VIOLET QUIRK

A BIBLIOGRAPHY

Violet Quirk
A fabulous author and a woman of mystery ...

Novels   |    Short Fiction   |   Poems   |   Articles

Novels

Different Gods
Published by Constable, 1923
Of this novel, which she dedicated to her mother, Violet Quirk had the following to say: "I had no plan when I started to write Different Gods. I merely wanted to tell a story and, perhaps, to give voice to my suspicion that temperament more than anything else determines one's way of life; circumstance being much less important." It is fair to say that Different Gods is, in part, a love story, very modern for its day, but there is so much more to it than that, as the central character, Sheila Derwent, finds her way in life. The impact of the First World War is dealt with by one who lived through those years and Sheila's Christian faith colours her view of humanity and the decisions she makes. Her half-sister, Peg, is also a realistically depicted character. Their experiences make for entertaining, emotive reading. Indeed, Quirk was also said to describe her novel as "an emotional sneeze"! John F. Carter, Jr., writing in The New York Evening Post, expressed his appreciation for the soul and message of Different Gods rather eloquently: "All men worship different gods, but I find no difficulty in approving Miss Quirk's selection: sanity, courage and a willingness to sacrifice in order to retain the essential beauty that informs all strong deeds and eludes the ratiocination of weaklings. For strength and purity are positive, constructive forces; only the timidly good make them seem negative; it is refreshing to read a book that is free from smugness and intolerance and which shows that after searching the barren fields of self the young novelist is coming back to a juster appraisal of the art of life." Different Gods also received high praise from May Sinclair, who said she could not put the book down, while other figures in the world of literature were equally appreciative of Quirk's debut novel, with one critic stating that it "blazes with the rage of youth, and weeps with youth's pathos." And here is another marvellous insight, from once again, the author herself: "Different Gods was written in a real attic bedroom with sloping roof, cabbagy wall paper, soiled, inferior pictures, and a square inch of window!"

The Skirts of the Forest
Published by Humphrey Toulmin, 1931
Violet Quirk's second and, sadly, final novel is set in the closing years of the nineteenth century, with the location being a rural area of Southern Germany. This tale of peasant life and the story of two young sisters, Trude and Bettina, is told with much insight and warmth. Quirk illustrates with skill the local population's customs, religious beliefs and the simple lives that they lead, largely sheltered as they are from the outside world. Although not without the transitional phase the Industrial Revolution and social changes had brought about encroaching to some degree on their peaceful existence. A review that appeared in The Grimsby Evening Telegraph described The Skirts of the Forest as "at once sombre and charming—sombre in its tale of human fallibilities and blindness, charming in its portrayal of simple virtue. It is a book of the soil, sincere, and artistically consistent." Harold Nicolson thoughtfully considered Quirk's second novel as "sincere and fastidious ... she has written this book with the calm deliberation of the artist to whom some chance occasion has come as a pang of revelation, disclosing an unexpressed beauty in some hitherto unrealised environment ... the result is that something evanescent has become solid." A scene at the end of the book depicts a German and an English boy at peace with one another and enjoying life and, with the author's hindsight, a touching remark from a mother who wonders what life will be like twenty years in the future—which of course was the time of the First World War. One wishes Quirk had gone on to have more of her novels published, as the two she did write are both quite brilliant and exhibit the gift she had for creating believable characters that really come to life throughout her excellent prose.

Short Fiction

"Blood and Wine"
The Novel Magazine, January 1917 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Fortnight"
The Parisienne Monthly Magazine, August 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Mr. Sardinapolis"
The Weekly Telegraph (Sheffield, Yorkshire), August 3, 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

