Editing Violet Jacob

{{Short description|Scottish writer, 1863–1946}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2021}}
{{Use British English|date=December 2016}}
{{Infobox person
|name = Violet Jacob
|image = Henry Harris Brown - Violet Jacob.jpg
|alt = Portrait of a pensive Violet Jacob, wearing a pink and black gown with ruffle at the neck, seated beside a vase of flowers. Oil on canvas.
|caption = ''Violet Jacob'', by Henry Harris Brown
|birth_name = Violet Augusta Mary Frederica Kennedy-Erskine
|birth_date = {{birth date|df=y|1863|9|1}}
|birth_place = [[House of Dun]], near [[Montrose, Angus|Montrose]] in [[Angus, Scotland|Angus]]
|death_date = {{death date and age|df=y|1946|9|9|1863|9|1}}
|death_place = Marywell House, near [[Kirriemuir]]
|resting_place = Dun kirkyard
|nationality = Scottish
|known_for = Poetry in Scots
|spouse = Arthur Otway Jacob (m. 1894–1936)
|children = 1 Arthur Henry Augustus Jacob Royal Fusiliers d. 16/7 1916<ref>British War Graves Commission</ref>
}}

'''Violet Jacob''' (1 September 1863 – 9 September 1946) was a Scottish writer known especially for her historical novel ''Flemington'' and for her poetry, mainly in [[Scots language|Scots]]. She was described by a fellow Scottish poet [[Hugh MacDiarmid]] as "the most considerable of contemporary vernacular poets".

==Early life==
Jacob was born '''Violet Augusta Mary Frederica Kennedy-Erskine''', at the [[House of Dun]],<ref name=":0">{{Cite ODNB |title=Jacob [née Kennedy-Erskine], Violet Augusta Mary Frederica |last=Anderson |first=Carol |date=25 May 2006 |doi = 10.1093/ref:odnb/58422}}</ref> the daughter of William Henry Kennedy-Erskine (1 July 1828 – 15 September 1870) of [[Dun, Angus|Dun, Forfarshire]], a captain in the [[17th Lancers]] and Catherine Jones (died 13 February 1914), the only daughter of William Jones of [[Henllys, Carmarthenshire|Henllys]], [[Carmarthenshire]]. Her father was the son of John Kennedy-Erskine (1802–1831) of [[House of Dun|Dun]] and [[Lady Augusta Gordon|Augusta FitzClarence]] (1803–1865), the illegitimate daughter of [[William IV of the United Kingdom|King William IV]] and [[Dorothea Jordan|Dorothy Jordan]]. She was a great-granddaughter of [[Archibald Kennedy, 1st Marquess of Ailsa]].

The area of [[Montrose, Angus|Montrose]] where her family seat of [[House of Dun|Dun]] was situated was the setting for much of her fiction. She married, at St John's Episcopal Church, Princes Street, Edinburgh, on 27 October 1894, Arthur Otway Jacob (1867–1936),<ref name=":0" /> an Irish [[Major (rank)|major]] in the [[British Army]], and accompanied him to India where he was serving. Her book ''Diaries and letters from India 1895–1900'' is about their stay in the Central Indian town of [[Mhow]]. The couple had one son, Harry, born in 1895, who died as a soldier at the [[Battle of the Somme]] in 1916. Arthur died in 1936, and Violet returned to live at [[Kirriemuir]], in Angus. She died of heart disease on 9 September 1946 and was buried beside her husband at the graveyard at Dun.<ref>{{Cite ODNB|title=Jacob [née Kennedy-Erskine], Violet Augusta Mary Frederica (1863–1946), writer|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-58422|access-date=2021-01-25|year=2004|language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/58422}}</ref>

==Scots poetry==
Violet Jacob was described by [[Hugh MacDiarmid]] as "by far the most considerable of contemporary vernacular poets",<ref>{{Cite book |title=Contemporary Scottish Studies |last=MacDiarmid |first=Hugh |year=1925 }}</ref> a view he did not rescind over a fifty-year period.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Lum Hat |last=Garden |first=Ronald |publisher=Aberdeen University Press |year=1982 |isbn=0-08-028449-3 }}</ref> She was particularly known for her poems in the Angus dialect. Her poetry was associated with that of Scots revivalists like [[Marion Angus]], [[Alexander Gray (poet)|Alexander Gray]] and [[Lewis Spence]], who drew their inspiration from early Scots poets such as [[Robert Henryson]] and [[William Dunbar]], rather than from [[Robert Burns]].<ref>Scottish renaissance (2000). In ''The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English''. Retrieved from [http://www.credoreference.com/entry/cupliteng/scottish_renaissance 17 December 2011.]</ref>

Jacob is commemorated in [[Makars' Court]], outside the [[Writers' Museum]], [[Lawnmarket]], Edinburgh. Selections for Makars' Court are made by the Writers' Museum, [[The Saltire Society]] and [[The Scottish Poetry Library]]. In 1936 she was awarded an honorary LLD degree by Edinburgh University.<ref>{{Cite news|date=11 September 1946|title=Death of Violet Jacob: A Notable Scottish Poet 'Songs of Angus'|page=4|work=[[The Scotsman]]}}</ref>

