Stephen Meredith Potter (1 February 1900 - 2 December 1969) was a British author best known for his mocking self-help books, and film and television derivatives from them.
After leaving school in the last months of
World War IWorld War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
he was commissioned as a junior officer in the British army, but by the time he had completed his training the war was over and he was demobilised. He then studied English at Oxford, and after some false starts he spent his early working life as an academic, lecturing in English literature at Birkbeck College in the
University of London-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...
, where he published several works on
Samuel Taylor ColeridgeSamuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
. Finding his income inadequate, he left the university and took up a post
producingA radio producer oversees the making of a radio show. There are two main types of producer. An audio or creative producer and a content producer. Audio producers create sounds and audio specifically, content producers oversee and orchestrate a radio show or feature...
and writing for the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
. He remained with the BBC until after
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, when he became a freelance writer, and remained so for the rest of his life.
His series of humorous books on how to secure an unfair advantage began in 1947 with "
GamesmanshipGamesmanship is the use of dubious methods to win a game. It has been described as "Pushing the rules to the limit without getting caught, using whatever dubious methods possible to achieve the desired end"...
", purporting to show how poor players can beat good ones by subtle psychological ploys. This sold prodigiously and led to a series of sequels covering other aspects of life. They were later adapted for the cinema in the 1960s and for television in the 1970s.
Early years
Potter was born in
BatterseaBattersea is an area of the London Borough of Wandsworth, England. It is an inner-city district of South London, situated on the south side of the River Thames, 2.9 miles south-west of Charing Cross. Battersea spans from Fairfield in the west to Queenstown in the east...
, London, the only son of Frank Collard Potter (1858–1939), a chartered accountant, and his wife, Elizabeth Mary Jubilee
née Reynolds (1863–1950). Potter attended
Westminster SchoolThe Royal College of St. Peter in Westminster, almost always known as Westminster School, is one of Britain's leading independent schools, with the highest Oxford and Cambridge acceptance rate of any secondary school or college in Britain...
from age 13 to 18, during
World War IWorld War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. As he reached school-leaving age he wrote in his diary, "If this war doesn't end soon I shall have to join the beastly army and lay down my blooming life for my blinking country." He volunteered for the army, was trained as an officer and "passed out" (graduated) as top of his company. He was commissioned into the
Coldstream GuardsHer Majesty's Coldstream Regiment of Foot Guards, also known officially as the Coldstream Guards , is a regiment of the British Army, part of the Guards Division or Household Division....
as a second lieutenant just as the war was ending, and did not see active service.
Potter was demobilised in 1919, and spent a few months in his father's office learning bookkeeping, before going to
Merton CollegeMerton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to...
,
OxfordThe University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
, to study English language and literature. His family paid for his university education, a fact that put him in the shadow of his elder sister Muriel, who had won a scholarship to her Oxford college, and had taken a first-class degree. Potter achieved only a second-class degree in English language and literature. On the strength of this he was offered the post of talks producer at the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, but turned it down as it was based in the provincial city of
BirminghamBirmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
, where he had no wish to reside. Potter instead tried to earn a living as an elocution teacher in London, advertising "Cockney accents cured", but attracted only one pupil. He then tried his luck as a tutor, as a schoolmaster and as private secretary to a well-known playwright,
Henry Arthur JonesHenry Arthur Jones was an English dramatist.-Biography:Jones was born at Granborough, Buckinghamshire to Silvanus Jones, a farmer. He began to earn his living early, his spare time being given to literary pursuits...
.
Lecturer in English literature
In 1926 Potter began teaching English literature at
Birkbeck CollegeBirkbeck, University of London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It offers many Master's and Bachelor's degree programmes that can be studied either part-time or full-time, though nearly all teaching is...
,
University of London-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...
