Cover image for The portable Dorothy Parker
The portable Dorothy Parker
Title:
The portable Dorothy Parker
Summary:
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. 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. 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. "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.
General Note:
Originally published: 1944. With new introd.
Edition:
2nd rev. ed.
Contents:
Introduction -- Suggestions for Further Reading. Part One: The Original Portable as Arranged by Dorothy Parker in 1944: The Lovely Leave -- Arrangement in Black and White -- The Sexes -- The Standard of Living -- Mr. Durant -- The Waltz -- The Wonderful Old Gentleman -- Song of the Shirt, 1941 -- Enough Rope A Telephone Call -- Here We Are -- Dusk before Fireworks -- You were Perfectly Fine -- Mrs. Hofstadter on Josephine Street -- Soldiers of the Republic -- Too Bad -- The Last Tea -- Big Blonde -- Sunset Gun Just a Little One -- Lady with a Lamp -- The Little Hours -- Horsie -- Glory in the Daytime -- New York to Detroit -- Death and Taxes The Custard Heart -- From the Diary of a New York Lady -- Cousin Larry -- Little Curtis -- Sentiment -- Clothe the Naked -- War Song

Part Two: Other Writings: Such a Pretty Little Picture, Smart Set, December 1922 -- Advice to the Little Peyton Girl, Harper's Bazaar, February 1933 -- The Game, Cosmopolitan, December 1948 -- The Banquet of Crow, The New Yorker, December 14, 1957 -- The Bolt Behind the Blue, Esquire, December 1958 -- Interior Desecration, Vogue, April 15, 1917 -- Here Comes the Groom, Vogue, June 15, 1917 -- Week's End, My Home town, McCall's, January 1928 -- Not Enough, New Masses, March 14, 1939 -- Destructive Decoration, House and Garden, November 1942 -- From Vanity Fair, 1918-1919: Hedda Gabler by Henrik Ibsen, An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde, Redemption by Leo Tolstoi, Dear Brutus by J.M. Barrie -- From Ainslee's From The New Yorker From The New Yorker Literary Rotarians: Appendicitis by Thew Wright, M.D.; Art of the Night by George Jean Nathan, The House at Pooh Corner by A.A. Milne, Round Up by Ring Lardner -- Forty Thousand Sublime and Beautiful Thoughts, compiled by Charles Noel Douglas, The Glass Key by Dashiell Hammett, Dawn by Theodore Dreiser, The Grandmother of the Aunt of the Gardner -- From The New York Times Book Review, 1957: The Road to Miltown, Or Under the Spreading Atrophy by S.J. Perelman -- From Esquire, 1958-1959: The American Earthquake by Edmund Wilson; The Subterraneans by Jack Kerouac; Ice Palace by Edna Ferber, Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote; The Poorhouse Fair by John Updike, The Yeas with Ross by James Thurber.

Part Three: A Dorothy Parker Sampler: Any Porch, Vanity Fair, September 15, 1915 -- Sorry the Line is Busy, Life, April 21, 1921 -- In the Throes, For R.C.B., The New Yorker, January 7, 1928 -- Untitled Birthday Lament, c. 1927 -- The Garter, The New Yorker, September 8, 1928 -- Sophisticated Poetry and the Hell With It, New Masses, June 27, 1939 -- Introduction: The Seal in the Bedroom and Other Predicaments, by James Thurber, 1932 -- The Function of the Writer, Address, Esquire Magazine Symposium, October 1959 [extract] -- New York at 6:30 P.M., Esquire, November 1964 -- Self-Portrait from The Paris Review, "Writers at Work," 1956 -- Letters 1905-1962: To Henry Rothschild, 1950 -- To Henry Rothschild, 1905 -- To Harold Ross, 1927 -- To Harold Ross, no date -- To Seward Collins, 1927 -- To Helen Rothschild Droste, 1929 -- To Robert Charles Benchley, 1929 -- To Sara and Gerald Murphy, 1934 -- To F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1934 -- To Alexander Woollcott, 1935 -- To Harold Guinzburg, 1935 -- To Helen Rothschild Grimwood, c. 1939 -- To Malcolm Cowley, 1958 -- To Morton Zabel, 1959 -- To John Patrick, 1962.
Physical Description:
xxviii, 626 pages ; 22 cm.
Publisher:
Penguin Books,
Publication Date:
2006
ISBN:
9780143039532
Publication Information:
New York : Penguin Books, 2006.
Call Number:
818 PARKER
Holds: Copies: