Irvine Welsh

Irvine Welsh was born in 1961 in Leith, Edinburgh, next to the docks, near Easter Road, the grounds of his favorite football club. He left school at sixteen and moved to London in pursuit of the punk scene, drugs, and-disgust you to see it-"all that very British, repressed, nudge-nudge wink-wink thing", which he turned into his first novel Trainspotting, published in 1993 and filmed on location.

"They were hostile and offhand to me, which didn't really bother me, in fact I enjoyed it."

Poet laureate of the chemical generation, Welsh has published The Acid House, Marabou Stork Nightmares, Ecstasy, Filth, Glue and Porno.

"They got fuck all on me."

Irvine Welsh currently lives in Chicago.