46 Facts About Dorothy Parker

Dorothy Parker was an American poet, writer, critic, and satirist based in New York; she was known for her wit, wisecracks, and eye for 20th-century urban foibles.

From a conflicted and unhappy childhood, Parker rose to acclaim, both for her literary works published in magazines, such as The New Yorker, and as a founding member of the Algonquin Round Table.

Dorothy Parker wrote in her essay, "My Home Town," that her parents returned to their Manhattan apartment shortly after Labor Day so that she could be called a true New Yorker.

Dorothy Parker's mother died in Manhattan in July 1898, a month before Parker's fifth birthday.

Dorothy Parker's father remarried in 1900 to Eleanor Frances Lewis.

However, her biographer, Marion Meade, refers to this account as "largely false," stating that the atmosphere in which Dorothy Parker grew up was indulgent, affectionate, supportive and generous.

Dorothy Parker grew up on the Upper West Side and attended a Roman Catholic elementary school at the Convent of the Blessed Sacrament on West 79th Street with her sister, Helen, although their father was Jewish and her stepmother was Protestant.

Dorothy Parker's stepmother died in 1903, when Parker was nine.

Dorothy Parker later attended Miss Dana's School, a finishing school in Morristown, New Jersey.

Dorothy Parker graduated from Miss Dana's School in 1911, at the age of 18, according to Authur, although Rhonda Pettit and Marion Meade state she never graduated from either school.

Dorothy Parker sold her first poem to Vanity Fair magazine in 1914 and some months later was hired as an editorial assistant for Vogue, another Conde Nast magazine.

Dorothy Parker moved to Vanity Fair as a staff writer after two years at Vogue.

Dorothy Parker later remarried, to Anne E O'Brien, former probation officer of the Juvenile Court, and died at 39, following a dental procedure.

Dorothy Parker published pieces in Vanity Fair, which was happier to publish her than employ her, The Smart Set, and The American Mercury, but in the popular Ladies' Home Journal, Saturday Evening Post, and Life.

Dorothy Parker became famous for her short, viciously humorous poems, many highlighting ludicrous aspects of her many romantic affairs and others wistfully considering the appeal of suicide.

Dorothy Parker published her first volume of poetry, Enough Rope, in 1926.

Dorothy Parker released two more volumes of verse, Sunset Gun and Death and Taxes, along with the short story collections Laments for the Living and After Such Pleasures.

Dorothy Parker collaborated with playwright Elmer Rice to create Close Harmony, which ran on Broadway in December 1924.

Dorothy Parker had a number of affairs, her lovers including reporter-turned-playwright Charles MacArthur and the publisher Seward Collins.

Toward the end of this period, Dorothy Parker began to become more politically aware and active.

In 1932, Dorothy Parker met Alan Campbell, an actor with aspirations to become a screenwriter.

Dorothy Parker learned that he was bisexual and later proclaimed in public that he was "queer as a billy goat".

In 1935, Dorothy Parker contributed lyrics for the song "I Wished on the Moon", with music by Ralph Rainger.

Dorothy Parker wrote additional dialogue for The Little Foxes in 1941.

Dorothy Parker reported in 1937 on the Loyalist cause in Spain for the Communist magazine New Masses.

At the behest of Otto Katz, a covert Soviet Comintern agent and operative of German Communist Party agent Willi Munzenberg, Dorothy Parker helped to found the Hollywood Anti-Nazi League in 1936, which the FBI suspected of being a Communist Party front.

Dorothy Parker served as chair of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee's fundraising arm, "Spanish Refugee Appeal".

Dorothy Parker organized Project Rescue Ship to transport Loyalist veterans to Mexico, headed Spanish Children's Relief, and lent her name to many other left-wing causes and organizations.

Dorothy Parker was listed as a Communist by the publication Red Channels in 1950.

Dorothy Parker's writing became increasingly erratic owing to her continued abuse of alcohol.

Dorothy Parker returned to Hollywood in 1961, reconciled with Campbell, and collaborated with him on a number of unproduced projects until Campbell died from a drug overdose in 1963.

Dorothy Parker occasionally participated in radio programs, including Information Please and Author, Author.

Dorothy Parker wrote for the Columbia Workshop, and both Ilka Chase and Tallulah Bankhead used her material for radio monologues.

Dorothy Parker died on June 7,1967, of a heart attack at the age of 73.

In 1988, O'Dwyer brought this situation to public attention, with the aid of celebrity columnist Liz Smith; after some discussion, the NAACP claimed Dorothy Parker's remains and designed a memorial garden for them outside its Baltimore headquarters.

In early 2020, the NAACP moved its headquarters to downtown Baltimore and the question about what would happen to Dorothy Parker's ashes became the topic of much speculation, especially after the NAACP formally announced it would later move to Washington, DC.

In 2014, Dorothy Parker was elected to the New Jersey Hall of Fame.

Dorothy Parker inspired a number of fictional characters in several plays of her day.

Dorothy Parker was portrayed as "Daisy Lester" in Charles Brackett's 1934 novel Entirely Surrounded.

Dorothy Parker is mentioned in the original introductory lyrics in Cole Porter's song "Just One of Those Things" from the 1935 Broadway musical Jubilee, which have been retained in the standard interpretation of the song as part of the Great American Songbook.

Those closest to him at the time suggest the association between the poet and the waitress by the same name in the song is a coincidence, but Dorothy Parker died on Prince's 9th birthday and chances are this brought her to his attention prior to writing the song.

Dorothy Parker is the main character in "Love For Miss Dottie", a short story by Larry N Mayer, which was selected by writer Mary Gaitskill for the collection Best New American Voices 2009.

Dorothy Parker has been portrayed on film and television by Dolores Sutton in F Scott Fitzgerald in Hollywood, Rosemary Murphy in Julia, Bebe Neuwirth in Dash and Lilly, and Jennifer Jason Leigh in Mrs Parker and the Vicious Circle.

Television creator Amy Sherman-Palladino named her production company 'Dorothy Parker Drank Here Productions' in tribute to Parker.

Tucson actress Lesley Abrams wrote and performed the one-woman show Dorothy Parker's Last Call in 2009 in Tucson, Arizona at the Winding Road Theater Ensemble.

Dorothy Parker reprised the role at the Live Theatre Workshop in Tucson in 2014.