Product Description
The second revision in sixty years, this sublime collection ranges over the verse, stories, essays, and journalism of one of the twentieth century's most quotable authors.

For this new twenty-first-century edition, devoted admirers can be sure to find their favorite verse and stories. But a variety of fresh material has also been added to create a fuller, more authentic picture of her life's work. There are some stories new to the Portable, "Such a Pretty Little Picture," along with a selection of articles written for such disparate publications as Vogue, McCall's, House and Garden, and New Masses. Two of these pieces concern home decorating, a subject not usually associated with Mrs. Parker. At the heart of her serious work lies her political writings-racial, labor, international-and so "Soldiers of the Republic" is joined by reprints of "Not Enough" and "Sophisticated Poetry-And the Hell With It," both of which first appeared in New Masses. "A Dorothy Parker Sampler" blends the sublime and the silly with the terrifying, a sort of tasting menu of verse, stories, essays, political journalism, a speech on writing, plus a catchy off-the-cuff rhyme she never thought to write down.

The introduction of two new sections is intended to provide the richest possible sense of Parker herself. "Self-Portrait" reprints an interview she did in 1956 with The Paris Review, part of a famed ongoing series of conversations ("Writers at Work") that the literary journal conducted with the best of twentieth-century writers. What makes the interviews so interesting is that they were permitted to edit their transcripts before publication, resulting in miniature autobiographies.

"Letters: 1905-1962," which might be subtitled "Mrs. Parker Completely Uncensored," presents correspondence written over the period of a half century, beginning in 1905 when twelve-year-old Dottie wrote her father during a summer vacation on Long Island, and concluding with a 1962 missive from Hollywood describing her fondness for Marilyn Monroe. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (21)

Miz Parker...how I wish we could chat today
When I was given this new edition of The Portable Dorothy Parker, it stirred a memory from my childhood. I recalled that a book by the same title had a permanent place in the old bookcase at the bottom of the stairs in the house where I grew up. A small pinkish paperback placed between Kinsey' Sexual Behavior in the Human Female and Proust's Remembrance of Things Past. After my surreptitious third read of the Kinsey book, I picked up the volume by Parker and leafed through it. I will never forget my sadness upon finishing the short story Big Blonde. Looking back on it, many years later, and many many years since Parker penned it, Big Blonde still has relevance in relation to the wasted lives and potential of many women. The trap of this society has not changed much, alas.

On a lighter note, there was one poem I remember from the collection, pert, direct and evocative, it was a humorous tour through a cemetery. The first bit of it captured the plight of a writer with a big heart, but a small, unrecognized lesser talent.


I. The Minor Poet

His little trills and chirpings were his best.
No music like the nightingale's was born
Within his throat; but he, too, laid his breast
Upon a thorn.

Dorothy shared her aching heart and acid-tongued pen with us and I am so glad a new generation has the opportunity through this new edition, to carry the Portable Parker under their coats with them, next to their hearts.

Amusing short stories....
I bought the 1973 version and wish I had bought the newer 21st version as I would like to read some of her political writings. However, I like her stories and found the one titled, "The Standard of Living" to be my favorite. Dorothy Parker combines her humour with pithy stories that illuminate the reality of life whole poking fun at it and poems that are far more stimulating than your average variety. I have read in some of the lower rated reviews on amazon.com that some readers complain of how dated some of the stories are. I didnt find it even slightly distracting and found it somewhat even more engaging since it created a realistic atmospehere in which these stories take place. One wonders if these people are so fussy about all of their stories, which if so, must be taxing as so many great literature are classics. Perhaps they fuss that the "Illiad" is dated too? I enjoyed reading this great American author and recommend it to anyone who enjoys a stimulating story with a sarcastic laugh to go along with it.

Books
My granddaughter, age 17, loves writing and drama. Thought some Dorothy Parker would be just right. This book has not only good biography but numerous examples of her various contributions to poetry, short stories, magazine columns etc. Good stuff!

What fresh hell is this?
I've been a major fan of Dorothy Parker for a very long time.In fact, my copy of the previous edition of _The Portable Dorothy Parker_ is falling apart at the binding with several loose pages.That version was close to perfect.This latest revision, edited by Marion Meade, is a poor replacement for the one that preceded it.Too many good things that Parker wrote are absent from the Meade edition.

For example, book reviews.Meade decided that Parker reviewed too many books that are of no importance nowadays, books that are long forgotten and long out of print.She is probably right about those books, but that's not the point of reading a Dorothy Parker book review.It's Parker's writing itself that's worth reading.Even if the book reviewed is one that was of little importance in its day and hasn't been read in 70 years, it's still worth reading Dorothy Parker's witty review of it.When a book was horrible, no one could convey just how bad it was as well as Parker, and if it was a good book, her praise was just as entertaining, though by its very nature not quite a juicy.Thanks to Marion Meade, too many of those reviews are no longer available.

That's just one criticism of this new version of the work.If the book had been a bit thicker, it could have included it all and it bloody well should have.

Take my advice.If you can find a used copy of the previous edition (the one with the introduction by Brendan Gill), get yourself a copy of that and skip this new "improved" version edited by Marion Meade.

The Portable Dorothy Parker review
I was a little disappointed cause it wasn't the one I was led to believe I was getting, only because the picture on the cover was different and it was smaller than I thought but other than that it was fine. It had all my favorite poems and short stories. Overall, I was very satisfied with the product. ... Read more

Product Description
As this complete collection of her short stories demonstrates, Parker's talents extended far beyond brash one-liners and clever rhymes. Her stories not only bring to life the urban milieu that was her bailiwick but lay bare the uncertainties and disappointments of ordinary people living ordinary lives.

Edited by Colleen Breese ... Read more

Customer Reviews (13)

Dorothy Parker's Humor
It is such a delight to read the works of Dorothy Parker.She has such a unique way of looking at life.She makes the most mundane things humorous because she is so realistic in her views.

Before there was Sex and the City. . .
Before there was Carrie Bradshaw writing her column for Sex And the City, there was Dorothy Parker.As early as the 1920's Parker was writing sexy, sardonic, stilletto-tipped stories about the battle of the sexes for such respected magazines as Vogue and Vanity Fair.In Parker's ascerbic world, the women usually come across looking obsessive, silly, and shallow; but the men, shown usually as either clueless or feckless, don't fare very much better.

Although many of the stories in The Complete Stories of Dorothy Parker were written during the Depression or other difficult economic times, most of Parker's characters are well-heeled and tend to worry more about where to find the perfect martini than whether they can make their mortgage payments. The women in many of her stories obsess about their weight, their social status, even their wall coverings,with the same intensity that others might reserve for high moral or ethical questions.But in some of these stories there are women facing genuinely emotional struggles.

