Reviews
I enjoyed the author's reviews of plays, musicals, and books quite a bit, and also her letters. Her short stories were fine, although I hated every story that was told in the first person narrative aside from "Mrs. Hofstadter on Josephine Street". The poetry I mostly skipped, not because of any lack on the author's part but because poetry doesn't do anything for me; I just end up bored.
Pretty much everything in The Portable Dorothy Parker is an enjoyable read. Dorothy Parker's poetry is extremely clever and often scathing - although the themes are quite repetitive when the poems are put all together like this, so you may want to break up your reading. Looooots of love-gone-wrong, and, warning, a fair amount of suicidal ideation. But: the real stars of this compilation are the short stories. I-Am-Insufferable alert: I have been know to make people sit down with my copy and read "The Game" on the spot, because it is amazing. It snaps from witty and frivolous to spooky and intense and the pacing/plotting is genius. I'm getting chills just thinking about it! Ahhh! "The Game" was originally published in Cosmopolitan magazine (apparently once upon a time they published literary fiction, how strange) and this compilation might be the only place to find it now, as brief internet searches have turned up nothing. I'd almost say it's worth it to get this compilation just for that story! And, I mean, this is a solid, clever collection of poems and stories, you won't be disappointed.
Best handled in chunks, I think. Give yourself time to forget some of the stories--some of them are very similar to each other. And dark. And I'm just not much of one for poetry.
