Parker, Dorothy - Ken Johnson (essay date 1995)
Ken Johnson (essay date 1995)
SOURCE: Johnson, Ken. “Dorothy Parker's Perpetual Motion.” In American Women Short Story Writers: A Collection of Critical Essays, edited by Julie Brown, pp. 251-65. New York: Garland, 1995.
[In the following essay, Johnson surveys the critical reaction to Parker's oeuvre and examines her unique use of repetition in her work.]
Somehow it has always been rather easy to dismiss Dorothy Parker and her writing from the collective literary consciousness. After all, she never produced a “big” work such as a novel, and her few plays did not achieve long runs. In addition, she shares the ironic fate of most writers who become identified primarily as humorists working with shorter literary forms: they are not considered “serious.” Parker's many celebrated, flip wisecracks (e.g., “One more drink and I'll be under the host.”) brought her the kind of notoriety that rarely carves a secure niche for itself...
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