For example, in "Horsie", Parker is able to describe the life of quiet desperation lived by a lonely woman who has spent all her life serving the needs of the privileged "bright young things" who make fun of her behind her back.In "The Big Blonde" Parker carefully crafts a story of a blowsy blonde woman who is never allowed to express any sadness or regret to her numerous male companions; but instead is continually exhorted to be a "good sport" and look on the bright side.

One of Parker's most famous stories is "A Telephone Call", in which within just a few pages she manages to perfectly capture the frantic, compulsive behavior and thoughts of a woman, desperate to hear from her lover. You know the woman is dying to call the man, struggling not to, and will inevitably give in, much to her detriment.It's tense, excrutiating, and very real.

Parker was often on the side of the underdog, so much so that in the 50's her association with various worker's groups landed her on the blacklist for "unamerican activities."Yet she continued to work and to aim her pen at all that she considered foolish, vain, and selfish in American society, particularly the upper classes and the idle rich.Reading her collected stories is great fun, like overhearing a rather tart-tongued guest offer blistering attacks on a smug, conceited hostess.You wish you could think of such bon mots yourself, but the next best thing is stifling a guilty giggle when you hear someone else say them!

fascinating stories
i loved the whole book; one fascinating story after the other. i could visualize them; that's how distinct parker's writing is. she cuts through the unnecessary and brings you right into the character's lives.

Solid
Dorothy Parker (1893-1967) was cute, sexy, witty, vivacious, delightfully vicious, and the only member of the infamously bad Algonquin Round Table that had even a modicum of real writing talent, and it's on full display in this collection of her finest short fictions. However, that all being said, Parker's short fictions are just that- fictions; not real `stories' with narratives that anyone can dig their teeth into. They are moments, fugues, scenes with a single purpose to illuminate, and most do those things very well. It is social criticism as art. But, there is not much real depth to much of her prose work- beyond condemning this or that faux pas, and as a consequence of that artistic choice, just as her light verse lacked any heft, this prose corpus stands in direct contrast to the writer who was her most obvious literary forebear- Oscar Wilde.In a sense, though, this is an unfair comparison, for Wilde simply was the greatest published witticist in human history, but there is the gnawing feeling, when reading Parker's `scenes', that she could have been so much more had she been less the bon vivant. Still, compared to what passes for comic commentary today, she is a genius. The New York that she details might best be described as the wordly equivalent to the paintings of Edward Hopper, for under all the goofiness there are extremely lonely and desperate characters. Her heroes, but mostly heroines, all struggle with capital L Loneliness primarily- in the gray beglittered nights of Manhattan neon life in the Jazz Age. They are ordinary folk with extraordinary dreams. Yet, their dreams are all that is extraordinary about them. They are divorcees, wannabe divorcees, boozers, whores, womanizers, palookas, and others from that lot, but that's all they are. The tales are too short to tell us much else.The basic problem facing Parker, in this collection of her Complete Stories, though, is that there is a rote quality that infects each `scene'. They are all about the four D's: drinks, dames, dilemmas, and dinners....

Sharp Wit Impales Lives- No Survivors
. Dorothy Parker live most of her life in hotel rooms, because she would rather starve than boil an egg, and smell than wash her own clothes. Her reason, also true, was, "I just need a place to lay my hat and a few friends".
. This biography is complete and helpful. It was a slog to get through the names of the many has-beens that populated her world. I gave it only 4 stars because of those many mentioned without explanation of who they were and why they mattered; and because the subject was such a bum. Another example of how brains, money, and arrogance combine to make a ruined life. Dorothy was brilliant, and her sharp wit entertained thousands during her reign. She wrote about her friends, drinking, money, unfaithfulness- the total of the lives of her many moneyed friends in New York City and Hollywood. An elitist by nature and arrogant by choice, she and her group are shown as desperate, lazy, unhappy, unsober; and quick to criticize the sober, happy, and hardworking for the sin of being boring.
. This is an indictment of the entire New York theater scene, and leftists of all stripes for good measure.Yes, I enjoyed it- and I'll never read it again. ... Read more

Product Description
Dorothy Parker was known for her outrageous one-liners, her ruthless theater criticism, her clever verses and bittersweet stories, but there was another side to Dorothy Parker--a private life, set on a course of destruction. She suffered through two divorces, a string of painful affairs, a lifelong problem with alcohol, and several suicide attempts.

In this lively, absorbing biography, Marion Meade illuminates both the dark side of Parker and her days of wicked wittiness at the Algonquin Round Table with the likes of Robert Benchley, George Kaufman, and Harold Ross, and in Hollywood with S.J. Perelman, William Faulkner, and Lilian Hellman. At the dazzling center of it all, Meade gives us the flamboyant, self-destructive, and brilliant Dorothy Parker. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (28)

The Essential Dorothy Parker
This is an incredibly thorough biography of Dorothy Parker, one of the founding members of the Algonquin Round Table. It manages to chronicle her extremely quirky persona in such extreme detail that you may never need to read another account of her career and life.
While thought of today as a writer who is most generally known for her satire and poetry, she managed to cover a lot of ground in her day. She was a successful screenwriter, magazine editor, lyricist, short story writer, and even wrote a play with her friend George S. Kauffman.
Her personal life was every bit as interesting as her professional one. She had a miserable early life as the daughter of a jewish father and christian mother, who died before she turned five. A detested stepmother and her father packed her off to a catholic school from which she was eventually booted when her verbal wit became her undoing. While plugging away at her literary ventures, she had doubts about her talents. She was prone to depression and for much of her life had an ongoing flirtation with suicide. She was married unsuccessfully three times to two men. Her second and third husband was reputedly bisexual Campbell, a one-time actor turned screenwriter. Their marriages resulted in an on-off relationship until Campbell's suicide in 1963. There were love affairs that ultimately failed, abortions, an increased dependency on alcohol, and an association with socialist causes that resulted in Parker's blacklisting in the '50's.
While this book might be considered scholarly because of the intense research and documentation that went into it, it really manages to avoid analysis of her work and sticks to Parker's life and her relationships. Her 'buddy list' reads like a 'who's who' of early 20th century american writers and humorists such as Robert Benchley, S.J. Pearlman, George S. Kauffman, Robert E. Sherwood, Franklin Pierce Adams, and Alexander Woollcott.
I don't recommend this book if you have only a passing fancy for Parker as you can get the basic facts from a lot of sources. However, if you are truly interested in Parker or this era of writing and its arrow quick barbs, you will get a lot out of reading it. It is a well-constructed book and Meade has managed to put a lot of information into it.

