While in France, Jacob began writing, returning to England after the General Strike. When he was seventeen, his first play was produced in Plymouth, where he started his career as a journalist on the Western Morning News. His second play, The Compleat Cynic, was produced in Plymouth the following year. In 1930, Seventeen, his first novel was published. It is a fictionalized account of his school days in Canterbury. By then, he had become a close friend of Margot Asquith, forty years his senior, who became his mentor and literary influence. She introduced him to editors and important literary figures, including Sir Roderick Jones, the head of Reuters, and was offered a position as diplomatic correspondent for Reuters in London.
