Trainspotting

[singlemalt]

by Irvine Welsh. I'm 50 odd pages into this and it took me about 20 pages to get a hold on the dialect. Told by different narrators which makes it a challenge and there are a lot of characters.

But, boy can this guy write like a mofo!

[bennie2]

you know, I still haven't read trainspotting. like fight club, it was cool for the longest of times...

I try to avoid that "cool" so I've avoided reading it... well, had. now it's just slipped my mind...

a lot of the "language" made it into the film, yes? what I mean is the style of writing? it reminded me of the drums in heroin by velvet underground - now slow, now fast, now heartbeat...

I'm not a huge fan of regional dialect in novels. I live just outside glasgow so the edinburgh/leith dialect in trainspotting wasn't such a chore to me. but... I suppose it serves a purpose.

I would never write in my own dialect. no one outside of this small country would be able to read it.

and of course...

Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suite on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pishing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourself.
Choose your future.
Choose life....
...So why did I do it? I could offer a million answers, all false. The truth is that I'm a bad person, but that's going to change, I'm going to change. This is the last of this sort of thing. I'm cleaning up and I'm moving on, going straight and choosing life. I'm looking forward to it already. I'm going to be just like you: the job, the family, the fucking big television, the washing machine, the car, the compact disc and electrical tin opener, good health, low cholesterol, dental insurance, mortgage, starter home, leisurewear, luggage, three-piece suite, DIY, game shows, junk food, children, walks in the park, nine to five, good at golf, washing the car, choice of sweaters, family Christmas, indexed pension, tax exemption, clearing the gutters, getting by, looking ahead, to the day you die.

[singlemalt]

I never saw the movie. I have been waiting to finish the book. I don't know how cool or popular the book was/is. Maybe I'm a little slow in finally getting to it.

The dialect works for me. I could see it as a gimmick, but it forces me to think that the book is set in Edinburgh. If it wasn't for the dialect, the book would seem like it was occuring in New York or Chicago, or any other city.

Even though the dialect forces me to read slower than I usually do (which is pretty slow to begin with) the story moves quickly. I cannot deny that Welsh is a helluva good writer and probably a "real doss cunt."

[bennie2]

doss cunt!

yey! it makes me so proud to know that such colooqualisms are seeping through to the US

I'm not sure that the location is of any real importance, though... a group of junkies, one tries to quit... shit happens.... the end. ("shit happens", i.e. don't know how much you've read

people who have read the book have told me the film is "shite" but that's always the case. I read fight club before I saw the film and consequently, the film, although great, doesn't live up to what I'd expected.

[singlemalt]

I completely agree with you on Fight Club. I read the book first and it is far suprior to the movie.

The last book I read by an author from the U.K. was something by Nick Hornby. Talk about shite! I dinnae ken what the fuss is about him. Welsh wipes the floor with him.

[bennie2]

hm.

what I've read on hornby is... he's very much an "easy" writer. if that's correct. what I mean is, his books are easy reads.

High Fidelity is a good read. It used to have the title "one of my favourite books", although, this is an istance where the film is much better. john cusack plays the list making, music obsessed protagonist. I think they moved the location from london to chicago for the film... hey, nice link up there, eh? UK to chicago.

what I have read of welsh... he reminds me of the beats, or maybe more precisely... S Thopmpson.. the fluid style... greatly autobiographical...

I know welsh was a junkie himself for quiet some time, so...

[singlemalt]

i saw high fidelity and i wanted to read something different by hornby. i read about a boy. it was extremely disappointing. it really went nowhere. i suppose it was easy to read, but i didn't care about the characters while i was reading it and i cared even less about them when i finished it.