" 'Earl Montague' "
The Weekly Telegraph (Sheffield, Yorkshire), September 14, 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Adam and Eve"
The Weekly Telegraph (Sheffield, Yorkshire), October 19, 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Spy"
The Novel Magazine, November 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Mrs. Butler's Christmas Day"
The Weekly Telegraph (Sheffield, Yorkshire), November 19, 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Jordan and His Wife"
The Parisienne Monthly Magazine, December 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Twins"
The Novel Magazine, December 1918 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Plot"
The Novel Magazine, January 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Geraniums"
The Novel Magazine, February 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Stars"
The Royal Magazine, February 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Ghost"
The Novel Magazine, March 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Seconds Into the Ring"
The Novel Magazine, April 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Oyster"
The Novel Magazine, May 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Ever After"
The Weekly Telegraph (Sheffield, Yorkshire), May 31, 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Dream"
The Novel Magazine, June 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Fool"
The Parisienne Monthly Magazine, June 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Matteo"
The Parisienne Monthly Magazine, July 1919 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Three Kisses"
The Novel Magazine, February 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
The Darker Sex: Tales of the Supernatural and Macabre by Victorian Women Writers, ed. Mike Ashley, Peter Owen, 2009

"Wednesday, Midnight"
The Novel Magazine, April 1920

"The Old Man"
The Royal Magazine, May 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Tigress"
The Novel Magazine, May 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Without a Name"
The Novel Magazine, June 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Baby Upstairs"
The Novel Magazine, July 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Swot"
The Novel Magazine, August 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Mother-Heart"
The Novel Magazine, September 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
The Manchester Evening News, May 26, 1923 (this short story is reprinted here as by "V. Quirk")

"Her 'Husband' "
The Royal Magazine, October 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Philanderers"
The Novel Magazine, October 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
Snappy Stories, March 1, 1923
The Manchester Evening News, June 16, 1923

"Sleeping Secrets"
The Sovereign Magazine, October 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
Pictorial Review, No. 7, April 1925

"The Second Thursday"
The Royal Magazine, November 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"An Untitled Story"
The Novel Magazine, November 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Marriage Lines"
The Novel Magazine, December 1920 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Nothing More to Be Gained"
The Novel Magazine, January 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
The Manchester Evening News, August 11, 1923 (this short story is reprinted here as by "V. Quirk")

"Rich Man, Poor Man"
The Novel Magazine, February 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The End of the Story"
The Novel Magazine, March 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Young Scamp!"
The Novel Magazine, April 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
The Manchester Evening News, June 14, 1924 (this short story is reprinted here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Squinting God"
The Sphere, April 9, 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Lizzie White of Skelly's"
The Royal Magazine, May 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Take That, Miss Jackson!"
Pearson's Magazine, May 1921

"Desirée"
The Novel Magazine, June 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

" 'If Mother Found Out—' "
The Royal Magazine, July 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Eleanore"
Colour, August 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"One of the Fools"
Telling Tales, August 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
The All-Fiction Quarterly, January—March 1922 (this short story is reprinted here as by "V. Quirk")

"Saraan"
Lloyd's Story Magazine, August 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Broken Windows"
The Novel Magazine, October 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Page Marked 'Saved' "
The Premier Magazine, October 7, 1921 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

" 'White Lies' "
The Grand Magazine, November 1921

"It's the Way of the World"
The Grand Magazine, January 1922 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Bundle of Faggots"
Colour, February 1922 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"She Knew!"
The Novel Magazine, May 1922

"No Scandal"
Lloyd's Story Magazine, June 1922

"The Wife Who Tried to Be Clever"
The Novel Magazine, July 1922

"With Love from Harry"
Pearson's Magazine, August 1922

"Whatever Happens"
Saucy Stories (British edition), October 1, 1922
Saucy Stories (U.S.A. edition), October 1, 1922

"Alias Nellie Turner"
Snappy Stories, November 2, 1922

"Nerissa Said It Was Fate" (part one of the "Only Mother" series)
The Novel Magazine, December 1922
McCall's Magazine, November 1927

"Good Gracious, Henrietta!" (part two of the "Only Mother" series)
The Novel Magazine, January 1923

"Just Jane" (part three of the "Only Mother" series)
The Novel Magazine, February 1923
McCall's Magazine, April 1928

