Scoring ecstasy: MDMA, consumerism and spirituality in the early fiction of Irvine Welsh

Abstract

This article discusses how Irvine Welsh, explores ecstasy's ability to enhance communication and offer people a version of religious ritual which means that the drug has the potential, at least, to modify subjectivity and intersubjective relationships in his work. The article focuses mainly on Welsh's novel Marabou Stork Nightmares, the novella 'The Undefeated' (from the collection Ecstasy) and the title story of the collection The Acid House.