Shuggie Bain

“He stared and tried to find something masculine to admire about himself: the black curls, the Milky skin, the high bones in his cheeks. He caught the reflection of his own eyes in the mirror. It wasn't right. It wasn't how real boys were built to be. He scrubbed at himself again.” 

From the outset of the novel, Shuggie struggles with the incongruity of himself and society’s expectations of masculinity. In an attempt to make himself “normal,” he religiously recites football statistics, a habit which he picked up at an early age from a book given to him by Eugene, his mother’s former boyfriend. This quote hints at Shuggie’s misunderstanding of masculinity and his sexuality. 

“As the women gabbed about the routine of their lives, she only listened to the noises beyond them and strained for any sounds of him in the room behind. now she wanted to tell the woman that she knew all about it. She knew about the sweaty taxi windows, his greedy hands, and how they must have panted at Shug to take them away from it all as he stuck his prick into them. it made her feel old and very alone. She wanted to tell them she understood. She knew all about its thrill because once upon a time it had been her.” 

Agnes Knows all too well about her husband's infidelity because she had been another one of his affairs, breaking up his previous marriage. Agnes saw in Shug a chance to start over and break the monotony of her life. As Shug begins to drift away, she feels more trapped than ever in her life. This quote reveals a catalyst for her alcoholism. 

“The auld Glasgow jakey was a dying breed—a traditionally benign soul that was devolving into something younger and far more sinister with the spread of drugs across the city.” 

This passage demonstrates both the Glasgow slang and the declining social situation that will consume Agnes’s life. “Jakey” is Glasgow slang for an alcoholic. While the “auld Glasgow jakey” was stereotypically a harmless old man—deindustrialization forced many younger men out of work and onto the dole (unemployment/government financial assistance), sparking a drastic increase in drug and alcohol abuse.