My Thoughts on Taylor Swift's 'The Tortured Poets Department'

Sincerely, a retired swiftie who knows too much about Taylor Swift.

Cover image for The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology

In Miss Americana, a documentary meant to give us an inside look into Taylor Swift during a “transformational time” in her life as she embraces becoming more politically involved, there’s a scene that’s stuck with me. Towards the end of the documentary, Taylor Swift says, “There's this thing people say about celebrities, that they're frozen at the age they got famous, and that's kind of what happened to me.” As I listened to The Tortured Poets Department, I could not help but think she was right. 

Swifties have been comparing her latest release to her album Speak Now, an album with a similar theme of “falling for the wrong guy.” The difference between The Tortured Poets Department and Speak Now is that Swift was 21 years old on her 3rd studio album; she is now 34 years old on her 11th studio album.

Swift has made writing confessional love songs her brand. Because of this, many of the songs read like a clunky, wordy, and boring diary entry. In the title track, she sings: “At dinner, you take my ring off my middle finger / And put it on the one people put wedding rings on/ And that’s the closest I’ve come to my heart exploding.” Lyrics like these do not work as songs on an album and instead feel like parts of a journal entry that should've stayed just that.

Swift loves to control the narrative and uses her albums to do so. Some believe an artist’s personal life and wrongdoings are irrelevant when critiquing their music. However, unlike many of her peers, Swift’s love life has been an active part of her brand since the beginning of her career. From her first album Taylor Swift, until her fifth album 1989, Swift would release a prologue and capitalize certain letters in the lyric sheet, providing a clue into who or what the song was about.

For instance, the secret message for her song “All Too Well” was ‘Maple Latte’ leading fans to assume the song was about actor Jake Gyllenhaal since they were spotted multiple times together at various coffee shops and holding hands walking down the street — coffee in one of Swift’s hands, her other hand holding his — seemingly confirming that they were together.

Although this tradition of including secret messages has stopped, releasing a prologue remains a way to explain the album and control the narrative. 

In the prologue for The Tortured Poets Department, Swift claims: “As you might all, unfortunately, recall, I had been struck with a case of a restricted humanity which explains my plea here today for temporary insanity” — yet this case of “temporary insanity” feels like it’s part of the same story it was with her past albums.

This is how the story goes: Taylor Swift loves someone despite everything. She thinks he’s the one even though she shouldn’t. He does her wrong and she concludes that she made a bad choice dating him. They break up. The fans eagerly anticipate the latest release to see what Taylor Swift has to say about her ex. They figure out which song is about what person and declare them public enemy number one. It happens again and again and again. It’s like hearing a friend complain about dating bad guys every time she dates for years and years and years. She swears she is done making bad choices, and yet the moment she tells you about the new guy she's dating, you think to yourself, “It’s happening again.” Taylor, girl I’m tired!

But Swift doesn't want or care about my opinion about her love life. If there’s one thing Swift has made clear, she is pissed that I would even think she would. Throughout her career, Swift has directed her anger to multiple people: her haters, her exes, and now her fans. Swift uses the song “But Daddy I Love Him” to respond to the “saboteurs” who criticized her for dating Matty Healy of the 1975, who has a documented history of questionable behavior including — antisemitism, racism, and more (yes more).

In the bridge, she sings: “God save the most judgmental creeps / Who say they want what's best for me / Sanctimoniously performing soliloquies I'll never see / Thinkin' it can change the beat of my heart when he touches me / And counteract the chemistry and undo the destiny / You ain't gotta pray for me / Me and my wild boy, and all of his wild joy / If all you want is gray for me / That's just white noise, that's just my choice.”

Here’s the thing, Swift has a history of weaponizing her fans to go after whoever she deems deserving to be attacked by thousands of Swifties. In an attempt to defend her, others have been placed in the middle of a drama that did not involve them. When she posted about her master's situation and being unable to perform her old songs at the American Music Awards, she called on her Swifties to help her. In turn, not only did they go after Scooter Braun, but they also went after people who worked with Scooter, like Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande, who did not automatically stop associating with him. 

When she tweeted she was upset about Netflix allowing a “sexist” joke on their show Ginny & Georgia, Antonia Gentry, a biracial black woman, was caught in the crossfire for simply doing her job. Now that criticism was given to her by those same fans, it’s a problem. It feels like when a mom has a child who constantly misbehaves and instead of approaching it, the mother doesn’t. And when their child becomes a teen and treats them with the same disrespect that they did others, they're upset and shocked that their precious child would go against them. You created this monster, Swift!

There are some exceptions to my overall negative feelings about this album. “Florida!!!” ft Florence + the Machine is fun and fresh (Unsurprisingly, Florence sounds heavenly as always). “Guilty as Sin?” is both catchy and makes me want to take a drive while listening to it. “I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)” almost feels religious — Swift’s desperation and loyalty to her lover are transparent. “I Look in People’s Windows” stands out among this often monotonous-sounding album. Sadly, there aren’t enough songs that catch my attention for an album that is 31 songs long.

2020s Swift is reminiscent of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) - the output is frequent and both critically and commercially successful. But unlike the MCU, whose last theatrical release Captain Marvel 2 became the lowest-grossing film in the MCU, there are no signs of Swift’s fame slowing down. The Tortured Poets Department is predicted to sell over 2 million copies in its first week and has been branded an instant classic by publications like Rolling Stone. There’s a significant chance Swift’s latest release will be nominated for Album of the Year at the 2025 Grammys, an award she has won 4 times already. Her fans not only love her but have turned her into the figurehead for girlhood (liking Taylor Swift means you are a girl's girl didn’t you know)? 

And yet despite all this, Swift seems stuck in this never-ending cycle of being trapped at the age she became famous. Stifled by fame, her love life continuously being a significant part of her brand, and her consistently breaking records each time she releases an album, this album highlights Swift’s lack of artistic growth. 

Many artists hit a point where they are surrounded by yes men. They run their brands and are in full control. The problem with full control is that sometimes you need someone to be honest with you about your art. At this point, it’s apparent that Swift would benefit from someone telling her “no” when she presents the idea of releasing an album that is too long and “girl, go rewrite this” when she shows them wordy and unbelievably bad lyrics like: “My friends used to play a game where we would pick a decade/ We wished we could live in instead of this/ I’d say the 1830s but without all the racists /And getting married off for the highest bid.”

As much as I love complex and complicated women, I love change and growth. This narrative of Swift being a wounded victim, even if she admits that some of her wounds were “self-inflicted,” has run stale. There are times in our lives when we have to be willing to admit that stating we know we have a problem is not the same as working towards fixing that problem. It feels as though Swift has yet to do so or has settled into her ways. 

Admittedly, there is a part of me who hopes that there will soon be a new and better chapter in the life and career of Taylor Swift. A chapter that doesn’t involve the same themes. A chapter that feels both exciting and challenging. A chapter that displays artistic growth. A chapter that feels like it’s written by an artist who takes risks and whose albums don't sound so monotonous. But that artist feels long gone, and now we have another album that desperately needs editing. It’s time for the tortured poet to release herself from this never-ending cycle of being frozen at the age she became famous.