The Brilliance of Dorthy Parker.
I first became interested in Dorothy many years ago. As a writer I was in awe of her wit, although I didn't really know much about her. This biography by Marion Meade is thorough, detailed and compelling. It includes a good sprinkling of Dorothy's wittier quotes as well as a great collection of photographs. I was very happy with this purchase and although it has over 500 pages it is well worth the time invested. You really get to know Dorothy Parker and the times she lived in through Marion Meade's well-written and methodically researched book. I think I read it in 3 nights, and was loathe to put it down even though the hour was late and I had work in the morning. It actually prompted me to go ahead and buy "The Portable Dorothy Parker" - a collection of Dorothy's short stories and poems.

A fine look back at an astounding woman
This biography of Dorothy Parker is well-researched and well-written. I knew very little about her but now want to read more. Also, visited the Algonquin Hotel which is still lovely and saw the movie "Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle". Her life reminded me how some people pack a lot into their lives, much more than the rest of us. The book was recommended by my daughter who is an editor-in-chief for many magazines at the Meredith Corporation. I will continue to take her advice!

She Knew Everyone
This biography of Dorthy Parker was very good.Not only did I learn about Parker but, I learned about her friends and aquiantances ( F.Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Benchly, Lillian Hellman, Robert Sherwood,George Kaufman, Ernest Hemingway etc.).

She was one the founders of the legendary "round table" ; however there's not much clever repartee reported in this book. Members of theround table includingParker were heavy duty drinkers which may have contributed to their relatively early deaths. Dorthy outlived most of them.

Dorthywas a prograstinator who missed dealines for magazine articles and books.From the 1930s on, it appeared that the amount of publishedwork was small.Many of the screenplays she worked on in Hollywood never made it to the big screen and themost of the small amount that didwere not memoriable.

She and her second husband Allan Campbell were paid large sums of money for their Hollywood work. The couple had frequent cocktale parties.

Throughout her life, Dorthy had dogs that were never trained. It seemed in the book that she was always acquiring dogs.

As she aged, people were always taking care of her ( No where in the bookdoes it mentionedthat she ever helped others.). Young writers were attracted to her.

This biography of Dorthy Parker was well written. Although the subject was not that likeable, this book about her life was.

Well Researched and Engrossing
This is a big book, and I took it everywhere with me for about a week until I finished it. I couldn't believe the depth of detail the author manages to pull off; the research must have taken years. Although I knew going in that it didn't have a happy ending, I was still upset when I got to the last chapter. What a fascinating story! ... Read more

Product Description
Best remembered today for her association with the legendary Algonquin Round Table, Dorothy Parker was a firecracker whose satirical wit and sharp-edged humor earned her a reputation as the wittiest woman in America. This volume, a companion to Parker's Complete Stories, presents the first complete edition of Parker's poetry. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

Exquisite poetry.
Witty, irreverent, articulate, brilliant. Marked my favorites with post-its, and almost every one is marked. Dorothy Parker was a poetic genius, and these poems are a luscious treat!

Dorothy Rocks!
It's amazing that these poems,written well over half a century ago,still retain their bite,impact and immediacy. And it's rather inspiring that Ms. Parker,in spite of her personal demons, still managed to produce such an impressive body of work. A very good introduction to her writing,especially if you only know her from the movie made about her,or just as one of several people who hung around a certain hotel in NY,trading quips with other writers. Check this one out,you're in for a treat..!

All the Parker you need
If Margaret Cho could really, really write, and was a young white socialite in the 1920-30s, she'd have been Dorothy Parker. Dorothy is sharp, and she cuts people to the quick, and in no better light than in this Penguin collection. She hates husbands, wives, smart-asses (though she is the preeminent smart-ass woman of her time), summer resorts...you name it, Parker trashes it.

The cool thing about her is that she does this with such cosmopolitan flair (small surprise since she wrote for Vogue and Vanity Fair for years) and obvious care (her poems almost always rhyme and subscribe to some traditional structure) that she makes herself almost untouchable to critic. She's good, she knows she's good, and watch out world, here she comes.

Not just another pretty muse for a Prince song, and great for classes.

Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye
Excellent - a must have volume of Dorothy Parker's work (as well as her "Complete Stories") - she was truly years ahead of her time.As was prevously stated, her style of writing poetry seems more an attack onthe type of poetry that had come to be accepted in her day as"artistic" (for example, Dickinson - seeing life as beautiful,beauty in the everyday, etc.).I identify immediately with her pessimism(and since I'm a male, that ought to tell you something about her abilityto communicate) and applaud her for having had the courage to expresshonest disgust with the habits of men and women instead of trying to alwaysfind the silver lining (this volume will definitely tell you why she wasone of the Algonquin wits).My favorite poems of hers are too numerous tobe listed here, but among them are "Frustration" (this is one youshould keep with you at work), "The Red Dress","Inventory", "Resume", "Indian Summer","Ode to a Certain Dog", "General Review of the SexSituation", "Little Words" and "News Item".Ifyou're a fan of dry humor and can appreciate those who excel at criticism,this is a great collection of poetry.If you're not, we don't need you -go buy some Dickinson or Rossetti.

one of the greatest wits
dorothy parker was one of the sharpest wits we've ever seen, and this collection of poems shows her talents at their best. you do get a little tired of her cynicism after a while, but her first two classics, Enough Rope & Sunset Gun both make it worthwhile to read. she is one of thebest poets we've had. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Wonderful Collection
This book is definately worth owning.It is a collection of all Dorothy Parker's short stories and poems.The book itself is a wonderful value, being hardcover, and containing so much of Parker's work.The poems and short stories are cunnignly written, with a sharp sense of humor and reality.A common theme in these stories is the battle of the sexes, where Dorothy Parker's unparalleled sarcasm brings lighthearted humor to the quarrels between men and women.Always she writes with quick wit and stunning realism.The poems are meant to be read again and again, which is why I reccomend buying the book instead of renting from a library.Enjoy!

From one who only read the short stories of the book
Not that I dislike her poems (I only read about a dozen) but I bought this book primarily for the stories. And I still don't regret it. Parker's stories can be separated in 2 or 3 groups; the cleverly sarcastic ones (most of the stories I believe), the third-person narrative ones (much rarer) with a rather grave tone (quite emotionally loaded), and the third group I do not remember because I read this book a while ago. Bear with me...

I have to say that nearly all of these stories made me want to purchase a gun and start to kill people randomly. Why? Because Parker has a way to present us the unnice sides of humans in such a way that you feel it like a personal attack (not an attack from the author to you, but one from the characters to another character, and that will make you want to break something). I guess that means Dorothy is good at making the reader emotionally involved; and she is. However sarcastic and cynical she gets, you always know how to take it, you always know what it means. It's a bit like someone telling you something terribly sad and adding a smile to it; you know it does not mean they are happy at all, but you understand it in a deeper way. Sorry if this all sounds far-fetched and fancy; I do suck at reviews. (This being said, that's a purely personal standard, on an amazon standard, I think I'm doing fairly well.)

