A·J·克朗宁

A·J·克朗宁，阿奇博尔德·约瑟夫·克朗宁（Archibald Joseph Cronin，1896年7月19日—1981年1月6日），苏格兰医生、小说家，世界著名文学《堡垒》（The Citadel）的作者，1919年毕业于格拉斯哥大学。

家庭

克罗宁在大学时遇见了他未来的妻子玛丽·艾格尼丝·吉布森，他们于1921年8月31日结婚，成为“医生夫妇”。

克朗宁成为作家后，他们的两个儿子（文森特和帕特里克）分别于1924年和1926年生于特雷迪加和伦敦。而他们的小儿子安德鲁则出生于1937年。

Archibald Joseph Cronin (Cronogue) (19 July 1896 – 6 January 1981) was a Scottish physician and novelist. His best-known novel is The Citadel (1937), about a Scottish physician who serves in a Welsh mining village, and then moves into a highly paid private practice in London where he becomes disillusioned with the greed and incompetence of some doctors. In writing the book, Cronin utilised his experiences both as a medical inspector of mines, and a physician on Harley Street. The Citadel exposed unfairness in British medicine and helped inspire the National Health Service.

The Stars Look Down, set in the North East of England, is another of his best-selling novels that used his first-hand knowledge of mining communities. The book's success prompted a film adaptation, as did The Citadel, Hatter's Castle, The Keys of the Kingdom and The Green Years. Cronin's 1935 novella Country Doctor was turned into a long-running BBC radio and TV series, Dr. Finlay's Casebook (1962–1971), set in the 1920s. There was a follow-up series in 1993–1996.

Early life

Archibald Joseph Cronin was born in Cardross, Dunbartonshire, Scotland, the only child of a Presbyterian mother, Jessie Cronin (née Montgomerie), and a Catholic father, Patrick Cronin. The future novelist often wrote of young men from similarly mixed backgrounds. His maternal grandfather, Archibald Montgomerie, was a hatter who owned a shop in Dumbarton. His paternal grandparents had emigrated from County Armagh, Ireland, and become glass and china merchants in Alexandria. His grandfather Owen Cronin (Cronogue) had his surname changed from Cronogue in 1870. Not long after their marriage, Cronin's parents settled in Helensburgh, where their son attended Grant Street School. When A. J. was seven years old, his father, an insurance agent and commercial traveller, died of tuberculosis. His mother moved the family to her parents' home in Dumbarton, and she later became the first female public health inspector in Glasgow.

Cronin was not only a precocious student at Dumbarton Academy, who won prizes in writing competitions, but an excellent athlete and association footballer. From an early age he was an avid golfer, and he enjoyed the sport throughout his life. His family then moved to Yorkhill, Glasgow, where he attended St Aloysius' College in the Garnethill area of the city. He played football for the St Aloysius' First XI, an experience he included in one of his last novels, The Minstrel Boy.

A family wish that Cronin should either study for the priesthood or practise medicine was decided by him when he chose "the lesser of two evils". He won a Carnegie scholarship to study medicine at the University of Glasgow in 1914. Having been absent in 1916–1917 for naval service, he graduated in 1919 with highest honours when obtaining the degree of MBChB. Later that year he visited India as ship's surgeon on a liner. Cronin went on to earn additional qualifications, including a Diploma in Public Health (1923) and Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (1924). In 1925 he gained an MD at the University of Glasgow with a dissertation titled "The History of Aneurysm".

Medical career

During the First World War, Cronin served as a surgeon sub-lieutenant in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve before graduating from medical school. After the war he trained at hospitals that included Bellahouston Hospital and Lightburn Hospital in Glasgow and the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin. He undertook general practice at Garelochhead, a village on the River Clyde, and in Tredegar, a mining town in South Wales.