Exploring References to Classic Literature Across Taylor Swift's Later Discography.
Hello everyone,
I’m back after my four month hiatus, and I’m here to explore some literary references on Taylor Swift’s albums ‘Folklore’ (2020), ‘Evermore’ (2020) and ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ (2024). Some of the novels / poems mentioned are explicitly mentioned in Swift’s discography, some are alluded to, and some are not mentioned at all, but they just remind of certain Swift songs.
LITERARY REFERENCES / ALLUSIONS ON ‘EVERMORE’
1. Rebecca (1938) by Daphne Du Maurier inspired ‘Tolerate It’, the fifth track on Evermore. In a 2020 interview with Apple Music, Swift revealed ‘When I was reading Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier, I was thinking wow, her husband just tolerates her. She’s doing all these things and she’d trying to impress him, and he’s just tolerating her the whole time. There was a part of that was relating to this because as some point in my life, I had felt that way, so I ended up writing this song ‘Tolerate It’, that’s all about loving someone who is ambivalent.’ Rebecca is told from the perspective of an unnamed twenty-one-year-old woman marries Max de Winter, a man twice her age. Young and naïve, the narrator loves her husband, but her feelings are seemingly not reciprocated: ‘I was too young for Maxim, too inexperienced, and not of this world. That that fact that love him in a sick hurt, desperate way, like a child or dog did not matter. It was not the sort of love he needed.’ This corresponds with the lyrics in Tolerate It: ‘You’re so much older and wiser, and I, wait by the door like I’m just a kid. Use my best colours for your portrait, lay the table with the fancy shit, and watch you tolerate it.’ Much like the narrator of Rebecca, Swift speaks of feeling infantilised in her relationship because her love goes unnoticed.
2. Middlemarch (1871) by George Eliot (Mary-Ann Evans) is a panoramic novel of English country life in the early nineteenth century, set around the time of the Reform Bill which was passed in 1832. The main character of the novel is a young woman called Dorothea Brooke, and ‘Dorothea’ is the eighth track on Evermore. While there are no direct references to Middlemarch in the song, nor have I found any instances of Swift mentioning the novel in interviews, every time I hear the song I am reminded of Middlemarch. In the song, Swift sings: ‘Dorothea, ah-ah, you’re a queen sellin’ dreams, sellin’ makeup and magazines’, Dorothea Brooke of Middlemarch is characterised by her altruism and kindness, as seen her longing to help those in need. One of my favourite quotes said by her is ‘I should like to make life beautiful – I mean everybody’s life.’ (chapter 22). Middlemarch also relates to Swift’s aforementioned interview where she explains ‘Tolerate It’ because Dorothea Brooke, aged twenty, marries Mr Casaubon, a man in his late forties. The lyrics ‘you’re so much older and wiser’ describe perfectly the marital dynamic between Dorothea and Casaubon. Longing to be educated, but unable to pursue higher education on the basis that she is female, Dorothea is thus drawn to Casaubon, looking at him as an oracle, and marries him the hope of becoming ‘learned’, only her marriage is an unhappy one…
3. Little Women (1868) by Louisa May Alcott. This novel, particularly the relationship between Jo March and Laurie, reminds me so much of ‘Champagne Problems’, the second track on ‘Evermore’. The bridge of the song is one of my favourites ever, in which Swift sings:
Evergreen our group of friends, don’t think we’ll say that world again, and soon they’ll have the nerve to deck the halls that we once walked through. One for the money, two for the show, I never was ready, so I watched you go. Sometimes you just don’t know the answer, till someone’s on their knees and asks you. “She would have made such a lovely bride, what a shame she’s fucked in the head” they said. But you’ll find the real thing instead, she’ll patch up your tapestry that I shred.
This excerpt from this beautiful bridge sung by Swift, reminds me so much of Chapter 35 of Little Women, ‘Heartache’, where Jo March famously rejects Laurie’s marriage proposal. Although Jo does marry eventually (albeit not to Laurie), she spends the majority of the novel understandably rejecting and dismissing the institution of marriage, and this is most potent when in chapter 35 ‘I’m homely, I’m awkward, I’m odd. […] I love my liberty too well to be in any hurry to give it up.’ As Jo subverts (Western) nineteenth century standards of female propriety and decorum, she is often placed in opposition to her sisters Meg and Amy who are more conventional female archetypes. Jo March then, fits the lyric ‘she would have made such a lovely bride what a shame she’s fucked in the head.’ Also, the line ‘you’ll find the real thing instead’ is pertinent to describe the sisterly dynamic between Jo and Amy because Amy is the more conventional woman who Laurie marries after Jo rejects his proposal. Another lyric from ‘Champagne Problems’ which is applicable to Jo and Laurie’s relationship ‘because I, dropped your hand while dancing. Left you out there standing, crestfallen on the landing, champagne problems. […] your heart was glass I dropped it, champagne problems.’