"Alison and the Stars" (part four of the "Only Mother" series)
The Novel Magazine, March 1923

"Most Respectable"
The Royal Magazine, March 1923

"When Mother Was Mary" (part five of the "Only Mother" series)
The Novel Magazine, April 1923
McCall's Magazine, February 1929

"Letting Them Grow"
The Novel Magazine, August 1923

"All Girls Are the Same"
The Royal Magazine, September 1923

"After the Years"
The Royal Magazine, November 1923
The Saturday Journal (Adelaide, South Australia), February 2, 1934

"The Sentimentalist"
The Smart Set (British edition), November 1923

"A Fool There Was"
The Manchester Evening News, November 10, 1923 (this short story is printed here as by "V. Quirk")
This is almost certainly a reprint of a short story that had previously appeared in another British periodical. The original publication details are unknown.

"Adjustment"
The Novel Magazine, January 1924

"The Seventh Symphony"
The Smart Set (British edition), February 1924

"The Man Next Door"
The Novel Magazine, March 1924

"The Spade"
Tip Top Stories of Adventure and Mystery, No. 5, April 1924

" 'Remember You're the Eldest' "
The Novel Magazine, July 1924

" 'Those Women' "
The Sovereign Magazine, August 1924

"The Heart of a Chinese Girl"
The Sovereign Magazine, August 1924
According to the information Richard Fidczuck supplied to The Fictionmags Index, "The Heart of a Chinese Girl" went uncredited in this issue of The Sovereign Magazine. However, I have come across more than one advertisement in Australian newspapers for the August 1924 edition of The Sovereign Magazine in which Violet Quirk is mentioned as the author of this short story.

"Linda and Life"
The Home Magazine (British edition), November 1924
This short story was described in certain sections of the press at the time of its publication as "a clever and fascinating study of the modern girl and her attitude to marriage."

"Wings"
The Smart Set (British edition), November 1924

"Urge: The Story of Maud Mason" (a three-part serial)
The Sphere (Christmas edition), November 24, 1924
The Sphere, January 3, 1925
The Sphere, January 10, 1925

"One Night"
Hutchinson's Magazine, January 1925

"Her Child"
The Home Magazine (British edition), February 1925

"Her Broken Engagement"
Cupid's Diary, February 11, 1925

"Standing Alone"
The Novel Magazine, March 1925

"Cara"
The Home Magazine (British edition), February 1926

"Her Baby"
McCall's Magazine, August 1928
This short story may not have been by the same author. See the Addenda section below for more details.

"The Wonderful Woman"
Modern Home, October 1928

"All in a Day"
The Quiver, 1930 (issue date unknown)

"Escape"
The Novel Magazine, February 1931

"How Collister Came Home"
The Evening Standard, April 30, 1935
The Evening Despatch (Birmingham), September 28, 1935
Short Story Magazine (Australia), No. 34, May 1947

"The Mantons"
The 20-Story Magazine, December 1935

"Just Two Minutes"
The Evening News, January 6, 1936
The World's News (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia), September 7, 1940

"Return of Mr. Archer"
The Evening News, February 21, 1936
The Sunday Telegraph (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia), September 20, 1942 (this short story is reprinted here under the title "The Return of Mr. Archer")
The Sunday Times (Perth, Western Australia), October 11, 1942 (this short story is reprinted here under the title "The Return of Mr. Archer")

"The Colossal Lover"
The 20-Story Magazine, March 1936
The Toronto Star Weekly, May 16, 1936 (this short story is reprinted here under the title "Colossal Lover")

"A Goddess Unaware"
The Evening News, March 2, 1936
The Wagga Wagga Express (New South Wales, Australia), September 12, 1936
The Mackay Daily Mercury (Queensland, Australia), September 16, 1936
The Dalby Herald (Queensland, Australia), October 2, 1936

