Sir Walter Logie Forbes Murdoch, KCMG (17 September 1874 – 30 July 1970) was a prominent Australian academic and essayist famous for his intelligence and wit.

A member of the prominent Australian Murdoch family, he was the father of Catherine, later prominent as Dr Catherine King MBE (1904–2000), a radio broadcaster in Western Australia; the uncle of both Sir Keith, a journalist and newspaper executive, and Ivon, a soldier in the Australian Army; and the great uncle of international media proprietor Rupert Murdoch.

After teaching in country and suburban schools to the end of 1903, Murdoch's academic career began with appointment as a Melbourne University assistant lecturer in English.

Murdoch published his first essay, "The new school of Australian poets", in 1899, and he continued writing for the Argus, under the pen-name of "Elzevir", in a column which appeared weekly from 1905 titled "Books and Men".

This has been established by his warmly sympathetic, but not uncritical, biographer John La Nauze; but the fact that he felt deeply his geographical and intellectual isolation in Perth was not evident to even his close associates there.

It coloured his second major contribution to Western Australian life: his association with several other members of the foundation professoriate in building closer links between the university and the community.

[3] Combined from 1933 with occasional day and evening talks on radio—he was to prove a very effective broadcaster—and appearances on public platforms, frequently in the chair, it brought Murdoch a wide and varied local following.

Moreover, for nearly twenty years from 1945, he conducted a weekly "Answers" column consisting of "little essays" on various questions, which was syndicated throughout New Zealand and most states and which was read by a huge public.

In addition to his academic teaching and the benefits which the young university obtained from his extramural activities, Murdoch was to remain a member of its governing body after he resigned from his chair in 1939.

When, in the month of his death, he was given a bedside message from Premier David Brand, announcing that the state government was to name its second university after him, he was able to send an appreciative acceptance.