David Frith was born in
Gloucester Terrace in
London, not far from
Lord's, on 16 March 1937. The family resided in
Rayners Lane,
Harrow, whilst he attended Roxbourne School. In 1949, he emigrated with his family to Australia, arriving in Sydney aboard the
RMS Orion on 25 February 1949. After leaving
Canterbury Boys' High School on 15 February 1954 he started his first job as a copy-boy for
The Daily Mirror but left after two months to join the
Commonwealth Bank where he was posted to the
Cronulla branch. He played his early cricket for the famous
St George club and then Paddington before returning to England in 1964.
Return to Sydney After the death of his mother in May 1971, family commitments led Frith to move back to Sydney. Here he sought, to no avail, a full-time cricket related post but, thanks to a recommendation by
Jack Fingleton, he did secure some work with the
Australian News and Information Bureau. The return to Australia would prove to be short-lived and he moved back to the United Kingdom departing aboard the
TSS Fairstar on 19 March 1972.
Magazine editing Commencing with the November 1972 issue, he succeeded
Tony Pawson as deputy editor of
The Cricketer before becoming editor from the March 1973 issue. He founded
Wisden Cricket Monthly and edited it from June 1979 to February 1996. In 1988 Frith won the
Sports Council's British Sports Journalism award as Magazine Sports Writer of the Year. Specialising in Ashes Test match history, Frith has written dozens of books on both cricket in modern times and cricket of the past. His major works include
My Dear Victorious Stod (a biography of
A. E. Stoddart), a lavishly illustrated history of
England versus Australia,
Silence of the Heart (on cricket's suicides, an expansion of his earlier book
By His Own Hand),
The Fast Men,
The Slow Men (about fast bowlers and spinners respectively),
Pageant of Cricket (the only cricket book to have as many as 2000 pictures),
Caught England, Bowled Australia (autobiography),
The Trailblazers (the first
English tour of Australia, in 1861–62),
The Archie Jackson Story (biography) and
Bodyline Autopsy. The catalogue of his vast collection ran to 1100 pages. He has also been involved in producing cricket videos, which have been extremely successful. Frith famously commented that
India should withdraw from the
World Cup if they did not improve. When they won it in
1983 he was pleased to (literally) eat his words, with the help of some red wine, claiming that he had helped spur India to victory. In association with the
National Film and Television Archive, he presented an annual archive cricket film evening at the
National Film Theatre in London for 30 years. In 2003 Frith became the first author to win the
Cricket Society's Book of the Year award three times, and was also a finalist in the
William Hill Sports Book awards for his
Bodyline Autopsy. The book also won ''
Wisden's'' book of the year and, in January 2010, it won
Cricketweb's award for "book of the decade". In his assessment, Martin Chandler wrote: "
Autopsy" is a magnificent book possessing a vibrancy and objectivity that when I first read it I found quite remarkable. It is, without question, the CW "Book of the Decade" and were there any prospect of my being around to collect I would certainly place a large wager on whoever is writing this feature in 90 years time confirming it as CW "Book of the Century". His co-written history of the
Australian Cricket Board won the
Australian Cricket Society book award in 2007, and in 2011 Frith was given the Cricket Society's Ian Jackson Award for Distinguished Services to Cricket. He has been honorary vice-president of the Cricket Memorabilia Society since its foundation in 1987. In 2013 he was awarded honorary life membership of the
Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians, and wrote a further book, ''Guildford's Cricket Story'', which revealed his adopted home town's unique claims to being the 'cradle of cricket'. ==Books by Frith==