Irvine Welsh's 'Filth'

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I think it's unjustly underrated. I think he's a genius with the dialogue and dialects.

― dave q, Sunday, 10 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

are you being sarcastic

― zumbar, Sunday, 10 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I agree, although to understand the dialect I have to read his stuff out loud with a put-on Scotch accent. I think John Aberdein possibly does that sort of dialect better but Irvine Welsh's writing is way more transfixing and more readable.

― toraneko, Monday, 11 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I have to read his stuff out loud with a put-on Scotch accent.

I'm no good at pretending I'm drunk.

― richard john gillanders, Monday, 11 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

It's scary how reliable this postulate of mine has become....if it turns out guys I just met can't relate to Irvine's brand of humor, chances are my friendship with them won't last past 2 weeks...I'm serious....this is how closely scosha thuglife and attendant comedy mirrors my own sense of humor and how I look at motherfuckers within my perimeter....I know Irv is played out, but his stuff clicked with me on a bugging-out-on-and-loving-every-affectation-of-the-cultural- other level second only to 80's-crenshaw type movie=>mid-90's US black culture...I'll always treasure him and noone else makes me laugh as hard...

That said I think Filth is his worst...I can't put my finger on why so I'll just say the font was too big....his new one GLUE is nothing new or flashy but it does the trick for me...warms my belly like cheddar rice and mushrooms.

But yes, dave, he's got an insane ear for dialect.....you know what? People that don't get off on dialects are almost worthless human beings to me....if a guy doesn't "get" why I think charver or down south booty bass lingo is the greatest, I don't "get" what he's doing in my car....further I don't "get" why I'm letting him continue to breathe....usually it's the kind of person that thinks he's a good writer simply because he has passable standard grammar...you know the type....film buffs

― Ramosi, Monday, 11 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I wuz a rabid Welsh fan, lost interest with Marabou Stork Nightmares, didn't read Ecstasy. Finally I picked up Filth to read during a sunny San Francisco vacation in Big Sur - I'd heard it wuz a "return to form" - but I couldn't even finish it. Yes, the man was a horrible person. MMm. Right. The slang seemed forced at times though. A lot of recycling. In the acid house you get the idea that these kids are almost surprising themselves with their own language. Nothing surprises our man in Filth. Zero joy. Anyway it got samey and tiring. Thought the trip to the 'Dam was memorable. Ramosi you are so right-on about the FONT!!

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, 12 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Filth isn't a bad book, for some reason his signature pointless violence seems to fit more in the context. Glue is rubbish, rubbish, rubbish that I barely feel inclined to bother finishing.

― electric sound of jim, Sunday, 17 February 2002 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

two years pass...

i just read this. i can't tell if it was good or bad or if I liked it or hated it. the lead-up to the ending is quite over the top and a big mess, and the tapeworm device doesn't always work very well. some of it is just too unbeliveable; if he's smelling as bad as he says, and is that covered in rashes and flaking crotch skin, why are any of these women fucking him? Now obv. when you get to the end of the book it becomes clear he's not a very reliable narrator, but still.

but still, I kind of liked it.

― kyle (akmonday), Thursday, 9 September 2004 04:32 (twenty years ago)

it's a couple of years since i read that book, but i rather thought the women weren't just randomly fucking him as some kind of good catch? weren't they generally prostitutes or in positions of imbalanced power to the cop (was he called bruce?)? the one scene where he pretty much forces oral sex on a female character in conjunction with the tales of his bad hygiene and skin disorder had me actually physically retching.

i thought it was quite a good book; i find most of irvine welsh's books pretty farfetched but in the sense that the improbability of the stories are a device to emphasise some of the poorer aspects of human nature i find them quite effective. i didn't much like glue or porno though. at least nowhere near as much as i liked his earlier novels.

― gem (trisk), Thursday, 9 September 2004 04:38 (twenty years ago)

well, he seduces the wife of one of his friends/coworkers, and has been having a long-standing affair with his sister-in-law, and there's someone else whose relationship to him I can't remember, who he gets into "turning off the gas" (choking at the point of orgasm), so there are at least three that weren't really coerced. but yeah the rest are prostitutes. but even prostitues draw the line somewhere, I think.

― kyle (akmonday), Thursday, 9 September 2004 04:42 (twenty years ago)

eight years pass...

And now a film w/ the (too lovely?) McAvoy:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2013/apr/12/filth-trailer-james-mcavoy-irvine-welsh

― Pope Rusty I (Dr Morbius), Saturday, 13 April 2013 07:57 (twelve years ago)

one year passes...

anyone like the film?

― images of war violence and historical smoking (Dr Morbius), Friday, 6 June 2014 19:03 (eleven years ago)

Oh, and in the book he used Frank Sidebottom's voice for his evil doings. Does he do that in the film?

― Mark G, Friday, 6 June 2014 20:34 (eleven years ago)

I couldn't get past the first 10 minutes of this, it felt like it would only become more painful.

― xelab, Friday, 6 June 2014 21:20 (eleven years ago)

he does use Sidebottom in the film, whole exercise felt pointless for the most part tho i did enjoy the "Silver Lady" scene, one of those films full of unnecessary hanging threads from the book, not that i have any real yen to read the book

― arid banter (Noodle Vague), Friday, 6 June 2014 21:26 (eleven years ago)

Ta, NV.

― Mark G, Friday, 6 June 2014 22:15 (eleven years ago)

book is awful

― Οὖτις, Friday, 6 June 2014 22:27 (eleven years ago)

five months pass...

loved the Silver Lady sequence, wish it had gone on longer. film is a total mess but i can't believe McAvoy wasn't praised to the skies for his work in it. definite future cult classic in the making i'd wager.

― piscesx, Thursday, 6 November 2014 15:25 (ten years ago)

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