{{quote box |width=350px |align=right |bgcolor=#FFFFF0 |salign=right |quote =<poem>
Oh, tell me what was on yer road, ye roarin' norlan wind
:As ye cam' blawin' frae the land that's niver frae my mind? 
My feet they trayvel England, but I'm deein' for the north – 
:My man, I heard the siller tides rin up the Firth o' Forth.
</poem>
 |source = – from "The Wild Geese", ''Songs of Angus'' (1915)<ref>[http://www.rampantscotland.com/poetry/blpoems_geese.htm "Scottish Poetry Selection – The Wild Geese" at rampantscotland.com]</ref>
}}

''The Wild Geese'', a conversation between the author and the North Wind, is a melancholic poem on the theme of homesickness. It was set to music as ''Norlan' Wind'' and popularised by Angus singer and songmaker [[Jim Reid (folk musician)|Jim Reid]],<ref>[http://www.springthyme.co.uk/wildgeese/index.htm "Jim Reid: The Norland Wind/ The Wild Geese" at springthyme.co.uk]</ref> who also set to music other poems by Jacob and those other Angus poets such as Marion Angus and Helen Cruikshank.<ref>[http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/scotlandssongs/secondary/genericcontent_tcm4556786.asp "Norlan' Wind (The Wild Geese)" at educationscotland.gov.uk]</ref> Another version, sung by [[The Singing Kettle|Cilla Fisher and Artie Trezise]], appeared on their 1979 [[Topic Records]] album ''Cilla and Artie''. Traditional folk band [[Malinky]] are among many other artists who have released versions of ''Norland Wind''.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://folking.com/tag/malinky/ |title=Malinky, Norlan'Wind/Wild Geese |date=27 April 2021 }}</ref>

==Prose==
Apart from her collections of poetry and short stories, Violet Jacob published an Erskine family history (''Lairds of Dun'', 1931) and five novels, the best known of which is the tragic ''Flemington'' (1911; reissued in 1994),<ref name=":1">{{Cite book |title=Flemington; & Tales from Angus |last=Jacob, Violet, 1863–1946 |date=1998 |publisher=Canongate |others=Anderson, Carol, Jacob, Violet, 1863–1946 |isbn=0862417848 |location=Edinburgh |oclc=60650770}}</ref> set in the aftermath of the [[Jacobite rising of 1745]]. ''Flemington'' was described by [[John Buchan]] as "the best Scots romance since ''[[The Master of Ballantrae]]''<nowiki/>".<ref name=":0"/><ref name=":1"/>

==Works==
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/57427 The Sheep-stealers]'' (1902), novel
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693606 The Infant Moralist]'' (1903), poems
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65800 The Interloper]'' (1904), novel
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693614 The Golden Heart & other fairy stories]'' (1904), stories
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693612 Verses]'' (1905)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/57503 Irresolute Catherine]'' (1908), novella
*''[https://archive.org/details/historyaythanwa01jacogoog The History of Aythan Waring]'' (1908), novel
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693613 Stories Told by the Miller]'' (1909)
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693604 The Fortune-hunters and Other Stories]'' (1910)
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55361 Flemington]'' (1911), novel
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17933 Songs of Angus]'' (1915), poems
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693610 More songs of Angus and others]'' (1918), poems
*''[https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69484 Bonnie Joann and other poems]'' (1921)
*''[https://www.fadedpage.com/showbook.php?pid=20240114 Tales of my own country]'' (1922), short stories
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693615 Two new poems]'' (1924), poems
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693620 The Northern Lights and other poems]'' (1927), poems
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693619 The good child's year book]'' (1928)
*''[https://archive.org/details/lairdsofdunbyvio00jaco The Lairds of Dun]'' (1931), family history
*''[https://digital.nls.uk/128693617 The Scottish poems of Violet Jacob]'' (1944), poems
*''The Lum hat and other stories: Last tales of Violet Jacob'' (1982), short stories
*''Diaries and letters from India 1895–1900'' (1990)

==Reviews==
[[Isobel Murray]] (1983), "The Forgotten Violet Jacob", reviewing ''The Lum Hat and Other Stories''", in Sheila G. Hearn, ed., ''[[Cencrastus]]'' No. 13, Summer 1983, p. 54

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*[[Janet Caird]] (1984), ''The Poetry of Violet Jacob and [[Helen B. Cruickshank]]'', in Geoff Parker, ed. ''[[Cencrastus]]'' No. 19, Winter 1984, pp. 32–34 {{issn|0264-0856}}
*Arianna Introna (2017), "Violet Jacob on the Capital Relation: Local and Global Flows of Privilege and (Im)mobility", Carla Sassi and Silke Stroh, eds., 2017, ''Empires and Revolution: [[Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham|Cunninghame Graham]] and his Contemporaries'', ''Scottish Literature International'', Glasgow, pp.&nbsp;157–170 {{isbn|978-1-908980-25-0}}

==External links==
* {{Gutenberg author |id=7709}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Jacob, Violet|name=Violet Jacob|author=yes}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Violet Jacob |sopt=t}}
* {{Librivox author |id=12913}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jacob, Violet}}
[[Category:1863 births]]
[[Category:1946 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century Scottish writers]]
[[Category:Doric poets]]
[[Category:History of Angus, Scotland]]
[[Category:People from Angus, Scotland]]
[[Category:Schuyler family]]
[[Category:Scots-language poets]]
[[Category:Scottish novelists]]
[[Category:Scottish people of Dutch descent]]
[[Category:Scottish people of Welsh descent]]
[[Category:Scottish Renaissance]]
[[Category:Scottish women novelists]]
[[Category:Scottish women poets]]
[[Category:Van Cortlandt family]]