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The Author. James Truslow Adams. 52, born in Brooklyn, now living in Manhattan, has written so ably of New England that he is often thought to be a New Englander. Educated abroad, at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute, at Yale, he became partner in a Manhattan Stock Exchange firm, retired in 1912 to study history. During the War he served as captain, was detailed to special duty at the Versailles Peace Conference. Other books: The Founding of New England (Pulitzer Prize, 1921), Revolutionary New England, New England in the Republic.
Caustic
LAMENTS FOR THE LIVING—Dorothy Parker—Viking ($2.50).
Author Parker has a way with her; her way is caustic, penetrating, deflating. Her sarcasm, often restrained, is always present, usually evident. Laments for the Living is a collection of 13 short stories, dialogs, monologs in her best, most caustic manner.
Bitter at her best, Dorothy Parker can also be funny. You Were Perfectly Fine is a dialog between a man with a hangover and a girl who tells him what he did last night. Each revelation bends him a little further. The Sexes, also a dialog, pictures the love-life of a "sheik," a flapper. The Mantle of Whistler is a dialog between a girl and a man, just introduced, both of whom have a reputation for wisecracking to keep up. Nothing but a succession of thin-worn comebacks; it gives the impression of being itself a wisecrack about wisecracking.
Author Parker is more entertaining when she is funny, but more herself in graver or more spiteful key. Mr. Durant is the story of a man who got into trouble with his stenographer, out of it with the help of what he doubtless imagines is providence. Little Curtis is a small, indeterminate but pathetic boy who has had the misfortune to be adopted by the very respectable first lady of a very small town. Best story: Big Blonde, which won first prize in the O. Henry Memorial award (1929). It is the story of a good-natured woman who takes to drink when her paunchy lovers grow tired of her.
The Author. Dorothy Rothschild Parker, youngish (age 36), chic, attractive, has become one of the best-known women writers in the U. S. Onetime steady contributor to Life, Judge, she was recently in Hollywood, writing scenarios. Last week she was asea, enroute for her Switzerland home. Famed is her conversation among friends for its bite, epigrams (sometimes unprintable). Her best witticisms are private. Lately in England she wrote that she had been at a luncheon party "at which all five sexes were represented." She is divorced. Other books: Enough Rope, Sunset Gun.
Punster's Whimsy
PARLOR, BEDLAM & BATH—S. J. Perelman & Q. J. Reynolds—Liveright ($2).