Janet Caird

{{Short description|Malawi-born British writer}}

{{Infobox person

| name = Janet Caird

| other names =

| image =

| caption =

| birth_date = {{birth date|1913|4|24|df=y}}

| birth_place = Livingstonia, Malawi

| death_date = {{death date and age|1992|1|20|1913|4|24|df=y}}

| death_place = Inverness, Scotland

| nationality = Scottish

| education = {{plainlist}}

• Dollar Academy
• University of Edinburgh, M.A., 1935
• University of Grenoble and the Sorbonne, 1935–36

{{endplainlist}}

| occupation = Writer, teacher, critic

| organizations = {{plainlist}}

• Royal Overseas League
• Society of Authors
• Society of Antiquaries of Scotland
• Inverness Association of University Women

{{endplainlist}}

| parents = {{plainlist}}

• Peter Scott Kirkwood
• Janet (Gilmour) Kirkwood

{{endplainlist}}

| spouse = James Bowman Caird (1938)

| awards =

| footnotes =

}}

Janet Hinshaw Caird (24 April 1913 – 20 January 1992) was a teacher and a 20th-century writer of Scottish mysteries, poems, and short stories.{{cite web|title=Janet Caird|work=Contemporary Authors Online|publisher=Gale|year=2003|url=https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/H1000014856/BIC?u=|access-date=19 August 2019|url-access=subscription}} Daughter of Peter Kirkwood, a missionary, and Janet Kirkwood, she was born in Livingstonia, Malawi, and educated in Scotland. She attended Dollar Academy in Dollar, Clackmannanshire, and the University of Edinburgh, graduating with a Master of Arts in English literature in 1935 before further study at the University of Grenoble and the Sorbonne in 1935–36.

She married James Bowman Caird in 1938, and they had two daughters. She taught English and Latin at Park School for Girls in Glasgow in 1937–38, at Royal High School, Edinburgh in 1940–41, and at Dollar Academy from 1941 to 1943.{{cite book|editor=John M. Reilly|title=Twentieth-Century Crime and Mystery Writers|publisher=MacMillan|year=1980|pages=[https://archive.org/details/twentiethcentury00reil/page/248 248–49]|isbn=0-333-30107-2|url=https://archive.org/details/twentiethcentury00reil/page/248}} After several years at home, she returned to teaching at Dollar Academy in the 1950s before moving to Inverness in 1963.

Her novel for children, Angus the Tartan Partan, was published in 1961, followed by five murder mysteries set in Scotland and an historical novel, The Umbrella Maker's Daughter (1980), set in Dollar. Her three books of poetry appeared between 1977 and 1988.{{cite book|editor1=Elizabeth Ewan|editor2=Sue Innes|editor3=Siân Reynolds|editor4=Rose Pipes|title=Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|year=2006|page=57|isbn=978-0-7486-1713-5|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zs6qBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA57}} Caird also wrote short stories for publication in periodicals and anthologies, and she wrote reviews and critical articles for Cencrastus, Chapman, Scottish Literary Journal, and other publications.

Caird was a member of the Royal Overseas League, the Society of Authors, and the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and she was president of the Inverness Association of University Women. Caird died in Inverness in 1992.