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USS Stephen Potter DD 538, Mesothelioma and Asbestos Exposure asbestos.com | Mr Stephen Weaver (Stephen Weaver Counselling and Psychotherapy) | What... wddty.com | Stephen Salmon (Stephen Salmon) - Profile on NLP Connections nlpconnections.com | Dr. Stephen Phelan - Dr Stephen Phelan smiletoremember.com |
Stephen Potter (1 February 1900 - December 1969) was a British author best known for his mocking self-help books, and film and television derivatives from them, though he wrote much more widely, including scholarly books on English literature, and worked producing and writing for the BBC.
[edit] Foundations of his literary careerPotter attended Westminster School from age 13 to 18, then served from 1918 to 1919 in the Coldstream Guards. Following his military service, he studied English Language and Literature at Merton College, Oxford, and in 1923 became secretary to a noted playwright, Henry Arthur Jones. In 1926 he began teaching English literature at Birkbeck College, University of London. In his teaching years, he began publishing, starting with a novel, The Young Man, in 1929. The next year, he published D. H. Lawrence: a first study, the first book-length work on that author. In 1934 and 1935, three books that he wrote or edited, relating to Coleridge, were published. The next year brought both his first writing for radio, on the BBC, and his departure from his university position. In 1937, he harshly criticized British university teaching of English, in The Muse in Chains. In 1938, Potter joined the Savile Club, known for its "artistic" and especially literary members, who have included, for example, Hardy, Kipling, and Yeats. As of 2004[update], the club's Web site begins its second entry under "Social Events" by saying of "Savile Snooker":
He started 1939 by beginning full-time writing and producing for the BBC, continuing through the end of the war and writing and/or producing at least 250 programmes. [edit] Satire and moreIn June 1943, Potter began producing a series of BBC "How" programmes that he wrote in collaboration with Joyce Grenfell.[1] The content (starting with "How to Talk to Children") was satirical, and ran for 29 episodes. With the war's end, Potter took on a number of concurrent literary tasks. These included drama critic for the New Statesman and Nation, book reviewer for the News Chronicle, and also more BBC work: the first programme on the BBC Third Programme, in 1946, was "How to Listen", again in collaboration with Joyce Grenfell. He published The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship: Or the Art of Winning Games Without Actually Cheating., illustrated by Frank Wilson, in 1947.[2] the first of his books that purport to teach "ploys" for manipulating one's associates, especially making them feel inferior and thereby gaining the status of being "one-up" on them. In 1949 he left the BBC and ended his existing journalistic commitments, became editor of a weekly, Leader Magazine.[3] 1950 brought publication of Lifemanship, and 1952 One-Upmanship. His Potter on America in 1956 described observations of that country made while travelling between lectures there. The original series of "one-up" books closed with the publication of Supermanship in 1958. The 1960 film School for Scoundrels (not to be confused with the play The School for Scandal) recapitulates many of the "one-up" ideas, and extends them to "Woo-manship", meaning the art of manipulative seduction of women by men. One-Upmanship is a British television series based on Potter's work. It was written and adapted by Barry Took for the BBC for a Christmas special, initially in 1974. Starring Richard Briers, Peter Jones (who also played a supporting role in School for Scoundrels), and Frederick Jaeger, it was subsequently broadened into three series that were broadcast between 1976 and 1978. Details of the broadcasts can be found on this BBC comedy Web site. In 2007, devotees of Potter created an annual winter golf tournament based on the tactics espoused in the author's book Gamesmanship. "The Potter Cup" is held annually at Fenwick Golf Course in Old Saybrook, Connecticut. [edit] Close of his oeuvreHis last works went in new directions:
His diaries, acquired by the University of Texas after his death, were a major source for Stephen Potter at the BBC, (ISBN 0-9546653-0-9) by his second son, Julian Potter. It is about the Features department of the BBC, in the 1940s (when Stephen Potter worked there, and is published in the UK by Orford Books, Orford, Suffolk. [edit] Personal lifeHe married Mary Attenborough (the artist Mary Potter) in 1927, and they settled in Chiswick. Their two sons, Andrew and Julian, were born over the next 5 years. After a series of work-mandated moves during the war, he returned in London; in 1951 they relocated to Aldeburgh in Suffolk. In 1955, after nearly 30 years of marriage, they divorced, and he remarried, to Heather Jenner; the second Mrs. Potter was the founder of the Marriage Bureau. Their only child, Luke, was born the next year. Potter's death came in 1969. [edit] His bibliography(As of 2004[update], some of his works are out of print, but most have new editions. In 2005, Lifemanship was re-published by Moyer Bell.
[edit] Books about Stephen Potter
[edit] Books developing and extending Potter's theories of gamesmanship
[edit] Notes
[edit] External links
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