Irvine Welsh is best known for his controversial novels, most notably Transpotting, the story of a group of friends pitted together in their addiction to heroin and alcohol. Trainspotting reached the last top 10 for the Booker prize (1993) and was turned into a successful film and play.
His other works include The Acid House (1994), Marabou Stork Nightmares (1995), the trio of novellas Ecstasy (1996), Filth (1998) and Glue (2001). Four stories from The Acid House were made for television by Channel 4.
The release of the novel Filth, which tells the story of a corrupt Edinburgh policeman, was hit by controversy when police were accused of censorship after seizing copies of a promotional poster from a shop window showing a pig in an officer's helmet.
At this year's Edinburgh Book Festival a dispute broke out over the gritty urban realism of writers such as Mr Welsh, when they were accused of creating a cultural ghetto due to the use of four-letter expletives, the Scots dialect and an obsession with drugs, drink and sex.
Mr Welsh pointed out that Trainspotting had encouraged a whole generation of young people to read.
He is now working on a film sequel to Transpotting called Porno about the pornography industry.