"Burning Embers"
The Daily Mail, April 16, 1936

"The Visitor"
The 20-Story Magazine, May 1936

"Strange Chemist"
The Daily Mail, September 9, 1936

"Someone Always Pushed Her On"
The Daily Sketch, October 9, 1937

"Child and Pierrot"
The Daily Herald, October 22, 1936

"The Glass Man"
The Daily Express, December 9, 1936
The Hong Kong Sunday Herald, November 7, 1937
The Daily News (Perth, Western Australia), March 29, 1938

"That Woman!"
The 20-Story Magazine, November 1937

" 'She Kissed My Hand' "
The Sketch, November 24, 1937

"Give Me My Armour"
The Daily Sketch, November 30, 1937

"Murderable Martha"
The Evening News, February 3, 1938
The Sunday Mail (Brisbane, Queensland, Australia), November 12, 1939

" 'The Blinding Light' "
The Yorkshire Observer Budget, March 4, 1938
The Northern Weekly Gazette (Durham), December 3, 1938
The Kensington News and West London Times, January 6, 1939
The Hampshire Telegraph & Post, January 6, 1939
The Auckland Star (New Zealand), February 2, 1939
The Evening News (Portsmouth, Hampshire), March 9, 1939
The Colne Valley Guardian (Yorkshire), June 2, 1939
The Advertiser (Rugby, Warwickshire), September 12, 1939
The China Mail (Hong Kong), May 17, 1940
The Halifax Daily Courier & Guardian (Yorkshire), August 12, 1940
The Bucks Examiner, November 22, 1940

"Fatal Forty"
The Star, November 2, 1938

"The Mystery of the Disagreeable Man"
The Star, September 6, 1939

"For All That"
The Evening Chronicle (Newcastle upon Tyne), July 8, 1944

Poems

"What Shall I Do?"
The Novel Magazine, October 1919 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"To-day and To-morrow"
The Novel Magazine, January 1920 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Stranger"
The Novel Magazine, April 1920 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Away"
The Novel Magazine, May 1920 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Poet"
The Novel Magazine, August 1920 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Another"
The Novel Magazine, March 1921 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"My Mother"
The Novel Magazine, March 1921 (this poem is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

Articles

"The Next War"
The Royal Magazine, April 1921 (this article is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"The Modern Craze for Undress to Blame"
The Sunday Chronicle, January 15, 1922

"Leave the Girls Alone"
The Sunday Chronicle, February 5, 1922

"Which Type Are You?"
The Royal Magazine, March 1922 (this article is printed here as by "V. Quirk")

"Hail to Prince Charming!"
The Illustrated Sunday Herald, June 18, 1922

"What Sort of Man Are You?"
The Upper Murray and Mitta Herald (Victoria, Australia), October 12, 1922
The Horsham Times (Victoria, Australia), October 13, 1922
The Narracoorte Herald (South Australia), October 13, 1922
The Shepparton Advertiser (Victoria, Australia), October 19, 1922
The Great Southern Advocate (Victoria, Australia), October 19, 1922
The Narracan Shire Advocate and Yallourn Brown Coal Mine, Walhalla and Thorpdale Echo (Victoria, Australia), October 22, 1922
The Omeo Standard and Mining Gazette (Victoria, Australia), October 31, 1922
The Yarrawonga Mercury and Southern Riverina Advertiser (Victoria, Australia), October 31, 1922
These are almost certainly reprints of an article that had previously appeared in a British periodical. I very much suspect the source article was the one originally published in the March 1922 issue of The Royal Magazine under the title "Which Type Are You?".

"Fettered Hero of Love-Dream"
The Daily Sketch, October 14, 1922

"My Pretty Maids!"
The Evening Standard, October 21, 1922
In this article, Violet Quirk relates the observations she made while attending the annual British Dairy Show.

"Is the Maternal Instinct Dying Out?"
The Home Magazine (British edition), November 1922

"Do Men's Looks Matter?"
The Royal Magazine, February 1923
It is worth nothing here that various newspapers around the world reprinted excerpts from this article, including several in such far flung countries as China and Australia.

