The Tortured Poets Department - What We Know So Far
Miss Swift is at it again. Every time I say I’m gonna give you all a break from me writing about her, she comes along and does something else. This time its The Tortured Poets Department (TTPD), her 11th studio album, which drops on April 19th.
Instead of doing a review like I normally do, I’m going to indulge in a bit of speculation and talk about what we’ve figured out so far. Or what we think we’ve figured out anyway. I may or may not update this with my opinions about the album after it drops, it really depends on how long this ends up being once I’ve finished speculating.
There’s six main topics I’m going to cover in no particular order, although I’ll no doubt weave in extra little bits as I go along if I remember them.
Jump straight to the album reaction
Clara Bow
‘Clara Bow’ is track 16 on TTPD.
The original ‘It Girl’, Clara Bow rose to fame as a silent film star in the 1920s before semi-successfully making the transition to ‘talkies’.
People have been drawing a lot of parallels between Clara Bow and Taylor Swift, so let’s dive in and see if we can figure out what the song is going to be like.
Media attention
Personally, I feel this is the most likely theme of the song.
Clara Bow was heavily scrutinised by the media at the time. The tabloids would run stories about her difficult upbringing, her personal relationships and the brazen activities she got up to off and on set.
This is the most obvious parallel with Taylor. Taylor Swift has been unfairly vilified by the press for around about a decade at this point. The media slate her from everything to who she’s ‘dating’ at the time to her being too successful. As if there’s any such thing as being too successful. It’s hardly her fault everyone else in the music industry is slacking.
Just kidding. Beyoncé’s new album fucking slaps, go stream Cowboy Carter.
But anyway, the media cycle continues, and we’ve circled back around to everyone hating Taylor again, surprise surprise. I saw a thing on Twitter talking about Spotify records saying ‘non-Taylor Swift records’ which just seems like a very petty way of trying to turn people against her.
Anyway, back to Clara Bow. She was widely considered as the face of the jazz age, the roaring 20s, all that stuff. Which, of course, made her widely attractive as a news story to the press at the time. But now, onto some of the specifics.
Sexuality rumours
Obviously, rumours of sexuality in the 1920s were nothing like they are today. However, there has been a lot of speculation, both at the time and throughout the years, of Clara Bow’s sexuality. While she was most well known for her romantic relationships with men, there were rumours that she was bisexual, and had multiple flings with women.
Bow had several high profile relationships with fellow male actors, and even married two of them. A lot of this was, of course, dragged through the tabloids, questioning why Clara Bow couldn’t ‘keep hold of a man’ and other things to that effect. Sound familiar?
Rumours of Bow’s bisexuality floated about in the meantime. Her role in Call Her Savage, which includes queer characters, helped fuel the rumours. In the film, Bow’s character interacts with a very flamboyant gay man. She was also publicly friends with members of the LGBTQ+ community, including actor William Haines, who’s career was cut off when he refused to deny his sexuality.
Bow also starred in The Wild Party, which was her first talkie and also had prevalent lesbian themes. Bow’s character attends an all-girls university, which were known as safe havens for lesbians. The film was also pre-Code, meaning there were very few restrictions on censorship and how filmmakers could express their ideas. The director, Dorothy Arzner, was an out and proud lesbian and one of Bow’s supposed flings.
Taylor has also been subject to rumours about her sexuality. She has been linked to several high profile women including actors Dianna Agron and Zoe Kravitz, and model Karlie Kloss. The music video for You Need To Calm Down, which features several prominent queer celebrities, also fuelled the media fire that Taylor may not be straight. However, rumours about both women have never been confirmed.
The Albatross
The Albatross is one of the many variants of this album, and also the name of a bonus track. I’ve never seen a group of people move so fast as Swifties googling albatrosses after Taylor announced this variant.
But, let’s talk about the symbolism of the Albatross, besides just being a cool as hell bird. There’s multiple interpretations of this, so it’ll be interesting to see which one is right, if any. To be honest it would very on brand for Taylor to completely mislead us and for us all to end up weirdly knowledgeable about albatrosses for literally no reason.
Guilt
The first interpretation, and perhaps the most well known, is that albatrosses are seen as a symbol of guilt and/or regret. This comes primarily from ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Coleridge was a Romantic poet and ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ is often considered the beginning of the shift into modern poetry and Romantic literature.
The poem tells the story of a sailor (the Mariner) who has returned from a long voyage. During the voyage, his ship gets stuck in Arctic ice. An albatross appears and leads the ship out of the ice, much to the joy of the crew, who give the albatross bits of food in gratitude. The Mariner shoots the albatross, and the crew believe this to be the reason they get becalmed later on in the poem. The Mariner is made to wear the dead albatross around his neck in penance, and only when his guilt lessens does it fall off.
