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Aug 25, 2011

Cambra rated it:

today the Algonquin Hotel bar offers for the ultimate fan the "Mrs. Parker" = a $15 cosmopolitan. If you're as nerdy as me, you'll bring the book with you to read while you nurse the shit out of a week's food money.

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Dec 05, 2007

Stephy rated it:

I enjoyed this book enormously. I used to love it. I still like it a great deal. Her writing has not changed, it is still rich and full of wonderful words arranged in to beautiful, sentences, clever paragraphs. The whole work still has great value. Dorothy Parker's legendary acerbic wit amused me no end as a young woman. What has changed is my perspective. As I have gotten older, I have come to view it as an internal rage, vented upon everyone around her. She remains a great read, but now I More...

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Dec 17, 2009

Jessica rated it:

So you want to write? Pick up this collection of poetry, short stories, essays, and criticism and bow to the master. Looking for a cutting remark? Dorothy Parker already said it, and said it best. But the sharpness of her critical knife and the sharpness of her wit do not undercut, and in fact enhance, the truly earned moments of deep feeling that keep her characters from being merely brittle.

1 comment like (6 people liked it)

May 30, 2008

Ramsey rated it:

Such a witty woman. I want to have lunch with her and listen to the ramblings of a dark, entertaining mind. She wrote humorous poems about how bad she is at committing suicide. She talked about the men in her life the same way us guys talk about women.

A Certain Lady by Dorothy Parker
Oh, I can smile for you, and tilt my head,
And drink your rushing words with eager lips,
And paint my mouth for you a fragrant red,
And trace your brows with tutored More...

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Mar 26, 2008

Jessica rated it:

Okay, so Parker is one of those authors I was constantly referencing and mentioning in an effort to sound well-read--the truth, Opus, is that I'd never read a word by her. She's quoted often enough that we can get the gist, but still...and now that I've come clean about that, I can move forward in this review.

This is an excellent collection, and darn-near comprehensive. Her complete stories are in here, as are most (if not all) of her poems, book and theatre reviews for Vanity Fair, More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Clare rated it:

After I wrote a particularly scathing review of the unedited re-release of Apocalypse Now for my Critical Reviewing class in college (actual line from the review: "Around the third hour or so, I became convinced that the real genius of this film was not Coppola himself but rather the person who forced him to cut at least an hour out of Apocalypse Now in the first place"), my professor compared me to Dorothy Parker. Or maybe he just suggested I read her, but my ego prefers the first ver More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Zen rated it:

It's not that portable, but Dorothy Parker's a bracing companion for travel, and well worth the bother of lugging her around. I love how mean she was, and she was a fabulous letter-writer: funny, frank and gossipy. Her poetry and short stories do get a bit samey when read all at one go -- themes recur -- but she's such an entertaining writer that it doesn't much matter.

It pleases me that she took up the mantle when P. G. Wodehouse stopped reviewing drama for -- hm, some magazine or t More...

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Jan 19, 2012

Stacie rated it:

Based on the stories I read from this, I am giving Ms. Parker four stars. She has an amazing ability to bring forth great characters, stories and emotions in only a few short pages.

I read, "The Lovely Leave", "Arrangement in Black and White", "The Standard of Living" and "Mr. Durant".

Wow. I just finished reading "Big Blonde"...what a tragic and heartbreaking story.

I will definitely be revisiting the rest of her stor

8 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 08, 2011

Holligolefty rated it:

The themes are common in life, and now they're common in every sort of media. Temp secretary has affair with the married boss, get's pregnant; A man bemoans his slippery grip on a fascinating woman, right to her, etc.

In 1944, The Viking Press in New York published this Portable compendium of all Parker's writing; collected stories, poems, unpublished later stories, articles and book reviews.
It was met with the usual scandalized reaction from 'The Heartland' upon which Parker al More...

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Jan 04, 2008

Megan rated it:

I was really obsessed with Dorothy Parker and the whole Algonquin Round Table in high school. I've read most of this book, maybe not all of the short stories. I always liked her play reviews the best, where she was truly snarky and not just sort of a 1920's version of emo; all whiny and overly ironic and desparate for attention. This collected edition has a lot of her play reviews, most of her poetry and I think all of her short stories.