Lastly, a word about Modern Library. Their books are definitely classy. I always prefer a hardcover to a paperback, so this edition made my day. The paper quality is a quite a fine one as well and the font is classy too (it has some special "e" in it, with a diagonal bar, but I don't think you'd notice that unless you were told).

Just A Little One
This is the Modern Library edition of the classic Dorothy Parker collection of stories and poems. If you want to introduce someone to Mrs. Parker - maybe with a birthday gift book - get this.

The first half is divided into verse from the collected editions Enough Rope, Sunset Gun, Death and Taxes; the second half is more than 25 short stories. It's a compact little hardcover book, with an old style typeface, and moderately priced. Even the dust jacket is classy.

Words that Cut Like Diamonds and are Twice as Pretty
Here you have it, all of the wit and charm of Dorothy Parker in one neat compact volume. The poems, many of which I had read before, are brilliant and stunning, having the punch of an O. Henry story in one or two little pages. The short stories, of which I had read exactly none before I picked up this book, are, incredibly, just as good as her verses. Full of the pathos and drama of a wide variety of domestic experience, these prose gems are brimming with smart and realistic dialogue seldom found in any medium. Some of the best tales are simply inner monologues of a woman doing ordinary things like waiting for the man she adores to call her on the phone or dancing with a clog footed bore who keeps kicking her in the shins. These pieces are so well done and so dead on that they would make great audition pieces for budding actresses to impress a casting agent with. Much has been made of Dorothy Parker's unhappiness and self destructive behavior, but despite, or possibly because of, her abject misery, the lady could put pen to paper. Her work, much more than her biography, is what should stand the test of time. If you like this book and simply have to have more, you should also pick up "Not Much Fun: The Lost Poems of Dorothy Parker" compiled by Stuart Silverstein and collecting, many for the first time, the poems that Dottie wasn't that fond of--they are brilliant as well.

4 books in one, and at a great price
This book is a compilation of all three of Parker's books of poetry as well as her published book of short stories.As for the price, it can't be beat, especially considering it's in hardcover.Plus, you also don't have to worry about buying 2 or 3 books to make sure you've got all of the poems you wanted.

Dorothy Parker's writing is fantastic anyway, and uses cynical wit to draw the reader into the poem.The reader laughs, but manages to feel empathetic.Her style is unique and doesn't seem outdated, even though most of this was written at least half a century ago.If you've ever wanted to laugh about being broken-hearted, this is the book for you. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (13)

Essential for all Parker Fans
Detailed enough for Parker enthusiasts, yet accessible to the new Parker fan, this beautifully illustrated book has something for everyone.Even after reading the book, I find myself dipping back into it to reread various sections and look at the gorgeous photographs.If you or someone you know is a Parker fan, buy this book!!

Excellent!Fun!
I love Dorothy Parker, New York, and the 20's, 30's and 40's to include the clothes, music, theatre, books, personalities - the whole culture of that era. This book touches so much of that. It's the portal for stepping back 70-90 years - and for becoming addicted to celebrating all things DP. You can take your own tour with this book (either actual or virtual) and feel the energy and excitement of New York, see buildings that no longer exist or now have different facades or purposes. You can even pop into a pub along the way and fully develop that hint of whisky or gin that you think you smell in the alleyways - or on the pages.

I have purchased copies of this book as gifts to friends and loaned my copy out several times because it never fails to prompt further interest in Dorothy Parker, the Vicious Circle, and New York in general. I've found that A Journey Into Dorothy Parker's New York is equally enjoyed by friends you might say are more academically inclined as well as those who are more experientially motivated.

Excellent resource!
This book is a fun and informative read.Any fan of Dorothy Parker needs a copy of this book (hell, I have two!)Kevin is able to provide the reader with a tour of an era.Great!

A seminal look at the woman and the city
The first half of the twentieth century was filled with constant change and development; it was an exciting time to be alive. "A Journey into Dorothy Parker's New York" is a focus on the woman herself, but a bigger focus on the city she lived in and its constant change through two world wars, a great depression, and so much more events. Filled with countless photos, both color and black and white, "A Journey into Dorothy Parker's New York" is a seminal look at the woman and the city, sure to please fans of her work and New Yorkers alike. "A Journey into Dorothy Parker's New York" is highly recommended for community library biography collections and students of the history and culture of New York City.

A Journey into Dorothy Parker's New York
This book provides an armchair walking tour of the meaningful places for the writer Dorothy Parker in NYC. It is also an excellent accompaniment to the Portable Dorothy Parker. ... Read more

Product Description
Previously considered the domain of bikers and a rite of passage in the army, tattoos have crawled out of society's fringes and onto the ankles of starlets and the biceps of bankers. While still risque enough to raise a mother-in-law's eyebrow, tattoos have come to be one of the most popular forms of personal expression. DOROTHY PARKER'S ELBOW brings together some of the most erotic, humorous, and vivid fiction, essays, and poetry that explore the mysterious fascination and the intensity of emotion attached tothe act of being tattooed. Readers will join great writers, including Flannery O'Connor, Rick Moody, Elizabeth McCracken, Sylvia Plath, and more in celebrating the tattoo experience in all of its rebellious glory. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

NOT TOO HAPPY
THE BOOK WAS NOT IN VERY GOOD SHAPE WITH A LOT OF HIGHLIGHTING IN IT AND LOOSE PAGES. FIRST TIME I WAS DISAPPOINTED.

a rich collection for writers & body art addicts alike
I bought this while on vacation in San Francisco and read the entire thing on the plane back to New England. A great variety of short stories, essays, and poetry, this collection brings together a lot of powerful pieces of writing. Tattoos are examined from many different perspectives, ranging from a tool of intimidation and punishment to something beautiful and otherworldly. Parts made my skin prickle and my hair stand on end, bracing for the touch of the needle. I'd been thinking about getting a new one. Reading this solidified that decision.

My favorites: Murguia's "A Toda Maquina" & Orlowsky's "Tattoo Thoughts"

A "pre"-review
Cheryl Dumesnil was one of my professors in college. I have not read this book yet, but based on her abilities as a teacher, I am totally looking forward to reading it.

ink on ink
Addonizio's and Dumesnil's anthology on writings on tattoos is a great collection of work. You can't go wrong with the writings inside.

