A Woman After My Own Spleen

Maybe it started with the Colette post. Or maybe it started with my bracing contacts with certain others of the feminine persuasion (you know who you are). In any case, I'm feeling rather, uh, c---y lately (it's not the four letter word you think it is).

And ready to sing the praises of the female mind.

Particularly a mind as gimlet-sharp as that of Dorothy Parker, a twice-married wordslinger who actually remarried her second husband after divorcing him, proving that two rights might make a wrong.

That's my kind of gal.

And here's my kind of book list about her, including a book of walking tours among her New York haunts.

One of my Stateside bliendies--Riannan, Shawn, I dunno, I'm too tired to go look--recently quoted Mrs. Parker's famous jibe, "You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think." A sentiment I find personally and deeply offensive.

But funny nonetheless.

Especially when you consider that its origin was when Parker was asked to use the word "horticulture" in a sentence.

Which reminds me to give some love to Rarity, whose Dictionary Tuesday was still going on as of this posting.

Closer to my own sentiments though is this (one big guess why) :

"If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to."

What didn't that little minx say!

Perhaps the only other woman of her generation who was even remotely as outrageous was Lillian Hellman. And was she all that funny? I think not.

She was Parker's best friend, nonetheless. Close enough for Hellman to be Parker's executor in the final hour.

Both women had a fierce commitment to justice, the kind that puts someone like me to shame. They were each blacklisted by the House UnAmerican Activities Committee for refusing to name names.

Many years later, when death came to claim Dorothy Parker, she left her estate to the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King. But Parker's famously brilliant timing in life didn't carry through to death: the year was 1967, and Dr. King was cut down less than a year later.

Parker's fortune then went to the NAACP. Her ashes went to...well, it's not a nice story.

Though in my present state of family affairs, I find it grimly affirming.

Perhaps the greatest crime committed against her memory was the epitaph when she was finally laid to rest. Instead of the pithy "Pardon My Dust," she got an overwrought, eagerly sincere, and poorly written canonization.

Hmmm.

Does that mean "Pardon My Dust" is still available?

categories: art ayinim life literature love miscellany