[mduerksen]

I definitely disagree that Clojure introduces "real world nastiness" which would prevent a beginner from learning it "the clean way". Clojures data structures are very elegant and easy to grasp (e.g. you don't have to think about pointers or define equal operators, it's all there already). And you can define functions just as clean an "pure" as in Scheme.

I do agree that Clojure is very comprehensive, and can be overwhelming for a beginner. But you could buy a book, which will use only a subset of Clojure at the beginning. And when you get to the point where you can use the basic data structures and map, filter, reduce them, this will get you very far.

[phren0logy]

To me, the "real world nastiness" is the Java cruft surrounding it. You don't have to deal with it except to get a nice programming environment running. At this point the options are much more complicated and uglier than DrScheme.

[mduerksen]

That's not what the author seems to mean though: Clojure's exceedingly cool, but to understand it you need to speak lisp

But I agree, an uncomplicated und "Java-free" IDE would be a great gain for a low-threshold start with Clojure. Clojurebox is a beginning, but it in turn burdens a starter with Emacs.