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Dorothy Parker: Spirit Of The Age
Dorothy Parker was one of the most successful and influential women writers of her era. Dorothy Rothschild was born on
August 22, 1893 in West End, N.J. Her mother was Scottish and her father Jewish. She was "a late unexpected arrival in a loveless
family". At the age of four her mother died. Her father remarried and Dorothy's home life was strained and distant at best.
She was educated in private schools in N.J. and N.Y.C. Dorothy suffered two tragedies as a young woman. Her brother Henry
died aboard the Titanic and a year later her father passed away. Dorothy moved to New York City in 1911 where she lived in
a boarding house and worked as a piano player at a dance school. At the age of 21 she began submitting her writing to various
magazines and papers. Her poem "Any Porch" was accepted and published by Vanity Fair. A few months later she was hired by
Vogue, a sister publication of Vanity Fair. While working at Vogue her submissions to Vanity Fair continued to be published.
After two years of working at Vogue she was transferred to Vanity Fair. In 1917 she married Edwin Pond Parker II, a Wall
St. stock broker from a distinguished family and a recent enlistee into the US Army. Eventually her husband was called
to duty overseas The marriage only lasted a brief time, but now she was Mrs. Dorothy Parker. At Vanity Fair she became
New York's only female drama critic at the time. In the spring of 1919 she was invited to the Algonquin Hotel because of her
connections at Vanity Fair and her reputation as a drama critic. This was the beginning of the famous Algonquin Round Table,
an renowned intellectual literary circle.Dorothy was the only female founding member. It brought together such writers as
Robert Benchley, Robert Sherwood, James Thurber, George Kaufman and many others. Dorothy was still writing for Vanity Fair
but her reviews were becoming increasingly sarcastic and unfavorable. She was fired from the magazine in 1921. To earn money
she began writing subtitles for a movie by D.W. Griffith
 Dorothy soon found another job at the magazine Ainslee's where she could be as sarcastic, bitchy, and witty as she pleased.
In 1922 she wrote her first short story - "Such a Pretty Little Picture" - this was the beginning of her literary career.
In January of 1924 Dorothy divorced and moved into the Algonquin Hotel. She began writing plays; "Close Harmony" was her first.
The first issue of The New Yorker was published in early 1925 and Dorothy contributed drama reviews and poetry for the first
few issues. In February of 1926 she set off for Paris, but continued contributing articles to the New Yorker and Life. While
in France she befriended Ernest Hemingway; surprisingly, considering his male chauvinist attitudes. Dorothy returned to New
York in November. Her first book of poetry, "Enough Rope", was published and received favorable reviews as well ad being a
commercial success. In 1927 she became very involved in the Sacco and Vanzetti trial. She traveled to Boston to join the protests
against the execution of two innocent men. During the protest she was arrested but refused to travel in the paddy wagon, insisting
on walking to jail. She was a committed socialist from this day until her death.
In October Dorothy became the book reviewer for the The New Yorker Magazine, under the title "The Constant Reader". In
February of 1929 Dorothy's short story "The Big Blonde" was published and she won the prestigious O. Henry award for the best
short story of the year. That same year Dorothy began doing screen writing in Hollywood. She moved to Hollywoodbecause she
needed the money and was offered a contract by MGM. Dorothy wrote many screenplays over the next decade. In 1933 she once
again traveled to Europe where she met her second husband Alan Campbell. He was also of Scottish-Jewish descent, and a rumored
bisexual. They became screen writing partners and signed a contract with Paramount Pictures in 1935. In 1936 she helped found
the Anti Nazi League. In 1937 Dorothy won an academy award for her joint screenplay of "A Star is Born".
Throughout the 1940's Dorothy continued writing prose and short stories along with screenplays. She was widely published
in many magazines and Viking released an anthology of her short stories and prose. In 1949 she divorced Alan Campbell, but
later they remarried.
In the 1950's she was called before the House on un-American Activities and pleaded the first instead of the fifth, still
refusing to name any names. In 1952-1953 testimony was given against her before the HUAC. From 1957-1963 she worked as a book
reviewer for Esquire magazine. In 1959 she was inducted into American Academy of Arts and Letters. She was a distinguished
Visiting Professor of English at California State College in L.A. In 1964 she published her final magazine piece in November's
issue of Esquire.
On June 7, 1967, she was found dead of a heart attack in her room at Hotel Volney in New York City. She bequeathed her
entire literary estate to the NAACP, and after much legal wrangling and indecision her cremated remains were buried at
the NAACP headquarters in Baltimore.
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what you are hearing is
Dottie herself, at the age of 70,
reading her poem, Men
press cuttings of the times
showing Dottie and the rest
of The Round Table
the Wikipedia entry
and a very extensive
one it is too. complete
with a recording of Dottie
herself, reading her poem
Men!
inwhich our Dottie plans
to make a purchase, but
other priorities get in the way
brought to you by the
Cabanon Press
here are thirty-one poems
by Dorothy Parker, again read by
Dottie herself. these recordings
were made when Dottie was
approaching seventy-one
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the official website of the
Dorothy Parker Society of New York
Dorothy Parker's New York, aka
Dot City, was launched in 1998 to
create something unique online: a
site devoted to Dorothy Parker's
life in New York. The award-winning
writer and peerless wit was a
quintessential New Yorker.
some of those oh so familiar
bon motsfrom that oh
so familiar voice
Daily Intelligencer, August
22, 1936
photograph of Dorothy Parker
and
Alan Campbell. Courtesy of
the
Spruance Collection of the
Bucks County Historical Society
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another photograph taken by
George Platt Lynes
related internet links
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author Marion Meade captures
this exuberant group portrait of
four extraordinary writers -
Dorothy Parker, Zelda Fitzgerald,
Edna St. Vincent Millay, and
Edna Ferber whose
loves, lives,
and literary
endeavors captured
the spirit of the 1920s.
The Algonquin Hotel is best known,
perhaps, for the members of the
Round Table, a group of luminaries
who had in common both the ability to
fire blazing witticisms and to withstand
being on the receiving end of them.
The tone they set during their
daily meetings set the literary style of
the 1920's
how's bayeux?
a grand tradition at a grand hotel
an oasis of calm amid
the hustle and bustle
the legend continues
now, in case you're wondering
about this.....well obviously you
don't know as much about
Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley
as you thought you did.
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