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Oct 23, 2009

Vanessa rated it:

Other than finding the introduction to the edition I read ridiculous to a degree I cannot describe (I guess there is something wrong with me for not glorifying suicide among artists...), I found Dorothy Parker's short story collection to be quite enlightening. It allowed me a chance to look into the lives of women (and men) in the early half of the twentieth century and understand more fully how much and how little we have changed in such a relatively short period of time. I feel much less like More...

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Jan 02, 2012

Jeanette rated it:

I only read from page 445 to the end. Her short stories take up the first several hundred pages. They are dry and boring and contain not a hint of her trademark wit, so I skipped them.

The miscellaneous non-fiction pieces at the back of the book are the jewels in her scribbler's crown. Book reviews, theater critiques, magazine articles, and private letters -- a cornucopia of her peculiar observations and famed turns of phrase. Parker was a very funny lady, and a brutally honest one a More...

4 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2007

Jessica rated it:

Well, I know just how she feels, which might be why I don't always enjoy this stuff so much. Reading Parker is a bit like having an IM conversation with myself, if I were a lot smarter, a much better writer, and a way bigger alcoholic.

1 comment like (6 people liked it)

Jun 06, 2008

Andy rated it:

"Big Blonde" is the best story in the book, and one of the greatest short stories ever written. Dorothy Parker is the greatest chick-lit writer of all time. If you like Louise Brooks movies you will kiss Dorothy's literary feet!

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Aug 02, 2009

Patrick rated it:

Lover her. Hate her. Her poetry is always sardonic fun.

"Now it’s over, and now it’s done;
Why does everything look the same?
Just as bright, the unheeding sun,—
Can’t it see that the parting came?
People hurry and work and swear,
Laugh and grumble and die and wed,
Ponder what they will eat and wear,—
Don’t they know that our love is dead?

Just as busy, the crowded street;
Cars and wagons go rolling on,
Children chuckle, and More...

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Dec 26, 2008

Heather rated it:

This is one of the handful of books that I consider really essential; everyone should own it. It's a collection of the best of Parker's work over the course of her career, and includes short fiction and poetry as well as a selection of her theatre and literature reviews (those last are my favorites). You can enjoy reading it straight through, or dip into it for a bit of brief amusement. Parker's sparkling, biting, cynical wit is still enjoyable, even long after the celebrities she wrote about More...

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Aug 10, 2010

Meg rated it:

Parker's poems are short, sparse, and witty; I can hardly ever sit down with this book and not feel compelled to read a particulary memorable gem aloud. Her short stories reveal surprising depth, and her "Constant Reader" reviews (especially the AA Milne ones!) are a real riot. I've found that it's an excellent bedside companion.

No subject is sacred when it comes to being a target of Parker's poetic wit. Her gems are enjoyable, and you'll find yourself quoting them at ever More...

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Nov 25, 2011

Ed rated it:

Because there are a lot of poems and short stories, they ranged between "I liked it" and "I liked it a lot, I gave it 4 stars.

Parker was a notorious wit. She is said to have, when working in Hollywood and in need of a date, appropriated a men's room sign and placed it outside her office door. Needless to say, she met a fair share that time, although a disproportionate amount may have suffered from bladder problems.

She also once stated that "brevity is th More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Mrs. rated it:

Dorothy Parker should be required reading in all schools – she is by turns tragic and hilarious, sometimes both at once. She is bitingly witty and a keen observer of human nature. She has a particular way of describing a character so that with just a few sentences you feel as though you know them completely. For example, from “Big Blonde” (a story she is thought to have based on herself):

“Hazel Morse was a large, fair woman of the type that incites some men when they use the word ‘bl More...

