This past week we studied Dorothy Parker, besides being a great poet, writer, and movie screenwriter Parker was a member of the Algonquin Round Table. The group of intellectuals besides discussing literature and news of the time would play poker, charades, and the "I can give you a sentence" game. The latter game actually was the cause of Dorothy Parker's famous sentence, "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think." Members of the Round Table included, Franklin Pierce Adams, Robert Benchley, Alexander Woolcott, and Robert Sherwood to name a few. A full list of the members can be found here. The Round Table had its doubters however, and since many of the members were famous and involved in media, the group was not very private in their actions. Even Dorothy Parker criticized the group,
"These were no giants. Think who was writing in those days—Laudner, Fitzgerald, Faulkener and Hemingway. Those were the real giants. The Round Table was just a lot of people telling jokes and telling each other how good they were. Just a bunch of loudmouths showing off, saving their gags for days, waiting for a chance to spring them....There was no truth in anything they said. It was the terrible day of the wisecrack, so there didn't have to be any truth..."
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