4. The Great Gatsby (1925) by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Swift directly references and quotes from Fitzgerald’s magnum opus, The Great Gatsby, in her song ‘Happiness’, the seventh track on Evermore. On the track, Swift sings ‘I hope she’ll be a beautiful fool, to take my spot next to you’, which is directly taken from the novel. When recounting the moment that she discovered her baby would be a girl to her cousin Nick Carraway, the novel’s narrator, Daisy Buchanan says: ‘I’m glad it’s a girl. And I hope she’ll be a fool. That’s the best thing a girl can be in this world. A beautiful little fool.’ (chapter 1) This quote, arguably one of the most famous in the novel, is often grossly misinterpreted, with people considering Daisy as shallow. In actuality, it is a heartbreaking statement about contemporary perceptions of womanhood. Daisy knows she is living in a time where female docility is valued over female intellect. The quote is essentially saying that ignorance is bliss as Daisy hopes that her daughter will be a fool in order to remain unaware of the suffering that women are made to endure for the crime of simply being a woman.
There is another lyric in ‘Happiness’ which is a direct reference to Gatsby, and that is ‘all you want from me is the green light of forgiveness’. Green light is a recurring motif throughout Gatsby, first mentioned at the end of chapter one: ‘involuntarily I glanced seaward – and distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far away, that might have been the end of a dock.’ The green light is again mentioned in chapter five, a most important chapter because it is the one in which Jay Gatsby and Daisy reunite. Gatsby tells Daisy: ‘if it wasn’t for the mist, we could see your home across the bay. You have a green light that burns all night at the end of your dock.’ The green light symbolises Gatsby’s yearning for Daisy.
5. Pride and Prejudice (1813) by Jane Austen. Austen’s magnum opus P&P is briefly alluded to in ‘Cowboy Like Me’ in the lyric: ‘and you asked me to dance, but I said, dancing is a dangerous game.’ This corresponds with Austen’s line ‘To be fond of dancing was a certain step towards falling in love.’ (chapter 3) Assuming Swift’s lyric is taken from P&P, the reason why she says ‘dancing is a dangerous game’ is because it can lead to ‘falling in love’, and ‘Cowboy like Me’ is a song about two con artists who then fall in love.
6. ‘The Raven’ (1845) by Edgar Allan Poe. The first time I ever heard Evermore’s title track ‘Evermore’, I instantly thought of Poe’s poem ‘The Raven’. The poem is set on a ‘bleak December’ night, and in the song, Swift sings' ‘hey December, guess I’m feeling unmoored’. Poe’s speaker hears a noise at his door, which opens and calls out the name of his lover, Lenore, who has apparently recently passed away. This reminds of the image conjured in Swift’s poem of her ‘staring out an open window catching my death.’ The Raven is a classic Gothic poem, and the song ‘Evermore’ is full of Gothic imagery from the winter setting, the mentions of nature, and the atmosphere of love. Poe also uses the word ‘evermore’ and the end of second and final stanzas.
