Frank McCourt Is Said To Be Near Death
Frank McCourt, the voluble Irish-American memoirist and retired New York City schoolteacher who wrote Angela’s Ashes, is on his deathbed, according to the Belfast Telegraph.
McCourt, who will turn 79 next month, has been battling skin cancer, the Telegraph reports. In May, his brother Malachy McCourt denied reports at the time that Frank was in poor health, describing him as a “hearty fellow” who had been through worse. But the Telegraph says things have gotten worse:
After receiving treatment at the world-famous Memorial Sloan Kettering hospital in New York, the writer was declared well enough to return home to Connecticut.
However, a friend said yesterday that Mr McCourt’s condition has deteriorated dramatically since then and that he is seriously ill.
It is understood he became unwell while on a cruise in the Pacific and was transferred to a hospital in Tahiti.
McCourt’s three memoirs of his hardscrabble upbringing in Ireland and career as a public schoolteacher in New York—Angela’s Ashes, ‘Tis, and Teacher Man—were all New York Times bestsellers. He is said to be working on his first novel.
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Comments (AU Comments | US Comments)
@FormerEnglishMajor: Do you not know that contraceptives were unavailable over the counter or even by prescription in Ireland till the late 70's-80s?
SarahHeartburn
@Calraigh: I've been living in Europe for 20 years and I've never visited Ireland (granted, my travel time and budget is limited and I like to go home to NYC as often as I can). But then there was my grandmother, who emigrated very young before the First World War, and who used to tell me, "Ireland is a wonderful country. Promise me you'll never go back there."
SarahHeartburn
@FormerEnglishMajor: Hell, even Irish friends of my age (40's-50's) sniff at the book and say it's nonsense invented for the American market. I don't deny there's a trace of blarney in Frank and Malachy. When I was growing up on the (now Upper)East Side, guys like that were called P.I.'s - Professional Irishman. Always a bit on stage about the Auld Sod, etc. But the vaguest idea of the history of the times will tell you that the book could quite well be true.
SarahHeartburn
@Calraigh: Because it'd be a hell of a bad joke on God's part if Frank outlived Malachy, who I believe did a bit more carousing....
SarahHeartburn
@Kid Twist: My ex was a Stuyvesant kid, and everyone from that school I know loves him.
SarahHeartburn
I've loved Angela's Ashes since I first read it in middle school; hearing this saddens me tremendously.
I hope he keeps fighting.
@Bob Wiley: He does have an apartment on 77th street - maybe this isn't true...
Through some really random and unexpected events, I was working on a coffee table book that Mr McCourt wrote and my company put out, dedicated to the firefighters in 2001/2002 after 9/11. I was literally a kid at the time - and somehow ended up in the crew room of a firehouse preceding a press interview having lunch with Tom Brokaw and Frank McCourt.
Just me - and them, it was something that just 'happened' and couldn't have been more special.
Here I was, dying to him questions about his life, his career, his experiences; ANYTHING & he was much happier asking me about me and my silly little entry level job and what I wanted to do next. "Frank" & "Tom" told me some stories, gave me some amazing advice and really listened to what I had to say. That lunch reigns in my mind as one of the most fantastically bizarre and special experiences I have had.
@iplaudius: This is true.
@BadUncle: MMMM. L'eau d'Institution.
@FormerEnglishMajor: Holy cow - do we have the same MIL?? My MIL said the same.
TriedandTrue
@scroll_lock: Hey, I just like you with that fresh prison smell.
@iplaudius: Keep Madonna away from Mia at all costs!
Iwillnotauditionforastar
@BadUncle: Thanks for bailing me out, BTW.
@resipsaloquacious: Um, you forgot the most important accessory. A good stiff drink.
Iwillnotauditionforastar
I got to interview him in college, and I don't think I could ever tell him how much it meant to me that he'd take the time to talk to a little student reporter. He couldn't have been kinder or funnier.
We had dinner, and I - a vegetarian - ate the served shrimp salad because I didn't want to offend someone who grew up so hungry.
After dinner, I realized he'd barely touched his food. Dammit, Frank!
@DramaClub: As an Irish American I have learned quite well that you never believe an Irishman. In fact, I am lying to you right now.
Iwillnotauditionforastar
I remember meeting him in the Lion's Head a million years ago. Pete Hamill was always there, too, typing in the corner and acting cool, but Frank was chatting and drinking with the ordinary folks. A great guy, I hope this is not true. The world will be less without him.
@Bob Wiley: That might have been his brother Alphie, who looks very, very much like Frank and is also a writer. I believe he lives on the UWS.
BTW: Frank has done lots of things in his long life -- at one point, in the early 1980s, he and his brother Malachy did an off-off-B'way show called "A Couple of Blaguards." Much of the material, which was autobiographical, formed the basis for "Angela's Ashes." The show pops up occasionally, so if you have the chance, it's worth seeing.
The_Lovely_Miss_Bronx
Oh, dear God no. I absolutely ADORE his writing! Here's to good health, Frankie!
shorty63136
@Calraigh: James Joyce called Ireland the pig that eats her young (Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, “Ireland is the old sow that eats her farrowâ€).
@scroll_lock: Stop publicly displaying your epidermis, and maybe you won't get locked up again.
@Bob Wiley: And therein lies the definitive difference between Irish-Americans and Irish. A) Nobody Irish would ever deny it and B) Nobody Irish ever refers to Ireland as ''The Motherland''.
