The Passion of Dennis Potter: International Collected Essays

by NA NA

Overview

Dennis Potter was a most remarkable, idiosyncratic, and influential screen playwright, writing such shows as "The Singing Detective" and "Pennies From Heaven" for British TV during the last half of the 20th century. In dramatizing the anxiety of his own inner journey, he articulated for the millions watching his shows their own distresses about the fast-changing cultural environment. The Passion of Dennis Potter represents the first collection of international essays on this celebrated playwright. Along with essays from the world s leading scholars and experts on Potter, there are personal memoirs from friends and colleagues who knew and worked with him. The result is an impressive collection which expertly dissects the themes and oeuvre of one of the major contemporary figures of British drama and literature, tracing his changing class, religious, and personal values from his debut in 1965 right up to his death from cancer in 1994.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312218034
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan US
Publication date:	04/22/2000
Edition description:	2000
Pages:	279
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Vernon W. Gras is Professor of English and Cultural Studies at George Mason University.

John R. Cook is Senior Lecturer in Media at De Montfort University, Leicester, England.

Table of Contents

Dennis Potter--A Chronology
• Introduction: Potter, Postmodernism, and Other Viewpoints
• I: Class and Culture
• The Public and the Private in Dennis Potter--Peter Stead
• The Uprooted and the Anxious--Glen Creeber
• Socialist Allegory in Dennis Potter's Lipstick on Your Collar --Rick Wallach
• "Grasping the Constellation"--Dave Evans
• "Cornucopias of Tinsel"--Eckart Voights-Virchow
• II: Religion and Dialogism
• Dennis Potter's The Singing Detective --Vernon Gras
• Confused Bodies, Wandering Minds--Chris Lippard
• Is There a Ship on the Horizon?--Heinz Antor
• Multiple Narratives in Dennis Potter's Blackeyes --Gwendolyn Connelly
• "Lost Lands?"--John R. Cook
• III: Media and Values
• Dennis's Other Hat--Philip Purser
• Pennies from Heaven, The Singing Detective and Lipstick on Your Collar --Samuel G. Marinov
• "Yesterday Once More"--Stephen Brie
• The Final Days, The Final Plays, The Final Ploys--Irving B. Harrison
• "Whose Dennis is it Anyway?"--Kenith Trodd
• Appendix: Dennis Potter--A Personal Interview (1990)