RAY MATHEW (1929–2003) was born in Sydney. While training as a teacher, he worked as a journalist, lecturer, art critic and editor, as well as a poet and playwright. He moved to London in 1960 and settled in New York in 1968, where he remained until his death. His plays include Church Sunday, Sing for St Ned, We find the Bunyip, The Life of the Party , The Bones of My Toe and A Spring Song. The Life of the Party was a finalist in the 1957 London Observer International Play Competition, as a result of which Mathew received a Commonwealth Literary Fund grant in 1958.