. On 7 July 1927 he married Marian Anderson Attenborough (1900–1981), a painter, professionally known as Mary Potter. There were two sons of the marriage. The family lived at first in
ChiswickChiswick is a large suburb of west London, England and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It is located on a meander of the River Thames, west of Charing Cross and is one of 35 major centres identified in the London Plan. It was historically an ancient parish in the county of Middlesex, with...
, London, and later moved to a flat in
Harley StreetHarley Street is a street in the City of Westminster in London, England which has been noted since the 19th century for its large number of private specialists in medicine and surgery.- Overview :...
.
Potter's first book,
The Young Man (1929), was an autobiographical novel, which was well-reviewed.
The Manchester GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
wrote, "a brilliant performance … a distinguished contribution to intellectual fiction." In 1930 he wrote
D. H. Lawrence: A First Study, the first book-length work on
LawrenceDavid Herbert Richards Lawrence was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanising effects of modernity and industrialisation...
, which appeared in print within a few days of the death of its subject, unfortunate timing because it seemed like an inadequate memorial rather than what it was intended to be, a critical reappraisal. It also suffered from a regrettable misprint, rendering the heading "Sea and Sardinia", as "Sex and Sardinia". This was soon amplified by rumour into "Sex and Sardines", none of which helped Potter's reputation as a serious writer. After this he concentrated in his next four works on
ColeridgeSamuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
. He edited the
Nonesuch PressNonesuch Press was a private press founded in 1922 in London by Francis Meynell, his wife Vera Mendel, and David Garnett.-History:Nonesuch Press's first book, a volume of John Donne's Love Poems was issued in May 1923. In total, the press produced more than 140 books. The press was at its peak in...
Coleridge (1933), praised in
The TimesThe Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
as "the best anthology that has ever shown Coleridge as poet, philosopher and critic. This was followed by an edition of Sara Coleridge's letters to Thomas Poole,
Minnow among Tritons (1934), which Potter edited from the original manuscripts in the
British MuseumThe British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom, and is the world's largest library in terms of total number of items. The library is a major research library, holding over 150 million items from every country in the world, in virtually all known languages and in many formats,...
. In 1941 he wrote a play,
Married to a Genius, based on the Coleridge marriage. In 1935 he published his most important contribution to the subject,
Coleridge and S.T.C., a discussion of the duality in the poet's nature, "not merely the earlier and the later, but the true and the false, and the exciting and the nauseating," as
John Middleton MurryJohn Middleton Murry was an English writer. He was prolific, producing more than 60 books and thousands of essays and reviews on literature, social issues, politics, and religion during his lifetime...
put it in a review in
The Times Literary SupplementThe Times Literary Supplement is a weekly literary review published in London by News International, a subsidiary of News Corporation.-History:...
. Reviews were good, but with reservations that Potter oversimplified the dichotomy in Coleridge's nature (
The ObserverThe Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
) or else did not explore the underlying reasons for it (
TLS).
In 1937 Potter published
The Muse in Chains: a Study in Education, a humorous satire on the academic teaching of English literature. G. M. Young wrote of it: "if I were suddenly commissioned by some Golden Dustman to organize a new University, I think I should send for Mr. Potter and offer him the Chair of English literature forthwith." Other reviewers thought Potter's suggestions more entertaining than practical. Potter's humorous insights into academic life were widely praised. He wrote of
George SaintsburyGeorge Edward Bateman Saintsbury , was an English writer, literary historian, scholar and critic.-Biography:...
: "It is recorded that for eighteen years he started the day by reading a French novel (in preparation for his history of them) – an act so unnatural to man as almost in itself to amount to genius."
BBC writer and producer
Potter first wrote for
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
radio in 1936. Finding that his academic career, though promising, was not well-paid enough to support his marriage and children, Potter resigned from Birkbeck in 1937 and the following year joined the BBC as a writer-producer in its features department, originally concentrating on literary features and documentaries. In the same year he joined the
Savile ClubThe Savile Club was founded in 1868 for the purpose of conversation and good company. Though located somewhat out of the way from the main centre of London's gentlemen's clubs, closer to the residences of Mayfair than the clubs of Pall Mall and St James's Street, it still contained some prominent...
