Angela's ashes door Frank McCourt

Biograpy of Frank McCourt Frank McCourt was born in Depression-era Brooklyn in 1930, the son of poor Irish immigrants. When he was four, the family moved back to Limerick, thinking life might be better there. But it isn’t, Frank's father, Malachy, rarely has a job and when he does, he spends his wages in the pubs, leaving Frank's mother, Angela, to beg from churches and charity organizations. Despite the tragedy of his drinking, Frank's dad shares a special bond with Frank, revealed through moments of heartrending tenderness. Near death from typhoid fever, Frank spends several months in quarantine in the hospital where he has steady meals, clean sheets, and best of all, books. It is here that he is first introduced to Shakespeare. He always has the dream to return to America, the country where he was born. At age 19, Frank McCourt went to New York, where he eventually made a career as a teacher. Frank McCourt was 66 when he published Angela's Ashes, an autobiography. Angela's Ashes went on to win a Pulitzer Prize and sell more than 2 million copies worldwide. This was the only book he wrote by himself, he also wrote some history books about Ireland and the Irish people in America with other writers. Summary Frank McCourt was born in Brooklyn. After a few years he gets a brother, who’s named after his father: Malachy. They live happy with the four of them, but they don’t have enough money for food and clothes. Their father, a very nice, gentle man has one big problem: his alcoholism. He doesn’t take his money at the end of the week home, but he drinks it all at the pub. And then he comes home drunk. So Frank and his brother are very lean and wear dirty, old clothes. His father and his mother have fights often, because of the alcoholism of the father. But they really love each other, and his mother, Angela gets pregnant again. His two brothers, Eugene and Oliver were born then. His father doesn’t bring his money home yet. And the whole family is hungry, lean and dirty. But after a few months, his mother is pregnant again! This time they get a girl: Margaret. The whole family is very happy with her. His father has a special relation with the little Margaret, he gets her little presents and cares very well of her, he also stops drinking and takes his wages home with him. When Margaret dies after a few weeks, his mother is going crazy and his father is very sad and starts drinking again. The family moves to Limerick, Ireland to work on a new better live. In Limerick it’s very bad. They have a bad house, which is flood at the first floor in the wintertimes. They have to live at the second floor, where the fireplace is. And they haven’t got money to eat and buy clothes. That’s why his mother is going to beg by a helpsociety for poor people. After a few months, his mother is pregnant again. Frank is getting a brother: Mikey. But then the twins die of pneumonia. And his mother is in a deep dewail. In the meantime, between all the death and doom, Frank goes to school and experiences a lot of things, as getting his first Communion and play hooky. For the last time, his mother gets pregnant. They get a boy again, Alphie. This time, nobody dies in his family again. Frank grows up and wants to go to America. When Malachy (his brother) is old enough, he goes to England in the army. And his father is going to England too, because of the war, where he can help to make weapons. But also this time, he doesn’t send the money for his family. Frank, Angela (his mother), Mikey and Alphie are going to live by a cousin of his mother’s mother. Frank hates that man. He gets work as an telegram boy and saves money in secret for his journey to America. He also writes mail-treats for Mrs Finucance, when she dies he steals money from her and buys his ticket for the boot to America.
Theme The theme in Angela’s Ashes is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood. Catholicism plays a big part in the book, because the whole family and all of Limeric are very religious. The children of the McCourts all have to do their Communions and their Confirmations. They also get charity from the church and go to church every Sunday. I think a second theme could be that people can survive anything. Starvation, death of children, the rain, Limerick and even the Catholic Church. Explanation of the title Angela’s Ashes stands for a lot of things. Firstly, Angela’s Ashes is a memoir which is partly about Angela. These are her remains, her ashes. Secondly, Angela smokes a lot of cigarettes and they leave ash, Angela’s ashes. And thirdly, everyone dies or leaves Angela in the book, so she ends up all alone with nothing but her mother’s ashes. Motives · Poverty, the McCourts family is very poor, they have to beg for money and they are starving all the time. The clothes they wear are also very poor. Most people around the family are poor to. · Death, chases the family, three of the children die of diseases and a lot of the people that are mentioned in the book die also. · Rain, it’s always raining in Limerick where the family lives. The rain is one of the reasons why Frank wants to go to America. Because there’s a lot of rain in the winter, the first floor of their house in Limerick floods every winter. Characterizations - Frank McCourt: He’s the oldest son of Angela and Malachy. He’s born in America in August. He is a boy with lot of brothers and one sister. He must do everything at home, because his father is always dronken. He is very good at school. He wants to go to America when he is old enough and when he had enough money. At the end of the story when he is 19 he had enough money and he goes to America. - Angela Sheehan: Angela is the mother of Frank McCourt. She’s born on Sylvesterday in Limerick. She never saw her father. She is married with Malachy McCourt. Angela is mother of seven childern, but three of her children are dead. - Malachy (father): Malachy is the father of Frank McCourt. He’s married with Angela Sheehan. Malachy is born in Toome, Country Antrim. He fought with the Old IRA. He smoked and he is an alcoholic. The father of Malachy had never a job, because he was always dronken. But if he had a job he drinks the monny up after his job in the pub. At the end of the story he goes to England to find a job, and to send monney to the family. But he never sends monney and he never comes back. - Malachy (brother): Malachy is the oldest brother of Frank. He is one year
