Listen to the passage and fill in the blanks: Frank McCourt (1930-2009) was born in New York of Irish parents, but grew up in Limerick, the Republic of Ireland. Aged 19, he 1)_________ to New York and did a variety of manual jobs before he went to 2)_________, without even a high school diploma. His strong desire for education was based only on his habit of reading. After qualifying as a teacher, he 3)________ English and creative writing in high schools and colleges for 30 years. He wrote a prize-winning childhood 4)__________, Angela’s Ashes (1996), and ’Tis: A memoir (1999), about his return to New York. McCourt’s writing has a humourous style, based on exaggeration and amusing dialogues.