Scratch me a lover, pass me a drink

Be My Robert Benchley

 (Dedicated to Dorothy Parker and the members of the Algonquin Round Table. . . with a nod to the Barenaked Ladies' Be My Yoko Ono)

If there’s someone you can drink without,

Then do so.

And if there’s someone you can waste your time with,

Do so.

You can be my Robert Benchley

You can follow me wherever I go

Be my, be my,

Be my Robert Benchley

Well there was this little lady in old New York

Her quips couldn’t get much darker

She soon became the toast of the Algonquin

Miss Dorothy Parker

If you were smart, or thought you were

If you dared to do it and were able

You got yourself to that hotel, and sat down at

That big Round Table

 

(Be my, be my, be my Robert Benchley

Be my, be my, be my Robert Benchley)

There was this fat guy sitting there

By the name of Woollcott

He and ate and drank and partied and insulted folks

Yes, quite a lot

And look, there’s George S. Kaufman

High hair and skinny as a rail

Though he wins no beauty contests,

His plays just never fail

(you can be my Robert Benchley)

Back in 1921

bootleg liquor there was plenty

You either had a bag of bills

Or you just didn’t have any

Though movies had no soundtrack

With Lloyd, Gilbert and Garbo

Round Tablers were all talkies:

Like George, Heywood and Harpo

(be my, be my, be my Robert Benchley)

While Dottie loved her Benchley,

They all said it was platonic

To think they’d ever hit the sheets

Was really quite moronic

When Benchley married Gertrude

Dottie nearly had conniptions

She was a girl without a brain

It just defied description

One day Dot and Benchley

Decided to incorporate

They had to call the company

A name that sounded great

They tried on this and tried on that

In English, Dutch and quasi-French

Till Alexander Woollocott said

“Why not call it Parkbench”

(You can be my Robert Benchley

You can follow me wherever I go)

Though Dottie loved her Benchley

His wit and clever thinkin’

There’s no doubt she corrupted him

And started him on drinkin’

He started chasing chorus girls

It saddens me to say it

But that’s the game that Benchley chose

And so he had to play it

Oh no, here we go – life is just one big pun,

Oh no, here we go – It’s Benchley on the run!

It’s sad to say this fairy tale

Doesn’t end in blazing glory

Benchley made short subjects

And Miss Parker wrote short stories

His liver conked at fifty,

And that’s not very groovy,

And his shorts are only fillers now

On Turner Classic Movies

Dorothy went on living

Smoking, drinking, taking lovers

But her heart belonged to Benchley

In her mind she had no other

Though her talent was unquestioned,

Her stories now are history

A product of her times, I guess

To me it’s just a mystery

You can be my Robert Benchley

You can follow me wherever I go

Be my, be my,

Be my Robert Benchley

 

Yes, thinking she is obsolete

Strikes me as quite absurd.

So let’s let Dorothy Parker

Have the final word:

Ballade Of A Great Weariness

There's little to have but the things I had,
There's little to bear but the things I bore.
There's nothing to carry and naught to add,
And glory to Heaven, I paid the score.

There's little to do but I did before,
There's little to learn but the things I know;
And this is the sum of a lasting lore:
Scratch a lover, and find a foe.

And couldn't it be I was young and mad
If ever my heart on my sleeve I wore?
There's many to claw at a heart unclad,
And little the wonder it ripped and tore.
There's one that'll join in their push and roar,
With stories to jabber, and stones to throw;
He'll fetch you a lesson that costs you sore:
Scratch a lover, and find a foe.

So little I'll offer to you, my lad;
It's little in loving I set my store.
There's many a maid would be flushed and glad,
And better you'll knock at a kindlier door.
I'll dig at my lettuce, and sweep my floor,
Forever, forever I'm done with woe.
And happen I'll whistle about my chore,
"Scratch a lover, and find a foe."

http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.com/2012/01/synopsis-glass-character-novel-by.html

http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.

The first time I died

Epitaph

The first time I died, I walked my ways;

I followed the file of limping days.

I held me tall, with my head flung up,

But I dared not look on the new moon's cup.

I dared not look on the sweet young rain,

And between my ribs was a gleaming pain.

The next time I died, they laid me deep.

They spoke worn words to hallow my sleep.

They tossed me petals, they wreathed me fern,

They weighted me down with a marble urn.

And I lie here warm, and I lie here dry,

And watch the worms slip by, slip by.

Dorothy Parker




http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.com/2012/01/synopsis-glass-character-novel-by.html

http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.htm

Ducking for apples, or, the queen of the quotes

Yeah, I know, posting quotes from famous writers is pretty cheesy, and maybe I could think up a better idea if I weren't so preoccupied with finding an agent to represent my (third) novel. It has me dancing on a bed of needles, my nerves jumping at every turn.

So let's think about something else, shall we? Meaning, one Dorothy Parker, a writer known for her sardonic poetry and even more sardonic quips ("One more drink and I'll be under the host", "You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think.")

Parker was brilliant, but she was also lightning-quick, fast on the verbal draw. She and her buds sat around a big round table at the Algonquin Hotel and drank their lunch every day. Quips flew like ping-pong balls, which is kind of surprising because these guys (all guys, except Dottie Parker) were so inebriated they could barely stand up. But then, this was the Jazz Age, and drinking was forbidden, a little naughty, and necessary fuel for the writing life.

Some of her best quotes seem to come out of the air, meaning they were likely part of a larger conversation. Such as the one about ducking for apples: "There but for a typographical error is the story of my life." And how did that sweet little debutante injure her leg? "Sliding down a barrister."

You don't get paid for these things ("a girl's best friend is her mutter"), so Dottie really had to scrape hard to make a living. She wrote grand short stories, as well as the kind of whimsical verse made popular by Ogden Nash - except that it went like this: "Three be the things I shall have till I die,/Laughter and hope and a sock in the eye." Book reviewing kept her afloat, and books were piled everywhere in her messy apartment, along with empty bottles, leftover cheese sandwiches, eviction notices, and assorted poodles.

Parker had a soul-friend named Robert Benchley, a humorist who was kind of like Bennett Cerf (God, why do I know about Bennett Cerf??). They never had sex, or at least I don't think they did, but they loved each other in a special way. I once considered writing a memoir of my crushes on men, titled Searching for Robert Benchley. (Don't anybody steal that, I might still use it.)

Poor Dottie. Though she lived to be over 70, she became increasingly bizarre and snappish with the years, so that her league of loyal friends thinned out. She could still get off a good one now and then ("This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."), but as the years passed, her life was loneliness, booze, TV game shows and messy old dogs.

What's the point of all this? Dorothy Parker is incredibly famous, but what exactly did she contribute? A few slight plays, even slighter verse, short stories that were memorable but not great. She was a personality, a package deal, and when you think about it, all writers need to be that way: a walking advertisement for their work, if not for themselves.

Writers are the delivery device for what they write. They must get out there and live it. Work it! And try not to get too drunk in the meantime.

Does it have to be that way? Does it?