"He told me it came to him while he was in Moscow on an exchange visit. He was sitting in a coffee bar on a warm night." He was sitting near the window with a group of Russian friends when a menacing group of "Muscovite thugs" creepily pressed their faces against the window. That triggered the idea for the book, as well as for the creation of Nadsat, the strange English/Russian/Yiddish slang language used by the youth of "A Clockwork Orange."