The Inner Scotch Monologue

When I’m caught up in a novel I usually spend my time outside of it walking around and talking in my head the way that the main character does, seeing things the way they see them, using turns of phrases that they use. So, since I’ve been reading Porno (Trainspotting II) recently, my inner voice has mostly had a brash Scottish accent and spent its time insulting passersby in the very worst ways imaginable.

I first noticed the extreme effect that getting too involved in a book has on me while reading Heavier than Heaven, a Kurt Cobain biography, and sinking into a deep depression until I finished. I was a student at the time so didn’t have to leave the house, and I didn’t, sitting in my room for three days sulking until I finished the book. I’ve spent time as Holden Caulfield, sneering at everybody that I interacted with, and, quite disturbingly, as Patrick Bateman, flipping between pretending to be an outrageous yuppie and a sicko while walking around the supermarket. I’ve fantasised about being characters from TV and films, like stealthily running through the streets as Jack Bauer, but it’s only with novels that the characters consume me, and change my inner voice as well as my actions. I hope I can create characters that are so well-drawn and powerful that they can mess around with readers’ minds.

Porno itself, I didn’t think was that good. It was a real page-turner and I was desperate to get to the end, but I think that this was mostly due to loving all of the characters in Trainspotting for the past ten years since I first saw the film, rather than anything so great about the sequel. I think I might be more of a sexual prude than a heroin one, because the smack-taking in Trainspotting didn’t bother me but the constant banging-on about sex in Porno did. It used to make me sad that Ewan McGregor and Danny Boyle had fallen out, and so the prospects of the sequel being filmed were slim, but now I agree with McGregor when he says that he doesn’t feel as if it’s a film that needs to be made. Some bits are very good and the love for characters left over from the first novel keeps things compelling, but there’s just too much emphasis put on shock tactics, and once you satiate the desire to know what happens to the characters at the end, there’s not that much value in the book as a stand-alone piece of art. It’s not bad, but it’s no Trainspotting.