Dorothy Parker

“Drink and dance and laugh and lie,Love, the reeling midnight through,For tomorrow we shall die!(But, alas, we never do.)”

“They say of me, and so they should,It's doubtful if I come to good.I see acquaintances and friendsAccumulating dividendsAnd making enviable namesIn science, art and parlor games.But I, despite expert advice,Keep doing things I think are nice,And though to good I never comeInseparable my nose and thumb.”

“I'm never going to accomplish anything; that's perfectly clear to me. I'm never going to be famous. My name will never be writ large on the roster of Those Who Do Things. I don't do anything. Not one single thing. I used to bite my nails, but I don't even do that any more.”

“I don't know much about being a millionaire, but I'll bet I'd be darling at it.”

“And there was that poor sucker Flaubert rolling around on his floor for three days looking for the right word.”

“By the time you swear you're his,Shivering and sighing.And he vows his passion is,Infinite, undying.Lady make note of this --One of you is lying.”

“I know this will come as a shock to you, Mr. Goldwyn, but in all history, which has held billions and billions of human beings, not a single one ever had a happy ending.”

“The first thing I do in the morning is brush my teeth and sharpen my tongue.”

“Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,a medley of extemporanea,And love is a thing that can never go wrong,and I am Marie of Romania.”

“So, you're the man who can't spell 'fuck.'" Dorothy Parker to Norman Mailer after publishers had convinced Mailer to replace the word with a euphemism, 'fug,' in his 1948 book, "The Naked and the Dead.”

“She was pleased to have him come and never sorry to see him go.”

“Ducking for apples -- change one letter and it's the story of my life.”

“You can lead a horticulture, but you can't make her think.”

“I might repeat to myself, slowly and soothingly, a list of quotations beautiful from minds profound; if I can remember any of the damn things.”

“Take me or leave me; or, as is the usual order of things, both.”

“That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone: Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment.”

“What fresh hell is this?”

“Mrs. Ewing was a short woman who accepted the obligation borne by so many short women to make up in vivacity what they lack in number of inches from the ground.”

“Why is it no one sent me yet one perfect limousine, do you suppose? Ah no, it's always just my luck to get one perfect rose.”

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

“Take care of the luxuries and the necessities will take care of themselves.”

“Every year, back comes Spring, with nasty little birds yapping their fool heads off and the ground all mucked up with plants.”

“I like to have a martini,Two at the very most.After three I'm under the table,after four I'm under my host.”

“All I have to be thankful for in this world is that I was sitting down when my garter busted.”

“Men seldom make passes at girls who wear glasses.”

“Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes clean to the bone.”

“I had been fed, in my youth, a lot of old wives' tales about the way men would instantly forsake a beautiful woman to flock around a brilliant one. It is but fair to say that, after getting out in the world, I had never seen this happen."[From a column dated November 17, 1928]”

“If wild my breast and sore my pride,I bask in dreams of suicide,If cool my heart and high my headI think 'How lucky are the dead.”

“Brevity is the soul of lingerie.”

“They sicken of the calm who know the storm.”

“If I didn't care for fun and such,I'd probably amount to much.But I shall stay the way I am,Because I do not give a damn.”

“Time doth flit; oh shit.”