Theme: modernism in american literature contents: introduction chapter the early twentieth century literature (1901-1939). Modernism

Archibald Joseph Cronin

1896-1981

A.J. Cronin is a representative of realism in contemporary English literature. He criticized various negative sides of bourgeois England, such as medical service, the life of the coalminers and the system of education.
Cronin, a Scottish novelist and physician, was born at Cardross, Dumbartonshire, the only child of a working class family. His father was Catholic and his mother was from a strongly Protestant family. He became fatherless very early and was educated at Dumbarton Academy at the expense of his uncle. During his school years he took great interest in literature. At the age of thirteen he won a gold medal in a nation-wide competition for the best historical essay of the year. He grew away from religion and realized his own dream of brotherhood between people of different churches. This spirit of conciliation marked all his books dealing with questions of faith.
His love for natural sciences got the upper hand and in 1914 Cronin began to study medicine at Glasgow University. His studies were interrupted by war service in the navy. However, in 1919 he graduated from the university with honours. Then he embarked as ship’s surgeon on a liner bound for India. Various hospital appointments followed later.
In 1921 he married and commenced practice in South Wales, where he got acquainted with the coalminers, their conditions of life, and their hard work. While working there he took two higher medical degrees. In 1924 he was appointed Medical Inspector of Mines. In 1925 he was awarded with M. D. honours by the University of Glasgow. Subsequently he started working as a doctor in the West End of London, where he amassed a large practice.
But in 1930 his health broke down, and while convalescing in the West Highlands of Scotland he turned to writing and started to write his first novel Hatter’s Castle, which was published in 1931 and very soon translated into 5 languages and was filmed in 1941.
Hatter’s Castle. The novel was an instantaneous success, and was highly estimated both by critics and readers. The writer has created an impressive character of Mr. James Brodie, a tyrant to his family – his wife Margaret and his children Matthew, Mary and Nessie. Margaret, who was once beautiful and gay, was just a piece of property to Brodie. Even if he seems to love someone – this is a strange love of an egoist. This concerns his younger daughter Nessie whom he made a physical and moral ruin. Their daughter Mary is a contrast to both her father and her mother. She strives for happiness and she is brave and decisive. She doesn’t fear Mr. Brodie and she is always ready to defend her younger sister whom she loves dearly. When Mr. Brodie gets to know about Mary’s relations with Denis Foyle and her pregnancy he drives her away from home. He never mentions her by name, he calls her “the one I kicked out of my home”. Mary is homeless and helpless. But her hope of life is Denis, the father of her future child. Unfortunately, at the moment when Mary is giving birth to her child her beloved Denis parishes when the storm breaks out and the lightning strikes the train right on the bridge. Mary returns home but she is neglected by her father. She tries to care about him and to please him although he is not the man who can appreciate it. He drives his little daughter Nessie to despair and suicide. He wanted her to be always top of the class and win the Latta scholarship. He always threatened to kill her if she didn't win. Nessie did not win the Latta competition and she knew what that meant for the ambitious man like her father and she committed suicide. Mr.Brodie sent his son Matthew to India, but instead of earning money there Matthew demanded money from his mother, and she sold and mortgaged everything she could, concealing it from her husband, to send Matthew 40 pounds. Eventually, Matthew left for America taking his father's mistress Nancy with him.
After the publication of his first novel Cronin determined to devote himself to literature, for all his life he had been intensely interested in the world of letters. In 1935 the novel The Stars Look Down appeared. In a short time it gained popularity both in Europe and America, and brought him fame. It is a novel of deep social problems which examines injustices in a North England mining community. Cronin shows the hard life and working conditions of the miners. David, the main character, wishing to serve his people, joins the Labour Party but soon gets disappointed. He realizes how deep the gap is between what the labourists say and the reality of life, the gap between the rich and the poor. He loses elections and returns to the mine with clear mind and heart.
World War II caused changes in Cronin’s literary activities. He left for America and in his subsequent novels he dealt less and less with burning social problems. His novels of this period are: The Keys of the Kingdom (1941) – a story about a catholic missionary Father Francis Chisholm who goes to China to convert the Chinese to Christianity. He becomes familiar with the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius, adopts a simple way of life, and advocates ecumenical cooperation between all Christians; The Green Years (1944) which describes the childhood of an Irish boy in a small Scottish town; Shannon's Way (1948) – a sequel of the previous novel. In The Spanish Gardener (1950) and Beyond this Place (1953) the author analyses the psychology of the characters without touching upon social questions.
His other best-known books are: Adventure in Two Worlds (1952) – an autobiographical novel in which he returned to his experiences as a doctor in Scotland and South Wales; The Crusader’s Tomb (1956)); The Northern Light (1958); A Song of Sixpence (1964).
After World War II A.J.Cronin travelled with his family in Europe. He moved to Switzerland and settled down in Lucerne. He had lived in Switzerland for the last 35 years of his life. He died on January 9, 1981, in Montreaux, Switzerland.
