Chapters 51-56 Summary and Analysis

In 1972 Frank takes a permanent teaching job at Stuyvesant, one of the best schools in the area. At first Frank is tough, finally having his own class and running things as he believes they should be. The students rebel and Frank realizes that he cannot pretend to be something he is not. Frank is not the teacher that simply grinds his students and forces them to learn by rote. Frank enjoys learning, and wants the students to enjoy it as well.

Frank takes his wife and daughter to Ireland when Maggie is six-weeks-old so that she will always have visions of Ireland in her youth. Once there the conflicts in the North are clearer to Frank when he visits his father. The Catholics and the Protestants will never get along as far as his family is concerned. Frank is...