Scan barcode
A review by joeyoudan
The Acid House by Irvine Welsh
3.0
Not Welsh at his absolute best, but he gets near it… though not often enough for my liking. The short stories, can take em or leave em. Didn’t do too much- for me, they seem almost like attempts by Welsh to capitalise on his rep as a crazy disgusting writer of depraved tales.
However, the novella ‘A Smart Cunt’ I really liked, and showcases Welsh’s talent better. Because it’s longer, it allows for a bit more thought, and Welsh is probably at his best when his preferred Edinburgh setting. Nothing much happens, but, arguably, it says more about drug culture and the reasons behind it than Trainspotting does. It’s certainly more of a ‘drug book’ than Trainspotting (though I hate that term) but it’s more confined to that subject. It does give a pretty sobering, despondent, nihilistic take on human life that, for me, is beautifully etched as follows Brian meandering along without purpose.
However, there are a few issues with ‘A Smart Cunt’ that mean that it isn’t genius, and it can’t lift the collection higher than 3stars. The whole notion of Brian being too clever for his surroundings, and thus suffering the consequences of that feel a bit hamfisted (as well as being basically identical to Renton). He keeps getting called ‘Smart Cunt’ but often he isn’t really being clever, so the other characters seem to lose credibility as they’re pissed off at him for little to no reason a lot of the time. And, you don’t really get the other side of the story from alternate POV’s as you do in Trainspotting, so he just comes across as a misunderstood guy that’s been through some shit. Which, overall, doesn’t feel as complex as how Renton is carefully built. And, the judgement of the novella as a whole is basically dependant on one’s like/dislike for Brian, because the plot simply follows him. And so, Brian’s weaknesses are the novella’s, and though they are admittedly few, and the novella remains impressive, they are such to retract, if only slightly, from its quality.
However, the novella ‘A Smart Cunt’ I really liked, and showcases Welsh’s talent better. Because it’s longer, it allows for a bit more thought, and Welsh is probably at his best when his preferred Edinburgh setting. Nothing much happens, but, arguably, it says more about drug culture and the reasons behind it than Trainspotting does. It’s certainly more of a ‘drug book’ than Trainspotting (though I hate that term) but it’s more confined to that subject. It does give a pretty sobering, despondent, nihilistic take on human life that, for me, is beautifully etched as follows Brian meandering along without purpose.
However, there are a few issues with ‘A Smart Cunt’ that mean that it isn’t genius, and it can’t lift the collection higher than 3stars. The whole notion of Brian being too clever for his surroundings, and thus suffering the consequences of that feel a bit hamfisted (as well as being basically identical to Renton). He keeps getting called ‘Smart Cunt’ but often he isn’t really being clever, so the other characters seem to lose credibility as they’re pissed off at him for little to no reason a lot of the time. And, you don’t really get the other side of the story from alternate POV’s as you do in Trainspotting, so he just comes across as a misunderstood guy that’s been through some shit. Which, overall, doesn’t feel as complex as how Renton is carefully built. And, the judgement of the novella as a whole is basically dependant on one’s like/dislike for Brian, because the plot simply follows him. And so, Brian’s weaknesses are the novella’s, and though they are admittedly few, and the novella remains impressive, they are such to retract, if only slightly, from its quality.