, known for its artistic and especially literary members, who have included
HardyThomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
,
KiplingJoseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
, and
YeatsWilliam Butler Yeats was an Irish poet and playwright, and one of the foremost figures of 20th century literature. A pillar of both the Irish and British literary establishments, in his later years he served as an Irish Senator for two terms...
. He was a leading player of the club's idiosyncratic version of
snookerSnooker is a cue sport that is played on a green baize-covered table with pockets in each of the four corners and in the middle of each of the long side cushions. A regular table is . It is played using a cue and snooker balls: one white , 15 worth one point each, and six balls of different :...
, and some of his later "gamesmanship" ploys are thought to have originated in the Savile's games room.
At the outbreak of
World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
Potter was sent by the BBC to work in
ManchesterManchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
. Later in the war years he and his wife moved south, living in a farmhouse in
EssexEssex is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the East region of England, and one of the home counties. It is located to the northeast of Greater London. It borders with Cambridgeshire and Suffolk to the north, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent to the South and London to the south west...
where she found more scope to pursue her career as a painter. In 1943 Potter collaborated with
Joyce GrenfellJoyce Irene Grenfell, OBE was an English actress, comedienne, diseuse and singer-songwriter.-Early life:...
on a gently satirical comedy feature "How to Talk to Children". It was well received and they made twenty-eight more "How to …" programmes, including "How to Woo" and "How to Give a Party". In 1946 "How to Listen" was the first broadcast heard on the newly created
Third ProgrammeBBC Radio 3 is a national radio station operated by the BBC within the United Kingdom. Its output centres on classical music and opera, but jazz, world music, drama, culture and the arts also feature. The station is the world’s most significant commissioner of new music, and its New Generation...
. At the end of the war, Potter took on a number of concurrent literary tasks. These included drama critic for the
New StatesmanNew Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
and book reviewer for the
News ChronicleThe News Chronicle was a British daily newspaper. It ceased publication on 17 October 1960, being absorbed into the Daily Mail. Its offices were in Bouverie Street, off Fleet Street, London, EC4Y 8DP, England.-Daily Chronicle:...
.
Gamesmanship and freelance writing
A ten-day power-cut at the beginning of 1947 prevented any broadcasting and gave Potter the opportunity to dash off a book. To the despair of his publisher he was a far from methodical author: every Potter manuscript was "a mass of dirty bits of paper, vilely typed, corrected in illegible biro, episodic and half-revised." This book,
The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship: Or the Art of Winning Games Without Actually Cheating, illustrated by Frank Wilson, was published in 1947, and sold prodigiously. It was the first of his series of books purporting to teach ploys for manipulating one's associates, making them feel inferior and thus gaining the status of being one-up on them. From this book, the term
GamesmanshipGamesmanship is the use of dubious methods to win a game. It has been described as "Pushing the rules to the limit without getting caught, using whatever dubious methods possible to achieve the desired end"...
entered the English language. Potter said that he was introduced to the technique by
C. E. M. JoadCyril Edwin Mitchinson Joad was an English philosopher and broadcasting personality. He is most famous for his appearance on The Brains Trust, an extremely popular BBC Radio wartime discussion programme...
during a game of tennis in which Joad and Potter were struggling against two fit young students. Joad politely requested that the students clearly state whether the ball landed in (when in truth it was quite obviously out). This remark nonplussed the students, who wondered if their sportsmanship was in question, and became so edgy that they lost the match. With the success of
Gamesmanship, Potter left the BBC in 1949, ended his existing journalistic commitments, and briefly became editor of a weekly,
Leader MagazineLeader Magazine was a weekly pictorial magazine published in the United Kingdom by the Hulton Press. It was disestablished in Spring 1950.Contributors included Stephen Potter , Kay Dick , Anthony Carson, Orson Welles, Edgar Lustgarten, Lesley Blanch, Leslie Illingworth, Eric Partridge, cartoonist...