There is some great (and at times surprising) fiction inside, which includes: an excerpt from Ray Bradbury's The Illustrated Man, Kafka's "In the Penal Colony," Sylvia Plath's story "The Fifteen Dollar Eagle," and Flannery O'Connor's "Parker's Back." O'Connor is always a joy to read, and this story is an especially good one. There's even a piece from Herman Melville (selected from Typee). Steve Vender has a most interesting piece on meeting one of the gang members he is to defend--this is a fascinating piece. And there are also vignettes scattered throughout where people discuss their tattoos, as well as other pieces of fiction.

And there's poetry by Thom Gunn, Kim Addonizio, Bob Hicok, Mark Doty, Cheryl Dumesnil, J.D. McClatchy, Tony Hoagland, Brenda Hillman, Laura A. Goldstein, Garnett Kilberg Cohen, Michael Waters, Joseph Millar, Katharine Whitcomb, Eliot Wilson, Bruce Bond, Virginia Chase Sutton, Lissette Mendez, Dzvinia Orlowsky, and Denise Duhamel.

Not only does it look impressive, it reads very, very well. I'm not surprised that Addonizio put together such a strong selection of work. I can't think of any other person who would have been more suited to this type of anthology. It's a great collection, one I'm sure everyone would enjoy reading.

Great Writing
Even if you are not a fan of, or have any tattoos, you cannot help immersing yourself in the assembled writings. The editors have done a great job. I found it hard to put this one down. Fascinating subject, fascinating writing. If you appreciate great writing, you'll love this book. You may even decide to go out and get your own tattoo. ... Read more

Product Description
Author, poet, screenwriter and outstanding member of the legendary Algonquin Round Table, Dorothy Parker was known for her quick wit, keen observations, and remarkable insight into the human condition. Regarded as brilliant, but known to be an alcoholic and often depressed, Parker's work pushes all buttons at once: humor, anger, love, pity and everything in between ... she pulled no punches, writing with pure, unadulterated passion; her work is timeless and as pertinent to today's society as it was to that of the time she wrote.

Among the gems included in this collection are her first published short story, "Such a Pretty Little Picture" and her O. Henry Award winner "Big Blonde," several other short stories, and, unlike other audio collections, some of her review work.

Includes: Big Blonde Review of Emily PostDusk before FireworksReview of Redemption But the One on the Right Horsie Diary of a New York Lady The Game Just a Little One The Bolt Behind the Blue Valedictory Review Such a Pretty Little Picture Lady With a Lamp The Waltz Cousin Larry A Telephone Call

Performed by Christine Baranski, Cynthia Nixon, Alfre Woodard, & Shirley Booth ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Excellent, especially the Christine Baranski and Shirley Booth Selections
Unlike the previous reviewer, I really enjoyed this collection. Though I think I might have given it 3.5 instead of 4, if I'd been able.

I admit, it's been years since I've read any Dorothy Parker, though I remember loving her dry, insightful wit.

Anyway, I had a chance to borrow this collection recently and am glad I did. All four readers were quite different in their delivery, and all did a very nice job. (As for Cynthia Nixon, the "chick from sex in the city" referenced by the previous reviewer, I thought she was terrific in "Just a Little One".)

Of the three more current actresses/readers (Woodard, Nixon, Baranski), I was most impressed with Christine Baranski. I think she was excellent in all of the pieces she performed and was the most consistent in capturing the spirit of the material.

And the last CD in the collection contains Parker selections read by the venerable Shirley Booth. She was such a treat to listen to!

All in all, a very enjoyable collection. It's not for those whose appreciation of language extends only so far as "Twitter" and text messaging. But if you enjoy wry, witty writing from the female perspective, try a little Dorothy Parker.

Actors who can't read
Ok, I LOVE Dorthy Parker but this CD set is hard to listen to.The chick from sex in the city starts it off and LOST me in 10 minutes.Sounds like she could use some read-out-loud lessons.
I guess these stories just don't "read" well out loud.
I suggest reading the books yourself. ... Read more

Product Description
When a Broadway producer is found dead in his luxurious apartment it is believed he choked on a cherry tomato. That he was not murdered is a surprise to the denizens of the Great White Way. The first of Agata Stanford's Dorothy Parker Mystery Series, takes you on a pictorial tour as you romp through the Manhattan of 1924 alongside real-life characters, writer and wit, Dorothy Parker, her adorable Boston terrier named Woodrow Wilson, Robert Benchley and the newspaper men of the Algonquin Round Table. Step out of your Silver Ghost Rolls to go on a scavenger hunt with the Marx Brothers, do the rounds of speakeasies, attend Broadway's opening nights, dance at the Waldorf, and then pull up your chair at the Algonquin Hotel's famous daily luncheon and enjoy a tossed salad of bon mots, all while sleuthing about for clues to find a killer. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

The Broadway Murders: A Dorothy Parker Mystery
I loved this delightful mystery romp.Wonderful characters:Dorthy Parker and her Round Table cohorts, solving murders in 1920's New York.Agata Stanford has recreated a jazzy, boozy, flamboyant period.It's a great read, fast and sophisticated.I can't wait for the next in this mystery series.

GREAT FUN!
Those of us, who since childhood, had wished there was a time machine that could let us experience and enjoy life in other periods, should read Agata Stanford's "Dorothy Parker Mysteries" series.They wonderfully recreate the atmosphere and spirit of the literary and artistic crowd at the Algonquin Round Table in the 1920's, and bring back to life the wit, habits, foibles and escapades of Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley and Alexander Woollcott, as well as of the multitude of their friends and even their pets, both human and animal.
Anatole KonstantinAuthor of "A Red Boyhood: Growing Up Under Stalin".

What a delight!
What a delightful book! It is just such a joy to be effectively transported back to another time (in this case, the Twenties) and entertained so well while one is there. Historically accurate in all major respects, Ms. Stanford uses characters we know well, like the Marx Brothers and effectively mixes them with characters from the Arts and History that we don't know as well like Dorothy Parker (who makes a perfect sleuth) and her co-horts, Robert Benchley and Alexander Wolcott. I love mysteries and this one kept me guessing right up until the end. But I think I enjoyed the ride as much as the destination. I am still laughing inwardly at some of the hysterical scenes and dialogues that Ms. Stanford writes. Especially wonderful for knowledgeable New Yorkers or those who want to be, as her descriptions of locations as they were then adds just another element of realism and excitment. Did it all really happen you find yourself wondering? Well, if it didn't I say it should have. Maybe all history should be written by an entertaining mystery writer. No one would ever be bored by it or by this book. ... Read more

Product Description
The blackly comic play about the oppressed lives of women in 1950s New York

One of Literature ’s leading humorists, Dorothy Parker drew from the dark side of her imagination to pen The Ladies of the Corridor, a searing drama about women living on their own in a New York residence hotel. Loosely based on Parker’s life, and co-written with famed Hollywood playwright Arnaud d’Usseau, The Ladies of the Corridor exposes the limitations of a woman’s life in a drama teeming with Parker’s signature wit. ... Read more

Product Description
When it comes to expressing the pleasure and pain of being just a touch too smart to be happy, Dorothy Parker is still the champion, after all these years. Along with Robert Benchley, Alexander Woollcott, and the rest of the Algonquin Round Table, she dominated American popular literature in the 1920s and 1930s.

