Choose life, choose a job, choose Renton & Co before Trainspotting, choose to write prequel

Published on Wednesday 7 October 2009 22:01

THE antics of Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie in Trainspotting won Scottish writer Irvine Welsh worldwide fame.

But now the Leith-born writer has vowed to "kill off" the characters that made his name, after one last outing in a prequel set before Trainspotting.

The new novel is being finalised by Welsh and will be the last appearances from Renton, played in the 1996 film by Ewan McGregor, Sick Boy and Spud.

The soon-to-be-published book Skagboys will tell how the Edinburgh gang descended from football violence, soft drugs and casual sex into a life of heroin addiction.

He said: "I'd like to think it was the last we'll hear of them."

Revealing details of the new novel for the first time, Welsh said: "Trainspotting was more about the lives of hardcore heroin addicts.

"Skagboys is more about the changes in British society in the 1980s, when a new underclass was created, and how a group of ordinary, young working-class guys became heroin addicts.

"It centres more on their family dynamics and peer relations between them."

The cult characters also featured in Welsh's sequel to Trainspotting, Porno, released in 2002. Welsh said the Trainspotting characters were still his "first loves" in writing.

Most of the new novel was already written before Trainspotting was first published, Welsh said, but he thinks the latest book is unlikely to have the same impact, as the original sold millions around the world and spawned one of the biggest British movies of all time.

"I'd be very, very surprised if it had the same impact as Trainspotting," he said. "You can only be responsible for the quality of the book, not how it's received. That's to do with a myriad of factors beyond your control.

"I've written better books than Trainspotting, but it would be hard for another book I write to make a bigger impact."

Even though he says that Renton, Sick Boy and Spud will now be laid to rest, he has left the door open for a return for violent thug Francis Begbie, who was played by Robert Carlyle in the film, claiming he would love to write about the character in his later years.

Welsh said: "I'm still quite interested in Begbie as a middle-aged man."

And he has promised to return to the 1980s for further novels, saying the Thatcher years were the most fascinating period in modern British history: "I'm obsessed with the 80s, which makes me feel now almost like a historical novelist, not just because I lived through them as a youth, but in retrospect they seem a huge point of transition for British society.

"We made choices then – whether they were good or bad or both is a moot point – but the ramifications of them are more apparent than ever. I'm interested in youth culture today in the globalised world, but I wouldn't be on it like younger writers. It's their territory."

Welsh also revealed details of his current project, directing a Scottish remake of Steve McQueen movie The Magnificent Seven.

He said: "I'm directing a film called the Magnificent 11. It's a mad romp about football, cowboy builders, Indian restaurants and gangsters. Very British, and daft, crazy fun."