. The magazine closed in 1950, and thereafter he was a freelance writer for the rest of his life. He followed up the success of Gamesmanship, extending the basic idea to many other aspects of life, in
Some Notes on Lifemanship (1950), which was another big seller.
In 1951 Potter and his wife moved to
SuffolkSuffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
, to the Red House in
AldeburghAldeburgh is a coastal town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England. Located on the River Alde, the town is notable for its Blue Flag shingle beach and fisherman huts where freshly caught fish are sold daily, and the Aldeburgh Yacht Club...
. The most famous local residents were
Benjamin BrittenEdward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
and
Peter PearsSir Peter Neville Luard Pears CBE was an English tenor who was knighted in 1978. His career was closely associated with the composer Edward Benjamin Britten....
, with whom the Potters quickly became friendly. They got involved with the running of Britten's
Aldeburgh FestivalThe Aldeburgh Festival is an English arts festival devoted mainly to classical music. It takes place each June in the Aldeburgh area of Suffolk, centred on the main concert hall at Snape Maltings...
, and "every summer Britten, Peter Pears, and the Potters formed the nucleus of countless tennis parties on the grass court at the Red House." In 1954, Potter asked his wife for a divorce. She consented, and he moved away from Aldeburgh. Finding the Red House too large and expensive for one person, Mary Potter agreed to exchange houses with Britten and Pears, who moved into the Red House, with which they were associated for the rest of their lives and beyond. In 1955, after nearly 30 years of marriage, the Potters' divorce was finalised, and he remarried, to Heather Jenner, the founder of the Marriage Bureau. Their only child, Luke, was born the next year.
A second successor to
Gamesmanship was published as
One-UpmanshipOne-upmanship is the art or practice of successively outdoing a competitor.The term originated as the title of a book by Stephen Potter, published in 1952 as a follow-up to The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship and Lifemanship titles in his series of tongue-in-cheek self-help books, and film ...
(1952). Potter had become well enough known overseas to be invited to give a literary lecture tour of America. He described his experiences in
Potter on America (1956), which received a long and complimentary review in
The Times Literary Supplement: "Mr. Potter's private army of Lifemen will need no recommendation to this latest frolic. … It is a pleasure to discover or rediscover the United States in this company, for the author is the most literate of humorists." A third sequel to
Gamesmanship, was published in 1958 under the title of
Supermanship. Its publisher,
Rupert Hart-DavisSir Rupert Charles Hart-Davis was an English publisher, editor and man of letters. He founded the publishing company Rupert Hart-Davis Ltd...
, privately wrote of the book, "
Gamesmanship made me laugh a lot, and its two successors were just good enough (all three still sell prodigiously), but the world has moved (deathwards, you may say) in the last ten years, and Potter hasn't budged an inch. In truth the joke is played out, but he won't face the fact. This manuscript consists of a bunch of marginal articles, written during the past six years and slung together with the minimum of care." Some critics agreed.
The New YorkerThe New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
commented, "his methods and the point of view behind them don't seem as funny or as sharp as they once did, possibly because they are no longer surprising, or possibly because he is getting a little tired of his own joke." But
Edmund WilsonEdmund Wilson was an American writer and literary and social critic and noted man of letters.-Early life:Wilson was born in Red Bank, New Jersey. His father, Edmund Wilson, Sr., was a lawyer and served as New Jersey Attorney General. Wilson attended The Hill School, a college preparatory...
remained a fan of Potter, praising "the brevity and compactness of the presentation. As in any practical manual, the principles are stated and concisely illustrated. Nothing goes on too long."
Later years
By the late 1950s the concept and the suffix "-manship" had entered the English language. The foreign policy of the American
secretary of stateThe United States Secretary of State is the head of the United States Department of State, concerned with foreign affairs. The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet and the highest-ranking cabinet secretary both in line of succession and order of precedence...
