Why Frank McCourt Writes

I write because my words are true...as true as the pint that often slid through the lips of my father, as true as the permanence of death, as I watched small, white boxes enter the ground. I write because my thoughts are like the dying embers of the fire that we barely were able to stoke, containing a heat, light, delicate, and pure, but still remaining strong. My words wind around the raven ringlets of my sister Margaret's hair, dancing along the whispers of poverty, and then floating to heaven. I write because my mother's soul was not a tainted one, it was a frightened one...living each life of her day in worry, deceit, anger, and fear. I write because I want to say thank-you to the Angel on the Seventh Stair, and to send a reminder to God to take care of my siblings, and my family. I wish for my family's story to be told, and I promise you, in no way is this ego-ism. There is nothing to be egotistical about. When I was a child, the 'souls' on my shoes were a luxury. Because I have walked on so many paths, I have probably gained more I could think of. When I was a child, I definitely was not rich with money or material things, but undoubtedly, I was rich with the stars that shone every night, the dust of the roads I have traveled, the crumbs of the coal salvaged, and the dry ground in "Italy". But I have a confession to make: the words on my pages are not words at all, they are the eyes, the hands, the feet...the entire being of McCourt. I hope that you, my readers do not feel deceived in any way...but I thought that you deserved to know that my words are not words...they are an entity of a family, a soul, a loss, suffering, and a fight just to live. In my childhood, money was not an easy thing for us to come by, it was something as rare as a blue moon, but I feel that my ability to write has made me wealthier and any other man in the world. I write because I believe the past is a very important thing to remember. Whether a past has been negative, or positive, it is important that it remains and sustains. I tell my past, because I am sure that there are others in the world that have lived one like it. I hope that my past, that my story, could maybe, just maybe help others to heal the past they had once lived. I write not only just to help others heal, but it helps me to heal myself as well. I write so that the souls of children can be remembered, so that the hungry could possibly be fed, so that everyplace could always be Italy, so that the barefoot can be relieved, so that the harmed could be sheltered, so that the poor may be rich, so the sick could be healthy, and so the sad, could be happy again.
AMERICA is my PEN, and IRELAND is my PAPER.

I write because it is my life, it is my passion...I write because I want to be a teacher, so I can teach others what I have learned, inside, and outside of school, and I want to teach what people true factors of life, and the reality of a harsh past. I want to honor my mother, my family, even though, it may not have been perfect. I write because I want to shun every ounce of alcohol that was ever in my father's blood, but I want to rejoice every once of blood, every beat of the heart, that nevertheless, still remained.