弗兰克·迈考特爱尔兰裔美籍教师，作家。1930年生于纽约，4岁时举家迁往爱尔兰，在贫民窟度过悲惨的童年。13岁辍学，19岁重返美国，当过兵，做过码头工人。“家国不幸诗人幸”，迈考特为这句话作了最好的诠释。苦难童年没有消磨他的斗志，反而让他学会在挫折中成长，在灰烬中微笑。1996年，处女作、自传体小说《安琪拉的灰烬》出版，一举获得普利策文学奖、全美书评奖、洛杉矶时报图书奖、美国年度好书奖等，连续117周雄踞<纽约时报》畅销书榜。之后陆续推出《就是这里了》和《教书匠》，好评如潮，使一个“教书匠”誉满全球。

《教书匠》于2005年11月出版，一周内即登上《纽约时报》畅销书榜首，后迅速被译成20多种文字，受到全世界教师、学生和广大读者的普遍好评：“自传体故事中最真诚的作品”、“教师的《圣经》”、“每个学生需要至少熟读10遍的温馨文字”。

《教书匠》以一个个生动的故事，用辛辣诙谐的文字，回顾作者30载从教生涯的苦涩与甘甜，讲述令人过目难忘的精彩人生。作者从不吝惜对自己的嘲讽，从不否认与学生似敌似友的关系，对规则和权威从骨子里透出蔑视，幽默和善良也从未在生命中缺席。他从不向学生灌输什么，而是在春风化雨问教会了他们唱自己的歌、跳自己的舞、讲自己的故事……

A third memoir from the author of the huge international bestsellers 'Angela's Ashes' and "Tis'. Frank McCourt arrived in New York as a young, impoverished and idealistic Irish boy - but who crucially had an American passport, having been born in Brooklyn. He didn't know what he wanted except to stop being hungry and to better himself. On the subway he watched students carrying books. He saw how they read and underlined and wrote things in the margin and he liked the look of this very much. He joined the New York Public Library and every night when he came back from his hotel work he would sit up reading the great novels. Building his confidence and his determination, he talked his way into NYU and gained a literature degree and so began a teaching career that was to last 30 years, working in New York's public high schools. Frank estimates that he probably taught 12,000 children during this time and it is on this relationship between teacher and student that he reflects in 'Teacher Man', the third in his series of memoirs. The New York high school is a restless, noisy and unpredictable place and Frank believes that it was his attempts to control and cajole these thousands of children into learning and achieving something for themselves that turned him into a writer. At least once a day someone would put up their hand and shout 'Mr. McCourt, Mr. McCourt, tell us about Ireland, tell us about how poor you were...' Through sharing his own life with these kids he learnt the power of narrative storytelling, and out of the invaluable experience of holding 12,000 people's attention came 'Angela's Ashes'. Frank McCourt was a legend in such schools as Stuyvesant high school - long before he became the figure he is now he would receive letters from former students telling him how much his teaching influenced and inspired them - and now in 'Teacher Man' he will share his reminiscences of those 30 years as well as revealing how they led to his own success with 'Angela's Ashes' and "Tis'.