Creative Conversations: Graeme Armstrong
Creative Conversations: Graeme Armstrong
Creative Conversations College of Arts
Date: Thursday 15 October 2020
Time: 17:30 - 18:30
Venue: Zoom Event
Category: Public lectures
Speaker: Graeme Armstrong
Website: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/creative-conversations-graeme-armstrong-tickets-117112272961
Graeme Armstrong grew up in Airdrie. His teenage years were spent within North Lanarkshire’s territorial gang culture, where he was privy to many incidents of street violence, both as victim and, occasionally, aggressor. At 16 years old, he picked up a copy of Irvine Welsh's Trainspotting and was blown away – it was then he began to consider studying English at university as a possibility, a dream met with scepticism by many.
Alongside overcoming his own struggles with drug addiction, alcohol abuse and violence, he defied expectation to read English as an undergraduate at the University of Stirling, beginning work on The Young Team, then a trilogy, after graduating with honours, and in a state of lonely withdrawal. He returned to study Creative Writing, and after achieving his Master of Letters with merit, continued work on the book, receiving no funding and continuing to study and work full time throughout its writing.
In 2019 Picador acquired world rights to publish the novel. Editor Kris Doyle said of the book: “Armstrong understands what’s going on in this community and has transformed his intimate knowledge into a ferociously written novel. He nails the cultural references, the dialogue and the landscape; he’s also brought to life a character you’ll care about as he tries to negotiate the world in front of him. I think a lot of readers will be shocked by it, but there’ll be another group who read this book and say: that’s what it’s like, that’s it exactly.”
Graeme Armstrong lives and works in Glasgow, and is currently working on his second novel. Through his writing he has become involved in the work of the Violence Reduction Unit and Community Justice Scotland, speaking to young people about crime and gang culture.
‘The Young Team is a book full of guts, power, humour and humanity. This is a community not often seen in literature, depicted by a talented writer who intimately knows that world and the truth of this is seared in every sentence’- Kerry Hudson, author of Lowborn
‘Phenomenal. It’s been ages since I read a book so funny, visceral, or powerful.’- David Whitehouse, author of Bed and The Long Forgotten
‘Vivid, dynamic and sharp as a whip’- Janice Galloway, author of The Trick is to Keep Breathing
‘Armstrong's writing fizzes off the page and skelps you across the face. It's visceral, funny, heartbreaking, thought-provoking and very fucking real. …you can feel his energy practically pulsing through this entire book.”- Chris McQueer, author of Hings and HWFG
This is a Zoom event. You will be sent a link to join the meeting once you book on eventbrite.
Creative Conversations is programmed by the University of Glasgow Creative Writing Programme and funded by the Ferguson Bequest. Professor Thomas Ferguson (1900-1977), Henry Mechan Chair of Public Health (1944-64), bequeathed his estate to the University, with the instruction that the money should be used to foster the social side of University life.