Ecstasy (novel)
Ecstasy: Three Tales of Chemical Romance is a collection of three independent short stories published in 1996 by Irvine Welsh . The writing style is mainly characterized by slang and gutter language and detailed descriptions of violence and sex scenes, black humor and a bit of kitsch mix together with some clichés in order to achieve a surreal, yet conceivable plot.
action
The first story is about 27-year-old Heather, a frustrated small town wife, and party-goer Lloyd. Heather is frustrated with her lack of sex life and depressed by the narrow-mindedness that has entered her life. Lloyd, in his early 30s, on the other hand, is the eternal party-goer and tries to find his love happiness with the help of ecstasy , because he is convinced that you can get much closer to people with it. When Heather starts to think about her previous life and goes to raves with her old friend Marie and takes E (synonym for ecstasy), Heather and Lloyd meet in the chill-out zone of a rave party. Heather is slowly breaking away from her current existence and enjoying life more and more Lloyd's way. She falls in love with him and leaves her husband, the manager Hugh. However, Heather soon realizes that the happiness that ecstasy brings is false luck and leaves Lloyd. Only when Lloyd changes his life can they both become happy.
The second story begins with a pharmacist couple having their baby's arms sent to them. The pharmacist then shoots himself and his wife goes crazy. Gradually, the murder of the kidnapped baby of the two turns out to be part of the revenge campaign of a disabled couple who have suffered from the side effects of the drug Tenazadrin for a lifetime: their arms are crippled. In order to hold those responsible for the chemical scandal accountable, the woman seduces a brutal hooligan and turns him into a tool for her retaliation.
The third and final story is about a novelist. Her life is turned upside down when she suffers a stroke. Shortly after recovering, she notices that her husband led a double life for years. But through a new friend, the nurse, who cared for her, she found new courage to live and made her new beginning.
criticism
The reviews of this Welsh novel are mixed. Some say that Welsh trivializes drug use and portrays it positively ("Sex is perceived more intensely, everyone is your friends") and that the content of the book cannot keep up with his earlier works. Others, on the other hand, see ecstasy as a grandiose continuation of his previous work. Many readers also emphasize that the book is quite entertaining, but that it hardly provides any moral food for thought.
Others
The name of the American rock band My Chemical Romance was based on the title of this book.
In 2011, the novel was made into a film under the title Irvine Welsh's Ecstasy . In supporting roles are u. a. Adam Sinclair, Kristin Kreuk and Billy Boyd , directed by Rob Heydon.