Pulitzer Prize-winning author Frank McCourt will deliver the 20th anniversary Red Smith Lecture in Journalism at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 16 (Thursday) at the University of Notre Dame.p. McCourt, whose memoirs “Angela’s Ashes” and “’Tis” were critically acclaimed international best sellers, will speak in the Hesburgh Library’s Carey Auditorium. Titled "From Copybook to Computer: What You Write On and How You Do It,? the lecture is free and open to the public.p. Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., to Irish immigrant parents, McCourt and his family returned to Ireland during the Depression. “Angela’s Ashes” chronicles his memories of growing up in Limerick during the 1930s and ?40s. A New York Times hardcover best seller for 117 weeks, the book won for McCourt the Pulitzer Prize for biography, the National Book Critics’ Circle Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Award.p. “’Tis” continues where “Angela’s Ashes” left off, with McCourt returning to America at age 19. “’Tis” also achieved critical and popular success. For several weeks it was the best-selling non-fiction hardcover in the nation, while “Angela’s Ashes” simultaneously occupied the same position for paperbacks.p. Before becoming an author, McCourt taught writing in the New York City Public School system, the last 17 years at the well-known Stuyvesant High School. He currently is working on a memoir about teaching.p. The Red Smith Lecture in Journalism was established in 1983 to honor the sportswriter and 1927 Notre Dame graduate Walter W. “Red” Smith, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1976 for distinguished criticism. At the time of his death in 1982, Smith was a columnist for The New York Times. Previous Red Smith Lecturers include James Reston, James J. Kilpatrick, Art Buchwald, Charles Kuralt, Georgie Anne Geyer, Ted Koppel and Jim Lehrer.p. The Smith Lectureship, which seeks to foster good writing and to recognize high journalistic standards, is administered by Notre Dame’s John W. Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics&Democracy.p. The series is made possible by a gift from John and Susan McMeel and Universal Press Syndicate. A South Bend native and 1957 Notre Dame graduate, John McMeel is chairman of Andrews McMeel Universal, the parent company of Universal Press Syndicate. He is a member of the advisory council for Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letter and a member of the advisory committee of the Gallivan Program.p. Universal Press Syndicate will publish McCourt’s lecture and distribute it to several thousand journalists and educators later this year.
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