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Feb 06, 2012

Jessica rated it:

Finally. I finally finished it! As a late-twenties quasi hipster girl I think I might be required to love Dorothy Parker, but until a friend of mine gave me this collection for Christmas I had never read more than a few poems. And I do enjoy her, but only in small doses, which may explain why it took me almost a year to finish this. While I love her sense of humor, I must say her work gets rather repetitive. Most of her stories are about women being more into men than the men are into them More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Sayra rated it:

It's a great book, it's rather longish and it takes quite some time to read it, because one just cannot read through it at one fell swoop, because a major part of it is short stories, which you start to mix up, if you read one after the other. The poetry is great, to hear the most mean and hateful things in beautiful words that even rhyme is wonderful. I wish I could express my not-so-nice-feelings this way. The theatre-critiques she writes are ok, sometimes they are funny, but about 50 or 60 ye More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Colleen rated it:

Even after renewing this book twice, I was still not able to finish this 613-page tome and am now out of time. So I reluctantly return it. Each of Dorothy Parker's short stories, poems, essays, and letters is a morsel to be savored. It's best kept at your bedside where you can pick it up, read and ponder, then set it back down again. There's no hurry to get through it--you won't forget the plot or who the characters are. This is not my normal genre so it was nice to break out and try someth More...

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Aug 29, 2009

Rebecca rated it:

I finished it! I finally finished it. I am so proud. Once I decided to skip the rest of the stories and poems and go to the reviews and essays, it was much better. And in the end, I read all the stories and poems as well. They are all very good, they were just too much all together. I definitely enjoyed her theater and book reviews the most. Some of her later stories were really excellent. All of them (including earlier ones) were good - witty, artfully constructed and written, succinct, More...

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Apr 09, 2008

Marigold rated it:

I just love Dorothy Parker! She's a hoot & I totally wish I could go drinking with her! "What would Dorothy Parker say?" just may be my new mantra! Sadly I will never be as witty or well-read as she was. Having said all that, I mostly loved this book for Parker's uncollected articles and reviews of books, plays & poetry. I kept on laughing out loud while reading this, earning curious looks from my coworkers at lunch, & patient eye-rolling from my husband who does not always want to hea More...

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Aug 25, 2011

Jim rated it:

I started reading Parker's book reviews in the back of the book and was caught by how much more they were than what they seemed.

At first they look to be just smart remarks without much depth about things Parker did and didn't like. There's nothing there that would get her an A in her English class.

After a few, you begin to see that the reviews are really the story of her reading and writing life, not an impartial evaluation of an author's achievement:

" More...

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Apr 19, 2009

Ariel rated it:

If somebody had described Parker's book to me I wouldn't have bothered reading it. Given how I would try to describe it, I would've figured the book arch and forcedly witty, set it back on the bookshelf and forgotten about it. That's what I did for a few years--I think I bought this book in a used book store in Korea when I lived there in 2005--but an unwillingness to read The Brothers Karamazov sitting at my bedside led me to pull down The Portable Dorothy Parker from the shelf.

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Mar 29, 2011

Brent rated it:

The introduction astutely observes that Parker was one of those artists like A.E. Houseman, also obsessed with death, who were afraid to embrace life fully and yet also afraid to actually follow through with the suicidal ideation that imbued their work. Since in Parker's case it resulted in the amazing poem "Resume" and a host of snarky, unabashedly urbane short stories, I'm grateful for this contradiction... but it is ironic (don't you think?) that she lived into her 70s.

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Jun 21, 2011

Mycroft rated it:

My college roommate introduced me to Dorothy Parker's poetry, and I do love that, but her short stories never cease to amaze me. One must infer what is going on by following the conversation or the interactions between characters or a characters inner voice and note the reactions around that character which gives such an amazingly clear impression of the person, their values, interests and how others think of them.

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Aug 19, 2011

Ed added it

No Rating. I read the select parts I was interested in this time. Her shorter poems I find to be fetching. Tart, witty, cynical but all human and humane. I read her best known short story "Big Blonde," an autobiographical, at least in part, writing. Great interview she gave for the The Paris Review. I have other titles waiting in my to-read queue, so I'll return and give a fuller reading.

8 comments like (4 people liked it)

Dec 24, 2009

Lindsey rated it:

The Portable Dorothy Parker was not very portable due to its large size. However, it was fun and sassy.

If you can't make it through the whole book here are some of the best poems:
Rainy Night
Philosophy
News Item
Song of One of the Girls
The Flaw in Paganism

Favorite Quote: The happiest person is the person who thinks the most interesting thoughts. --Professor Dwight

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