Taylor's Many Muses
My own flavors of pure speculation about TTPD. Part One of ?
I count myself among the multitude of Taylor Swift fans on this planet. I know she’s not everyone’s cup of T, so scroll on if you don’t care for talk about Tay and her work. This will be a deep dive, cause my goal is to be thorough, because I keep reading people saying stuff I want to argue with, like who was Taylor’s inspiration for a song.
Now, on one hand I am very grateful that Taylor is such an open book about her life with her song writing, and I feel a little guilty dissecting her lyrics because THEY ARE HER LIFE, and that’s kinda a big thing to just be dissecting, never mind, none of my business either.
However, this is also ART, and art begs to be interpreted. Not always through the autobiographical author lens, however, that is my FAVORITE way to explicate things, and let’s face it, that’s what is gonna get us the most accuracy out of Taylor’s work (autobiographical is her style), so it’s kind of impossible not to judge the music from this viewpoint.
I will try to refer to Taylor as the narrator, because I think it is important to separate the art from the artist, cause even if Taylor DID intend these songs 100% autobiographically, she probably is not the exact same narrator as the person singing the song… she’s gained perspective since then, she filtered the feelings so that it was just this one slice of viewpoint. Like the whole album is a delicious multi-layered cake/pie/pudding concoction, and this slice is how I felt at the time. I can dig that. I fight with that about my own poems and stuff… does a wiser me edit out the ignorance of my earlier narrator, or do I need to validate that narrator’s experience by voicing their ideas unfiltered? The debate rages on…
The Tortured Poets Department
No speculation on the missing apostrophe in Poets… maybe she didn’t want to be obvious whether it is one tortured poet or many? Otherwise, this title seems undeniably to directly jab at narrator’s Significant Other, JA,1 having a podcast/group called the “tortured men’s department,” which Taylor apparently didn’t care for cause its very name casts relationships in a negative light (random factoid from the internet, unsure of veracity). Alas, those poor tortured men! *eye roll*
Fortnite
First single. Suspected Muse- Multiple, unknown
I think this song was written with an idea of it not being too inflammatory a song to have as a lead single. It has very few realistic details pinpointing who the narrator means by “you”, but it contains a lot of the themes of the album, most prominently “I love you, it’s ruining my life”… This could be true about multiple inspirations, it’s ruining the narrator’s life because she loves more than one man (Partially because you never stop loving people you once loved idea). There are also notes of potential hospitalization and mental health treatment for the narrator: “WAS a functioning alcoholic”, “sent away”, “move on miracle drug.”
The I touched you only for a fortnight, seems to indicate that the inspiration for this song is someone that was a brief relationship. Taylor has been in a lot of short relationships in the past, and any one of them, or none of them, might be the inspiration. I don’t think this is obviously a MH inspo. Maybe it’s Hiddleston? Maybe it’s someone that she reconnected with when she and JA were “on a break”? Did they take breaks? Many relationships go through a phase like this. Maybe Tay did too?
BUT WE WERE ON A BREAK!?!?!?!
Two takes on the line your wife waters flowers, I want to kill her. One: You have moved on and have a wife now and I am jelly as a mofo, and think dark thoughts about her cause I still love you. Two: The idea you have in your head of who your future wife is, is a woman who would be watering the flowers, and I’m not that kinda chick. I smite those kinds of chicks! Clearly the narrator is having unstable thoughts a bit, and probably could do with some good therapy. Is her husband really cheating? Is she only imagining it? Is she just drunk and fucked up and day dreaming of greener grasses where people water the flowers? Who knows, but it’s a great first release because it fits all the flavors of the album, without being too much detailed about a specific muse.
Tortured Poets Department
Song 2: Album Title: Definitely JA Muse
Undeniably, this song exudes vibes from the narrator’s long term relationship with someone she considers to be in the “Tortured Poets Department.” She obviously considers herself to be part of this tribe as well, currently the chairman of this fictitious organization.
The narrator’s SO left his typewriter at her apartment, which she finds endearing, but also silly. The song is poking fun at modern poets, and the idea that the narrator and her SO belong to such a group, cause they aren’t Dylan Thomas or Patti Smith (comparatively worthy tortured poets, I suppose). But whatever the narrator and her SO are, they are of the same spirit. They GET each other cause they’re both crazy modern idiots. He’s just the kind of weirdo who has a typewriter cause it’s cool and hipster and edgy. Black turtlenecks and horn rimmed glasses.
The narrator feels that they don’t really fit the worthy tortured poets. They don’t live in squalor, and just sit around with their posh typewriters, getting stoned and eating too much candy. And yet still tortured, and wrestling with mental health issues: self sabatoge, dread, and coming undone.
Contrary points people mention about the muse being JA: Tattooed golden retriever. A lot of people latched on to this indicating MH, cause he is obviously tattooed, but how do we know JA isn’t tattooed? MH is decidedly NOT golden retriever like, but JA definitely is. Also, gold and blue are the colors Taylor generally uses to indicate JA.
In this song, even when the narrator’s relationship starts to show red flags— But you told Lucy you'd kill yourself if I ever leave And I had said that to Jack about you, so I felt seen. Rather than identify this as unstable and potentially toxic behavior, the narrator feels like “OH YES, we are SO the same and he GETS me!” and believes that everyone understands why they are two peas in a pod.
General theme: He gets me and I get him, and so how could there possibly be anyone else for either of us? We are so perfect for each other! We’re both fucked up, but I choose this, cause I know he loves me and gets me and I love him and get him and how could it ever be otherwise. Like breathing.
To be continued…
It’s gonna take me a lot longer to get through all the songs… I thought I would bust this out in a couple hours, but here I am a couple hours later and I’ve only done two songs. lol having fun though and I plan to continue…
Significant Other, SO, in this instance means Joe Alwyn, the 6 year relationship that ended just before the Eras tour. Since this seems to be impossible for me to write without mentioning actual names of people in relationships, I am going to use initials to indicate where I can’t seem to avoid it. Hopefully none of them have the same initials! lol