dot parker & the vicious circle

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"a celebrated group of new york city writers, critics, actors and wits. gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "the vicious circle," as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the algonquin hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. at these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay and witticisms..."

dot parker & the vicious circle

floradoragirl:

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Though William Randolph Hearst frequently invited prominent Hollywood personalities to visit his spectacular castle (San Simeon), he always insisted upon the observation of certain rules. Despite his own scandalous relationship with Marion Davies, among the rules was a ban on sex between unmarried couples.

When Dorothy Parker visited and broke the rule, she received a note from her host asking her to leave. She did so, but not before leaving a note in the castle’s guest book:

Upon my honor, I saw a Madonna
Standing in a niche,
Above the door
Of the famous whore
Of a prominent son of a bitch.

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This is possibly my favorite anecdote about Dorothy.

@1 year ago with 22 notes

"They sicken of the calm, who knew the storm."

Fair Weather, Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago with 14 notes
#quote #dorothy parker #poet

I’m never going to be famous. I don’t do anything, not one single thing. I used to bite my nails, but I don’t even do that any more.

@2 years ago

"I like to have a martini,
Two at the very most.
After three I’m under the table,
after four I’m under my host."

Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago

"
If I had a shiny gun,
I could have a world of fun
Speeding bullets through the brains
Of the folk who give me pains;

Or had I some poison gas,
I could make the moments pass
Bumping off a number of
People whom I do not love.

But I have no lethal weapon-
Thus does Fate our pleasure step on!
So they still are quick and well
Who should be, by rights, in hell.
"

Frustration, Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago with 5 notes

Razors pain you, rivers are damp, acid stains you, drugs cause cramps, gun aren’t lawful, nooses give, gas smells awful, you might as well live.

(via amorandpsyche)

@1 year ago with 11 notes

"I know that there are things that never have been funny, and never will be. And I know that ridicule may be a shield, but it is not a weapon."

Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago
#quote #dorothy parker

"That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone: Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment."

Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago with 23 notes

"There’s little in taking or giving
There’s little in water or wine
This living, this living, this living
Was never a project of mine.
Oh, hard is the struggle and sparse is
The gain of the one at the top
For art is a form of catharsis
And love is a permanent flop
And work is the province of cattle
And rest’s for a clam in a shell
So I’m thinking of throwing the battle -
Would you kindly direct me to hell?"

Coda, Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago with 35 notes

"I shall come back without fanfaronade
Of wailing wind and graveyard panoply;
But, trembling, slip from cool Eternity-
A mild and most bewildered little shade.
I shall not make sepulchral midnight raid,
But softly come where I had longed to be
In April twilight’s unsung melody,
And I, not you, shall be the one afraid.
Strange, that from lovely dreamings of the dead
I shall come back to you, who hurt me most.
You may not feel my hand upon your head,
I’ll be so new and inexpert a ghost.
Perhaps you will not know that I am near-
And that will break my ghostly heart, my dear."

I Shall Come Back, Dorothy Parker

@2 years ago with 6 notes