Angela's Ashes (AUDIO CASSETTE)

Rating:
Summary: Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt; Memoir
Review:
"The master says it's a glorious thing to die for the Faith and Dad says it's a glorious thing to die for Ireland and I wonder if there's anyone in the world who would like us to live."
--Frank McCourt

Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt is a thrilling memoir that enlightens the reader with tales of his childhood in the impoverished towns of Brooklyn, New York and Limerick, Ireland. McCourt grew up during the late 1930s and 1940s and faced several conflicts such as hunger, death, his father's alcoholism, and illness. While amongst the lower-class, he faces opposition with people in all positions of authority such as schoolmasters, priests, and family members. However this does not make Frank's goal of rising up from poverty and leaving Ireland impossible.

Frank McCourt tells his story in an eccentric intriguing style. He mixes humor and wit with the harsh experiences of his childhood while also informing the reader of the stereotypical Irish lifestyle. The memoir is told in the present tense and written as though he is experiencing specific events that very moment. "I'm on deck the dawn we sail into New York. I'm sure I'm in a film, that it will end and lights will come up in the Lyric Cinema. . . . Rich Americans in top hats white ties and tails must be going home to bed with the gorgeous women with white teeth. The rest are going to work in warm comfortable offices and no one has a care in the world." This gives the reader a sense of the emotions he was facing at the time and lets you picture the event taking place. He also aligns the tone of the text with his progressing age. McCourt ties in the themes of family, love, religion, and social relationships, drawing the reader into his tragic life. "My brothers are dead and my sister is dead and I wonder if they died for Ireland or the Faith. Dad says they were too young to die for anything. Mam says it was disease and starvation and him never having a job. Dad says, Och, Angela, puts on his cap and goes for a long walk". His writing style gives the reader the opportunity to see the care for family, Church and society, dedication, tragedy of alcoholism, and the harshness of life in Ireland.

Angela's Ashes is a story of survival of the spirit and body and an unforgettable memoir of a boy searching for a childhood in a world where he is forced to take on adult responsibilities. Frank McCourt, the book's author, narrator, and protagonist, tells his own life story from the perspective of an adolescent looking out onto the world. His early childhood consisted of his mother, Angela, struggling to feed her growing sons, paying the wages, and coping with the deaths of her young daughter. His childhood is a time of some adventure and continued deprivation. After the tragic death of his younger sister the family moved back home to Ireland. Soon enough Frank witnessed the death of his two brothers.
He faces several conflicts such as hunger, neglect, his alcoholic father, oppressive weather, poverty, starvation and harassment. However, Frank remains strong. McCourt descriptively shares his memories of searching for coal along the streets, begging for food, and the ruthless, cold nights. Frank increasingly condemns his father's irresponsibility but worries also about the morality of his own behavior. He determines to make a success of himself in America. He portrays an independent, determined young boy who eventually found himself as the "man of the house" instead of his own father. Frank still loves his father regardless of his alcoholic habits. When his father's attempt to earn money in England fails, Frank finds work on his own. This gives him the feeling of responsibility and lets him dream of hope for providing his family with food and clothes. Frank soon faces conflict again when his family moves in with Angela's cousin, Laman. A sexual relationship between the two is formed which brings anger to Frank. Frank soon starts a sexual relationship of his own with one of his customers, who soon dies of consumption, leaving Frank with a broken heart. Near the end, a priest pardons Frank of all his sins. This allows Frank to leave for America with a clear conscience and to take hold of his thoughts for his potential future. At this point, Frank's dream of leaving Ireland and overcoming poverty becomes possible. Even though he is sad of leaving his family back in Ireland, he earns enough money to move to New York and bid his farewell to Ireland. Angela's Ashes is a beautifully written memoir. The story captures your heart and gives you an idea of the hardships faced in our past.

Frank McCourt brought numerous emotions to the reader. The fast moving memoir allows you to picture the tragedies as if they were happening right before your eyes. With great detail, you can create images within your mind of the dark streets of Ireland and rough living styles. As a result of the incomparable life in the 1900s, the reader is pulled into Frank McCourt's personal experiences, investing every emotion. His description of his life is matchless. Angela's Ashes won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics' Circle Award, and spent 117 weeks on The New York Times hardcover best-seller list. Angela's Ashes serves as a living record of the strong moral values and sense of humor McCourt maintained despite the suffering and despair he suffered as a child.