LITERARY REFERENCES / ALLUSIONS ON ‘FOLKLORE’
7. Northanger Abbey (1818) by Jane Austen. The plot of Northanger Abbey, one of my favourite Austen novels, reminds me so much of ‘Seven’ the seventh track on Folklore. On the track, Swift sings ‘and I’ve been meaning to tell you, I think your house is haunted, your dad is always mad and that must be why’, and these lyrics perfectly describe the chapters of the novel actually set in the Abbey. Northanger Abbey, a Gothic literature parody published posthumously, just six months after Austen’s death, follows Catherine Morland, who ‘for many years of her life was as plain as any’. (chapter 1) Catherine possesses none of the usual traits of a heroine, but when at seventeen she is invited on a trip to Bath, courtesy of Mr and Mrs Allen, Catherine learns to become more cultivated and worldly. In classic Austen fashion, Catherine meets her future husband, Henry Tilney, during this formative trip. A significant element of Catherine’s character arc is her predilection for Gothic novels, which reflects the contemporary fascination with them during the late eighteenth century and nineteenth century. When Austen was writing her novels, Gothic literature was a very new phenomenon, with the first Gothic novel The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole appearing in 1764. Catherine’s favourite novel is Ann Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho which appeared on the literary scene thirty years after Walpole’s novel in 1794. Being a young naïve girl, Catherine’s love for Gothic literature often causes her to blur the lines between fiction and reality, and this becomes more potent towards the end of the novel when Henry invites Catherine to his home, Northanger Abbey. During her stay at the Abbey, Catherine, under the influence of Udolpho, begins to lose sight of reality as she starts to suspect that General Tilney, Henry’s father, murdered his late wife because the protagonist of Udolpho, Emily St Aubert, finds herself in a dark castle with Count Montoni whose wife dies by his own hand. Spoiler alert: Henry’s mother actually died of an illness completely unrelated to her husband! When Henry realises Catherine’s dark thought process, he mildly chastises her: ‘Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions you have entertained […] what idea have you been admitting?’ (chapter twenty-four) It is this situation that reminds of Swift’s aforementioned lyrics from ‘Seven’: ‘I think your house is haunted, your dad is always mad and that must be why.’ Additionally, the lyrics ‘picture me, in the weeds, before I learnt civility. I used to scream, ferociously, any time I wanted…’ also remind me of Catherine, because her trip to Bath was for her to ‘learn civility’. Hitherto the trip, Catherine was what we might nowadays label a tomboy, as seen in Austen’s description of her: ‘she was fond of all boys play […] she was noisy and wild.’ (chapter 1) There is so much overlap between Catherine Morland and the speaker of ‘Seven’ that I am 99% certain that Taylor Swift has read Northanger Abbey.
8. Jane Eyre (1847) Charlotte Brontë. Much like The Great Gatsby, Jane Eyre, Brontë’s magnum opus is explicitly mentioned in one of Swift’s songs. On ‘Invisible String’, the eleventh track on Folklore, Swift sings ‘Isn’t it just so pretty to think that all along there was some invisible string tying you to me.’ The image of the invisible string in taken directly from chapter 23 of Jane Eyre in which Mr Rochester professes his love for Jane Eyre, the eponymous heroine, before proposing to her: ‘I sometimes have a queer feeling with regard to you – especially when you are near me as you are now: it is as if I had a string somewhere under my left ribs, tightly and inextricably knotted to a similar string situated in the corresponding quarter of your little frame.’ As much as I dislike Mr Rochester, I really love this quote because it is so beautifully crafted and emphasises the profound connection between the two characters.
Another song on Folklore that relates to Jane Eyre is ‘Mad Woman’ which follows ‘Invisible String’. Knowing how meticulous Swift is with her artistry, these two tracks were definitely placed together intentionally. Charlotte Brontë is undeniably one of the most prolific Gothic literature writers, and her character Bertha Mason of Jane Eyre has become the face of the Madwoman in the Attic motif which can be seen frequently across late eighteenth century and nineteenth century literature. This motif can be first observed in Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho. Much like my assertion of Jo March and the speaker of ‘Champagne Problems’ being almost identical, I feel the same way about Bertha Mason and the speaker of ‘Mad Woman’. The lyrics of the chorus: ‘and there’s nothing like a mad woman, what a shame she went mad. No one likes a mad woman; you made her like that’ are analogous to Bertha’s circumstances. Bertha is the first wife of Mr Rochester, whom me met and married in Spanish Town, Jamaica. Due to her ostensible madness, when the pair arrive in England, she is imprisoned in the attic of Mr Rochester’s residence called Thornfield Hall. Perhaps Bertha truly was mad, but she remains voiceless throughout the novel. The lack of knowledge and compassion surrounding mental illness in the nineteenth century absolutely contributed to Bertha’s poor mental state, ergo causing a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is why her character reminds me so much of the lyric ‘you made her like that’.
Swift co-wrote ‘Mad Woman’ with Aaron Dessner, and in a discussion where she explains how the song came into fruition, Swift revealed:
Mad woman, the first time I heard that piano thing you had written, I just felt like it’s got these ominous strings underneath it, and I was like “oh, this is female rage. This has to be about female rage.”
She then goes on to talk about the ‘most rage provoking element of being a female’ which she claims is the expectation that women should always silently put up with men’s dangerous and oppressive behaviour, and that our response to ‘bad male behaviour is often treated like the offense itself. Bertha Mason is the perfect symbol for female rage and madness.
