AJ Cronin

Biography: The Citadel and The Keys of the Kingdom

1. The Life of AJ Cronin

2. The Life of AJ Cronin he was born on the 19 th of July 1896, Cardross , Dunbartonshire the only child of a Protestant mother, Jessie Montgomerie Cronin and a Catholic father, Patrick Cronin

3. The Life of AJ Cronin A.J.CRONIN Archibald Joseph Cronin, MB, ChB , MD, DPH, MRCP, was a Scottish physician and novelist. a Sub Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve during the Great War.

4. The Life of AJ Cronin His best-known works are Hatter's Castle , The Stars Look Down , The Citadel , The Keys of the Kingdom and The Green Years , all of which were adapted to film.

5. The Life of AJ Cronin He also created the Dr. Finlay character, the hero of a series of stories that served as the basis for the popular BBC television and radio series entitled Dr. Finlay's Casebook .

6. The Life of AJ Cronin Cronin proved a precocious student at Dumbarton Academy and St. Aloysius’ College, winning many writing competitions, before being awarded a scholarship to study medicine at the University of Glasgow.

7. The Life of AJ Cronin It was there that he met his future wife, Agnes Mary Gibson, also known as May, who was also a medical student.

8. The Life of AJ Cronin He graduated with highest honors, a commendation, from the University of Glasgow in 1919, being awarded an M.B. and a Ch.B., and would eventually earn additional degrees, including a Diploma in Public Health (London) (1923) and his Member Royal College Physicians (1924).

9. The Life of AJ Cronin On 3rd July 1925 he was awarded an MD for his dissertation, entitled "The History of Aneurysm. Being a Contribution to the Study of the Origins, Growth and Progress of Ideas in Medicine".

10. The Life of AJ Cronin Medical career: During World War I Cronin served as a Surgeon Sub-Lieutenant in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve before graduating from medical school.

11. The Life of AJ Cronin After the war, he trained at various hospitals including Bellahouston and Lightburn Hospitals in Glasgow and Rotunda Hospital in Dublin , before taking up his first practice in Tredegar , a mining town in South Wales .

12. The Life of AJ Cronin . In 1924, he was appointed Medical Inspector of Mines for Great Britain , and over the next few years, his survey of medical regulations in collieries and his reports on the correlation between coal dust inhalation and pulmonary disease were published.

13. The Life of AJ Cronin Writing career started in 1930, after being diagnosed with a chronic duodenal ulcer , Cronin was told he must take six months complete rest in the country on a milk diet.

14. The Life of AJ Cronin At Dalchenna Farm by Loch Fyne , he was finally able to indulge his lifelong desire to write a novel, having theretofore "written nothing but prescriptions and scientific papers ".

15. The Life of AJ Cronin From Dalchenna Farm he travelled to Dumbarton to research the background of the novel, using the files of Dumbarton Library, which still has the letter from Cronin requesting advice on this.

16. The Life of AJ Cronin He composed Hatter's Castle in the span of three months, and the manuscript was quickly accepted by Gollancz , the only publishing house to which it had been submitted (apparently chosen when his wife randomly stuck a pin into a list of publishers).

17. The Life of AJ Cronin This novel, which was an immediate and sensational success, launched his career as a prolific author, and he never returned to practicing medicine.

18. The Life of AJ Cronin Many of Cronin's books were bestsellers which were translated into numerous languages. His strengths included his compelling narrative skill and his powers of acute observation and graphic description.

19. The Life of AJ Cronin Although noted for its deep social conscience, his work is filled with colorful characters and witty dialogue .

20. The Life of AJ Cronin Some of his stories draw on his medical career, dramatically mixing realism, romance, and social criticism. Cronin's works examine moral conflicts between the individual and society as his idealistic heroes pursue justice for the common man.

21. The Life of AJ Cronin Archibald Joseph Cronin, Glasgow doctor and best selling novelist, enjoyed a long life and died of bronchitis in Glion , Switzerland, on 6th January 1981. By that time his books were perceived as old-fashioned . For most of his writing life, however, he had quite uniquely touched the hearts of a huge reading public, nostalgic perhaps for a sense of community and goodness in the face of war and rapid social change.

22. The Keys of the Kingdom

23. The Keys of the Kingdom The Keys of the Kingdom  is a 1941 novel by A. J. Cronin. Spanning six decades, it tells the story of Father Francis Chisholm, an unconventional Scottish Catholic priest who struggles to establish a mission in China. Beset by tragedy in his youth, as a missionary Chisholm endures many years of hardship, punctuated by famine, plague and war in the Chinese province to which he is assigned. Through a life guided by compassion and tolerance, Chisholm earns the respect of the Chinese—and of fellow clergy who would mistrust him—with his kindly, high-minded and courageous ways.

24. The Keys of the Kingdom The novel has six parts, the first (The Beginning of the End) taking place in Scotland in 1938. Father Francis Chisholm is an old man, living with a housekeeper and a young orphan. Due to his unconventional views, he is being investigated by Monsignor Sleeth .