These unabridged selections of more than thirty short stories and poems is essential for any Parker fan and an excellent way for new readers to make the acquaintance of one of the twentieth century's most quotable authors, whose memorable lines include: "She runs the gamut of emotions from A to B," "This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force," and "Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses." ... Read more

Product Description
Dorothy Parker, more than any of her contemporaries, captured the spirit of her age in her writing. The decadent 1920S and 1930s in New York were a time of great experiment and daring for women. For the rich, life seemed a continual party, but the excesses took their emotional toll. With a biting wit and perceptive insight, Dorothy Parker examines the social mores of her day and exposes the darkness beneath the dazzle. Her own life exemplified this duality, for a while she was one of the most talked-about women of her day, she was also known as a "masochist whose passion for unhappiness knew no bounds". As philosopher Irwin Edman said, she was "a Sappho who could combine a heartbreak with a wisecrack". Her dissection of the jazz age in poetry and prose is collected in this volume along with articles and reviews. ... Read more

Product Description
Using selected and arranged passages Barry Day tells the life of Dorothy Parker. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Dorothy's Irreverence
I enjoyed reading Dorothy Parker's view of life which was colored by her childhood in New York.It's almost a defense of hers against the lack of love she received and the wrong choices she made during the speakeasy era.My mother was a "flapper" and this book helped me pick up on the spirit of those times.It's hard to tell which words of Dorothy's I should take seriously and which are part of her wonderful sense of humor. ... Read more

Product Description
This series collects together the best-known aphorisms, epigrams and reflections of a wide variety of figures from antiquity to our own age: humorists and novelists, poets and philosophers, politicians and playwrights. ... Read more

Amazon.com Review
Before there was Fran Leibowitz, there was DorothyParker. Before there was practically anyone, there was DorothyParker. When it comes to expressing the pleasure and pain of beingjust a touch too smart to be happy, she's winner and still championafter all these years. Along with Robert Benchley, AlexanderWoollcott, and the rest of the Algonquin Round Table, she dominatedAmerican pop lit in the '20s and '30s; like Ginger Rogers, she did itall backwards. Parker's held up well--maybe the best of all of them.

This book is essential for any Parker fan, and an excellent way fornew readers to make her acquaintance. It reprints her finest shortstories and poems, some later articles, and all of her excellent"Constant Reader" book reviews from the Depression-era glorydays of the New Yorker. The poetry, always light, has becomebrittle, sorry to say. But you've only to pick any story to bereminded that no middle-distance writer was better than Parker at herbest. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (25)

The Hobo Philosopher
It is said or was said by somebody famous that writers should be read and not known. I think this is especially the case with Dorothy Parker. I enjoyed this volume of stories, poems and reviews so much that I was led to buy a biography of her life. After reading her life her melancholy comes forward and her wit and humor fall backwards. It seems that she was a sad and lost human being but a very entertaining writer.

All of her writing is of an intellectual type - by that, I mean that she makes you think. She is not cozy or snugly. This book is not a laugh a minute. It is instead intelligent and thoughtful with a chuckle here and there. Dorothy is distant.

She's not Will Cuppy when it comes to clever and she's not O'Henry or Mark Twain when it comes to story telling. She's no Emily Bronte or Elizabeth Barrett Browning when it comes to poetry. Erma Bombeck will give you more laughs per page. But Dorothy Parker has an aura about her. She's a "smart" woman. She was "allowed" to hangout with the intellectual boy crowd of the day. She has a reputation.

There is a loneliness in these pages. The picture on the cover captures it.

I imagine that Dorothy was most famous for her reviews. That is where she is the most witty and purposefully entertaining.

If you want to read Dorothy Parker, this is a good volume. If you want to know what makes Dorothy Parker tick, I think that would take more reading and many more books.

Books written by Richard Noble - The Hobo Philosopher:
"Hobo-ing America: A Workingman's Tour of the U.S.A.."
"A Summer with Charlie" Salisbury Beach, Lawrence YMCA
"A Little Something: Poetry and Prose
"Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother" Novel - Lawrence, Ma.
"The Eastpointer" Selections from award winning column.
"Noble Notes on Famous Folks" Humor - satire - facts.
"America on Strike" American Labor - History

Wonderful!
The product came exactly as described if not better. The sender had it to me very quickly. I would definitely buy from this seller again!

portable dorothy parker
this is a book that my fiancee told me about and we went online and found it reasonable and received it fast! lots of anecdotes and pithy poems that still hit the mark almost 75 years later!!!

Biting Wit, Clever Literary Style, Acid Tongue, And Pure Genius
Dorothy Parker was brilliant! Sure I'd have been afraid of her and that whip-sharp mind of hers that could unleash a rapier wit with seeming ease, but I love her stories, poems, and essays. This "portable" anthology of the great lady's writings is a perfect marriage of the printed word compacted into an accessible format. This is a book to sit back and fall into, as one slips into tales peopled with a cast of (surely Hell-bound) movers and shakers, all infused with the cool, trademarked Parker style. Recommended sans hesitation!

The Bible For Dorothy Parker Fans
This is the bible for Dorothy Parker lovers. "The Portable" contains Mrs. Parker's short stories, poems, book reviews and Broadway criticism. The book originally came out in 1944 - and has never gone out of print.

Most of Mrs. Parker's most famous writing is presented here. Her short stories and verse were chosen in 1944 and arranged by Parker herself. When the book came out again in 1973 the editors added some of her theater reviews from Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, along with selected book reviews she penned for The New Yorker and Esquire.

The only downside to this edition is the rotten introduction by the crusty Brendan Gill, who was a longtime staff member of The New Yorker and is not too kind to Mrs. Parker. I suggest skipping his intro entirely. For most Parker fans, this is the first collection they buy, and it is a good start. If you are going to own just one Parker book, this is it. ... Read more

Product Description
“Silly of me to blame it on dates, but so it happened to be.Dammit, it was the Twenties, and we had to be smarty.” – Dorothy Parker

The Algonquin Round Table, or “The Vicious Circle” as it was commonly known, came about much like so many social gatherings. A few friends get together, have a good time, and decide it would be fun to do it on a regular basis.

