
He suggests that Alex expect a shot after every meal.
Alex lies in bed daydreaming about freedom, getting out, and getting a new gang together.
He has a meal of hot roast-beef with mashed potatoes, followed by ice cream and tea for dessert. There's even a cigarette.
This is the life, thinks Alex.
Half an hour after his meal, a woman nurse with nice breasts comes in and gives him a shot in the arm.
Some white coat now comes in with a wheelchair for Alex, who questions why it's necessary.
He realizes soon thereafter that he's been feeling a bit weak.
Alex enters a mind-blowing room with a giant silver screen, a dentist-looking chair, and lots of white coats. Still feeling weak, Alex has to crawl from the wheelchair into the dentist's chair.
A white coat straps his head, hands, and feet down; the staff also attaches clips to his forehead so that his eyelids are forced to be open.
Alex wonders out loud how "horrorshow" this film must be.
Alex is forced to watch a film. He begins to feel ill in the stomach.
A second film, and Alex is feeling pains all over his body and also wanting to throw up one minute and not the next. He begins to feel distress.
They show him a third film. Alex reasons with himself that this film cannot be real, but he still feels just as sick.
A fourth film shows an old woman shopkeeper being robbed by a lot of modern youth. The woman is being burned alive, and her shrieks make Alex want to vomit.
The fifth film Alex views takes place during World War II. Alex feels now feels such horrible pain in his head and belly that he screams for the film to be stopped.
Alex now refuses to describe the other films he's been forced to watch that afternoon, but he does let on that he believes Dr. Brodsky and Dr. Branom and all the white coats are sicker than any of the prisoners he's met.
Finally, Alex is released – sick and tired and nauseous – back to his room.
Alex realizes that the white coats must be doing something to make him ill, and wonders if it's the wires that are attached to him.
A Discharge Officer comes in to question Alex's plans upon his release.
Before exiting the room, the Discharge Officer challenges Alex to punch him in the face.
Alex is puzzled, but attempts to punch the officer in the face anyhow.
He immediately feels ill, thinking the whole thing pretty funny.
After dinner, Alex goes to sleep and has a nightmare about one of the films he saw that afternoon.
At the height of all the ultra-violence in the dream, he feels paralyzed and nauseated.
Alex wakes up and attempts to get out of the room, only to find it locked and the windows barred. He realizes for the first time that there's no escaping from all of this.
Worse, he does not dare to go back to sleep, not wanting to get sick.
Soon enough, he is able to fall asleep anyhow, and thank goodness, he doesn't have to dream.
This chapter opens with Alex screaming for the white coats to stop the film.
Alex throws up while pleading with the white coats to stop the film and its musical accompaniment. He calls it a filthy unforgivable sin to play Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 while showing a Nazi film.
Alex retreats, stating that he doesn't care about the ultra-violent films, but he won't forgive the white coats for playing Beethoven and Handel with the films.
Alex squirms, saying that he's learned his lesson, and that his paradigm has been transformed. He's against violence, finally.
Alex reasons that it must be the shot that's making him sick.
The next day, Alex hits the nurse in order to avoid his shot.
Alex then skips the minutiae in his descriptions of the film-viewing. He states that the days seem to blend together as he's shown the same likeness of ultra-violent films: Japanese torturers or Nazi shooters…whatever.
Then, one morning Alex wakes up to have his breakfast and shot, and the nurse with the syringe does not come.
Today, Alex was going to walk to the screening room accompanied by a white coat.
No syringes? None needed.
The film rolls, and Alex feels sick. But this time, he realizes that he can no longer blame the syringes for feeling sick and thirsty and full of aches. He realizes that the Ludovico stuff is like a vaccination, and that his blood has been poisoned against the ultra-violence.
Alex cries and cries and cries…
That night, he lies in bed alone, contemplating escape.
He fakes illness, crying out to the doctors that he is dying…
A jangle of keys at the door; Alex prepares to throw his fists at the first fool that opens the locked door.
The problem is, Alex envisions his unsuspecting victim in pain. And a sickness arises in him as if it might kill him.
Alex stumbles toward the bed in fear, moaning "urgh urgh urgh."
Finally, while Alex lies there immobile, the white coat punches him in the face for his deceit.
Alex learns that he has become a total wimp, and that now it feels better to him to be hit than to throw a punch.
The fortnight is up for Alex. There's one real big day left. It's to be a "passing-out day."
This morning, Alex's been given the clothes he was wearing on the night he was arrested, except now all nicely pressed. He's even been given his knife back.
Led quietly to the same old room, Alex notices that the curtains have been drawn in front of the silver screen, and that the frosted viewing glass under the projection area has disappeared.
The Staja Governor, the chaplain, the Minister of the Interior, the doctors, and the other white coats are all there.
The lights go out. Two spotlights begin to shine.
One shines on Alex; the other shines on a big dude he's never seen before.
The man starts to insult Alex. Then he pinches Alex's nose, twists his ear…the pain stings!
The dude challenges Alex to hit back.