John Foster DullesJohn Foster Dulles served as U.S. Secretary of State under President Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1959. He was a significant figure in the early Cold War era, advocating an aggressive stance against communism throughout the world...
was universally known as "brinkmanship", and in England
Prince PhilipPrince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh is the husband of Elizabeth II. He is the United Kingdom's longest-serving consort and the oldest serving spouse of a reigning British monarch....
borrowed from Potter in 1957, accusing accountants of "taxmanship – the art of scoring off the Inland Revenue without actually cheating". According to Joyce Grenfell, Potter had become bored with the joke by this time, "but for the rest of his life he found it difficult to speak or write naturally, so accustomed had he grown to the jocose gambits and ploys of his own invention." Potter himself was aware of the pigeonhole in which he had put himself. He described himself in
The Times in 1967 as "one whose sole contribution to world thought has been the naming and description of the form of behaviour now known as gamesmanship…" Another friend said of him, "This kind of fame was not what he had hoped for. He wanted to be a great serious writer. Yet that was totally beyond him."
Potter's last works went in new directions. In 1959 he wrote a corporate history of
H.J. HeinzThe H. J. Heinz Company , commonly known as Heinz and famous for its "57 Varieties" slogan and its ketchup, is an American food company with world headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.Perhaps best known for its ketchup, the H.J...
under the title
The Magic Number, and his autobiography of his first 20 years,
Steps to Immaturity. His publisher was doubtful about the latter, but it was well received.
The Times Literary Supplement, called it "this sympathetic, beguiling book" and looked forward to a sequel, and other papers from
The Daily Express to
The New Statesman praised it in their reviews. In 1965 when his youngest son was about 9 years old, Potter wrote a children's book,
Squawky, illustrated by George Him, with whom he had earlier created the mythical County of Schweppshire as part of an advertising campaign for a soft-drink manufacturer. At the time of his death he was making notes on word origins from the natural world; they were posthumously edited and published in 1973 as
Pedigree: Essays on the Etymology of Words from Nature.
Potter died of pneumonia in London at the age of 69.
Adaptations and commemorations
The
1960The decade of the 1960s in film involved many significant films.----Contents1 Events2 List of films: # A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z.Hundreds of full-length films were produced during the 1960s....
film
School for ScoundrelsSchool for Scoundrels is a 1960 British comedy film inspired by the "Gamesmanship" series of books by Stephen Potter. The main character, Henry Palfrey , is a failure in sport and love, and victim of conmen. He enrols at the "School of Lifemanship" in Yeovil, run by Dr...
recapitulates many of the "one-up" ideas, and extends them to "Woo-manship", meaning the art of manipulative seduction of women. The script was adapted from Potter's books by
Peter UstinovPeter Alexander Ustinov CBE was an English actor, writer and dramatist. He was also renowned as a filmmaker, theatre and opera director, stage designer, author, screenwriter, comedian, humourist, newspaper and magazine columnist, radio broadcaster and television presenter...
. The film starred
Ian CarmichaelIan Gillett Carmichael, OBE was an English film, stage, television and radio actor.-Early life:Carmichael was born in Hull, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The son of an optician, he was educated at Scarborough College and Bromsgrove School, before training as an actor at RADA...
as the innocent in need of Professor Potter's teaching,
Alastair SimAlastair George Bell Sim, CBE was a Scottish character actor who appeared in a string of classic British films. He is best remembered in the role of Ebenezer Scrooge in the 1951 film Scrooge, and for his portrayal of Miss Fritton, the headmistress in two St. Trinian's films...
as Potter,
Terry-ThomasThomas Terry Hoar Stevens was a distinctive English comic actor, known as Terry-Thomas. He was famous for his portrayal of disreputable members of the upper classes, especially cads and toffs, with the trademark gap in his front teeth, cigarette holder, smoking jacket, and catch-phrases such as...
