Stuart Petre Brodie Mais (1885–1975) was a prolific British author, journalist and broadcaster. The son of a Bristolian rector, he was born in Birmingham but raised in Tansley, Derbyshire, where his family moved shortly afterwards. He was educated at Denstone College, Staffordshire. After graduating in English Literature at Christ Church, Oxford, and then teaching at a number of schools including Rossall and Sherborne, Mais later worked for National Press at Fleet Street. He was a prolific author writing over 200 books, his reputation was such that Churchill once joked that the speed of his output made him feel tired.
Mais broadcast for numerous wireless programmes for the BBC between the 1920s and 1940s. He was married twice: to Doris Snow and then to Jill Doughty. S.P.B (who preferred to be called Petre), was an ardent campaigner for the English countryside and traditions, he was also broad minded and innovative. He began to broadcast a "Letter from America" in 1933, a ground breaking venture at the time, and an idea that has been used by other media figures since. S.P.B. died at in April 1975 at Lindfield, Sussex.
He worked as a journalist for The Oxford Times newspaper, and also for the BBC as a radio broadcaster, most famously on the Kitchen Front radio show that aired after the morning news during World War Two. For an account of these broadcasts see "Calling Again - My Kitchen Front Talks with some results on the listener" by S.P.B. Mais, 1941. He presented Letter from America from 1933, 13 years before it was made famous by Alistair Cooke; he also presented a series on This Unknown Island.
A grandson is the Evening Standard writer Sebastian Shakespeare who writes, "My grandfather, SPB Mais, wrote more than 200 books and was a household name in his day. Prolific production alas was no guarantee of riches. He wrote to keep the bailiffs at bay. I'll never forget when my mother told me how she once had to hand over the contents of her piggy bank to his creditors."[1]
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He was a schoolmaster and his first books were a series of annoted William Shakespeare plays, published in 1914. He continued to publish works on English literature, and even tried his hand at writing novels.
Works on literature Include:
These include: