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Anarchy inc. .. presents ..
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[A CLOCKWORK ORANGE] Glossary of NADSAT Language
Compiled and typed in by: The Stranger (...Harrison)
Reprinted without permission from the novel "A Clockwork Orange", by Anthony
Burgess (c) 1962 - All rights reserved.
Perhaps the most fascinating thing about the book (A CLOCKWORK ORANGE) is it's
language. Alex thinks and talks in the "nadsat" (teenage) vocabulary of the
future. A doctor in the book explains it. "Odd bits of old rhyming sland,"
he says. "A bit of gypsy talk, too. But most of the roots are Slav.
Propaganda. Subliminal penetration." Nadsat is not quite so hard to
decipher as Cretan Linear B, and Alex translates it. I found that I could not
read the book without compiling a glossary; I reprint it here, although it
is entirely unauthorized, and some of it is guesswork.
At first the vocabulary seems incomprehensible: "you could peet it with
vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom or one or two other veshches." Then the
reader, even if he knows no Russian, discovers that some of the meaning is
clear from context: "to tolchock some old veck in an alley and viddy him
swim in his blood." Other words are intelligible after a second context:
when Alex kicks a fallen enemy on the "gulliver" it might be any part of the
body, but when a glass of beer is served with a gulliver, "gulliver" is head.
(Life is easier, of course, for those who know the Russian word golova.)
Anthony Burgess has not used Russian words mechanically, but with great
ingenuity, as the transformation into "gulliver," with its Swiftian associates,
suggests. Others are brilliantly anglicized: khorosho (good or well) as
"horrowshow"; iudi (people) as "lewdies"; militsia (militia or police) as
millicents. Burgess has not used Russian words in an American slang extension,
such as nadsat itself, in the termination of the Russian numbers eleven to
nineteen, which he breaks off independently on the analogy of our "teen". Thus
kopat (to dig with a shovel) is used as "dig" in the sense of enjoy or under-
stand; koshka (cat) and ptitsa (bird) become the hip "cat" and "chick";
neezhny (lower) turns into "neezhnies" (underpants); pooshka (cannon) becomes
the term for a pistol; rozha (grimace) turns into "rozz", one of the words
for policeman; samyi (the most) becomes "sammy" (generous); soomka (bag) is the
slang "ugly woman"; vareet (to cook up) is also used in the slang sense, for
something preparing or transpiring.
The "gypsy talk", I would guess, includes Alex's phrase "O my brothers", and
"crark" (to yowl?), "cutter" (money), "filly" (to fool with), and such.
The rhyming slang includes "luscious glory" or "hair" (rhyming with "upper
story"?) and "pretty polly" for "money" (rhyming with "lolly" or current slang)
Others are inevitable associations, such as "cancer" for "cigarette" and
"charlie" for "chaplain". Others are produced simply by schoolboy transforma-
tions: "appy polly loggy" (apology), "baddiwad" (bad), "eggiweg" (egg),
"skolliwoll" (school), and so forth. Others are amputations: "guff" (guffaw),
"pee and em" (pop and mom), "sarky" (sarcastic), "sinny" (cinema). Some
appear to be portmanteau words: "chumble" (chatter-mumble), "mounch" (mouth-
munch), "shive" (shiv-shave), "skirking" (striking-scratching).
There are slight inconsistencies in the story when Alex forgets his word and
invents another or uses our word, but on the whole he handles his Russianate
vocabulary in a masterly fashion. It has a wonderful sound, particularly in
abuse, when "grahzny bratchny" sounds infinitely better than "dirty bastard".
[The above material was re-printed without permission from the AFTERWORD from
A CLOCKWORK ORANGE. It is condensed as to save wear-and-tear on my fingers.]
Stanley Edgar Hyman
July, 1963
GLOSSARY OF NADSAT LANGUAGE
Words that don't seem to be of Russian origin are distinguished by asterisks.