The Citadel. When the novel The Citadel was published in 1937, it gained world fame at once. It fascinates the reader not only with its interesting plot but also with its realism. At the beginning of the novel we get acquainted with Andrew Manson. He has just graduated from the university. He arrives at Blaenelly, a small provincial town in South Wales where he is to start his medical career as an assistant to a doctor. He is excited by the prospect of his future work and even the rainy October afternoon and the dull bare landscape could not spoil his cheerful mood. But the work at Blaenelly turns out to be more difficult than Andrew had imagined. Old doctor Page is so seriously ill that he cannot help Andrew even with his advice. He sees that his knowledge gained at the university is not sufficient. Besides he has ho experience and does not know the work conditions .of a doctor in a small provincial town lacking even a primitive hospital. These conditions are clearly described by Philip Denny, a clever and talented surgeon: “There’s no hospital, no ambulance, no X-rays, no anything. If you want to operate you use the kitchen table. You wash up afterwards at the scullery bosh. The sanitation won't bear looking at. In a dry summer the kids die like flies with infantile cholera.”
The local authorities do not adopt any measures to stop the epidemic. Manson's attempts to summon the District Medical Officer end in failure. Andrew understands that being a doctor he is responsible for the health of the people on his cards. He must find some means of fighting with the indifference of the government. Thus he agrees to Denny’s proposal to blow up the old sewer, which is the cause of infection. After blowing it up Andrew feels exceedingly happy.
But Blaenelly is not the right place for Andrew who wants to be independent, who wants to do something really good for the people. So he and his wife Christine Barlow, a school teacher, leave Blaenelly for Aberalaw where he gets a post as assistant with the Medical Aid Society. In Aberalaw the financial side is better, so are the working conditions, though far from good. He has to face many difficulties. As Andrew is just and honest, it is against his conscience to write a certificate of incapacity for work to a man who is fit for it. Such a case presents itself which is enough to start a trouble. Many of his patients come to him and demand their cards back, they do not want him as doctor. Besides it makes Andrew indignant that the doctors must pay a fifth of their income to the chief doctor. However, worst of all was the routine of the members of the Committee of the Medical Aid Society, who did not want to do real scientific work. Time passes until the patients begin to feel confidence in the young doctor and respect him.
Inspired by Christine, Andrew makes up his mind to take the examination for the M.R.C.P. (Member of the Royal College of Physicians) degree. After achieving the new degree Andrew turns to actual problems – he writes a scientific work in order to improve the life of the miners. Assisted by Christine he makes a number of experiments on guinea pigs, but his work is interrupted by ignorant members of the Committee. He is summoned to appear before the Committee for doing his work “without the necessary permit”.
He finds out that there are things which he cannot fight alone – namely – the whole medical system of bourgeois England. He feels tired, irritable, worried. He gets utterly disappointed with his work at Aberalaw and drops it. With his last money he buys a practice in a poor district of London. His earnings at first are hardly sufficient for food. To Andrew’s wife Christine it seems real work, but Andrew has got tired of all his vain attempts to be of great use to his people. He looks back and sees only defeats, sees that the medical system is rotten and conservative. And Andrew turns away from the principles he has tried hard to fight for. In London he has no true friends like Denny and Hope to support him, but such as Doctor Freddie Hampton and the like, who know how to succeed, of course, not by honest work but by means of cheating, charging large fees and prescribing stock medicine for every disease. He begins to strive only for material wealth and succeeds. “Life moved too swiftly for him to pause long for reflection. The pace exhilarated him. He had a false sensation of strength. He felt vital, increasing in consequence, master of himself and of his destiny.” Christine sees the changes in her husband and is terribly upset. She tries to explain to him that he is becoming a victim to the very system he so hated earlier. When Andrew sees that his worshipped surgeon Ivory cannot perform a simple, operation, the result of which is the death of his patient, he feels guilty, and he understands that he has gone from real life, that he has betrayed his noble cause. He decides to continue his medical practice on a high scientific standing. Christine is willing to support him. When Manson is firm in his decision to begin a new life he has to suffer another blow – Christine meets a tragic death, she is run over by a bus. Only with the help of his true friends does Andrew get over it. He regards Christine's death as punishment for his “crime”. At first Andrew thought that he could not bear his misfortune. Supported by his friends, he recovers. Together with Denny and Hope they decide to leave London for Stanberough, a small provincial town, to start good Christine’s death as punishment for his “crime”. At first Andrew thought that he could not bear his misfortune. Supported by his friends, he recovers. Together with Denny and Hope they decide to leave London for Stanberough, a small provincial town, to start good work. And the reader believes that they will devote their lives to benefiting mankind.
His last hour in London Andrew spent at Christine’s grave, thinking of all he had gone through.