duration: "And here I've been locked in his noxious embrace for the thirty-five years this waltz has lasted." Parker was thirty-five years old when she divorced her first husband in 1928, but given the dance's symbolic representation of sexual encounters, the number more likely refers to the length of a marriage.

This marriage, though, is not confined to any particular couple. Parker uses unnamed characters to broaden her critique to the institution of marriage as a whole. It is depicted as troubled, marked by miscommunication, male insensitivity, sexual dissatisfaction, and physical abuse. The female partner feels compelled to agree to her partner's request, unable to express her true feelings. She feels "trapped" by her circumstances and societal expectations for women to pair off. "But what could I do? Everyone else at the table had got up to dance, except him and me." His "dance," however, is too fast, preventing the woman from ever feeling comfortable or satisfied. "Why can't we stay in one place just long enough to get acclimated?"

This complaint is frequently interrupted by instances of violence and denial. The male partner kicks the narrator's shins; her external reaction is to smile and endure it. Internally, however, the assault takes on greater significance. "I don't want to be of the oversensitive type, but you can't tell me that kick was unpremeditated. Freud says there are no accidents. I've led no cloistered life, I've known dancing partners who have spoiled my slippers and torn my dress; but when it comes to kicking, I am Outraged Womanhood." More severe references to violence appear: "plaster cast," "splintering bones," "dead," and "I'm past all feeling now." Collectively, Parker's literal exaggerations gain allegorical strength.

Parker's biting critique of marriage and male-female relationships highlights one of the paradoxes of the Roaring Twenties, or Jazz Age. The social and sexual freedom women experienced often backfired due to persistent, neo-Victorian values regarding sex. Liberated women were still expected to be "ladies" (at least in appearance) while there was little expectation for Jazz Age men to remain gentlemen. This tension contributed to rising divorce rates. The physical violence between Parker's waltzing couple eerily predicts the spouse abuse prevalent in the 1990s.

The narrator in "The Waltz" resembles the sharp-tongued, complaining female archetype found in Chaucer's "Wife of Bath" from The Canterbury Tales (c. 1387-1400). However, the use of humor to critique male-female relationships has a more modern tradition among American women writers. The nineteenth century introduced Fanny Fern, Francis Miriam Berry Whitcher, and Marietta Holley, authors who provided incisive commentaries on gender dynamics through the protective guise of humor.

An intriguing comparison can be drawn with a turn-of-the-century regional story, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman's "A New England Nun." Despite being set in a different era and context, Louisa Ellis finds a way to decline a man's proposal.

"The Waltz" also aligns with works by Parker's contemporaries. Although primarily known for her poetry, Edna St. Vincent Millay's book of satirical sketches, Distressing Dialogues (1924), humorously explores various gender-related challenges. In terms of psychological depth and sexual tension, "The Waltz" can be effectively compared to Katherine Mansfield's "Bliss" (1918; see separate entry), a writer Parker greatly admired. The stream-of-consciousness style of Parker's interior monologue also connects "The Waltz" with the fiction of James Joyce and, notably, Virginia Woolf's "The Mark on the Wall" (1917; see separate entry). For the female stereotypes Parker was challenging, refer to any of the stories or novels by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Parker evokes a comparable feeling of entrapment and offers insights on romance and societal norms in her other stories through the use of internal monologue. These stories include "The Garter," "But the One on the Right," "A Telephone Call," "Lady with a Lamp," "The Little Hours," and "Sentiment."