Alex reaches for his knife, but is immediately overwhelmed by images of blood gushing out of the guy. He realizes that he has to change his own perception of this adversary before he starts to get sick.
Alex pleads with the man to take his cigarette, then his knife, then offers to clean his boots.
Alex licks the dude's shoes. The audience roars with laughter.
Alex screeches, what about me? Am I just an animal? Am I just a clockwork orange?
Alex notes that the second actor, a woman, has nice breasts.
Alex is aroused, and immediately thinks about raping her like a fierce savage.
But a shot of sickness pierces through his daydream and he knows he has to think about something else before it takes over completely.
Alex breaks into what seems like a Shakespearean sonnet, offering to worship and protect the young actress.
Standing outside of the white building the next day, Alex recounts his last day inside it.
On an empty stomach, Alex decides to grab some grub.
Alex reads the morning paper. Alex throws the paper on the floor in a fit of rage.
A homebound Alex looks forward to surprising his parents, all the while dreaming about the classical music he'll be able to listen to in bed.
Alex opens the door to his home with the key he has in his pants; he finds himself confronted by three pairs of frightened eyes, belonging to his parents and to a stranger Alex has never seen before.
Alex's parents started questioning him how he broke out of jail.
Alex starts to explain, and the stranger starts to huff and puff…
Alex questions the stranger: how long has he been there, what he does, etc. He looks to be thirty or forty, very ugly, very middle-class.
Alex's dad interrupts to defend the stranger, Joe. He lives there now; he's renting Alex's room.
Upon noticing that his stereo and discs are gone from his room, Alex screams out in pain, calling Joe a horrible bastard.
A baffled Alex sits down.
Alex retorts to Joe with profanity, and instantly feels pretty sick.
Alex starts to cry, feeling very sorry for himself.
In tears, Alex speaks out about how everyone just wants him to suffer.
Alex staggers out the door, saying that he'll never be seen again. And that he wishes he were back in prison.
Alex wanders into the disc shop he used to frequent.
Alex wants to listen to a bit of the Mozart Number Forty in the listening booth.
Alex feels himself growing angry with the flippant teenager there, but quickly tries to forget about it, and instead smiling at him.
The music is piped over…Alex realizes he had forgotten how Ludovico's Technique has ruined all classical music for him.
Crawling out of the booth sick and in pain, Alex staggers into the Korova Milkbar around the corner.
Alex orders some laced milk, size large.
The hallucinogens work on Alex. He starts to trip on the whole world.
He starts to make funny noises.
He talks about God and his Angels and Saints…and sees them standing in front of him in a sea of statues.
He feels light, almost like he's in Heaven.
He grows warm and cold, and collapses…
Alex starts to cry, feeling like death may be the only answer to his sorrows.
He doesn't know how he can kill himself without getting sick, though, as the thought of himself bloodied by his own sword makes him sick.
Alex walks to the public library to research other methods of dying, by drifting off into a dreamless sleep.
He flips through a medical book, but its descriptions and drawings of wounds and diseases only make him more sick.
Then he takes down the Bible, thinking it might give him comfort like it had in the Staja days.
But he's wrong; he starts to cry about Jews fighting with one another.
He converses with an old man.
A second old man recognizes Alex.
Alex responds that he's been punished for his crime since.
Alex is beaten up by the old men.
Alex pleads with the attendant to protect him, and to call the police.
The police had to beat up the old guys to disentangle Alex from them.
OMG! Alex recognizes the older cop as old Billyboy and the younger as none other than Dim.
Impossible, says Alex.
Billyboy and Dim force Alex into the backseat.
Alex can't help but wonder whether this is all a joke.
Alex asks about Pete and says he feels sorry about Georgie.
Alex freaks out. What's going on?
Dim punches Alex right in the nose. Blood drips out.
Dim and Billyboy beat Alex up. Finally, the cops drive away, leaving Alex lying there in the snow completely bloodied and disheveled.
Alex gets up and begins walking.
Alex stumbles upon a gate with HOME written on it. He swears he's seen this before.
He knocks on the door; it opens.
He tells the man he's been beaten up by the police and left to die on the road.
Alex knows right then what was so familiar about HOME.
Alex drinks some whiskey to warm up.
Alex recalls the manuscript, A Clockwork Orange, on the table.
Alex bathes, gets in some pajamas already laid out for him, and has supper with the writer.
The writer speaks of repayment.
The writer recognizes Alex from the picture in the paper.
The man urges Alex to tell his story.
Alex treads carefully, giving little detail about his crimes.
The writer wants Alex to help dislodge the current overbearing Government.
Alex agrees with the writer, but seems to be more concerned with how fervently the writer has been wiping the same dinner plate (he is washing and drying the dishes).
Alex recalls the vivid details of that unfortunate night he raped the writer's wife and caused her death. He starts to get sick.
Alex goes to bed.
After a really nice night's sleep, Alex walks around in the room trying to figure out the writer's name.
