Measure is the first title Oprah has given her seal of approval to since James Frey's memoir, A Million Little Pieces, was exposed as partially fabricated and caused Winfrey considerable embarrassment. Oprah's Book Club has been a major boon to the publishing industry; her imprimatur on a title means gold at the checkout counter.

Originally published in September 2000, The Measure of a Man is Poitier's second memoir and recounts his rise from an impoverished childhood on Cat Island in the Bahamas to his Oscar-winning film career. The book includes meditations on integrity, commitment, faith and forgiveness and finding meaningful pleasures in life. The book sold 125,000 hardcovers and paperbacks in its first run, according to the publisher.

Winfrey was chastened when the Smoking Gun Web site revealed that Frey had faked significant portions of A Million Little Pieces, a book she heavily promoted through her club and initially defended. That book had gone on to sell some 1.7 million copies following her imprimatur and in excess of three million copies in all. Despite the scandal, Winfrey still managed to turn a revised edition of Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel's Holocaust memoir Night into a million-copy bestseller.

Mark Tauber, vice president and deputy publisher of HarperSanFrancisco, called Poitier's memoir "a great inspirational story about an authentic life. Oprah loves these kinds of stories," he added in a telephone interview today, "and she's never been shy about saying how much he's been important to her career. It makes a lot of sense."

"I think writing a book about this experience would be trying to capitalize on it in some way and that's not something I want to do at all," Frey said in a segment on Oprah Winfrey's syndicated talk show that was taped, but not immediately aired, after Thursday's explosive program when Winfrey turned against the author whose book she endorsed last fall.

Frey's comments were part of "Oprah After the Show," a conversation featuring Frey, Winfrey and publisher Nan A. Talese to be broadcast Friday night on the Oxygen network, a cable channel Winfrey helped found.

Despite Frey's on-air humiliation, when Winfrey berated him and the author acknowledged that key parts of the books were invented, "A Million Little Pieces" kept on selling. On Friday, it was in the top 5 on both Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com.

Winfrey initially supported Frey - making a surprise phone call to Larry King Live to back her author when he was being interviewed by CNN. But yesterday she brought him on to her show and in front of baying, booing live audience, introduced the author as "Mr Bravado Tough Guy", before taking him to task for a string of inaccuracies. "I really feel duped," she said. "But more importantly, I feel that you betrayed millions of readers."

Frey, who submitted his book as fiction but eventually had it published as a memoir without a word being changed, defended his work. "I don’t think it is a novel," he said. "I still think it’s a memoir." But after Winfrey had addressed a series of disputed passages, including Frey's claim to have endured root canal surgery without anaesthetic, the author was more contrite.

"This hasn’t been a great day for me," he said. "I feel like I came here and I have been honest with you. I have, you know, essentially admitted to..." "Lying," Winfrey interrupted. "To lying," said Frey. "It’s not an easy thing to do in front of an audience full of people and a lot of others watching on TV... If I come out of this experience with anything it’s being a better person and learning from my mistakes and making sure I don’t repeat them."

Winfrey said she had received hundreds of messages of support for Frey when the first doubts were expressed about his memoir. But she said these had clouded her judgment, leading her to defend him on CNN, saying the controversy was "much ado about nothing". "I regret that phone call," she said yesterday. "I made a mistake. I left the impression that the truth does not matter, and I am deeply sorry about that. That is not what I believe... To everyone who has challenged my position, you are absolutely right."