Burgess is a natural writer, if such an animal exists, but he is certainly no struggler. Throughout his career he has been all too content to let his undeniable talents as a wordsmith, and his not inconsiderable erudition, carry more than their fair share of the artistic burden. That is a great pity since Burgess, a Joyce scholar and a writer almost painfully attuned to the possibilities of language in modern fiction, is superbly equipped to undertake a really major work. His apparent unwillingness to do this—to take the time to do it—is the worst kind of arrogance. It is as if he feels he is so clever, so on top of things, he need not exert himself. He's wrong.

Burgess has written only one first-rate novel: A Clockwork Orange. In it, he succeeded in transforming his oft-expressed anxieties about the future into an inspired work...