Quote of the Day (Frank McCourt, on His Students' Reaction to Required English Class Reading)

“Put everything away and open your books.

“What books?

“Whatever books you have for English.

“All we got is this Giants in the Earth and that's the most boring book in the world. And the whole class chants, Uh huh, boring, boring, boring.

“They tell me it's about some family from Europe out there on the prairie and everyone is depressed and talking about suicide and no one in the class can finish this book because it makes you want to commit suicide yourself. Why can't they read a nice romance where you don't have all these Europe people all gloomy on the prairie? Or why couldn’t they watch movies?”—Longtime Irish-born New York schoolteacher—and future Pulitzer Prize-winning memoirist—Frank McCourt (1930-2009), 'Tis: A Memoir (1999)

(The photo accompanying this post of Frank McCourt was taken by David Shankbone on March 21, 2007, at New York City's Housing Works bookstore, for a tribute to recently deceased Irish poet Benedict Keily. It comes from the photographer's blog post about the death of Frank McCourt and the memory of this photo.)