A. J. Cronin

Archibald Joseph Cronin ( born July 19, 1896 in Cardross, Scotland, † January 6, 1981 in Montreux, Switzerland ) was a Scottish physician and writer. Some of his novels have been worldwide successes. Exciting events, life characters and pronounced social criticism characterize his narrative. In his autobiography, Adventures in Two Worlds, he is also committed unequivocally to the Christian faith. Cronin is in the tradition of the Bildungsroman and uses the techniques of the Victorian novel realism.

Life

Archibald Joseph Cronin was born the only child of Patrick Cronin and his wife Jessie Montgomerie. Later he attended the Dumbarton Academy and won several writing contests. For his outstanding achievements him a scholarship in medicine at the University of Glasgow was granted. There he also met his future wife, Agnes Mary Gibson, know who - like him - studied medicine.

Cronin worked in various hospitals, as a ship's doctor and during the First World War as a surgeon in the service of the British Army. After the war he practiced in a mine district in South Wales. Experiences from this activity flowed later in his novels The Stars Look Down (1935 ) and The Citadel (1937 ). He later moved to London and conducted a thriving practice in Harley Street. However, Cronin contended with his profane -profit and self-interest desires, as he explains in his autobiography. During a vacation stay in the Scottish Highlands, he wrote his first novel, Hatter 's Castle (1930 ), which was an immediate success.

In the 30s Cronin moved with his wife and three sons in the United States and settled in New Canaan, Connecticut, down. In later years, he returned to Europe and lived in the last 25 years in Switzerland.

A. J. Cronin died at the age of 84 years.

His son Vincent Cronin has also published books, especially biographies and works on the history of France.

Artistic creation

Cronin was best known for The Stars look Down ( 1935), a novel about miners with sharp attacks against the self-interest of the mine owners.

Works ( selection)

Stories, novels

• Hatter 's Castle, 1930 (Eng. The tyrant, James Brodie, the Hatter and his castle )
• Three Loves, 1932 ( German Lucy Moore, also Three Loves )
• Grand Canary, 1933 (Eng. The House of the Swans )
• The Stars Look Down ( down dt The Stars Look ) 1935
• The Citadel, 1937 (Eng. The Citadel )
• Lady with Carnations, 1939 German: Lady with carnations, translated by Martin Beheim - Schwarzbach, Paul Zsolnay Verlag, Hamburg 1949

Plays

• Jupiter Laughs, 1940

Autobiography

• Adventures in Two Worlds, 1952 (German adventure in two worlds. My life as a physician and writer )

Films