HISTORY/ POPULAR CULTURE

The Timeless Wit and Wisdom of Dorothy Parker

She brushed her teeth, then sharpened her tongue…

Even if you don’t immediately recognise her name, you will certainly be acquainted with the incisive witticisms of acclaimed writer, poet, satirist, screenwriter, and critic, Dorothy Parker. Indeed, many of her clever one liners and sagacious sayings have become a part of our cultural lexicon. She was a founding member of the Algonquin Round Table, a New York- based circle of writers famed for their wit, wisecracks, and wordplay, and she remains an important figure in American modernist literature.

Dorothy Parker (nee Rothschild) was born in her parent’s summer home in New Jersey in 1893, the daughter of immigrant parents. She had a troubled childhood; her mother died when Dorothy was just five years old, and her relationship with her abusive father and his new wife, Eleanor Lewis, was fraught and unhappy.

Perhaps as a means of diversion from her discontented family life, Dorothy began writing poetry and, at the age of 21, she sold her first poem to Vanity Fair. The following year, she was hired as an editor at Vogue and, another two years after that, she was appointed Vanity Fair’s drama critic, taking over from P.G. Wodehouse. This appointment made her the first female critic on Broadway.

Dorothy’s tenure as Vanity Fair’s drama critic lasted two years; she was dismissed in 1920, her caustic comments and biting critiques having alienated many powerful producers. Vanity Fair continued to publish some of her writing, however, along with other publications such as The American Mercury, Ladies’ Home Journal, and The New Yorker.

Dorothy’s first book of poetry, Enough Rope, was published in 1926 and met with positive and enthusiastic reviews. Two more poetry collections, Sunset Gun (1928) and Death and Taxes (1931) followed over the next few years, as well as two short story collections, Laments for the Living (1930) and After Such Pleasures (1933).

Following their 1934 marriage, Dorothy and her husband, actor/screenwriter Alan Campbell, (her second husband, and also her third! — they divorced in 1947 and remarried in 1950), moved to Hollywood, where they both signed with Paramount Pictures. They were both co-writers alongside Robert Carson on A Star is Born (1937), for which they received an Oscar nomination. Dorothy was nominated by the Academy again in 1947 with co-writer Frank Cavett for Smash Up, The Story of a Woman.

Dorothy then wrote the screenplay adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s Lady Windemere’s Fan, which was directed by Otto Preminger and released as The Fan in 1949. It would be Dorothy’s last screenplay; as McCarthyism ran rampant through Hollywood, she was suspected of being a Communist, and was subsequently blacklisted.

Though she continued to write and to publish, Dorothy’s work became sporadic as she battled alcoholism, depression, and two suicide attempts. In her later years, she spoke disparagingly of the infamous Algonquin Round Table who had played such a notable role in her life and career, saying

“These were no giants. Think who was writing in those days — Lardner, Fitzgerald, Faulkner and Hemingway. Those were the real giants. The Round Table was just a lot of people telling jokes and telling each other how good they were. Just a bunch of loudmouths showing off, saving their gags for days, waiting for a chance to spring them… There was no truth in anything they said. It was the terrible day of the wisecrack, so there didn’t have to be any truth..”

Dorothy Parker died of a heart attack in New York on June 7, 1967, and bequeathed the bulk of her estate to Martin Luther King Jr. Upon his assassination less than a year later, the estate passed to MLK’s organisation, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Her ashes remained unclaimed for several years until the crematorium sent them to her lawyer’s office, where they sat on a filing cabinet for around 15 years. The NAACP claimed the urn containing her ashes in 1988, where they remained at their headquarters in Baltimore until 2020, a plaque proclaiming:

Here lie the ashes of Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) humorist, writer, critic. Defender of human and civil rights. For her epitaph she suggested, ‘Excuse my dust’. This memorial garden is dedicated to her noble spirit which celebrated the oneness of humankind and to the bonds of everlasting friendship between black and Jewish people. Dedicated by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. October 28, 1988.

In 2020, following the NAACP’s relocation, Dorothy’s remains were brought back to New York, where they now lie in the family plot in Woodlawn Cemetary, The Bronx.

Twenty Classic Quotes from Dorothy Parker

• “The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.”
• “Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes clean to the bone.”
• “I’d like to have money. And I’d like to be a good writer. These two can come together, and I hope they will, but if that’s too adorable, I’d rather have money.”
• “Brevity is the soul of lingerie.”
• “Three be the things I shall never attain: Envy, content, and sufficient champagne.”
• “I like to have a martini, Two at the very most. After three I’m under the table, after four I’m under my host.”
• “You can lead a horticulture, but you can’t make her think.”
• “I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.”
• “What fresh hell is this?”
• “Of course I talk to myself. I like a good speaker, and I appreciate an intelligent audience.”
• “It’s a small apartment, I’ve barely enough room to lay my hat and a few friends.”
• “I’ve been too fucking busy or vice versa” (said when a publisher asked why she hadn’t submitted her work whilst she was on her honeymoon)
• “This wasn’t just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it.”
• “A hangover is the wrath of grapes.”
• “Time may be a great healer, but it’s a lousy beautician.”
• “If you don’t have anything nice to say, come sit by me.”
• “Vice is nice, but liquor is quicker.”
• “This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.”
• “If all the girls attending the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn’t be at all surprised.”
• “The writer’s way is rough and lonely, and who would choose it while there are vacancies in more gracious professions, such as, say, cleaning out ferryboats?”

Sources:

Dorothy Parker’s stunning wit and tragic life, BBC Culture, 2017. Dorothy Parker Society Poetry Foundation: Dorothy Parker Dorothy Parker, Wikipedia Dorothy Parker Ashes Return to Hometown, Dorothy Parker Society, 2020. Homecoming: Dorothy Parker’s Ashes Buried in New York City, Kevin Fitzpatrick, Dorothy Parker Society, 7 Sept. 2020.

Jupiter Grant is a self-published author, blogger, narrator, and audiobook producer. Buy me a coffee here: https://ko-fi.com/jupitergrant

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