Summary
Too weak to stand on his own, Alex arrives at the screening
room in a wheelchair. The room is unlike any theater he has ever
seen. On one wall hangs a huge screen. Against another wall is an
array of meters. A pane of frosted glass is set in the back wall,
and through the window, Alex thinks he can see figures moving. In
the middle of the room sits a dentist’s chair, which has a series
of wires running through it. Attendants fasten Alex, who is fast
becoming limp and very sick, into the dentist’s chair. They strap
his head and hands down, and fasten clips to his forehead which
pull and keep his eyelids open. Then Dr. Brodsky enters, a short,
fat, curly-haired man with thick glasses and a sharp suit. With
everything prepared, Alex begins his treatment.
The first film Alex is forced to watch depicts an old
man being attacked and stripped naked by two fashionably dressed
boys. As he watches the brutal beating, Alex begins to feel sick
to his stomach. He tries to forget about it, but the nausea becomes
worse during the second movie, which portrays a gang rape involving
a young girl and several teenage boys. The violence appears so real
that Alex wonders how these movies could have been made with the
victims’ consent.
Alex watches three more films, during which Brodsky measures Alex’s
reactions through wires attached to his head and stomach. The first
film shows a single face being beaten and cut with a razor. The
face screams in anguish as the razor cuts out one of its eyes and its
teeth get yanked out with pliers. The second film shows an old woman
being robbed and burned alive in her store, shrieking in a way Alex
has never heard before. These images set Alex to retching, and he
pleads for a receptacle in which to vomit, but Brodsky calmly assures
him that it’s only his imagination. The last film takes place during
World War II, and shows Japanese soldiers laughing as they torture
their enemies in elaborate ways. The horror of this spectacle causes
Alex to scream and beg them to stop, but Brodsky and the others
simply laugh at him.
Though Alex only describes these five films, he sees several
more that afternoon that are so horrific that he decides his captors
are more deranged than any of the criminals in prison. When the
screenings are over, Alex feels horribly sick. Brodsky seems pleased
by the day’s proceedings and sends Alex back to his room. There,
Alex begins to recuperate and receives a visit by a smiling and
sympathetic Branom. Branom seems to know already that Alex is beginning
to feel better. He tells Alex that his body is in the process of learning
that violence is bad. A healthy human organism, he says, should
react to evil and destruction as Alex has just done. Alex doesn’t
believe him, though. He accuses Branom and the others of making
him feel ill, but when Branom asks how he feels at this moment,
Alex finds himself quite well, even hungry. This puzzles Alex, but
Branom’s reasoning is simple: “you felt ill this afternoon . . .
because you’re getting better.”
All this seems strange to Alex. He remains skeptical,
figuring that his illness has something to do with the wires. As
he considers resisting treatment the next day, a man calling himself
the Discharge Officer enters the room and asks Alex about his plans
once the two weeks are up. Reminded of his imminent release, Alex
concludes that it would be best to reserve his rebellious impulses
for the outside. The two casually discuss Alex’s future plans, and
Alex remains vague and noncommittal but secretly plans for future
mischief. Before the Discharge Officer leaves, he asks Alex if Alex
would like to punch him in the face, “just to see how [Alex is]
getting on.” The officer then moves his grinning face within striking
range but pulls back when Alex swings and walks away. Alex is bewildered
at first, then becomes violently ill for a few minutes, as if he
were back in the screening room.
That night, Alex dreams he’s leading a gang rape, but
just as the situation reaches its climax, Alex becomes paralyzed
with sickness and all the other rapists laugh at him. Alex then
wakes up feeling so sick that he climbs out of bed to vomit in the
bathroom. He finds his door locked and his window barred, preventing
escape. The nausea eventually subsides by itself, leaving Alex trembling
and afraid to go back to sleep.
