Contemporary Literary Criticism | Fast, Howard - Diana McLellan (review date 17 February 1987)

Diana McLellan (review date 17 February 1987)

SOURCE: “Washington's Power Eaters,” in The Wall Street Journal, February 17, 1987, p. 32.

[In the following review, McLellan offers unfavorable assessment of The Dinner Party.]

Recently, an attractive woman told me of attending a Washington dinner party with a lobbyist beau. During the evening, she met a bigwig she had once expressed a fleeting desire to know.

Next morning, her lover mailed her a bill: “For Introduction: $600.”

Romantic, no? No. Romance is never invited to Washington dinner parties; the lingering glance and secret touch are out of place. Introduction is the main course: “Persuasion, meet Power.”

Over snowy napery and gleaming silver, their faces magically softened by candlelight and their wits sharpened by wine. Washington's great, near-great, and Oh-God-if-I-pull-this-one-off-I'll-be-great gather for their kind of dinner party.

It is...

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