Against all odds, the four main characters of Trainspotting (1993) reached their fifties. 30 years after his big break, Irvine Welsh reunites Mark Renton, Francis Begbie, Sick Boy and Spud in Marked for Death (Anagrama). As soon as this gang has a pint (i.e. Begbie mineral water) anything can go wrong; This means, in literary terms, a novel that is fast, wild, grotesque, satirical, funny and… melancholy. As Phil Lynott said, the boys are back in town. Marked for Death is expected to complete the cycle that started with Trainspotting and continued with Porno, Skagboys and The Blade Artist. We’ll see if this is the case.
Why did you find it interesting to rescue Trainspotting’s main quartet of fifties?
I enjoyed reimagining Begbie in The Blade Artist, and the novel’s ending, where Begbie meets Renton on the plane, left me no choice. I had to pull the thread. This was a final beginning.
Which of the four characters do you have the most fun writing?
The four of them give a lot of play and together they have an advantage, when you get a little bored with one you go to the other. It’s amazing to be in the world and the mindset of each of them. If Begbie goes crazy, you can go to Spud to calm down. And such.
What would twenty-somethings Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie think of the fifties they’ve become?
Nothing. When you’re young, you don’t have time to think about old people. Actually, I still don’t have time to think about the elderly. After the age of 30, people lose interest.
The heroes’ lives have long been separated, there are scores pending between them, and it’s all a matter of maintenance. What makes a certain friendship continue despite everything?
You always stick to your friends since your youth or youth. Even if you don’t like them and have bad feelings, they are like a second family. There are two things that serve as bonds in this environment: shared experience and self-justification. Each wants to justify his life to the others in the group, wants the others to witness that he has done something worthwhile with his life.
How has Edinburgh changed in the 30 years since you published Trainspotting?
Edinburgh city center has become a wealthier area at the expense of the rest of the metropolitan area. Now all major cities are designed for business, tourism and students. The aim is to attract as many conferences, tourists and students as possible. Cities are no longer the places of those who live in them, but of the people who live there for days, weeks, months. This is the case at a general level.
In Marked for Death, Renton explains that he loves Barcelona, no matter how touristy and no matter how noble. Do you share?
Amine. Great location from the port to Tibidabo. You feel like you’re at the center of the world, and there aren’t many cities right now that make you feel that way. I know many people say the situation is getting worse. Okay, I understand, but it still has a lot of magic.
Can people change, or can they hide their dangerous side?
It is very difficult to change. The characters in Marked for Death try to become better versions of themselves, even though they cannot change their past.
Have you tried offering them some kind of redemption, pardon the cliché?
I suggested an evolution because readers need changes to maintain interest in the characters. They have light spots that make hooking easy no matter how dark it is.
Begbie is satirizing the art world, isn’t he?
Definitely. While it is creative, it is also… let’s say a little destructive. Like anarchists. In Begbie’s hands, an act of destruction is also an act of creativity. It allows me to explore the fascination that many posh people have for wild working-class artists in a way that I find very entertaining.
Is Sick Boy also a satire on the fuck case?
The character is way beyond that point. My theory is that he wants to be a woman. He is aware that women are a superior gender to men and that this is the driving force of his actions.
Renton went from Iggy Pop fan to disc jockey manager. Does the development of your musical taste reflect your own?
I think so. Although I’ll never be able to manage disc jockeys, it seems like a pretty terrible job to me. I gave him this job to destroy him: the man who waits to be creative ends up serving creative people. I was and still am very immersed in electronic music. Frankly, I don’t go to as many parties as I used to, but I kind of stuck there because I love the club life. A force that gives my life so much energy. I also recently founded the Jack Said What record label.
Is Marked for Death really the end of the Trainspotting saga?
I don’t think I would want to write a novel with older characters. But it can still be tempting to salvage something from your past. Actually I have no idea. I never know what to write until I start writing.
What contributions do you think Trainspotting has to English literature?
I think I was the first person in Britain to write about the collapse of regular work and the birth of another world. Trainspotting tells the story of how people cope with life without secure employment. This change was brutal for the working class and therefore for society as a whole.
In Trainspotting’s final storyline, the Edinburgh gang travel to London to sell a batch of heroin and their alibi is attending a concert by The Pogues, whose singer Shane MacGowan died on 30 November. Did his death affect you?
It was a very hard blow. We had the same friends in London during the punk era. We moved to Dublin at the same time in the early 2000s and reconnected there. I thought about sharing a few photos of us on Instagram, but most of the photos we took together were party-oriented and didn’t seem like a good tribute to a great songwriter. There is a popular image of Shane as cursed by drink and drugs, but the truth is that Shane was a very positive and inspiring person.
What did the Pogues mean to you in the ’80s?
I was a big fan. Between the death of punk and the birth of acid house, almost all music was shit. These were terrible years under Thatcher’s government. But there was Shane and The Pogues.