David Roberts || Sparks From Culture | Substack

Welcome to Sparks From Culture

Personal essays on life, literature, and privilege from the POV of generational wealth and living within the Manhattan bubble.

Aug 11, 2023 • David Roberts

Blinded By The Light

In 1997, shortly before the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke, I attended a small gathering for Bill Clinton in our host’s apartment at The Dakota. There…

23 hrs ago • David Roberts

Live with David Roberts

A recording from David Roberts's live video

Feb 20 • David Roberts and a. natasha joukovsky

1:00:45

My friend Tommy deserves love

My wife was away skiing this week. As I often do when I’m alone, I went over to the Upper West Side to catch up with my friend Tommy.

Feb 14

Epstein's Inner Ring

I know and have met some of the people named in the enormous Epstein data dump.

Feb 7 • David Roberts

Recent posts

Belle Burden's memoir Strangers and the torture of hindsight

Belle Burden’s memoir Strangers is a post-mortem on the sudden rupture of her seemingly idyllic twenty-year marriage.

Jan 31 • David Roberts

DEFCON 2 for risk of nuclear war

This week, in between watching Oppenheimer, I also watched Mark Carney, Canada’s Prime Minster, give an important speech at the Davos conference.

Jan 24 • David Roberts

When the rich bring the ick: Ozymandias in Manhattan

when an extremely wealthy hedge fund executive and his wife choose to splash their extravagance in our faces.

Jan 17

Revisiting Willy Loman in the age of Trump

I wrote the post below in the summer of 2023, trying to understand the continued appeal of Trump through the lens of Willy Loman in Arthur Miller’s…

Jan 10 • David Roberts

Recommendations

Emily Sundberg

Homo Vitruvius by A. Jay Adler

A. Jay Adler

Untrickled by Michelle Teheux

FLESH WORLD by Jessica DeFino

Jessica DeFino

Lirpa Strike

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