9. William Wordsworth’s poetry: Swift, being the well-read woman that she is, decided to base her song ‘The Lakes’, the final track on the deluxe version of Folklore, on the English Romantic poets. Romanticism was an artistic and literary movement that took off in Western Europe in the late eighteenth century. A notable text from the era is ‘Lyrical Ballads’ (1798) by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who were pioneers of Romanticism in England. William Blake is also a key figure from this time. Key preoccupations of Romanticism include its fascination and adoration of the natural world, (this can be observed in the numerous instances of pastoral imagery across Romantic poetry), primacy of the individual, childhood, and personal liberation. In one of the Long Pond Studio sessions, Swift reveals the inspiration behind ‘The Lakes’ with her producer Jack Antonoff:
We’d gone to the Lake District in England a couple of years ago. In the nineteenth century you had a lot of poets who like William Wordsworth and John Keats who would spend a lot of time there. […] In my career, since I was about twenty, I have written about this sort of cottage backup plan that I have. So, ‘The Lakes’ is really talking a lot of people who hundreds of years ago had the same exit plan, and did it. I went to William Wordsworth’s grave and just sat there, and I was like “wow, you just went and did it, you just went away and kept writing, and didn’t subscribe to the things that were killing you”. That’s really the overarching thing that I felt writing Folklore. […] They did this hundreds of years ago, I’m not the only one who has felt this way.
‘The Lakes’ is full of wonderful lyricism, and it one of my favourite songs from Swift’s discography. She refers directly to Wordsworth, using double entendre: ‘I’ve come to far to watch some, name dropping sleaze, tell me what are my words-worth’. Furthermore, ‘The Lakes’ reminds of Dorothy Wordsworth’s The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals, particular in the lyrics:
Take me to the lakes where all the poets went to die, I don’t belong, and my beloved neither do you. Those Windermere peaks look like a perfect place to cry, I’m setting off, but not without my muse. I want auroras and sad prose. I want to watch wisteria grow right over my bare feet, ‘cause I haven’t moved in years, and I want you right there. A red rose grew up out of ice frozen grown, with no one around to tweet it. I bathe in cliffside pools, with my calamitous love, and insurmountable grief.
Dorothy Wordsworth was William Wordsworth’s sister. In their adulthood, they had an endearingly close relationship. They lived together all their lives, even throughout William’s marriage to Mary Hutchinson. Dorothy Wordsworth’s journals are filled with Romantic imagery as she frequently describes the natural world and the comfort it brought her. Many of her journal entries were used as poetic inspiration for William. There is a passage she wrote about daffodils which William went on to use in his famous poem ‘I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud’. A particular entry that reminds me of ‘The Lakes’ is actually the first entry, dated from the 14th of May 1800:
I sate a long time upon a stone at the margin of the lake, & after a flood of tears my heart was easier. The lake looked to me, I knew not why, dull and melancholy, the weltering on the shores seemed a heavy sound. I walked as long as I could amongst the stones of the shore.
Dorothy would have been more than familiar with the Windermere Peaks that Swift describes in ‘The Lakes’ and she too cried there. Both Wordsworth and Swift describe their connections to nature and how a purging of emotions by the lakes is a cathartic experience for them.
Villette (1853) by Charlotte Brontë. Although Villette is not referenced or alluded to across Swift’s discography, the track ‘Mirrorball’, the sixth on Folklore, really reminds me of Lucy Snowe, the heroine of Villette. Written in the first person, Villette is an evocative tale of female repression in the Victorian era. As a heroine, Lucy is characterised by self-consciousness, isolation, and repression. For Lucy, repression is a coping mechanism for navigating a world that was cruel towards women, particularly those who were poor, plain, and single. At only twenty-three years old, Lucy’s life is marked by perpetual loneliness, with her describing herself as ‘lover-less, and in-expectant of love’. The lyrics of the ‘Mirrorball’ bridge are:
When they called off the circus, burnt the disco down, when they sent home the horses and rodeo clowns, I’m still on that tightrope, I’m still trying everything, to get you laughing at me. I’m still a believer, but I don’t know why, I’ve never been a natural, all I do is try, try, try. I’m still on that trapeze, I’m still trying everything, to keep you looking at me.