younger than Frank When he is old enough, he goes to England to join the army. - Oliver: Oliver is a brother of Frank. Oliver is a twin with Eugene. Oliver dies

of pneumonia. - Eugene: Eugene is a brohter too of Frank. Eugene is a twin with Oliver. Oliver’s death leaves Eugene in shock. Shortly after that, Eugene dies too. - Margaret: Margaret is the only sister of Frank. But when she was seven
weeks old, she got sick she died. When Margaret was born everybody was happy in the family. The father of Frank was never dronken when she was born. But when she was dead he start again with drinking and everybody was sad. - Michael: Michael is a littel brother of Frank, Michael doesn’t die in this
book. - Alphonsus: Alphonsus is the youngest brother of Frank. Alphonsus doesn’t
die either in this book. He is a very lovely boy. - Aunt Aggie: she is an aunt of the boys, they have to stay with her when
Angela gets sick. She is very severe and mean to them. - Laman Griffin: He is Angela’s cousin. Angela, Frank, Michael and
Alphonsus get shelter at his house when their own house caves in. He is a mean men that keeps most of his food for himself and Frank has to empty his chamber pot. Time and place In this book is the lapse of time from 1930 when Frank was born until 1949 when he’s going to America. When he is going to America he is 19 years old. The second world war took place in this time, in the book it isn’t mentioned but there are going men to the army in England and others are going to work in fabrics in England to make weapons. Most of the story takes place in Limerick a little city in Ireland. Only the first four years take place in New York, America. Limerick is a very depressing city, it rains all the time and there’s a lot of industry. The houses are mostly bad and most of the people that live there are poor. Narrative Perpective The book is written from Frank’s point of view, that’s funny because in the beginning you see everything through the eyes of a child. He only begins to realise his poverty when he’s already in school and learns that it’s not normal to be starving all the time. The fact that Frank’s not very aware of how bad things are makes the book funny in a really strange sort of way (the things that happen aren’t funny at all). Frank sees everything in his own unique point of view: careless and gullible.
The end At the end of the book Frank takes the boot to America. It’s a good end of the story, it’s not the whole biography of the author but he described the m,ost interesting part of his life, his childhood. That’s definitely ended when he goes to America, so the end is good. My opinion about the book I really liked it to read this book. It’s a beautifull story, it’s sad and in some way funny. It’s so sad because it seems that nothing can go the right for the Mc Courts family. Three children die, the father is an alcoholic who drinks away their money. That way they don’t have enough money for clothes and food, they’re could and starving all the time, they also get sick because of that. They find a little comfort in their religion, the Catholicism. The children are very happy when the do their Communion and their Confirmation, that’s also because they can collect money afterwards to go to the cinema. What is very sad also that a lot of people get sick and die of pneumonia, typhoid or galloping consumption. Frank gets typhoid, he has to stay in the hospital in quarantine. It’s sad that this is the only time in his childhood he sleeps between clean sheets and gets enough food. The story is kind of funny because you see things happen through the eyes of a child. What I found very funny was that they parted their house in Limerick in “Ireland and Italy”, Ireland was downstairs because it was flood their in winters, upstairs was Italy because it was dry and warm there most of the time. It’s also nice to read that the children are happy with every small thing, they have fun most of the time, but there’s actually nothing to have fun about when you are so poor but they don’t get that then and that’s nice. They don’t realise that they are poor until they go to school, they think it’s normal to be starving all the time, it’s sad but also good, than they don’t think that they are sad and poor all the time. The person I liked the most in the book was Frank himself. He is such a strong boy, he survives everything and is nice and strong to his mother. He tries to make the best of his sad and poor life. He has a goal and goes totally for it. He works hard to get enough money and realise his goal, going back to America. He works also for Mrs Harrington, who is a bitch and needs someone to write and bring around letters to poor people to get her money back with much interest rate. He doesn’t like the job, but he has to do it for the money. When he finds the women dead, he takes all her money and her lists with names of the poor of who she gets money from. He throws the lists in the river and takes the money to buy a ticket to America, he has reached his goal! It’s not weird that I like Frank the most, because he writes the story about himself, you see everything from his perspective. That way you will never get a bad image of him. Because you know his thought you think he does the way it has to go, he does it the best. He couldn’t have done it better. But that is probably not true, but you don’t know that because of the perspective of this story. The story may be sad and everything but it shows the way life was in those days. It was shortly after the crash of the Stock Exchange in America and a lot of people were very poor. The Irish people all went to New York after the potato disaster and soon the weren’t wanted there anymore. Their life’s didn’t get better so some of them went back. Because there were a lot of poor people the hygiene was very poor and most people didn’t have heating or good clothes so they often got sick and died. The book shows these things very good. It really realistic, it just was that way back than. My general opinion of the book is good. It’s a sad but beautiful story and it shows a good image of the thirties and forties of the last century.