,
Dennis PriceDennis Price was an English actor, remembered for his suave screen roles, particularly Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts and Coronets, and for his portrayal of the omniscient valet Jeeves in 1960s television adaptations of P. G...
and
Peter JonesPeter Jones was an English actor, screenwriter and broadcaster.-Early life and career:Jones was born in Wem, Shropshire and he was educated at the Wem Grammar School and Ellesmere College. He made his first appearance as an actor in Wolverhampton at the age of 16 and then appeared in repertory...
as exemplars of one-upmanship.
One-Upmanship is a British television series based on Potter's work. It was written and adapted by
Barry TookBarry Took was an English comedian, writer and television presenter. He is best remembered in the UK for his weekly role as presenter of Points of View, a BBC TV programme in which viewers' letters criticising or praising the BBC were broadcast...
for the BBC for a Christmas special, initially in 1974. Starring
Richard BriersRichard David Briers, CBE is an English actor whose career has encompassed theatre, television, film and radio.He first came to prominence as George Starling in Marriage Lines in the 1960s, but it was in the following decade when he played Tom Good in the BBC sitcom The Good Life that he became a...
, Peter Jones (who also played a supporting role in
School for Scoundrels), and
Frederick JaegerFrederick Jaeger was a German-born actor who found success working in British television.Jaeger was born in Berlin, but moved to England following Adolf Hitler's rise to power in Germany. He graduated from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 1948, and became a British citizen two years later...
, 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.
Potter's diaries, acquired by the University of Texas after his death, were a primary source for
Stephen Potter at the BBC (2004) by his second son, Julian Potter, a chronicle of Potter's time in the features department of the BBC in the 1940s.
Raffles and the Match-Fixing Syndicate, by Adam Corres, is an extension of Potter's theories, explaining the principles of cricket gamesmanship and the psychology of 'thinking the batsman out'. In a 1959 article Edmund Wilson wondered why Potter, as an academic himself, did not "exploit the fertile field of one-upmanship among professors, whereupon Wilson proceeded to fill the gap".
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.
"Some Notes on Lifemanship"
First published in 1950, Potter's notes on "Lifemanship" were a very English exploration of what a French contemporary was studying at the same time under the heading of 'the imaginary...a struggle of pure prestige' - of status-seeking in everyday interaction. (Again like
LacanLacan is surname of:* Jacques Lacan , French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist** The Seminars of Jacques Lacan** From Bakunin to Lacan: Anti-Authoritarianism and the Dislocation of Power, a book on political philosophy by Saul Newman** Lacan at the Scene* Judith Miller, née Lacan...
, Potter was interested in the relation 'between writing (
l'ecrit) and speech' - in 'the essential difference between the Written Word, which is inscribed, and the Spoken Word, which is, essentially, speech'). Among the areas of life he extended the principles of gamesmanship to were courtship ("Woomanship"), literature ("Writermanship") and pastimes ("Conversationship").
Thus for example the reader was enjoined to 'never forget the uses of Lowbrowmanship in conversation...LOWBROWMAN: Oh, I don't know, I rather like a good bit of old-fashioned vulgarity. And I'm awfully sorry but I like leg shows. If the Lowbrowman happens to be a Professor of Aesthetics...his remark is all the more irritating'. A related gambit for the journalist was '
Daily Mirrorship...an unaffected love of tremendously ordinary and homely things like
Danny KayeDanny Kaye was a celebrated American actor, singer, dancer, and comedian...
, mild and bitter, the
Daily Mirror, the Bertram Mills circus and
Rita HayworthRita Hayworth was an American film actress and dancer who attained fame during the 1940s as one of the era's top stars...
'. (The postmodern phenomenon of
Dumbing downDumbing down is a pejorative term for a perceived trend to lower the intellectual content of literature, education, news, and other aspects of culture...
might be viewed in Potter's terms a vast cultural extension of Lowbrowmanship).