This is interesting in regards to the song, because it could go either way. Is Taylor the albatross, or is she the Mariner?
Either way is fascinating to consider.
If we take the first scenario: Taylor is the albatross. The implication there is that she feels as though she is a burden to whoever the song is about. Or, slightly more abstractly, her love feels like a burden to her own self, in that she cannot help how she feels. This is a common theme throughout her discography, so I’m inclined to believe this interpretation over others. I feel as though this would make for a very hard-hitting song; Taylor feeling burdened by her own feelings and experiences in a way she cannot alleviate.
The second scenario: Taylor is the Mariner. A slightly darker interpretation, perhaps Taylor has ‘killed’ something; a relationship, someone’s feelings for her, who knows, and now she feels as though she cannot get rid of the guilt regarding her actions.
Hope
This interpretation has it’s basis in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis. In similar circumstances to Coleridge’s poem, the albatross in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader guides the Dawn Treader out of the Dark Island.
The albatross speaks in Aslan’s voice, telling Lucy “Courage, dear heart”, and leads the ship back into the light. Now, I could delve deep into the whole ‘Aslan is Jesus’ thing, but that’s a whole separate blog (let me know in the comments if you want me to write about the religious imagery in the Narnia books). However, there is no sad ending to this. The Dawn Treader makes it out safely, thanks to the albatross, thus making it a symbol of hope rather than guilt.
Now, I hate to say this, but based on the album title and everything else we know so far, I don’t think this is how the song is going to feel. In my opinion it’s much more likely that the song is going to be about guilt rather than hope.
The Black Dog
Again, we’ve got multiple interpretations here. Nothing is ever straightforward with Miss Swift.
Folklore
Unlike most people, apparently, my first thought when I saw this album variant was the Black Dog of British folklore, so I’m going to talk about that first because I think it’s interesting.
The Black Dog, as a concept, is a demonic hound found in folklore all across the country, although it has different names depending on where you are. Stories of the dog differ, sometimes it’s simply an omen, sometimes it’s directly harmful and sometimes it’s benevolent, which gives us a lot to play with when it comes to thinking of interpretations of this song.
Let’s start with the bad first, just for funsies. At worst, the Black Dog is said to physically attack if you catch sight of it or even cause some kind of mental distress. Being an omen of death, it’s also said that if you see it, you’ll die quite soon after. These all refer to Black Dogs that look particularly demonic or hellhound-like. They’re normally portrayed as huge beasts with glowing eyes, not something you could mistake for anything other than a hellhound really.
(Sidenote: this folklore tale is said to be the inspiration for The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle)
Then, we have the less malevolent versions of the tale. More akin to the Fae than anything else, these versions of the Black Dog operate on a mutual ignoring vibe. If you leave it alone, it’ll leave you alone and you can be safely on your way. They’re more of just a haunting presence than anything else, a spectral figure you might catch sight of by the side of the road, but the second you go for a closer look it;s gone.
Lastly, we have the helpful versions of the Black Dog, which are admittedly few and far between. One of these is the Church Grim which, despite the name, is a positive figure. Said to protect holy ground, normally churches, from witches, the Devil, vandals and thieves, the Church Grim is a good boy who normally hangs around in the grounds of the Church. I wouldn’t recommend trying to pet it if you happen to come across one, but it won’t hurt you.
Another version of the Black Dog is the Gurt Dog or Gytrash, depending on where you live. This version is said to appear on pathways and crossroads to help guide travellers. If Taylor were to take the folklore route, I imagine this would be the most likely interpretation for the song. Having reportedly spent a lot of time in up in the Lakes, where Gytrash is the colloquial name for the Black Dog, I’d be very surprised if she hadn’t at least heard of this interpretation. I have no idea how it would fit into the context of a song, but it’s defintely a fun idea regardless.
Depression
I’d never heard of this, but apparently the black dog is a common metaphor for depression, popularised by Winston Churchill, although the imagery has been in use for hundreds of years. Doesn’t make much sense to me to have a dog, a notoriously happy and cheerful animal, as a metaphor for depression, but here we are.
Knowing what I do about this album (admittedly, not a whole lot), I feel this is far more likely to be what the song is about. Like, we been knew Taylor’s depressed, her last three, maybe four, albums have all talked about yeeting herself off something tall so if this interpretation surprises you, you probably need to go back and actually listen to the lyrics she’s using.
There’s not really much more to say about this interpretation as it’s fairly self-explanatory, although it will be interesting to see how she utilises this imagery.
The Little Mermaid
Wildcard, right?
Think again! Track number 6 of TTPD is called ‘But Daddy I Love Him’, a reference to The Little Mermaid (1989).
