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Dorothy Parker
Complete Stories
Paperback, 447 pages
Penguin USA, September 1995

 

The jury weighed in on Dorothy Parker a long time ago, and despite her obvious talent, she has often been dismissed by critics of "serious" literature. Her writing has been relegated to the "stories for women" category, perhaps because she wrote for many women’s magazines — Harper’s Bazaar, Cosmopolitan, and Women’s Home Companion, even though she also wrote for The New Yorker, Vanity Fair and The New Republic. At a time when such issues were not discussed openly, Parker wrote about racial discrimination, alcoholism, abortion and dysfunctional families. Whatever you make of her short stories, Parker had a talent for capturing the absurdity and irony of society’s mores in the early part of the twentieth century.

 

Smarter than you, not that you'd know it, December 27, 2001
Reviewer: Rob Lightner
Mrs. Parker possessed a venom that incapacitated its victims with sheer brainy pleasure. Her stories are tight, sparse, and crunchy with wit--Oscar Wilde looks like Krusty the Klown in comparison. While some would complain that she rarely strays from critiquing the hypocrisies of the wealthy and powerful, it's hard to argue that there isn't enough material therein to fuel a thousand careers. Her work is essential reading for those of us who aren't perfectly at ease with the ways of the world but find ourselves coping with it anyway.

The Elaine Stritch readings of seven of these stories are also tremendously entertaining and worthy of separate purchase. The delight of sitting in a darkened room, listening to a master actress reading Mrs. Parker, sipping from a tumbler of whiskey, must be experienced to be believed.

 

 

A Lime-Green Look at the Battles of the Sexes, August 23, 2001
Reviewer: Brian Kevin Beck
And I thought I knew all of the short story writers who write good social satire, especially about the Battle of the Sexes. Do you like John Updike's dissonant couples the Maples? John Cheever's middle-class suburban sashayings? John O'Hara's accounts of evil-propelled mis-treatments and non-treatments? Ring Lardner's tales of hamfisted bunglings? Katherine Mansfield's dry-point etchings of looming males and tendril-like females?

To these I can now add Dorothy Parker--whom I discovered only last month after enjoying the above social-critics for decades. A sharp-tongued journalist, Parker wrote in New York City in the 1920's through the 1950's. She's a key addition to the "fruit salad" of these writers--call her a lime, perhaps--small, tart, acid but somehow quenching our thirst for the truth however tangy?

 

 

The "Daria" of the 1920's, March 19, 2000
Reviewer: mr_nasty
Dorothy Parker had a style of writing all her own, and this book is a perfect introduction to her work. (I also suggest you buy the companion book of her poetry). To me, the best part of the book by far is the second half, which contains essays where she describes people in different settings, and comments on their habits and mannerisms sarcastically and subtly - if you are a big fan of dry humor (such as W. C. Fields and Robert Benchley), as I am, then you will find this book to be worth its weight in gold for these essays alone... Wonderful work by an American original who should have been included in all those lists that were circulating at the close of 1999 of "100 most influential / important women of the century" (instead of the likes of Marilyn Monroe or Madonna).

 

 

My favorite author!!!, October 7, 1999
Reviewer: Amy Bettinardi (amybett@hotmail.com)
These stories capture such genuine interactions of so many believable characters, that I sometimes find it hard to realize that the stories are as old as they are. Her wit and way with words is unmatched, the conversations are so real and I can relate to the female characters so much, that Dorothy Parker has become my very favorite author!

 

 

Dorothy Parker is a true hero for American fiction, January 12, 1999
Reviewer: skeeve_thegreat@hotmail.com
Ms. Parker's collection of short stories are modern and funny. Many of the dialogues detailed in her works can still be heard uttered today between men and women.