Now give them all literary or theatrical pedigrees and larger than life personalities. Then put them in a time and place that encourages artistic creativity, excessive social drinking and some rather outrageous behavior.

Lastly, give them national exposure.What emerges is a group that not only sets the standard for contemporary literary style and wit, but helps change forever the face of American culture.

This collection contains early poems, stories and anecdotes from seven of the Algonquin Round Table writers: Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, Franklin Pierce Adams, Heywood Broun, Edna Ferber, Ruth Hale, and Donald Ogden Stewart.

Each author, and each story is included in the linked table of contents. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Smarty and Brilly!
A welcome alternative to the volumes and volumes of gossip about the lives of the writers who came to be known as the "Algonquin Round Table". This collection places the focus squarely on the writers themselves, their accomplishments and their literary body of work. Edna Ferber and Donald Ogden Stuart are two writers who rarely get their due, and I was gratified to see their work given new life.

A Great Primer for the Algonquin Round Table
The writers of the Algonquin Round Table occupy a place in our literary history as a nation, filled with humor, and gossip, and scandal, but also some of the most creative, and inspired satirical work to ever be produced in the United States. Authors such as Robert Benchley, Dorothy Parker and Edna Ferber have become icons of the genre, and withstood the test of time. Reading Robert Benchley's "How To Understand International Finance" today, seems to be just as biting as it was when it was written.

The introduction for this edition sets the tone for the volume, interweaving biographical information about the time period, the type of literature the country was reading, and bits and pieces about the lives of the authors. The collection contains several poems, stories or narratives from each of the eight or so authors contained in the edition, as well as a brief biographical sketch of each artist.

I felt a definite sense of orientation in time and place, as I read each of the stories. A real treat was the clever placement of Dorothy Parker's "Men I'm Not Married To" followed by Franklin Pierce Adam's "Women I'm Not Married To," which had both appeared this way in a rather obscure edition in Canada during the 1930s.

Each author is showcased briefly, but not allowed to steal the spotlight for the entire volume. This is an excellent primer for readers unfamiliar with writers of The Algonquin Round Table, and one of those books you will enjoy letting friends read, so you can giggle over the hundreds of quote-worthy quips, pieces of dialog, and one-liners interspersed in some spirited and highly amusing literature.

Bon Mots?
The title led me to believe that I would hear some mouse in the corner repartee and anecdotes about the Algonquin round table participants antics and wit. Instead I got biographical information on some of the round table authors, a few good copyright-free pieces of their writing with which any admirer of their work is already familiar, and WAY too much Edna Ferber. Several of the most interesting members of the group are entirely absent. This book's bumpy amateurish typography with vast spaces between paragraphs and word spacing certainly adds to a slim book's bulk but led me to wonder if this book was produced by the corner printer down the street. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Bad typesetting...
The font type was old and distracting.I like Dorothy Parker and found the reading not attractive.

Pleasure reading at its finest.
Dorothy Parker was one of the great American wits of the past century, always ready to engage in wordplay. Once challenged to construct a sentence with the word "horticulture," she reportedly responded without hesitation, "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."

Little familiar with her work aside from the opening anecdote, I determined that I would become better acquainted upon seeing The Best of Dorothy Parker in a catalog. Having ready access to bookstores, libraries, and online retailers, I have infrequent need for catalogs. Nevertheless, that's how the Folio Society keeps its members abreast of its current releases.

The Folio Society edition (not for sale except directly from the Society or a used bookseller) is, of course, beautifully bound and typeset, coming complete with a few illustrations. While these are in fact secondary issues, proper handling of these details does in fact greatly enhance the pleasure brought by the book.

The text is organized in a manner that reading straight through from beginning to end will keep the reader engaged with poetry and prose intermingled. Were I looking for a reference work, I might have found the arrangement inconvenient but I was interested strictly in pleasure reading. Furthermore, the book has a serviceable index in the back such that any particular entry can be easily found.

Many great writers can be assessed on their ability to present a story that might be mundane in itself. Ms. Parker's great talent, abundantly evident in this volume, is the ability to make even the most trivial things amusing. ... Read more

Product Description
During the early years of her career, while struggling to "keep body and soul apart" (as she ruefully put it later), Dorothy Parker wrote more than three hundred poems and verses for a variety of popular magazines and newspapers. Between 1926 and 1933 she collected most of these pieces in three volumes of poetry: Enough Rope, Sunset Gun, and Death and Taxes. The remaining poems and verses from America's most renowned cynic make up this volume. Eclectic and exuberant, these 122 once-forgotten gems display Parker's distinctive wit, irony, and precision, as she dissects early-twentieth-century American urban life and gleefully skewers a rich array of targets that range from personal foible to popular culture. With an authoritative, immensely entertaining, and critically acclaimed introduction by Stuart Y. Silverstein, Not Much Fun is an essential addition to the Dorothy Parker library and a welcome gift to her many admirers and devoted fans.Amazon.com Review
A succinct, yet enlightening introduction and footnotes withquintessential Dorothy Parker anecdotes and quotes serve as brilliantfoundation for this collection of "lost" poems. In fact, they arepieces that Parker discarded as not fit for publication, and Parkerenthusiasts will notice that many foreshadow more-polished later versions.Though Parker once described her verse as "horribly outdated--anythingonce fashionable is dreadful now," it's clear that even her"unfit" works are far from dreadful. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Ironically Titled:Not Much Fun
The book consists of a 73-page Introduction (with 120 footnotes) and 169 pages of poetry containing approximately 129 "lost" poems, each one usually not more than a page or two long. The footnotes are funny because, largely, they contain they situational wisecracks of Dorothy Parker which liven up the generally lackluster recounting of the major events of Dorothy Parker's life.

The wisecracks in the Introduction bring such chuckles of delight, they instantly raise the evaluation of the whole book -- momentarily, like a seductive tease.Easily, Parker's wisecracks could have been substituted for the Introduction if laughter was the primary purpose of the book.

The remarkable thing about the Introduction that is worth noting is Stuart Y. Silverstein's assertion that Dorothy Parker was a Stalinist and that she signed Stalin's petition to put millions of his own people to death. Unmistakably, and (for me) very disappointingly, Dorothy Parker, as the Introduction makes clear, was "not a personal friend of the multitudes."She was a "grand dame" all right, but in the meanest and most anti-human sense. (If you also just think of the various genocidal movements going on through various nefarious charitable organizations or non-governmental organizations today in the name of "world governance" (i.e., World Communism), through WHO or Social Services in the UK just to name two, then Dorothy Parker's signature on Stalin's petition in the Thirties (again, for the eradication of the multitudes) makes reading her poems and wisecrackings seem a pleasureless, wrongheaded straining for depth and gratification that is not much fun, not much fun at all, at all.)

The poems in this collection are inaptly name as "lost." They were not ever lost, only forgotten, at least for the most part. They do bring a certain pleasure and do provide a few guffaws.At least, this is true for the first third of them. The middle portion of the collection, however, is actually dull and repetitive, and the not-much-fun reading of them seems endless and unrelieved until the last third of the collection where the reader discovers "The Hate Verses." These late, contrarian poems do return lift and light to the reader's soul-seeking pleasures and unlock a few more unexpected giggles.

The Introduction quotes a Wyatt Cooper saying "If you didn't know Dorothy Parker, whatever you think she was like, she wasn't.Even if you did know her, whatever you thought she was like, she probably wasn't."What Mr. Cooper made of Dorothy Parker as a human being, I think can equally be made of the poems found in this collection.While the compiler, Mr. Silverstein, thinks these poems are eclectic, breezy, and unself-conscious, the carefully cultivated image and personality Dorothy Parker crafted for herself through her books of poetry (and through careful editing) is nowhere to be found, is totally abandoned or "lost" such that, for me, these poems seem written either by a completely different person or by an adolescent version of that "modern woman" Dorothy Parker fans have already come to know and love.Having read now all the poems in this collection, I think I (still) prefer the "aesthetic profile Dorothy Parker had hoped to project" and succeeded in projecting - that is, succeeded well before encountering this book. Having learned how bad some of the poems in this collection are while also discovering what a life-hating Communist she turned out to be, I find the book ironically titled.Reading it was, aptly, not much fun.

So Much Fun!!
Dorothy Parker's "Not Much Fun" is so much fun!There's no one quite like Ms. Parker--witty and wonderful with her words that get her point across with no doubt on the reader's part of how she really feels.She says it like no other, with a style that is all her own. And all that fabulous opinion set to the beautiful music of poetry's rhythm and rhyme.I look forward to her "Complete Poems" coming back in print!

She called them 'verses' -- but they're more potent than verse
She was a Rothschild --- just not the right kind. Her mother died a month before her fifth birthday, her hated stepmother died when she was nine, her father died when she was 20.

Born lucky, you might say.

It should be no surprise that Dorothy Parker had a close relationship with alcohol (great quantities, taken in small sips, so she was always drinking but never completely smashed). Or that she had bad luck in love (two husbands committed suicide). Or that she'd fail at suicide on four separate occasions (once she slashed her wrists, but only after ordering dinner to be delivered, thus guaranteeing that she'd be found alive).

Dorothy Parker was one of the most celebrated writers of her time, but she's much better remembered for her big mouth. Day after day, she sat with America's greatest wits at the Round Table in the bar of New York's Algonquin Hotel and quietly devastated the all-male group with her one-liners. She was as much a symbol of the 1920s as the flapper, the flivver and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Or so the legend has it.

The fact is, Dorothy Parker had no trust fund. She was a working writer. And much of her work involved --- try imagining a career like this now --- poetry. She sold her first poem to Vanity Fair in 1915 for $12, a tidy sum back then. And she wrote about 330 more during her life; over thirty years, that's a poem every other week.

She downplayed her poetry. She said she wrote "verses" --- not poems. And they weren't, she noted, original: "I was following in the exquisite footsteps of Miss Edna St. Vincent Millay, unhappily in my own horrible sneakers."

Her poetry was collected at the peak of her fame. It has since languished. A decade ago, "Not Much Fun: The Lost Poems of Dorothy Parker" appeared. As with many things Parker, don't believe the title.

Is Parker a great poet? By no means. But she was one of the first American women to speak her mind --- her smart, contrarian, troubled mind --- openly on the page, and that gives her a certain historical import. And, setting aside all serious considerations, she's just plain fun. Fun and funny.

The book opens with a poem about...bridge. ("Didn't you hear what I bid?")It moves on to "Any Porch," a pastiche of overheard conversations. ("I really look thinner, you say?") She decries "the lady in back," who invariably ruins her night at the theater. She touches on every popular subject, even psychotherapy: "Where a Freud in need is a Freud indeed/we'll always be Jung together."

Parker's stock in trade is the last line that dramatically reverses the energy of the poem --- and slaps the reader in the face. Thus, a poem about Hollywood ends: "The streets are paved with Goldwyn." Well, how else?

And there are many poems that are just droll jokes:

Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea;
And love is a thing that can never go wrong;
And I am Marie of Romania.

And:

Razors pain you; Rivers are damp;
Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give;
Gas smells awful; You might as well live

If Parker were only cleverness and verve, she'd be worth a paragraph in a chapter on the `20s. What makes her poems interesting is that her pain shows through the wit. In a great poet, this is no big deal; when the poet in question is paying her rent with her poems, it means something that she goes beyond froth. As, here:

When all the world was younger.
When petals lay as snow.
What recked I of the hunger
An empty heart can know?
For love was young and cheery,
And love was quick and free;
Tomorrow might be weary,
But when was that to me?

But now the world is older,
And now tomorrow's come.
The winds are rushing colder,
And all the birds are dumb.
And icy shackles fetter
The brooklet's sunny blue--
And I was never better;
But what is that to you?

"I don't care what is written about me so long as it isn't true," Parker once said. But in addition to poems that tell more than she may have intended, "Not Much Fun" includes an introduction, by Stuart Y. Silverstein, that's so amusingly annotated it's almost a biography. Together, they give a rollicking and touching picture of a woman you'd never want to be --- but would surely want to know.

Dottie Didn't Like Them, But I Sure Do!
How we live in a world where this book was at one time remaindered and now out of print is simply beyond me. Dorothy Parker is not only one of the finest poets who ever ran pen across page, but a wit and a charm as well. This collection of works that fell through the cracks (mostly because Dottie didn't like them) is a gem fit for anyone's library. The obligatory biography is peppered with footnotes of a more informal and personal nature, giving many of her scathing witticisms in given situations. The verses collected are also quite good, even though viewed as rejects by the author. Scathing, sarcastic, brilliant and at times, very personal, your Dorothy Parker collection isn't complete without them. The conclusion of the book are the "Hymns of Hate" not collected anywhere else and are wildly funny and pertinent even in our modern world. Don't miss this fun and fine book which has, hopefully, not seen its last visit to the printing press.

awesome collection
Awesome collection of many of Dorothy Parker's orphan verses as well as her witty remarks throughout the years. The book does not overlap much with other Dorothy Parker collections -- and therefore likely a great addition for some even avid Parker fans. The introduction attempts to present the life story of Dorothy Parker, although I find the comical rendition sometimes a bit too harsh to laugh about. Overall, an easy read that is easy to pick up but hard to put aside! ... Read more