David Lawrence (OM 1981)
This article was first published in Grammar News, October 2024.
With a winding career path that includes stock broking, a role with an oil company, comedy writing, and children’s literature, David Lawrence (OM 1981) has always found joy in collaboration. “There’s been a lot of luck in my career, as well as persistence,” he says. “Through it all, I’ve consistently found that working with other people makes your own work better.”
From financial analysis to children’s literature
Having started out working as a financial analyst in an oil company, David knew his job wasn’t aligned with his passion. When the company entered a sketch comedy competition for employees, he saw an opportunity for change.
“I thought I could write a funnier script than the one we’d entered in the competition, so I sat down that night, wrote my version, and sent it off our advisor – TV comedy legend Mike McColl-Jones,” David explains. “Mike wrote back and told me: ‘You should be writing for TV.’ On the strength of that, I resigned from my job at the oil company and started working in comedy.”
Corporate hoaxes, stand-up comedy, comedy festival shows and multiple roles writing for television all followed. Then, a chance meeting with Australian netballer and sports commentator Eloise Southby-Halbish led to David’s next collaboration, writing the children’s book Anna Flowers. It tells the story of a young girl adapting to a new environment through the lens of netball.
“No one had told me how to write a book, but I really enjoyed the process of working with Eloise,” David explains. “The publisher came back and suggested I write another book focusing on AFL. When asked about which AFL star I would like to work with on it, I immediately thought of Hawthorn legend Cyril Rioli so he became my collaborator in the writing of the Fox Swift series.”
Working with Rioli turned out to be transformative for David, who was invited to visit Rioli’s home in the Tiwi Islands to talk to school children about literacy.
“That whole week really did change my life,” David says. “I realised how little I knew about First Nations Australians and their culture.”
A life-changing collaboration
From that point, David began working with the Indigenous Literacy Foundation to involve students from the Tiwi Islands in a unique literacy project. David served as a mentor for a small group of girls who, in a week-long workshop, wrote, illustrated, published and launched their own book.
“They came up with a story about a young Tiwi girl who wanted to make it in the AFLW, and the book, Japarrika, ended up becoming a series that’s being sold around the world, each written by a different group of students,” David says. “The kids get to see themselves in the book characters. The look of pride on their faces when they unbox the books is one of the most special things I’ve ever seen.”
David has also created the Ball Stars series in partnership with Basketball Australia, and remembers writing his first stories about sport as a Melbourne Grammar School student. “There are a lot of reluctant readers out there who are very sporty, and want to read about their heroes,” he says. Writing about that with humour, and talking about themes like sharing your problems and relying on others – it’s a great way to get a reluctant reader interested.”
Alongside his writing work, David is now also a member of Melbourne Grammar’s First Nations Program Steering Committee. “Working on the Committee has been a joy,” he says. “Seeing how the School has changed in this area and the success of the First Nations students at the School is really inspiring.”
The latest book in David’s most recent children’s book series, Finn and the Pen, will be published in March next year. “The message of this series: Do the hard work, but also, rely on your friends – you don’t have to do it all on your own.”