These lyrics vividly remind me of Lucy’s heartbreaking quote:
The beginning of all efforts has indeed with me been marked with preternatural imbecility. I never could, even in forming a common acquaintance, assert or prove a claim to average quickness. A depressing and difficult passage has prefaced every new page I have turned in life. (chapter 30)
Much like the speaker of ‘Mirrorball’, Lucy speaks of her self-perceived ineptitude. Lucy’s belief that she possesses ‘preternatural imbecility’ and no ‘average quickness, correspond with the lyrics ‘I’ve never been a natural, all I do is try, try, try’. This is Lucy Snowe, or at least it is how she sees herself. In another Long Pond Studio Session, Taylor explains the story behind ‘Mirrorball’: ‘We have mirror-balls in the middle of a dance floor because they reflect light, they are a million times and that’s what makes them so shiny. We have people like that in society too, they hang there and every time they break, it entertains us.’ She goes on to say it’s a metaphor for being in the public eye, but also ordinary people who have to be different versions of themselves for different people, which can be ‘exhausting.’
LITERARY REFERENCES / ALLUSIONS ON ‘THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT’
When Taylor Swift announced her 11th studio album ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ (TTPD) at the 2024 Grammy Awards, I anticipated many literary reference, particularly ones in the style of ‘Folklore’ and ‘Evermore’. For me, the phrase ‘tortured poet’ makes me think of Sylvia Plath, Emily Dickinson, and The Brontë siblings. Although there are not as many literary references as I had anticipated, the album has really grown on me. My top five tracks are: I Hate it Here, But Daddy I Love Him, loml, Down Bad & Cassandra.
‘Agamemnon’ (5th century BCE) by Aeschylus. The twenty seventh track on ‘TTPD: The Anthology’ is called ‘Cassandra’, named after an important figure in Greek Mythology. Cassandra, the cursed prophetess, was the daughter of King Priam and Queen Hecuba, and the sister of Hector and Paris, the man who kidnapped Helen, thereby causing the Trojan War. Cassandra was gifted the gift of prophecy by Apollo, god of sun and prophecy, but when she rejected his advances, he cursed her so that any true prophecy she uttered would not be believed. Cassandra appears in Aeschylus’ play ‘Agamemnon’ which is the first play in a trilogy called The Oresteia, which is set after the Trojan War. After the war, Agamemnon brings Cassandra home as his concubine (against her will) and the pair are soon brutally killed by Agamemnon’s wife Clytemnestra. In the play, Cassandra explains her relationship with Apollo: ‘He came like a wrestler, magnificent, took me down and breathed his fire through me and – […] I yielded, then at the climax I recoiled – I deceived Apollo! Once I betrayed him, I could never be believed.’ In the song ‘Cassandra’, Swift sings:
So they killed Cassandra first ‘cause she feared the worst, and tried to tell the town. So they filled my cell with snakes I regret to say, Do you believe me now? […] When it’s “Burn the bitch”, they’re screaming. In the streets, there’s a raging riot. When the truth comes out, it’s quiet. It’s so quiet.
Thinking of both these lyrics and Cassandra’s story then, perhaps Swift invokes this famously wronged female figure as a means to commentate on the current feminist issue of women being disbelieved when speaking out about crimes made against them, or perhaps it is about her infamous feud with Kim Kardashian. Back in 2016, Kanye West released his song ‘Famous’ in which he calls Swift ‘that bitch’, but did not tell her he would be using those words. When Swift publicly addressed this, Kim then branded her a liar and called her snake, which may explain the mentions of ‘snakes’ in ‘Cassandra’. Regardless of what the song is about, I really like it because I have always loved Greek mythology, and Cassandra is such a fascinating figure in the Western mythological realm.
The Secret Garden (1911) by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I have not actually read this book, nor have a watched any of the film adaptations, but I am aware that it is mentioned on track twenty-three ‘I Hate it Here’, which is my favourite song on the album. In the song Taylor sings:
I hate it here so I will go to secret gardens in my mind, people need a key to get to. The only one is mine, I read about it in a book when I was a precocious child. No mid-sized city hopes and small-town fears. I’m there most of the year ‘cause I hate it here. […] I hate it here so I will go to lunar valleys in my mind, when they found a better planet only the gentle survived, I dreamed about it in the dark the night I felt that I might die. […] I’m lonely but I’m good, I’m bitter but I swear I’m fine, I’ll save all my romanticism for my inner life and I’ll get lost on purpose, this place made me feel worthless. Lucid dreams like electricity the current flies through me, and in my fantasies, I rise above it. And way up there, I actually love it.
