David Rayvern Allen

David Leonard Rayvern Allen (5 February 1938 – 9 October 2014) was a cricket writer and historian, as well as a radio producer and presenter, a speaker and a musician. His radio productions won awards including the 1991 Prix Italia for Who Pays the Piper, a collaboration with Richard Stilgoe. He died aged 76 in 2014.

Life and career Allen was born in Streatham, London, and went to school at Sir Walter St John's School, Battersea. Later, as a member of the MCC's Arts and Library committee, he was largely responsible for the club's Audio Archive Project, a collection of several hundred interviews with cricket people; he conducted more than a hundred of the interviews himself.

With Richard Stilgoe Used Notes Who Pays the Piper (1991)

Cricket-related (partial list) A Song for Cricket (1981) The "Punch" Book of Cricket (1985) Cricket on the Air: A Selection from Fifty Years of Radio Broadcasts (1985) BBC Books Arlott on Wine (1987) (with John Arlott) Peter Pan and Cricket (1988) Constable & Co Sir Aubrey: A Biography of C. Aubrey Smith - England Cricketer, West End Actor, Hollywood Film Star (1st 1982), J. W. McKenzie, (2nd 1987), ; augmented edition: limited to 150 (2005), 2010: The Guinness Book of Cricket Extras (1988) (with Honor Head), Guinness Publishing Arlott: The Authorised Biography (2004) Jim: The Life of E. W. Swanton (2004) The Second Lord's Cricket Ground: Home of MCC, 1811-1813 (2006) MCC Songs of Cricket (2011) mentor for this Signum CD by cantabile - the London Quartet with guests Rory Bremner, Tim Rice, Richard Stilgoe, Alex L'Estrange, Eliza Lumley and Chris Hatt

Other Punches on the Page: A Boxing Anthology (1998) Living with London (2012) Methuen (with Nick Botting)