The Trainspotters

Having seen the movie before ever reading the book, the storyline of Trainspotting is pretty easy for me to follow. However, through my reading I kept thinking to myself "how the hell could I have understood this without seeing the movie first?" The Scottish brogue (which I find to be the most fucked up version of the english language) that is extremely prevalent in the novel is hard to understand and difficult to form into cohesive scenes. The language paired with the delirium and chaos of a heroin addict's thought process makes for a confusing reading. The story switches point of view as often as the characters shoot heroin; a lot. And each narrator has a different style of narration which includes a shift in the phonetic language and accent. The narration overall seems to be in a stream of consciousness, helping to pull movement of the story out of proportion. It seems to me that Irvine Welsh is using the language to illustrate exactly the difficulty in understanding the thoughts and motivations of a heroin addict. It took me a bit of time to adjust my mind to the phonetic patterns in the novel, but once I got into the rhythm and began to understand the meanings of the slang words the language barrier was broken down. I started whizzing through. When I reached the chapter narrated by Nina, I found myself having a hard time adjusting back into the proper English. I think Welsh's decisions concerning the language of the novel works to mimic the patterns of drug use itself. At first the addiction is hard for an outsider to rationalise, but it is completely intriguing. Although the first few pages I was hard-pressed to understand what exactly was being described to me I was interested. The moments when I could piece together the situation I became excited and felt accomplished. This is much like the beginning stages of drug use. The soon-to-be user isn't yet comfortable with the drug or the lifestyle, but it is interesting and opens new doors of exploration in life. Once I found my groove in the story I did not want to get out of it, again like drug use. I was dependent on the patterns of the language to propel me forward. The user begins to really enjoy the drugs and does not see any need or reason to stop using. Then Welsh changes the game; he uses a language that I was (once) familiar and comfortable with, but at that point, after becoming accustomed to the patterns of the accent, it seems unnatural and uncomfortable, even boring. This switch in language even comes at a point in the story where Mark/Rents is 'seriously' considering quitting junk.  I am interested in seeing how Welsh continues these patterns through the rest of the novel, already knowing loosely how the arc of the story progresses.