One may regret that Potter only mentions in passing how 'in the last of my Bude lectures I spoke of Gamesmanship and Shakespeare' - a vast subject indeed - where 'most of my remarks referred to Footnote Play', something only too familiar to the academic world. His notes on 'Donmanship...the "art of Criticising without Actually Listening"' are of course essential reading for the aspirant academic.
His notes on Woomanship - Potter expresses his surprise that 'twelve times as many workers volunteered to send in reports on Woomanship as on any other subject' - continue to bear contemporary fruit in the form of
The RulesThe Rules: Time-Tested Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr. Right is a controversial self-help book by Ellen Fein and Sherrie Schneider, originally published in 1995....
or
The GameThe Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pick-up Artists is a non-fictional book written by investigative reporter Neil Strauss as a chronicle of his journey and encounters in the seduction community.The book was featured on the New York Times Bestseller List for two months after its release in...
. We may simply note how in mixed gamesmanship for the man 'a good working knowledge of the Chivalry Gambit is essential', as well as the woman's counter to 'the least signs of trying the "I have long adored you from afar" move', which is to 'treat it immediately as a formal proposal of marriage
which you shyly accept. This is one of the most devastating, the most match-winning, counters in the whole realm of gamesmanship'.
Wider influence of Potter
Eric BerneEric Berne was a Canadian-born psychiatrist best known as the creator of transactional analysis and the author of Games People Play.-Background and education:...
in his best-selling
Games People PlayGames People Play: The Psychology of Human Relationships is a 1964 bestselling book by psychiatrist Eric Berne. Since its publication it has sold more than five million copies. The book describes both functional and dysfunctional social interactions....
readily acknowledges Potter's Gamemanship as a precursor: 'Due credit should be given to Stephen Potter for his perceptive, humorous discussions of manoeuvres, or "ploys", in everyday social situations'. Elsewhere he calls Potter 'the chief representative of the humorous exposition of ulterior transactions'.
What has been termed Potter's "blend of flat and serious tone (reminiscent of a gentlemanly sports handbook) united with a sceptical judgement of the values of the English middle-class social scene" would thus seem to have fed into Berne's own "sardonically humorous
Games People Play...con-games of daily life that Dr Berne describes with desperately penetrating gallows-wit".
Potter's '
Game Leg..."Limpmanship", as it used to be called, or the exact use of minor injury' precedes Berne's "Wooden Leg"; Potter's 'Nice Chapmanship...Being a Nice Chap
in certain circumstances is valuable' precedes Berne's "Good Joe"; Potter's "Advicemanship", whereby 'if properly managed, the mere giving of advice is sufficient' to win, precedes Berne's "I'm Only Trying to Help You", where 'the damage is done while being helpful'. And 'Just as there are O.K.-words in conversationship', so too in
transactional analysisTransactional analysis, commonly known as TA to its adherents, is an integrative approach to the theory of psychology and psychotherapy. It is described as integrative because it has elements of psychoanalytic, humanist and cognitive approaches...
there are "
O. K. Words: Words rewarded by parental approval...those approved by the Parental part of the patient's father, mother, therapist, or other parental person".
Where Potter noted that 'each gambit has its answer or
counterlife ', Berne would note how everyone has positive forces in them 'counter to the plot of [their] script - a counterscript'; where Potter offered 'Counter Psychiatry, which is, of course, a huge subject', Berne explored how 'Psychiatry as a procedure must be distinguished from "Psychiatry" as a game'.
The sociologist
Erving GoffmanErving Goffman was a Canadian-born sociologist and writer.The 73rd president of American Sociological Association, Goffman's greatest contribution to social theory is his study of symbolic interaction in the form of dramaturgical perspective that began with his 1959 book The Presentation of Self...
also profited from Potter's work, in the sense that it "disclose[s] an elaborate code of conventions which operated in everyday social intercourse, which was nevertheless tacit", and could be exploited by the sociologist: "what Potter's articles perhaps did, by their oblique but recognisable affinity with Goffman's own ideas, was to provide the kind of licence or mandate" Goffman needed to find his own creative approach.
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