A biography for Frank McCourthasn’t been written yet.
“When I was a teacher, I'd walk into the classroom. I stood at the board. I was the man. I directed operations. I was an intellectual and artistic and moral traffic cop, and I - and I would direct the class, most of the time.”
“If I have a cause, it's the cause of the teacher.”
“I certainly couldn't have written 'Angela's Ashes' when my mother was alive, because she would have been ashamed.”
“Sure, I went through my 'J'accuse' phase. I was so angry for so long, I could hardly have a conversation without getting into an argument. And it was only when I felt I could finally distance myself from my past that I began to write about what happened - not just to me, but to lots of young people. I think my story is a cautionary tale.”
“When I came to America, I dreamed bigger dreams.”
“I don't know anything about a stock!”
“Ireland, once you live there, you're seduced by it.”
“The part of Limerick we lived in is Georgian, you know, those Georgian houses. You see them in pictures of Dublin.”
“They all went into the bar business. Which was a mistake, because they began to sip at the merchandise and it set them back, set us all back. Well, them more than I.”
“People come up to me and talk about the alcoholism in their family.”
“We had nothing, no television, no radio, nothing to get in the way. We read by the streetlight at the top of the lane, and we acted out the stories.”
“I had no accomplishments except surviving. But that isn't enough in the community where I came from, because everybody was doing it. So I wasn't prepared for America, where everybody is glowing with good teeth and good clothes and food.”
“Actually, my mother and Alfie came for three weeks' Christmas vacation and stayed for 21 years. I guess my mother never went back because she was lonely.”
“You might be poor, your shoes might be broken, but your mind is a palace.”
“It's like a series of waves hitting you. First, getting excerpted in the 'New Yorker' last summer, then getting published, then the best-seller list, the award, the movie deal, now this, a Pulitzer.”
“I had never attended high school, but I was fairly well read.”
“I was unloading sides of beef down on the docks when I decided enough was enough. By then, I'd done a lot of reading on my own, so I persuaded New York University to enroll me.”
“On the last day of my teaching career, I was sitting in my apartment, having a glass of wine, thinking I'm glad I did it, that I had been somehow useful, that I had learned something.”
“Teachers have a million stories, but nobody consults them.”
“The sky is the limit. You never have the same experience twice.”