#renton

So, news, i got an ipad, and this is from the request i take from my friends on Twitter.

Trainspotting gang and Rumplestlitskin!

God, this made me realize I didn’t draw Robert Carlyle for so long…

You only need to know two things about Trainspotting:

1- Drugs dude

2- These two are hatemarried

(3-) I love/hate ‘em

“We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we’re all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. We develop all those long-winded ideas which just interpret the reality of our lives in different ways, without really extending our body of worthwhile knowledge, about the big things, the real things. Basically, we live a short disappointing life; and then we die. We fill up our lives with shite, things like careers and relationships to delude ourselves that it isn’t all totally pointless.”

Trainspotting(1996)

Skagboys is the prequel to Irvine Welsh’s phenomenal 1993 novel Trainspotting which was later immortalised by Danny Boyle’s feature film in 1996. Welsh later followed the success of Trainspotting with other novels and short stories, most of which are based in the familiar setting of Edinburgh and Leith.

There is much to enjoy about Skagboys. It is always nice to revisit memorable characters but the general subject matter is not largely different from Trainspotting itself. Skagboys details the lives of Renton, Sick Boy and Spud amongst others as they embark on heroin addiction. It hints at the choices people make which change their lives and the political and social circumstances which led to drug abuse being so prevalent in 1980s Scotland.

Typically Thatcherite policy bears the brunt of the blame. A growing underclass with no possibilities or hope of progression are easy fodder for the escape which heroin promises but ultimately fails to deliver. The death of working class values leads the majority of the book’s characters down a road to oblivion, be it drugs or in the case of Begbie, extreme and at times indiscriminate violence.

Renton’s character is perhaps the most interesting in this book. He throws away a promising university career and beautiful girlfriend for the aimlessness and depression which drug addiction is certain to bring. Whether or not it is because of his childhood or disabled brother’s persistent struggle against illness is ambiguous. It seems that Welsh leaves readers open to wonder if many users begin drug habits just for the sheer fun or curiosity of it.

Skagboys is a lot less enjoyable than Porno, the 2002 sequel to Trainspotting which brought out the more humorous and debaucherous side of Welsh’s writing. It may be a worthwhile read for fans of his work but there is little in it to merit publication as it is all familiar and well tread territory. Having said that, Welsh remains one of modern fiction’s most ambitious writers and anything he has published deserves the benefit of the doubt.