All in his strides
Irvine Welsh reanimates the Trainspotting gang — maybe for the last time?
Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh has revisited the characters that made his name — and adorned the bedroom walls of any self-respecting teenager in the mid-Nineties thanks to Danny Boyle’s film adaptation — before, in the excellent 2002 sequel Porno, the ambitious prequel Skagboys (2012) and, most recently, The Blade Artist (2016), in which only Begbie — the most terrifyingly familiar psychopath in modern British literature — returned, having undergone an unlikely rehabilitation as a successful artist living in LA.
Dead Men’s Trousers, the sequel to the sequel to the sequel, picks up with the whole crew now deep into middle age living through the time of Brexit, with the jacket cover promising — somewhat cynically you might argue — that this time, one of them won’t survive to the final page. For fans to whom Renton, Begbie, Sick Boy and Spud matter, it’s an irresistible premise, and, for that reason, one that demands Welsh put in a big match performance. Largely, he does. While Dead
Men’s Trousers suffers from the same flaws that dogged The Blade Artist and much of Welsh’s later work: specifically, a plot that stretches incredulity to breaking point (a storyline involving organ harvesting and an underwritten gangster in particular), at other times, such as when the old frenemies witness Hibernian’s Scottish Cup Final victory of 2016, the years are rolled back for characters and author alike.
On his day, no one captures the competing affections and resentments that underpin lifelong friendships like Welsh, and the original lads — Sick
Boy and Spud in particular — still bring out the best in him. There are fleeting moments in Dead Men’s Trousers that reach the heights of his three true masterpieces Trainspotting, Porno and 2001’s Glue.
Even where it does not, his new book still achieves what almost all Welsh’s novels do by keeping you gripped and choking on bursts of shocked laughter. Like Begbie, Welsh has softened with age but can still find his edge when he needs it. Dead Men’s Trousers (Jonathan Cape) is published on 29 March