"When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I survived at all."
--Frank McCourt


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Summary: Beyond the Stereotype
Review: Frank McCourt tells his story with an extraordinarily beguiling style that shows a life stereotypically Irish, but with humor mixed in goodly measure amongst the tough reality. Returning to Ireland to escape the depression (an irony unto itself,) McCourt ties in social themes, as well as a candid representation of honest family ties and relationships that draws the reader in and doesn't let them go.

It is easy to enter into the experience with McCourt and see and feel along with him, the harshness of life, the tragedy of alcoholism on the family, the dedication of the tragic figure of Angela (McCourt's mother) and the combined care and indifference of extended family, Church and society.

Many of the themes are earthy and may offend the purient, but they are not gratuitous, ring true to the honest human experience and make a refreshing change to the typical auto-biographical work which often seems to be straining for self-canonization. McCourt shows his own warts along with those of his family so that the image portrayed is that much more powerful for the lack of self-flattering or evasive narrative.

What comes through in the end is not only a realistic portrayal of a young man's hard early life, but beyond that a story marked by its honesty in the social statements made or available to be drawn with regard to poverty, religious indifference and social injustice which are made more personal and real for the lack of portraying himself as a modern Oliver Twist, victimized by all.

Well worth the effort to read and to keep on your shelf to glance back over from time to time.

Rating:
Summary: Charmingly written, but in the end, a disappointment
Review: Even though it wasn't a page-turner, I enjoyed this book at least half way through because it was written so candidly. However, by the end of the book, I found more reasons to dislike it than I did to like it.
#1. Yes, as many others have said, it was supremely depressing. I can tolerate a lot of depressing literature as long as there are small victories, or occasional heartwarming lessons, or true humor toward the situation, but I found none of that with this book. I'm not sure what had others "roaring with laughter." The most I could find were tiny oddities and ironies that could render no more than a smirk.
#2. Can you really win a Pulizer with that many references to masturbation? I really could have done wihout that.
#3. This was the most disappointing of all. I realize that it was an autobiography, and, therefore, isn't supposed to have a regular plot, but it did need some form of resolution. After reading a novel, one shouldn't have to read the sequel to find out the ending. Perhaps a good editor could have helped Mr. McCourt cut away some of the the masturbation so that he had room to finish the story.


Rating:
Summary: "I don't give a fiddlers fart." if anybody else liked the bk
Review: I loved it!! - If you don't buy, read and enjoy this book then you must have been "dropped on your head as a child." This reference is just one of Mr McCourt's MANY unique and orginal one-liners throughout the book.
Hard to believe he lived long enough to tell his story AND that he can tell his story in such a way that will make you laugh and cry at the same time.

I listened to the book on CD, which is aprox. 14 hours total in length and it was worth every minute!! The time flew by, it was as if I was sitting and listening to my grandfather tell a story.

Everyone should have been so lucky to have had just one teacher like Frank McCourt in school. What a storyteller!!

Thank You Mr. McCourt I REALLY enjoyed this book!!!
I think you will enjoy it too!


Rating:
Summary: A wonder memoir.
Review: In Angela's Ashes, Frank McCourt describes his childhood in the impoverished town of Limerick with such lyricism and tongue-in-cheek retellings that the reader wants to laugh, cry, and raise an eyebrow in disbelief all at the same time. McCourt first lays down the foundations of his story in the events.
The book moves rather quickly from event to event: the reader sees his father and mother mourning over the death of their young daughter in America and then sees the entire family sleeping in a prison in Ireland because they have no money. McCourt so wonderfully recounts his memories, such as his experiences in the hospital to his adventures as a mail courier, with the same tone and opinions of his younger self that the reader can almost hear the young Francis talk to the angel on the seventh step or read aloud his composition to his class. McCourt manages to describe the most dismal situation with a tongue-in-cheek comment or an optimistic ending. Along with the tone, the imagery in this novel is vivid.
McCourt recounts such unique details, such as the newspaper wrapping of a hog's head falling apart to children competing for a teacher's apple peelings, that the reader is pulled into his life because it so different from their own and because there is so much emotion invested in these details. McCourt makes sure that when he describes his life, it will be totally singular in its description.
Overall, Angela's Ashes was simply amazing. Even though the reader is swept into a unique childhood full of hunger and starvation, McCourt manages to a "silver lining" in his despair.