Originally published in 1837 by Hans Christian Andersen, The Little Mermaid is a queer allegory. It also doesn’t have the happy ending the Disney versions do.
Andersen, aggressively pining for his friend Edvard Collin, wrote The Little Mermaid after Collin announced his intentions to marry a woman. The story is filled with queer subtext; the separated worlds, the attempt to hide and change into something suitable, the overall yearning (we do love to yearn), and the inevitable conclusion. Ariel perishes at the end of the story, dissolving into sea foam, as the prince has never loved her back, and marries another woman.
But, circling back to ‘But daddy, I love him’, if we view the 1989 version of The Little Mermaid through a queer lens, this line feels like a denial and a confirmation all at once. Let’s break it down.
Confirmation: Andersen’s letters to Collin include quotes like “my sentiments for you are those of a woman” and “the femininity of my nature and our friendship must remain a mystery”, and, in his story, the character he has written as himself is a woman.
While the line ‘but daddy, I love him’ isn’t in the original story, it is said by Ariel in the 1989 film version about Prince Eric and, as we’ve already established, Andersen wrote Ariel with himself and his situation in mind. Therefore, by proxy, Andersen is professing his love for another man.
Denial: Here’s where we start getting a little hypothetical. Let’s assume for a minute that The Little Mermaid isn’t a love letter from Andersen to Collin, and that we don’t know any of the context surrounding the line. Actually, let’s just take the line completely out of context aside from the fact that I’m looking at it through a queer lens. All we’re going to do here is change the emphasis.
For the most part, with no indicated emphasis, we put the emphasis on ‘love’. But daddy, I love him. But, consider this: but daddy, I love him. It changes the meaning. Instead of emphasising the feeling, we emphasise who it’s for.
Let’s see if we can paint a picture:
A young queer girl with a secret girlfriend, figures out her homophobic dad has suspicions about her relationship. He confronts her, asking about a boy she spends a lot of time with. Asks in a way that implies the answer he wants. She replies “daddy, I love him” the “not her” implied but unsaid.
It will definitely be interesting to see which way the song swings.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Track 10, ‘Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?’, is a clear reference to this play by Edward Albee.
The play centres around George and Martha, a middle-aged married couple. One night, after a university faculty party, they invite Nick and Honey, a younger couple, over and unintentionally involve them in their bitter relationship.
The play is mostly three acts of psychological mind games, with Martha and George using Nick and Honey as part of their games. It will be interesting to see if this song has any actual relevance to the play, or if Taylor is just borrowing the title. To be fair, the title of the play itself is borrowed. It comes from a joke made at the very beginning of the play. Instead of singing ‘who’s afraid of the big, bad wolf?’, one of the characters sings ‘who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf?’, a tune which reoccurs throughout the play.
But, let’s assume the song will have some thematic aspect of the play, what would that be like? Will the song take on the persona of George or Martha - hellbent on making each other as miserable as possible? Or will it fall more in line with Nick and Honey’s experience - unwittingly drawn into a psychological game they reluctantly play along with? Perhaps it will be neither and will fall more along the thematic path of the original song? Who knows?
Alchemy
Track 15 of TTPD is called ‘The Alchemy’ which, grammatically doesn’t make a huge amount of sense unless it’s part of a longer phrase. But we’ll move past that. It could also be a place, but the closest I could find was some bar in Bloomsbury, which is a possibility but I doubt it.
So what is alchemy?
Simply put, alchemy is a speculative school of thought that involves the of transmuting metal into gold, attempting to create the elixir of immortality and solving every disease ever. The magnum opus of alchemy is supposed to be completely purifying your body and soul, how you do this I do not know.
Alchemy seems complicated and simplistic at the same time. It uses the assumption that the four classical elements (air, earth, fire, and water) make up everything in the world and that we can figure everything else out from there. It also corresponds with astrology, and humans’ relationship with the cosmos.
Honestly, who knows where Taylor is going with this, because I definitely don’t. My best guess is that ‘The Alchemy’ is part of a longer phrase like ‘the alchemy of love’, ‘the alchemy of life’ or something of that sort. It’ll probably change in each chorus, hence the shorter title. Either that or it’s some fuck ass dive bar in the West Village no one’s ever heard of.
Final Thoughts
I’m excited! We’ve got less than three weeks until we get an entire new album from Taylor Swift. Obviously, everything in this blog is speculation and if any of it actually turns out to be accurate, I’ll be very surprised.
The Tortured Poets Department is out April 19th.
Album Reaction
Okay FIRST OF ALL, The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology???? Hello!! Trust Taylor to singlehandedly ruin all of our sleep schedules by dropping an extra 15 (!!) songs two hours after the original album. I love her. This is also now her longest album to date, beating out Red (Taylor’s Version) by a single track.
