I can't go back. The past won't go away in this family.
Frank MccourtRead
I was unloading sides of beef down on the docks when I decided enough was enough. By then, I'd done a lot of reading on my own, so I persuaded New York University to enroll me.
Interpretation
This quote reflects a moment of personal determination and the pursuit of education despite difficult circumstances.
Frank McCourt's quote illustrates a pivotal moment in his life where he chose to take control of his future by pursuing education after experiencing challenging work conditions. His decision to enroll at New York University signifies a quest for knowledge and self-improvement, demonstrating how one can rise above their circumstances through education and determination.
In practice
You might use this quote when discussing the importance of education in overcoming adversity.
I can't go back. The past won't go away in this family.
Sit and quiet yourself. Luxuriate in a certain memory and the details will come. Let the images flow. You'll be amazed at what will come out on paper. I'm still learning what it is about the past that I want to write. I don't worry about it. It will emerge. It will insist on being told.
Kids all want to look cool, as if knowledge is a great burden, but they're always looking around. They remember.
That's what kept us going - a sense of absurdity, rather than humor.
A mother's love is a blessing No matter where you roam. Keep her while you have her, You'll miss her when she's gone -- Angela's Ashes.
You might be poor, your shoes might be broken, but your mind is a palace.
Negative feelings are typical of learning, and you shouldn't feel like you're stupid when you're frustrated doing something. You might say to yourself, 'I can't do this,' but you should say, 'That's great.' That means you really have the potential to learn something there.
I remember going to university, and the people who'd left home for the first time looked at the food and were horrified. Whereas, my view was that if it was vaguely edible, then it's fine.
It seems to me that the great pleasure of human life is not in having an opinion, but rather in learning all the ways you are wrong, and all the nuances you failed to account for, and all the truths that turned out to be not as simple as you once believed. And it seems to me that one of the central pleasures of attending school is that you get to read with really well-informed people who can help welcome you into a complex world stuffed with rich and maddening ambiguity.
After all manner of professors have done their best for us, the place we are to get knowledge is in books. The true university of these days is a collection of books.
I like my job because it involves learning. I like being around smart people who are trying to figure out new things. I like the fact that if people really try they can figure out how to invent things that actually have an impact.
Voters inclined to loathe and fear elite Ivy League schools rarely make fine distinctions between Yale and Harvard. All they know is that both are full of rich, fancy, stuck-up and possibly dangerous intellectuals who never sit down to supper in their undershirt no matter how hot the weather gets.
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