Writing & Insights
Some selected cultural gems from Delighter, from the Renaissance Tour to To The Lighthouse and many in between.
Toad by Katherine Dunn
Sally, by all accounts, is a toad, hopping around glumly and compulsively, making mordant one-liners under her breath, and observing her peers from her vantage point of being kept at an arm’s length.
Drive My Car (2021)
What makes Drive My Car exceptional is that it’s entirely modern while remaining completely un-self-conscious. Instead of wringing meaning out of an aesthetic, or leaning on nostalgia, or putting Timothee Chalamet in it, director Ryusuke Hamaguchi is counting on the fact that you, the viewer, are interested in the story in the same way you are interested in anyone’s story, how anyone comes to be who they are.
The Transit of Venus by Shirley Hazzard
The sepia desert at the bottom of the world gives way to the lush post-war estates at the precipice of modernity, which despite its sprawl remains beholden to the fates dictated by vigilant stars.
Devin Troy Strother
Warped cartoons nestle together in the orb of someone’s memory, then spill out in conversation as naturally as falling stars.
Beautiful World, Where Are You? by Sally Rooney
Alice and Eileen grapple with the value of making art in a world that’s falling apart; feeling selfish in caring about love and relationships and beauty while the fate of humanity looms large. Their emails to each other are nuanced, clear-headed ruminations on neoliberalism, the limits of Internet political debate, the Irish housing market, the role of art, fame, and God. Real life interactions with their lovers are awkward, insecure, restrained, filled with longing. Alice and Eileen are far more comfortable intellectualizing their fears and desires than expressing what they want. Intermittently, they’ll look down at their phones, and think about how pointless it all is. In other words, they’re very much like people we know, or are.
Animal by Lisa Taddeo
We are seduced into believing in her mission through her unassailable style and oscillating self-possession, a jaguar on the prowl for the answers to her life’s greatest failures.
Vernon Subutex I-III by Virginie Despentes
Brutal, clueless, vain, cunning, violent, heartbroken, and searching, they are all drawn to the nostalgia that Vernon represents, along with the music and dancing that provide them the release that they crave.
Sally Jerome
In Sally’s paintings, these bent, broken, and askew things are in the midst of their own private dramas, unfurling under the light and shadow meant for us in the moments after we’ve overlooked them.
Clockwatchers (1994)
Each woman has her own personal style that evokes a complex life beyond the office as opposed to an archetype: they repeat clothes, they have favored silhouettes, they take pride in what they wear because sometimes that’s the best part of the day. Eventually, though, the centrifugal force of the corporate workplace wears each of them down; someone is stealing in the office and everyone is suspicious of the stylish young women that have more hope than the rest of them.
Real Housewives of Potomac S5 (2020)
As the ritzy suburb that relies on DC for its caché, the Potomac franchise is about politics and proximity to power.
The Sopranos
Tony’s belly. Carmela’s nails. Melfi’s voice. Paulie’s hair. Adriana’s hoops. Janice’s tattoo. Christopher’s profile. Good thing they all exist forever.