(untitled article)
The Sunday People, April 29, 1923
In this article, Violet Quirk reports, in vivacious fashion, on the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of York at Westminster Abbey, which occasion she attended. Her comments on the royal ceremony include sightings of such luminaries as Winston Churchill, Lloyd George and Lady Diana Cooper.

"Jazzing to Jeopardy"
The Sunday Chronicle, June 24, 1924
An article in which Violet Quirk shares with readers her somewhat negative impressions after spending an evening in a nightclub where modern jazz music was the entertainment!

"Being Happy With One Maid"
The Home Magazine (British edition), September 1926

"Wives and Wages"
The Sun (Auckland, New Zealand), April 14, 1927
This is almost certainly a reprint of an article that had previously appeared in a British periodical. The original publication details are unknown.

"Sanctity of Modern Marriage"
The Sunday Pictorial, May 29, 1927

"Is He Really Shy"
The Otago Witness (New Zealand), February 1930 (this was a weekly newspaper; the exact issue date is unknown)
This is almost certainly a reprint of an article that had previously appeared in a British periodical. The original publication details are unknown.

Sources and Acknowledgments:
In the process of compiling this bibliography, as well as referring to my own collection of literature and the research I have done at the British Library Newspaper Library, a number of other sources were consulted, not the least of which was Philip Stephensen-Payne's Galactic Central website, the home of William G. Contento's Fictionmags Index.

Illustration in The Evening News for "A Goddess Unaware".

Addenda:
Please note that in the Short Fiction section of this webpage, The Evening News and The Star refer to the London evening newspapers that bore those titles and The Evening Standard to the London evening newspaper that is still with us today.
There were two very short pieces (as by "V. Quirk") that appeared in American pulp magazines which I have been unable to identify as either poems, articles or sketches. "The Third Kiss" was published in the February 1919 edition of The Parisienne Monthly Magazine and "The Woman Speaks" was printed in the January 4, 1920 issue of the periodical Snappy Stories.
An article by Violet Quirk on the subject of spinsterhood, or, equally unkindly, women who are referred to as "old maids", was published in an early 1922 edition of the magazine Home Notes. Unfortunately, I have been unable to identify the issue date or the title of this article.
At the time of writing, it has not been possible to ascertain whether the "Violet Quirk" byline was the author's real name or a pseudonym. Furthermore, I have been unable to establish in which year she was born or when she passed away. In fact, details of her life are almost non-existent on the internet. One thing I do know is that when she was active as a published writer from the late 1910s through to the 1940s, Violet Quirk was a young English woman receiving high praise in the press for her outstanding literary efforts. It is possible she was from Yorkshire, because some of the earliest short stories by her were published in The Sheffield Weekly Telegraph. There is also some evidence, regarding a comment (see the image below) in the American newspaper The Shamokin Dispatch about the short story "Her Baby", first published in the August 1928 issue of McCall's Magazine, to suggest that Quirk was living in Shamokin, Pennsylvania for a period during the 1920s. If that was her, I do strongly believe she must have returned to England at some point afterwards, but I cannot expand further on this information. In all candour, I consider it unlikely the author of "Her Baby" was the same Violet Quirk, but a different person who happened to share the same name. Another telling thing is that this short story first appeared in McCall's Magazine, unlike a number of other stories from British periodicals that were reprinted across the Atlantic in McCall's Magazine, Pictorial Review and Snappy Stories. Whatever the truth is, after the Second World War, she appears to have disappeared from the public eye and ceased being active as a writer. One last piece of evidence that Violet Quirk may well have been a Yorkshire lass is a mention in The Halifax Daily Courier & Guardian of a Violet Quirk who was part of a fire-watching group in November 1944. And going back a few years, her short story " 'The Blinding Light' " was first published in the March, 1938 edition of The Yorkshire Observer Budget.  I very much hope the mystery regarding the background and identity of this author will be solved at some point in the future. For now, I hope anyone interested in Violet Quirk's work finds this bibliography informative. It was a pleasure to put together!

Email: marks3789@gmail.com

Copyright © 2026 Richard Simms