Second of all, it’s nice to see I was wrong about practically everything. Although I was kind of right about The Albatross, and I did say there would be a bar/pub, it just turned out to be The Black Dog and not The Alchemy.
It’s worth noting that I have literally listened to nothing else except this album since it came out over a week ago, and I will probably continue to listen to nothing else for the next couple of weeks.
Anyway, onward with the reaction!
I LOVE this album! I think it’s genuinely her best work yet. The first 16 songs are a masterpiece all on their own, and The Anthology songs could be an entirely separate album if she wanted them to be. Thematically I feel the two halves of the album are different enough that they could be entirely separate entities.
My Favourite Tracks
This was hard to pick, but I’ve narrowed it down to my top five. Although, as with everything Taylor related, I’m sure this will change based on my mood, day of the week and which way the wind is blowing. Putting these in a particular order was so hard and I’m still not entirely happy with it, but hey ho🤷♀️. I’m also going to include my favourite lyric from each song.
Sidenote: I’ll also be updating Taylor Swift: Best Lyrics to include lyrics from TTPD.
5. The Prophecy
This song!! It makes my brain buzz in the best way possible. I think this song has one of my favourite bridges on the whole album. Also, it’s taken TikTok by storm (I see you Marauders girlies), which has absolutely no bearing on how much I like it but it’s sometimes surprising which songs get picked up the fastest, especially as this song isn’t part of the original 16 songs.
My favourite lyric in this song (aside from the entire bridge) is:
“Cards on the table/Mine play out like fools in a fable”
Taylor has consistently used cards as a motif throughout her discography, and it’s really nice to see it continued into this new album. I also like the way this lyric flows and ‘fools in a fable’ presents very interesting imagery within the context of the song.
4. I Can Do It With A Broken Heart
Taylor is a master at putting the most devastating lyrics you’ve ever heard over an upbeat track. And I am a sucker for that kind of song. I feel going to the Eras tour after hearing this song is going to change me as a person. Especially as the four count in this song is what plays in her in-ears when she’s on stage. If you didn’t know that already, I’m sorry to have ruined your day.
Picking a favourite lyric from this songs was hard but this is what I went with:
“Cause I’m a real tough kid/I can handle my shit”
I like this line because it kind of feels like a sequel to You’re On Your Own, Kid. I’m not sure I’d call it an affirmation, it’s more like a reassurance or a mantra.
3. The Albatross
The song I was kind of right about! If you skipped my theories to get straight to this bit, I theorised that this song could either be about how an albatross is an ill-omen or a symbol of hope, and I was kind of right! (it’s the only thing I wasn’t completely wrong about, actually). The juxtaposition in this song is really fascinating, let me know how you feel about it in the comments!
Favourite lyric:
“The devil that you know/Looks now more like an angel”
I love this lyric as it contradicts the popular idiom ‘better the devil you know’, which is also alluded to in the song. This lyric demonstrates that even though the people who are familiar to you can often cause a lot of issues for you, it’s nothing compared to what the people who don’t know you will say, which is often how it goes.
2. Who’s Afraid Of Little Old Me?
Yet another song about which my theory was completely wrong. However, it is a BANGER. There’s an excellent bit of the outro where the drums just go off and it makes me feral every time I hear it. This song is another one that’s making the rounds on TikTok and let me tell you I am never gonna get tired of my favourite fictional women being edited to this song…it was made for them.
It was HARD picking a favourite lyric from this track as the enitre song is just a goddamn masterpiece, but here we go:
“I was tame, I was gentle ‘til the circus life made me mean/’Don’t you worry folks, we took out all her teeth’”
This lyric is devastating, to be honest. It feels like it’s awakened a sleeper cell spy inside me and I’m ready to fight the internet all over again. Ringmasters used to remove their animals’ teeth so they couldn’t defend themselves against their handlers. Do with that information what you will.
1. Guilty As Sin?
It’s giving gay religious guilt. It’s giving yearning. It’s giving delulu. I don’t know what else it’s giving but I am living for it. Guilty As Sin? song of the summer anyone? I feel if she dropped it as a single it would truly dominate the summer. Taylor and Sabrina Carpenter would have the summer on lock.
Also, shout to @jesustaylorsversion on TikTok for the fabulous edit to this song.
Favourite lyric, although I could genuinely put the whole song on here, is this:
“What if the way you hold me is actually what’s holy?”
Y’all ever been told by someone that you’re going to hell for being queer? Or that it’s sinful to love someone of the same sex? This song is what the realisation that those people are wrong feels like.
Final Final Thoughts
I love this album and I honestly feel bad for all the people that don’t get it because you are truly missing out on something wonderful.
Let me know your thoughts on the album in the comments!
