Frank Mccourt

Speech at the New York State Writers Institute in 2006

My only knowledge of American high schools was what I saw on the movies, about wonderful American suburban life. Everybody was bright, clean and white. Everybody was white. All the girls had these bosoms that were apocalyptic, and I wanted one of them, even when I was 9.

At that time, I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life in America. Mainly I wanted to be comfortable. [...] Then I meet a nice Irish girl named Maureen, a nice Irish girl my mother would approve of. We go out for a while, and I wouldn't touch her. Because she'd be maureen and the favourite word of an Irish Catholic girl is no at that time-- at that time, anyway. It's all changed. Got be 19 again, and I'd be dead at 21. That was my dream that I'd marry Maureen. We'd live in the suburb in the Borough of Queens. We'd have 3 children. We'd go to mass every morning, and I'd work in an insurance company till I was 65, then I'd kill myself.

I was saved by the Chinese. Mao Tsedong sent his attack to Korea, and America got nervous and turned to me and drafted me. But they didn't send me to Korea. They sent me to Germany, where for 2 years I trained attack dogs-- German shepherd attack dogs, which is good preparation for teaching.

When I got out of the army, I was working on the docks in New York, the warehouses and the piers. One day, we had unloaded a ship, and I went to a bar[...] I sat at the bar, and I started doing something that was very dangerous for a young Irish man-- I started thinking. I started wondering what was the meaning of everything.


I walked across Bleecker Str. towards NY University. I don't know why I was walking that direction. I got over there and there was NY University. I asked somebody where the admissions office was and they told me.I went in and I applied. They thought I was amusing when I didn't put down what high school I graduated from. I said I never did, and they were laughing and laughing and laughing. The dean of admissions was just passing by. It was Florence Beeman. She said what was going on. They told her, it is very funny this young man applying for NYU without a high school diploma. Then I got desperate. I was shy and not assertive. I was fairly reticent and withdrawn most of the time.
I said, I'd love to go to college, because I read a lot of books.
Oh. What books have you read?
And I mentioned Dostoevsky, and she was impressed with that. Then I mentioned Dickens. But then I clinched it-- Joyce.
Do you read James Joyce.
I said yeah, I'm Irish, I suppose all... nobody in Ireland reads James Joyce. Nobody can.



Address to Model UN students at the 2008 United Nations

I hope they encourage you to think for youself. That's the main thing. When I grew up in Ireland, that was discouraged. "Oh, you will not think for yourself, because the government knew everything, and certainly if the government didn't know, the church knew it." If you started thinking for yourself, that was almost a sin.

You might start asking questions later on. We were discouraged from asking questions. We could not raise our hands in classes "what... how could it be... how could be a virgin having a baby?" They'd cut your hand off. The other pillar of Irish education was all the things that were wrong in Ireland could be directly attributed to the English.

I grew up with all of this in Ireland, and I came over here, and I found it a strange situation. I went to school here to NYU for 4 years to become a teacher, and I found myself a bit dazzled by the atmosphere-- in a class, you were encouraged to raise your hand to ask questions. I forgot what a question looked like, and I was almost afraid to ask questions. All the time-- and this happens to all of you, all of us-- at the back of your mind, there are always quetions-- the questions and dreams, sometimes more dreams than questions, sometimes more questions than dreams. But it's all in there. I think that's the purpose of education, to help you sort that out.


I also learned the main thing is learning, because nobody knows anything. If we knew anything, the world wouldn't be in the awful state it is in. We don't know anything. Why we have educated people in every country, why are countries so stupid?


The greatest fear of all I think-- and I know this from growing up in Ireland and being exposed later on to other religions and other politics-- the greatest fear of all is to look at the two sides of the story.