Angela's Ashes was a hopeless, beautiful work that beautifully weaved Depression-era Irish American culture into a plain display of the trials of poverty. Voices like that are always missed.
@resipsaloquacious: You are exceedingly wise. If at all possible, a full suit of armour is really your best bet.
I love this man. I've read all 3 books and they're brilliant. Please get better Frank!
MashedPotatoes
@FormerEnglishMajor:
Cos there was absolutely no birth control of any kind and she had a catholic obligation to submit to her husband. Hideous stuff :(
I would have sworn I saw him coming out of the movie "Up" on the UWS about a month ago. He looked somewhat frail but certainly not near his death. Hope this turns out to be just a rumor, and not that I saw his doppleganger (who also had a brogue, heard him say he wasn't too impressed with the movie).
This quote by Shel Silverstein perfectly sums up Frank McCourt:
"If you are a dreamer,come in. If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar, a hoper, a prayer, a magic-bean-buyer. If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire, for we have some flax-golden tales to spin. Come in! Come in!"
I hope he feels better as I want to hear his flax-golden tales.
momof3wildkids
@FormerEnglishMajor: My Irish Catholic grandmother, who has never even been to Ireland, also claims "Angela's Ashes" was exaggerated. Insinuate anything remotely derogatory about the Kennedys and she will literally never speak to you again. That's just how they do, no negative talk against the motherland.
Speaking on his mortality to an Irish newspaper a couple years ago, McCourt was quoted as saying, "I'd just like to go. I don't want funeral services or memorials. Let them scatter my ashes over the Shannon and pollute the river."
http://www.limerickleader.ie/news/Reports-Limerick-author-Frank-McCourt....5456376.jp
to.exit.88
A 79 year old Irishmen should not be exposed to the latitude in Tahiti without a full body coat of zinc oxide, an enormous sombrero and a covered sedan chair.
Cancer sucks. I hope he recovers fully and makes it onto http://menwholooklikeoldlesbians.blogspot.com/
This is exactly why I don't leave the house without SPF 5Million on my Irish epidermis.
@Calraigh: From the mouths of my Irish relatives, "Ditto!"
He was born on 19 August 1930. He's 79 years old and most of them (the adult years) were good years, I think. He'll be missed by family and friends and his fans, but as my elderly relatives put it, "he had a long good run and mostly a good life which all any of us can hope for".
Here's hoping he gets well. He's still got some tales to tell, I bet.
2009 is shaping up to be the year The Reaper got pissed and went on a rampage downtown. That said, I hope Frank has a good few more years left in him and that Malachy is right.
@FormerEnglishMajor: Oh, stop. It's all true.
I knew him back when he was plain old Mr. McCourt, a teacher at my high school. Very sad.
Angela's Ashes still gives me chills and I've read it 20 times.
Beautiful writer. Praying for an unexpected recovery.
It's sad news. McCourt's a good guy, and his writing is wonderful. I actually preferred 'Tis, which was the sequel to Angela's Ashes.
The_Lovely_Miss_Bronx
@FormerEnglishMajor: Maybe she's delusional? Because it was, they did and hell effing yes, they do.
I loved Angela's Ashes. I remember devouring it in about 2 days while working in a shitty museum here in NYC. I should really read the other two books. Off to Amazon..
@FormerEnglishMajor:
And whom did you believe? Mr. McCourt or your mother-in-law?
DramaClub
I recall being on a flight from Boston to San Francisco about a month or so after "Angela's Ashes" was published, and there were seven people in the cabin reading this remarkable memoir. Here's hoping Mr. McCourt has many more years in front of him.
DaeSu
I absolutely LOVED Angela's Ashes, and went to hear FMcC at a couple of readings. My Irish Catholic MIL said it was a complete pack of lies ("it wasn't that bad; the Church didin't turn people away; Irish men don't drink THAT much"). edited to note - my MIL is completely crazy about defending a. The Church, and b. The Irish. It drives me completely insane. Not only do I believe Frank McCourt's memoir was true, I think he underestimated the impact of what he went through on himself and his siblings. His mother - I will never understand why - if she couldn't leave the father - did she keep getting pg?
@SarahHeartburn: Wow. This is like remembering my life before I died. When I do die. I was a Stuyvesant kid before I got accepted to the High School of the Performing Arts. And then my bastard (I will always hate them for this) moved out to the Long Island border. I will hate them because they knew I was too lazy to take two buses and two trains to go to H.S. Seriously? Two buses and Two trains????
I also now hate Deborah Harry.
Iwillnotauditionforastar
This is so sad...I adore his writing. May the angels be waiting at the gate for him.
AuntieFreeze
@SarahHeartburn: You could get the pill from sympathetic doctors by claiming menstrual pain. The funny thing was, when they tried to legalize condoms, they decided they could only be obtained w/ an RX for "normal personal use". They had to backtrack on that when the wags started demanding Rxs for 100 condoms a week...
@scroll_lock: Cell No. 5?
@SarahHeartburn: Are you serious? Were my husband disappearing for months at a time, drinking up all the money while my children starved - he would not be welcome in the house, much less my bed. The whole neighborhood told her to get rid of him.
Teacher Man was how I learned that my feelings about being a new teacher weren't unique. Also, it showed how it's never too late to be a writer. Plus, he could write like no one else's business - such a unique voice.
Whenever he goes, I will miss him.
@scroll_lock: Hey, hey. That's Freedom Jail in 'merica.
Iwillnotauditionforastar