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I was reading “The Collected Poetry Of Dorothy Parker”. These poems are too sad and despondent for my taste. I think probably the author can really release her feelings of being unloved and abandoned through writing these lines, but it feels awful to read it.
Actually it’s not only the sadness that’s the issue here, but also one feels that the author understands the fleeting nature of love and jumps in it anyway. When it turns out just like what she predicted, she just claims a kind of prescient wisdom. It’s a sad wisdom, but it is still a wisdom.
I am at page 77 right now and I wonder if I can go through the whole thing. 222 pages of lovers running away. Somehow I suspect that all these heartbreaking love affairs make the author a better writer. I know there’s a common saying among gamblers that if one is lucky in love, one is surely going to get unlucky in gambling. On the contrary when one is unlucky in love, one is going to get lucky in gambling. This might just be an Asian immigrant superstition. It really doesn’t apply to those people in poker tournaments on TV. Those winners can be lucky in both.
Here I got some quotes from the book:
“My own dear love, he is all my world– And I wish I’d never met him.”
“In youth, it was a way I had
To do my best to please,
And change, with every passing lad,
To suit his theories.But now I know the things I know,
And do the things I do;
And if you do not like me so,
To hell, my love, with you!”
“…if my friendships break and bend,
There’s little need to cry
The while I know that
every foe Is faithful till I die.”
Haoyan Do 
Thank you for sharing your review. I cannot read sad books or watch teary movies.
I will opt for horror before I can let myself be entertained by sadness.
Your review is concise and allows me to understand such dreariness. Only a great writer,such as yourself, can do this. ♥️
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Thank you for such sweet encouragement. I am so flattered. I think you just give me a great idea of transforming a sad story into a horror story. What a brilliant thought. Thank you for the inspiration.
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You excerpted a wonderful selection.
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Thank you for your wonderful encouragement.
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But now I know the things I know,
And do the things I do;
And if you do not like me so,
To hell, my love, with you!”
LOVE THIS!! Haha!
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She says things so plainly and interestingly. Life is such a good teacher. As we become more mature, we do realize that some of the things we heard in the past are total garbage.
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Lovely choice. Thanks a lot!
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Thank you.
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Thanks.
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good 😇
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Thank you.
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The poems you have shared speak of someone who has seen the world. Yet is not afraid to face whatever else comes through. She has a predestined expectation like many of us, and this is the perpetual ruin.
These kind of stories do not have a happy ever after. They are drools on how fragile they found love to be.
I love your frankness on the part that they are ‘awful’ to read’ even though I might somehow enjoy them. Because it takes effort to write the contrary like Dorothy does.
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So true. She is quite experienced and very matured and not afraid of speaking her mind. So true. Love is hardly forever although we all wish it to be so. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on this. So true. I think you will enjoy it more since it speaks as what it is.
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Great review. It sounds like a tragic read.
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It is. I don’t think I can finish it. Too pessimistic.
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