I think this song is perfect for anyone who loves to read and who seeks comfort in books. It makes me think of the Bronte siblings, particularly Charlotte, who used writing as an outlet for her depression and grief. The Bronte siblings were ‘precocious children’ who had deeply literary childhoods, even making up their own fictional worlds named Angria and Gondal. It also makes me think of Jane Eyre, Lucy Snowe, Catherine Morland, Emily St Aubert, Mary Garth from Middlemarch, and Jo March, who when writing, sits ‘safe and happy in an imaginary world, full of friends almost as real and dear to her as any in the flesh.’ (chapter 27)
Jane Eyre: (again!) The twelfth track on TTPD is called ‘loml’, a poignant ballad depicting lost love. Although there are no overt references to Jane Eyre, the lyrics remind me of part of the relationship between Jane and Rochester. If you have read JE, then you will know that Jane and Rochester are engaged twice. They almost marry but their ceremony is interrupted by Richard Mason who exposes Rochester for attempted bigamy as he is already to married to Bertha. Jane, understandably, is heartbroken by this revelation, and feeling betrayed and deceived, she temporarily flees from Thornfield Hall, thus reminding me of the lyrics from' ‘loml’:
In your suit and tie, in a nick of time. You lowdown boy, you stand up guy. Holy Ghost, you told me I’m, the love of your life. […] You shit talked me under the table talking rings and talking cradles, I wish I could un-recall how we almost had it all. Dancing phantoms on the terrace are they second-hand embarrased that I can’t get out of bed, ‘cause something countferfeit’s dead? It was legendary, it was momentary, it was unnecessary. […] I’m combing through, the braids of lies. […] Our field of dreams, engulfed in fire. Your arson’s match your sombre eyes. And I’ll still see it, until I die, you’re the loss of my life.
I can imagine Jane feeling exactly this when running from Thornfield after finding out the truth. The images of Rochester in his wedding suit and him making false promises perfectly fit the lyrics. Their relationship would have felt ‘counterfeit’ to Jane after finding out the existence of Bertha. Swift also uses Gothic imagery with the ‘dancing phantoms’, and Jane Eyre is a novel filled with Gothic conventions. Moreover, the image of the ‘fire’ is significant because fire is recurring image in Jane Eyre. Bertha sets fire to Mr Rochester’s bed curtains, but Jane saves him by extinguishing the fire. When Jane returns to Rochester at the end of the novel, she finds that Thornfield has burned down because of Bertha who subsequently died. Lastly, ‘loml’ has a double meaning. Before the album came out, everybody naturally assumed that it would mean ‘love of my life’, but Swift closes the song with ‘you’re the loss of my life’. In the case of Jane Eyre, Rochester was temporarily the ‘loss’ of Jane’s life, but he eventually became the true ‘love’ of her life.
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These are not all of the literary references featured in Taylor Swift’s discography there are others, including her mention of Patti Smith and Dylan Thomas in the song ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ whose works I have not personally read. Swift also references Peter Pan (1904) by J.M Barrie in ‘Cardigan’ on Folklore and ‘Peter’ on ‘TTPD’. I have no doubt missed other references from books I have not read, these are just ones I have noticed.
Thank you for reading! <3
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Works Referenced:
Aeschylus, ‘Agamemnon’ in The Oresteia trans. Robert Fagles (London: Penguin Classics, 1977)
Alcott, Louisa May, Little Women (London: Penguin Classics, 2018)
Austen, Jane, Northanger Abbey (Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Classics, 2007)
Brontë, Charlotte, Jane Eyre (London: Vintage Classics, 2015)
Brontë, Charlotte, Villette (London: Penguin Classics, 1985)
Du Maurier, Daphne, Rebecca (London: Virago Press, 2003)
Eliot, George, Middlemarch (London: Penguin Classics, 2012)
Fitzgerald F. Scott, The Great Gatsby (London: Marshall Cavendish, 1988)
Swift, Taylor, ‘Evermore’ (Republic Records, December 2020)
Swift, Taylor, ‘Folklore’ (Republic Records, July 2020)
Swift, Taylor, ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ (Republic Records, 2024)
Wordsworth, Dorothy, The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008)
All transcriptions from any of Swift’s interviews are my own.
when you mentioned the secret garden i remembered seven also has a reference to the little princess, from the same author in “pack your dolls and a sweater, we'll move to india forever”. great article! now i want to read villette.
Love this!