FREE ESSAY ON FRANK MCCOURT'S ANGELA'S ASHES

FRANK MCCOURT'S ANGELA'S ASHES

Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes is a powerful and emotional memoir of his life from
childhood through early adulthood. This book is a wonderfully inspired piece of work that
emotionally attaches the reader through McCourt's life experiences. Its effectiveness is
primarily due to McCourt's evolving 'innocent-eye' narrative technique. He allows the
reader to experience his own life in a changeable form. Through this unique story telling
technique, the reader is able to watch Frank grow and evolve. Between the ages of four,
eleven and fourteen changes in his writing can be easily identified. It is evident that
the written text, McCourt's thoughts, and the resultant relationship with the reader
evolve and become more complex during this part of his life.
When describing his experiences at the age of four, McCourt's writing style is very much
like a story told from a child's perspective. He uses simple dialogue and a 'tell it like
it is' approach: "We're on the seesaw. Up, down, updown. Malachy goes up. I get off.
Malachy goes down. Seesaw hits ground" (19). At this point, he demonstrated a basic,
staccato-like sentence structure. McCourt presents information as if heard and
interpreted by a child. On page38 Mrs. Leibowitz, a kind neighbour who lives in the same
building as the McCourt family, says, "Nice Chewish name, have apiece of cake, eh? Why
they give you a Chewish name, eh?" The reader knows that the word Jewish is spelled as it
is heard and that this is typical of child interpretations.
Just as simple dialogue is used throughout the book, so are simple pattern thoughts.
Children have a tangible stream of consciousness and often have a tendency to change
subject matter quickly throughout a conversation: "They have their tea…uncle Pa
Keating, who is my uncle because he's married to my aunt Aggie, picks up Eugene" (87).
The reader already knows from previous information that Pa Keating is the children's
uncle. Just as children often incorporate needless information into a conversation,
McCourt does the same in his writing. The reader acquires an image that a real
conversation is taking place.
Frank McCourt also shows the reader, through examples such as on page 16, that his
thoughts as a child are quite simple. He tries to describe the anger he feels by stating
"a blackness comes over me." Because of his age, he is unable to clearly describe and
fully express his thoughts. This is due to a lack of knowledge. He can only perceive what
he knows to be familiar. For instance, he refers to his family standing in the kitchen as
"big people" (106). He is easily confused and does not understand complex concepts:
"…He can have Malachy and the twins for brothers. He can't have Margaret anymore
because she's like the dog in the street that was taken away. I don't know why she was
taken away" (43). Concepts such as death and religion are especially difficult for a
child to understand. "Mam tells us, That's the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and I want to know
why the man's heart is on fire and why doesn't He throw water on it?" (67).
A unique relationship forms between the author and the reader through McCourt's effective
'show and tell' narrative method. This gives the reader more involvement and greater
emotional attachment. During the first part of this book, he 'shows' the reader, through
innocent misunderstandings, that interpretation is needed in order to fully understand
the context: "Sometimes he [Mr. Leibowitz] speaks to Mrs. Leibowitz and I don't
understand because strange sounds come from his mouth. Freddie understands…smiles
back and makes the strange sounds" (38). Here the reader knows that the 'strange sounds'
are the Leibowitz's speaking another language. Frank does not understand that there are
different languages that people speak other than just English, but the mature reader is
informed.
Proceeding into the section of the book where McCourt is eleven years old, the dialogue
becomes less simple and moderately complex. There is structure to his sentences with use
of grammatical tools, like commas, that raise the level of complexity to the writing. For
instance on page 178, the sentence "he drinks his tea in the morning, signs for the dole
at the Labour Exchange, reads the papers at the Carnegie Library, goes for long walks far
into the country…" shows an elevated level of writing. Not demonstrated at the age
of four, Frank starts to give more detail and description to words during this age. "He
coughs and bring up ropes of green and yellow stuff"(204).
Attributes like education and personal experiences contribute by making Frank's thoughts
become more involved. At this age, his thoughts are insightful but they show how gullible
he can be but he is slowly maturing. For example, when Angela has new child, Frank's
brother Malachy inquires why their Mam's bed is in the kitchen. McCourt writes, "I'm
older so I tell Malachy the bed is in the kitchen so the angel can fly down and leave the
baby on the seventh step but Malachy doesn't understand…he's only eight"(223). The
fact he still thinks an angel brings newborn babies shows his level of maturity and
gullibility.
He begins to exercise his mind with questions and it shows at the age of eleven that
Frank is quite insightful. On page 200 he postulates about his Faith and patriotism: "I'd
love to be big and important…but I don't think I'll live that long the way I'm
expected to die for this or that. I want to ask why there are so many…people who
haven't died for Ireland or the Faith"(138). 
Reader interpretation decreases as Frank grows up. On page 156, Frank describes a funny
scene in a confessional booth with a priest: "There is heavy breathing. The priest has
his hand over his mouth and he's making choking sounds and talking to himself, mother o'
God." The reader clearly sees the priest is laughing and that Frank does not know this.
Finally arriving at the age of fourteen the written text, thoughts and the relationship
with the reader reach a point where all merge to present a mature, complex and an evolved
Frank McCourt. In the last part of this book, the writing has changed noticeably compared
to the beginning and the middle sections. In contrast from the age of four and eleven
years old, the following exert on page 411 is a good example to support the complexity of
Frank at the age of fourteen. "Frost is already whitening the fresh earth on the grave
and I think of Theresa cold in the coffin, the red hair, the green eyes. I can't
understand the feelings going through me but I know that with all the people who died in
the lanes around me and all the people who left I never had a pain like this in my heart
and I hope I never will again. It's getting dark. I walk my bicycle out of the graveyard.
I have telegrams to deliver."
The text is very descriptive and has an involved sentence structure characteristic of a
mature writer. His thoughts and his feelings are deeply profound. The relationship with
the reader has changed extremely and is quite noticeable. In the beginning and parts of
the middle of this book, the reader is 'shown', not described, a scenario where the
result is often left to be interpreted. This is not so at the end of his memoir. Frank
McCourt, instead of using a 'show and tell' narrative method, which applies in the
beginning, is in a didactic mode where he explains everything in detail and there is
nothing left for the reader to interpret. To conclude, there is an evolved Frank
evidently noticed from the start through to the end.
As Frank McCourt grows and develops into an adult, so too does his writing. The written
text, thoughts and the relationship with the reader indeed evolves and becomes more
complex as Frank matures. Examples taken from the ages of four, eleven and fourteen show
these noticeable differences. Through an evolving 'innocent-eye' narrative technique
McCourt is able to establish a powerful emotion connection with the reader.
Bibliography
frank mccourt. angela's ashes