Student Question
What is the significance of the title "Just a Little One" by Dorothy Parker?
Quick answer:
The title of Dorothy Parker's “Just a Little One” is significant because it refers to a continual refrain from the narrator, who orders several highballs throughout the story. Each drink makes her more talkative, more maudlin, and more likely to say what she really thinks.
The title of “Just a Little One” by Dorothy Parker refers to a refrain spoken by the narrator throughout the tale. This narrator is out on a date at a speakeasy, and her escort, Fred, says he's going to have a highball (with real scotch). The narrator says she will have one, too, but “just a little one” and “awfully weak.” She knows that alcohol goes straight to her head (making her want to adopt stray horses even), but she doesn't like Fred to be drinking by himself.
As the conversation progresses (although we only get one side of it), the narrator orders her second drink, again “just a little bit of a one.” By this point, though, the scotch is loosening her tongue, and she is beginning to say what she really thinks rather than what she thinks Fred wants to hear. She talks about Edith, for instance, another...
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friend of Fred, and at first comments on her good looks. But now she notes that Edith dresses horribly and that Fred's crowd must be astigmatic to think that she looks good.
Pretty soon the narrator is crying and saying that she doesn't have a “single friend in this world.” Her little drinks are quickly making her maudlin. Fred suggests that another drink might make her feel better, and she agrees to have another, but “just a little one.” By this point, she is horribly unhappy with the atmosphere in the speakeasy and asserts that Edith is a horrible woman.
Before long, the narrator is suggesting that they have one more drink, just a little one, of course. It's real scotch after all, and she and Fred are such good friends. The narrator is quite drunk by this point, and she has a great idea for after they've had their next little drink. They should go out and adopt a horse, “just a little one,” to be sure.
Indeed, the title “Just a Little One” is highly appropriate and entertainingly ironic, for those little drinks of scotch have greatly altered the narrator's character and shown readers what it is like for a person to fall under the influence of a little whisky.