Irvine Welsh quotes - page 2

Irvine Welsh is a Scottish novelist and playwright, best known for his gritty portrayal of contemporary Scottish life. His most famous work, "Trainspotting," was adapted into a highly influential film. He has earned acclaim for his distinctive narrative voice and exploration of social issues. Here are 73 of his quotes:

The first job of a writer is to be honest.

Irvine Welsh

Funny scene, likesay, how aw the psychos seem tae ken each other, ken what ah means, likes?

Irvine Welsh

"We are all acquaintances now". It goes beyond our personal junk circumstances; a brilliant metaphor for our times.

Irvine Welsh

Ah jist shrugged, -- Well, as one anarchist plumber sais tae the other: smash the cistern.

Irvine Welsh

He had noted that with older people. They often try to control younger, more popular and vivacious people; usually due to the fact that they are jealous of the qualities the younger people have and they lack. These inadequacies are disguised with a benign, protective attitude.

Irvine Welsh

The duty sergeant was going through his routine of asking each brawling set of prisoners who the Billy and who the Tim was. If the handshake is right he will let the Billy go and slap the Tim around a bit. That way everybody's happy. The Billy gets to feel superior and delude himself that being a non-churchgoing 'protestant' is somehow important; the Tim gets to feel persecuted and indulge his paranoia about masonic conspiracies; the sergeant gets to slap the Tim around.

Irvine Welsh

I'm not running away, I'm moving on.

Irvine Welsh

Now there is apparently a causal link between heroin addiction and vegetarianism.

Irvine Welsh

I dinnae Tam, ah jist dinnae. Life's boring and futile. We start oaf wi high hopes, then we bottle it. We realize that we're aw gaunnae die, withoot really findin oot the big answers. We develop aw they long-winded ideas which jist interpret the reality ay oor lives in different weys, withoot really extending oor body ay worthwhile knowledge, about the big things, the real things. Basically, we live a short, disappointing life; and then we die. We fill oor lives up wi shite, shite like joabs n relationships, tae delude ourselves intae thinkin that it isnae aw totally pointless. Smack's an honest drug, because it strips away these delusions. It's the only really honest drug. It disnae alter yir consciousness. It jist gies ye a hit and a sense ay well-being. After that, ye see the misery ay the world as it is, and ye cannae anesthaetise yirsel against it.

Irvine Welsh

Now, for the first time, he's seeing that there really is a way out of this, and it's all so simple. You don't have to run away. You just meet somebody special and step sideways into a parallel universe.

Irvine Welsh

don't let jesus in. AA is just one obsession replaced with another.

Irvine Welsh

I feel like I've exhausted guys and male friendships.

Irvine Welsh

I tend to read more nonfiction, really, because when I'm writing I don't like to read other fiction.

Irvine Welsh

I wanted to capture the excitement of house music, almost like a four-four beat, and the best way to do that was to use a language that was rhythmic and performative.

Irvine Welsh

I'm always watching people over a short time frame, putting them in an extreme position. Sometimes you don't see the humanity in a person because the time frame is so short and the circumstance so extreme.

Irvine Welsh

When I first started to get into writing, it was via music. I'd generate ideas for songs that would turn into stories, then they'd turn into novels. I was biased toward music.

Irvine Welsh

Writing is about culture and should be about everything. That's what makes it what it is.

Irvine Welsh

When people start writing there is this idea that you have to get everything right first time, every sentence has to be perfect, every paragraph has to be perfect, every chapter has to be perfect, but what you're doing is not any kind of public show, until you're ready for it.

Irvine Welsh

Sometimes there's a snobbery among literary types that these people don't really get it, but in a lot of ways they get it more than the literati. There's a culture in the background that they understand and know. They get that deeper level.

Irvine Welsh

I grew up in a place where everybody was a storyteller, but nobody wrote. It was that kind of Celtic, storytelling tradition: everybody would have a story at the pub or at parties, even at the clubs and raves.

Irvine Welsh

It's different in Scotland. People who come to readings are more interested in literature as such, but the readership in general is really quite diverse. It's a cliche, but it's said that people who read my books don't read any other books, and you do get that element.

Irvine Welsh

There is a kind of mysticism to writing.

Irvine Welsh