He has the fantastic idea of looking for the writer's name on a manuscript of A Clockwork Orange.
He leafs through the book and wonders if F. Alexander has been made crazy by his wife's death.
Alex wonders out loud why F. Alexander is so hot and strong against the Government.
And what does Alex get out of this, he wonders? Can he return to his enjoyment of classical music?
Well, F. Alexander ducks the question, and instead shows Alex an article he's written for him, soon to be published in The Weekly Trumpet.
It's a long, weepy piece, but Alex is kind enough to call it "real horrorshow" to F. Alexander.
Come again?
Horrorshow is nadsat speak for all modern youth, Alex explains.
Alex converses with F. Alexander's three friends who have just arrived.
Alex starts to argue with them.
Alex objects, crying that he doesn't want to be a plaything, an idiot that anyone could just use. After all, he's not dim.
F. Alexander raises an eyebrow when he hears the word "dim."
What's Dim got to do with it? Alex retorts, without thinking.
F. Alexander goes mad.
Alex tries to leave.
Z. Dolin, F. Alexander's associate who is also there, grabs a hold of Alex.
Alex is dragged into town by F. Alexander's associates.
They arrive at an apartment, plop Alex in, and tell him that this is his new home.
Before they leave, however, they ask Alex whether he's the person F. Alexander feared he was.
Alex responds that he's paid for his sins.
Alex takes a nap.
When he wakes up, he hears Otto Skadelig's Symphony Number Three through the wall.
Alex can enjoy it for only two seconds before the pain and sickness overcome him.
He bangs on the wall for it to be turned off.
He crashes against the wall until his knuckles bleed.
He plugs his ears with his fingers – no luck!
He bangs against the door – it is locked!
In a frenzy, he leaps from the window stories above ground, and bids farewell to the world, "May God forgive you for a ruined life."
He falls hard on the sidewalk.
Before he passes out, it becomes clear to him that F. Alexander and associates were trying to force his suicide to suit their own political agenda against the Government.
After a long time, Alex comes to, not knowing who he is or why he's been totally bandaged up. He can't feel anything.
Alex drifts in and out of consciousness for a while.
He comes to with Z. Dolin, Rubinstein, and D. B. da Silva there, calling him "friend" and saying how well he has served "Liberty."
Alex protests this, but to no avail because his mouth is bandaged up.
Alex falls into a dream, during which he's doing ultra-violent stuff like in the olden days. A little bit of smashing into a parked auto, a bit of raping young girls, and so on.
He wakes up in a hospital with his parents by his bed.
Alex orders them out of his room with a lot of violent profanity.
He realizes that he can think violent thoughts and not get sick.
He asks the nurse how long he's been there.
Alex has her confirm that Ludovico's Technique has been reversed on him.
More time passes and Alex gets a lot better. At 2:30pm one day, Alex receives a special visit from the Minister of the Interior, followed by a dozen of journalists and photographers.
The two converse cryptically for a while.
The Minister now tells Alex that he's been cured, after all, and that a high-paying job is lined up for him when he checks out. He also reminds Alex that it's the Government that ultimately put away the crazy lunatic, F. Alexander, who wants his life.
Distracted by the thought, a photographer screams out, SMILE! and Alex complies.
Now, the Minister brings in a present – a stereo! Alex is overjoyed.
Beethoven's Ninth is just a signature away, they tell him.
Alex signs, and the symphony that ensues is glorious indeed.
Alex, and his three new friends – Len, Rick, and Bully – are drinking milk-plus at the Korova Milkbar.
They are still dressed in the heighth of fashion.
Randomly, but presumably feeling the drugs kick in, Alex punches some dude in the stomach and orders his friends out of the bar.
The boys suggest grabbing a glass of hot something at the Duke of New York, not far away.
Alex grants permission.
Old ladies flirt with Alex for a round of freebies.
Alex isn't feeling it, saying that his cash is hard-earned.
Seeing how eager the old women are, he loosens up and orders them a round. He orders a small beer for himself.
As he pulls the money out of his pockets, a newspaper clipping of a baby drops to the floor. His entourage makes fun of him.
Alex tears up the photo, embarrassed.
Still not feeling it, Alex excuses himself and suggests meeting the next night.
It is dark outside, and Alex feels just as somber. He notes that lately his down moods have been dictating what music he listens to. Instead of great, violent symphonies, he's more partial to sappy romantic songs.
He walks into a coffeehouse for a cup of tea.
He bumps into Pete and Georgina at the coffeehouse.
Alex cannot believe how grown up Pete seems…and married, too!
Alex continues to sit in the coffeehouse after the couple leaves Alex, thinking about how time has passed him by. After all, he's eighteen now, and eighteen is not such a young age anymore.
Back out in the dark winter streets, Alex envisions his adulthood. He likes the idea of a wife, a mother to his son.
Anyway, a wife and a son: that's something new to do, like a new chapter in a book, this book of life.
And he resolves to do it all.

Alex Timeline and Summary

Alex Timeline and Summary

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