25. The Keys of the Kingdom The second section (Strange Vocation), focuses on Chisholm's youth. His father a Catholic and his mother a non-denominational Protestant. After getting beaten by an anti-Catholic mob, Chisholm's mother tries to lead him home to safety, only for them both to die in a bridge collapse, leaving young Francis an orphan. Initially, his kindly Aunt Polly wishes to adopt him, but his maternal grandmother, Mrs. Glennie , intervenes and adopts him, thereby receiving any money in the Chisholm's estate.

26. The Keys of the Kingdom Francis's maternal grandfather, a baker by trade, is also a preacher of his own branch of Christianity focused on universal tolerance, and plays a large role in the development of Francis's ideologies. While his grandfather is kind, Mrs. Glennie and her son Malcolm are resentful and exploitative. Francis is forced to quit school and work in a shipyard.

27. The Keys of the Kingdom Things take a turn for the better when Francis befriends Willie Tulloch and his family. Tulloch's father is the local doctor and the family are the town's free-thinkers. Willie aids Francis in his attempt to run away. When the attempt fails, Willie's father contacts Aunt Polly, who takes Francis home to live with her and her daughter, Nora. Francis falls in love with Nora, but is afraid to act on it. Nora later has a child out of wedlock, and rather than marry a man she doesn't love, commits suicide. This cements Francis's decision to join a seminary with childhood friend Anselm Mealey , where Francis's humanistic views cause problems for him.

28. The Keys of the Kingdom The third section (An Unsuccessful Curate) focuses on Father Chisholm's first two assignments and his struggles to do what he feels is right in the face of bureaucracy, tradition, and obstinance . At his second appointment, a local girl claims to have come across a previously dry well that had now burst forth anew with healing properties, accompanied by visions of the Virgin Mary, drawing comparisons to Saint Bernadette. Francis is shunned being doubtful of the girl's claims but is vindicated when it is discovered that she had lied. Francis's faith is rewarded when he finds a gravely ill boy who is cured by the spring water.

29. The Keys of the Kingdom In the fourth section (The China Incident) , Father Chisholm takes a position at a mission in Pai -tan, China. When he arrives, the mission is in ruins and no converts are to be found. Much of this section deals with the superficial and detrimental aspects of the mission systems, which focus only on official numbers and not on improving spiritual lives. With supplies from Willie Tulloch (now a doctor himself), Father Chisholm opens a free clinic, gaining the support of the villagers.

30. The Keys of the Kingdom He saves the life of a wealthy local's son, who builds him a new mission and gives him land. With the aid of an isolated Christian village nearby and three nuns sent to him, he starts a school and the mission flourishes. Then a plague hits Pai -tan. Willie Tulloch comes to help, and is among the last to perish from the disease. He learns that Nora's daughter Judy died in childbirth, and sends money for the care of her son, Andrew. The mission is caught in a battle between two warlords, and Father Chisholm is forced out of his pacifism. Decades later, the warlord he worked against kidnapped Chisholm, one of his mission workers, and two Methodist missionaries.

31. The Keys of the Kingdom They manage to escape, but one of the Methodist missionaries is killed. Chisholm soon returns to Scotland (in section five, The Return) and asks Bishop Anselm Mealey for an appointment in his home town. He finds and adopts Andrew. The story ends with section six (The End of the Beginning), in which Monsignor Sleeth is convinced of Chisholm's ideologies and recommends he not be removed from his position.

32. The Citadel

33. The Citadel The Citadel  is a novel by A. J. Cronin, first published in 1937, which was groundbreaking with its treatment of the contentious theme of medical ethics. It has been credited with laying the foundation in Great Britain for the introduction of the NHS a decade later .  In the United States, it won the National Book Award for 1937 novels, voted by members of the American Booksellers Association.

34. The Citadel In October 1921, Andrew Manson, an idealistic, newly qualified doctor, arrives from Scotland to work as assistant to Doctor Page in the small Welsh mining town of Blaenelly . He quickly realizes that Page is invalid and that he has to do all the work for a meagre wage. Shocked by the unsanitary conditions he finds, he works to improve matters and receives the support of Dr . Philip Denny, a cynical semi-alcoholic. Resigning, he obtains a post as assistant in a miners' medical aid scheme in ' Aberalaw ', a neighbouring coal mining town in the South Wales coalfield. On the strength of this job, he marries Christine Barlow, a junior school teacher.

35. The Citadel Christine helps her husband with his silicosis research. Eager to improve the lives of his patients, mainly coal miners, Manson dedicates many hours to research in his chosen field of lung disease. He studies for, and is granted, the MRCP, and when his research is published, an MD. The research gains him a post with the 'Mines Fatigue Board' in London, but he resigns after six months to set up a private practice.

36. The Citadel Seduced by the thought of easy money from wealthy clients rather than the principles he started out with, Manson becomes involved with pampered private patients and fashionable surgeons and drifts away from his wife. A patient dies because of a surgeon's ineptitude, and the incident causes Manson to abandon his practice and return to his former ways. He and his wife repair their damaged relationship, but then she is run over by a bus and killed.

37. The Citadel Since Manson had accused the incompetent surgeon of murder, he is vindictively reported to the General Medical Council for having worked with an American  tuberculosis specialist who does not have a medical degree, even though the patient had been successfully treated at his nature cure clinic. Despite his lawyer's gloomy prognosis, Manson forcefully justifies his actions during the hearing and is not struck off the medical register.