Playwright and novelist Michael Frayn has been named as the next Cameron Mackintosh Visiting Professor of contemporary Theatre at Oxford University.

The post is linked to St Catherine’s College. Mr Frayn will succeed the actor and director Kevin Spacey in October.

Mr Frayn started his writing career as a journalist for the The Guardian and The Observer.

He has won numerous prizes for his plays and novels, including the Somerset Maugham Award, the Hawthornden Prize and the Whitbread Novel Award.