This is a book trailer for my new one, The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide. And since I made it about Jane Grant, Harold Ross, and Alexander Woollcott, I thought I’d post this recipe. It’s from my earlier work, Under the Table: A Dorothy Parker Cocktail Guide. It’s the recipe Jane Grant used to make her own bathtub gin. The video was made outside their former duplex, the landmark 412 West Forty-seventh Continue Reading →
This is DeWolf Hopper, dead actor, who made Casey at the Bat famous. I had a fantastic private tour of The Lambs, America’s 1st professional theater club, founded in 1874. The art, paintings, and nicknacks of old New York are blowing my mind.
It’s in a Stanford White building off Fifth Ave (not to be confused with the restaurant that swiped and uses the Lambs name). What a cool spot and the people like from a movie.
I was very happy to see Sam Roberts include my new book in his Bookshelf column in the Sunday New York Times. The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide shares space with The Ramones and Weegee, both are favorites of mine. Roberts also wrote about my 2006 book, A Journey into Dorothy Parker’s New York. Of the new book, he writes: This delightful illustrated reminiscence profiles the full cast of wits who defined cosmopolitan Continue Reading →
I kicked in a blog post for my friends at Cladrite Radio about, guess what? Radio. The article is Radio Pioneers of the Algonquin Round Table (tied into my new book this month, The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide) and it goes over the members of the Vicious Circle who were on the air. It was nice to be able to share some information about some of my favorite people, including Franklin Continue Reading →
Letter from Harold Ross of The New Yorker to Frank Sullivan, both were Vicious Circle members. What I find ironic is now The New Yorker will use this language regularly. He also mentions John O’Hara.
This is some of the research from my new book The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide (Lyons Press).
Martin Luther King Day is a federal holiday held on the third Monday of January. It celebrates today, Monday, Jan 19, 2015. Dorothy Parker left her estate to Dr. King, a man she never met. She spoke up for social justice her entire career.
Now that my book is out, I am looking at what went right and what went wrong with The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide. Today I was in a file of letters, and I came across one that I never got a response to. In 2010, I wrote to the director of the Castleton Free Library, in Castleton, Vermont. This is not far from where Alexander Woollcott and his friends had a vacation house Continue Reading →
I’m happy my third blog post for the Huffington Post was published today. You can read my others here. With my book, The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide, published this week, I wanted to write a post for a wide audience. My subject: six of the women in the group, the ones not Dorothy Parker and Edna Ferber. It was fun to put this blog post together. Have a look.
Today I visited the graves of Gerald Murphy (1888-1964) and Sara Wiborg Murphy (1883-1975) in South End Cemetery, East Hampton, Long Island, New York. Nearby are their sons Baoth Murphy (1919-1935) and Patrick Murphy (1920-1937). The inscription on Sara’s gravestone reads “…and She made all of light” from the English poet Thomas Campion. Gerald’s speaks more to his personality: “Ripeness is all.” from “King Lear. I’ve been meaning to go for 10 years and it Continue Reading →
The press release for my new book is finally here: Lyons Press is proud to announce the January 6, 2015 release of The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide, by Kevin C. Fitzpatrick (978-1-4930-0757-8, hardcover).Retrace the steps of the legendary wits that convened at the Algonquin Hotel in 1919 who called themselves the Vicious Circle. The Algonquin Round Table is the first book to fully explore the whole group and their world. It’s Continue Reading →