Quotes From Angela's Ashes

Franks revelation of Esteem

Growing up in Limerick, in his memoir Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt describes the continuing difficulties The McCourt’s face in 1930’s with World War II going into motion soon after in the early 1940s. Frank goes through many changes as he progresses through his childhood. His enrollment into Catholic school places him with many rigorous Headmasters with a seemingly sole purpose of belittling the students. To get ready for confirmation Frank must join the Confraternity, a brotherhood group that all the boys must join in preparation for confirmation. Through Catholic school, Frank becomes friends with Paddy Clohessy and they get into many forms of mischief for a time. Through his younger years he develops ailments

Going through childhood, he is beginning to gain reasoning and understanding of his situation of poverty. Frank begins to see a common trend in dying for a cause while he grows in the Catholic Church and dealing with his family. “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” (McCourt 113). For Frank, this is a perplexing idea since many of his siblings died before they could even die for anything, yet there are so many adults who are still living and have yet to die for a cause (113). There are several occasions when Frank actually questions his own desires, for example, back to the time when Frank thinks of his father as the Holy Trinity, he longs to assert his love for his father, despite Malachy’s drinking habit, but he gives up this thought for fear that people will view him as weak (210). He believes that Limerick would see his love as a “softness in the head”

As he goes through the process of confirmation, he realizes the weight and consequence of these engagements. When Frank reminisces of his Uncle Pa Keating, he considers the way that Pa Keating does not care of the esteem society hold him to, “That’s the way I’d like to be in the world, a gas man, not giving a fiddlers fart” (132). Like his Uncle, Frank aspires to go beyond the need for the esteem of others, though he has high regard against sinning that often leaves him in conflict with himself. While Frank is out looking for his father, he eats some fish and chips that fell to the floor of a pub (184). Before he goes to find his father, he feels he must go to the priest to repent (184-185). Although he seeks to go beyond the necessity of esteem, he still has high respect for the Catholic Church and attempts not to