Dorothy Parker

A tart-tongued wit and prolific writer of reviews, poetry, short stories, plays and screenplays, founding member of the famed Algonquin Hotel Round Table Dorothy Parker parlayed her caustic barbs into a successful career as a writer in numerous mediums. Parker could be unpredictable and self-destructive, attempting suicide several times in her life, while growing increasingly dependent on alcohol. Still, she remained a prolific writer throughout her career for magazines like Vogue, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, Smart Set and LIFE while becoming more politically active in leftist causes. She married actor and writer Alan Campbell, which led to a Hollywood career writing screenplays for "Nothing Sacred" (1937), "A Star Is Born" (1938) and "Saboteur" (1942), while helping to form the Screenwriters Guild, only to find herself blacklisted by 1950 because of her Communist affiliations. She left Hollywood for New York to write plays and a regular book review column for Esquire. Though she died quietly in 1967, Parker remained a vital nerve in the cultural zeitgeist whose contributions to literature, film and non-fiction were unparalleled.