The Custard Heart: Dorothy Parker (Penguin Modern)

First time I read Dorothy Parker. Three very simple stories that once I started I had to finish. Not happy endings! Or maybe I should say that there are no endings at all!

stories were all much of a muchness

This is a volume from the Penguin Modern series. These are true pocked-size books. It contains three short stories spread over 50 pages. The stories are taken from  The Collected Dorothy Parker . These are not happy stories, neither are they depressing, but they do describe a time when women had fewer options.The first story, “Custard Heart”, is 12 pages long. It is about Mrs Lanier, who is wistful. She can afford to be wistful, unlike her servants, whom she notices only in relation to herself, or the poor people of The Depression whom she sees on the streets when she is driven by her chauffer to her dressmaker.“Big Blonde” is 33 pages. It is about Hazel Morse, the men in her life, the role she has to play for these men and the gradually increasing assistance of alcohol to support her role.“You were Perfectly Fine” is 5 pages long. It is a description of the day after the night before, what was promised by a young man when drunk and what his girlfriend will hold him to.

I enjoyed these three short stories. This is another of the Penguin Mini Modern Classics in my set that I bought on impulse. These are pre-cursors to Sex and The City and Desperate Housewives about depression, booze, regret and despair. They are slightly upsetting and the message is clear that there is no happy ending. There might be a resolution or a neutral ending, neither good or bad. This is not Hollywood. It is real life kind of fiction. The women simply just booze and age away.

This is another of the Penguin Mini Modern Classics that I’ve been working through. Three cracking short stories that touch on boozing, mistakes and regret. It’s piqued my interest and left me wanting more from Dorothy Parker.