Thirty Years of Trainspotting with Irvine Welsh

Irvine Welsh was born in the great city of Edinburgh and matured in the housing schemes of Leith, West Pilton and Muirhouse. Neither school nor conventional employment appealed, but he was inspired to write after experiencing the explosions of Punk and Rave first hand. Trainspotting, Welsh’s debut novel, was rejected from the Man Booker Prize shortlist, allegedly for offending the judges. It went on to sell over a million copies in the UK alone and was adapted into an iconic film by Danny Boyle, starring Ewan McGregor, Robert Carlyle and Kelly Macdonald. He has been involved in dance music for most of his life, as a DJ and promoter and is currently co-writing a TV drama series charting the rise of electronic music since the late 80’s.

Michael Pedersen: is a prize-winning Scottish poet and author. His prose debut, Boy Friends, was published by Faber & Faber in 2022 to luscious reviews in both the UK and North America and was a Sunday Times Critics Choice 2022. He’s produced two acclaimed collections of poetry with a third, The Cat Prince & Other Poems, due for release in July 2023 with Little Brown. Pedersen won a Robert Louis Stevenson Fellowship, the John Mather’s Trust Rising Star of Literature Award and was a finalist for the 2018 ‘Writer of the Year’ at The Scottish Culture Awards. Pedersen also founded the prize-winning literary collective Neu! Reekie! and has attracted praise from the likes Stephen Fry, Kae Tempest, Irvine Welsh, Maggie Smith, Jackie Kay, Sara Pascoe and more.