Stephen Potter (1) (1900–1969)

There is a little game I play where I ask "What Is the National Question?" Crucial to this game is this book by Stephen Potter. It was the beginning of a prosperous period for the author as it opened the way for a series of books which fattened his wallet for at least a decade. It is comedy based on the reinforcement of personal superiority in social relations by appearing to have been more deeply involved on any point than one's companion. It is not kind comedy, but wry smiles do abound. What then is the national question of the English |(not British in general) person? "What is MY status in this circumstance?" of course. Go and sin no more. Of course you may just feel that it is the only true question, in which case I wish you a happy life in the real world.… (more)

I first read Gamesmanship at the tender age of six or so. I knew it was supposed to be funny, because the way I had found it was by browsing the humor shelves of the public library. (At six I was already exploring out well beyond the confines of the library's juvenile sections.) It probably had a salutary effect on me, in terms of making the gamesmanship in which it purports to offer instruction seem utterly repellent, albeit curiously arresting.

Potter often describes the complex and antagonistic relationship among the three factors of sportsmanship (constructive sociability in the game context), skill (mastery of game-specific processes and contents), and gamesmanship (exploitation of socio-psychological factors to defeat opponents). In fact, gamesmanship turns out to be not so much about the "art of winning" (note the sparse and apologetic chapter on "Winmanship"), but the art of precipitating losses in rivals.

Some of the best bits of the book are the elaborate (and often pointless) diagrams, and the end-matter: especially "A Queer Match" in the "Gamesmanania" section (105-107). Appendix II, a "Note on Etiquette" betrays the essentially esoteric character of gamesmanship, which may account for the fascination it once exercised over me.… (more)