The Belfast Review Team | 20 February, 2024
Welcome to Week 1 of our Spring Blog (February - May 2024). Each week we plan to feature a small selection of artists, photographers, writers, poets, and song writers, with works relating to certain themes. Certain days of the week will focus on different creative forms, for example:
'Feast Your Eyes' Sundays (art, media, photography), 'Wordy' Tuesdays (fiction, nonfiction, flash), and 'Rhythm-Verse' Thursdays (poetry and song lyrics).
This week we're exploring the theme of 'Memory & Experience' with featured creatives whose work interrogates or portrays the use of memory and personal experience in art.
Featured writer: Carol McGill
The following nonfiction piece was a favourite with our readers, so we decided to highlight it in our opening week, as it pertains to a current cultural icon who has followed in a grand tradition of female artists elevating Memory & Experience into an art form.
Has too much been written about Taylor Swift? Too little? Is she a legend, a distraction, a zeitgeist moment, or just a career woman? This writer grapples with what the icon means to her, from the personal to the political. Regardless of where you stand, the artist has become a cultural phenomenon to be reckoned with.
Have a read!
tarnished but so grand
CAROL MCGILL
I can’t listen to Taylor Swift’s discography on shuffle. It gives me emotional whiplash. I am sixteen, then twelve, then twenty-one years old. I am heartbroken, then homesick, then happy.
It is strange to realise she has been such a constant in my life, when I have outgrown or fallen out of love with so many other childhood fascinations. It’s also strange to reflect on what a conflicted relationship I’ve had with myself regarding her, and how much it correlates with my growing up.
*
Swift’s artistic achievements are objectively, statistically undeniable. She has received fourteen Grammys in sixteen years, four of them for album of the year, with her latest win in 2024 making her the only artist in the history of this award to have received it four times. She has broken records set by Beyoncé and The Beatles, and she reportedly sent Don McLean flowers after beating “American Pie” for longest song to go to number one. Five of her albums have sold over a million copies in their first week. 1989 (Taylor’s Version) recently sold a million copies in just five days, ultimately outselling the original 2014 version. Her 2023-24 Eras tour is more than three hours long, including upwards of forty songs per night, an athletic feat if nothing else. According to Forbes, Swift became a billionaire in October 2023. After making her their Person of the Year, TIME described Swift’s career trajectory in 2023 as “the last monoculture left in our stratified world.”
The numbers prove the emotional resonance of her work with a huge audience and have done so for years before her meteoric 2023 career milestones. Yet, I remember mentioning Taylor Swift to a guy and watching him flinch in horror, a reaction which far exceeds reasonable personal disinclination. How can liking music so undeniably popular be so shocking?
It seems that Swift’s achievements are somehow less valid because the demographic that are buying the records and responding to the music are mostly women. Mainstream acceptance by men is, after all, the main difference between her and The Beatles. While the majority of the fanbase were teenage girls, Beatlemania was seen as a crazy or even frightening phenomenon until the band transcended this hysteria and gained male attention. Connecting with women is less valid because female emotions are considered lesser in our current cultural climate. Female pain is so ordinary – and therefore it is less of an artistic achievement. I would love to be wrong about this, but I’ve never been offered a better explanation. I just don’t like her doesn’t cut it. Not everyone has to like her, but dislike doesn’t justify disgust; either way, it doesn’t invalidate Swift’s cultural relevance.
*
I was teaching a class called Write Act Perform to kids aged 8-12 in the autumn of 2021 when Swift re-released her 2012 album Red. I was looking for ways to encourage the kids to think critically about storytelling, about what it is and what it does and why it’s important. I also wanted to analyse the new album with anybody who would listen, and I had a captive audience.
I stood in front of the class and asked if they were familiar with the song “All Too Well.” On the original five-minute version, it sounds like Swift is describing a near-perfect relationship whose premature end left her heartbroken. In the extended, ten-minute version, which goes into more detail, it becomes clear that the relationship had problematic, potentially even toxic elements from the start. “In each song she’s talking about the same situation,” I told the class. “But based on what she chooses to include or exclude, she tells an entirely different story. This applies to other kinds of storytelling. For example, you all do history, right? Well, the history you’ve learned in school is only what whoever wrote that particular history book has chosen to tell you. There’s too much to ever include everything. So that’s going to warp your interpretation. Has anybody ever heard the phrase history was written by the victors?”
And one of the boys who’d struggled most in the class, who I honestly hadn’t thought was paying attention, said, “I haven’t heard that one, but I know the one: history will be kind to me for I intend to write it.”
I wish everybody would discuss her music with the same consideration as those kids.
*
I fell in love, alongside my two sisters, with Speak Now (my younger sister does not consider herself much of a fan, but still to this day refers to this as a perfect album) and then fell off the wagon for most of my teens. It’s hard to decide now how much of this was genuine disinterest and how much felt socially necessary. I was the girl who used feminism as the basis for disliking the Twilight saga, in a way which in hindsight was undeniably sexist. I still knew the words to almost every Swift song, but I wasn’t shouting about it. Even as a young adult, I was surprised when my friends openly expressed positive feelings towards her.
It wasn’t until the release of folklore in lockdown – arguably her most lyrically sophisticated album, and I have always been drawn to lyrics – that I realised my desire to distance myself from Swift was due to internalised misogyny. So, I discarded any shame associated with my love for her. The only reason I was able to make this leap at the time was again due to the turning of the public tide: I saw a tweet by a college acquaintance saying as much, and that gave me the permission I’d needed.
This moment back in 2020 and its joyful embrace predicated on outside validation has defined my relationship with Taylor Swift to this day. I only began to take the idea of writing this essay seriously after a guy friend told me he’d be interested in reading it.
*
It feels strange for me to be writing an essay about music at all.
I had some bad friendships as a teenager. I’m not naturally musical but my friends were, so at fifteen I asked them to check and approve any songs I liked. We would be hanging out and baking or whatever and I’d play a song (not Taylor Swift, incidentally, as this was during one of my off phases) and they would squish up their noses and say, “It’s fine. Like, it’s okay.” (We were kids.) (I was a kid.) (I want to give my baby self a hug.)
Then on a school trip, when we were walking in the woods, I was thrown together with some lads I didn’t really know. I was explaining to one of the Ciarans about my poor music taste, and how I’d get my friends to approve it, as a self-deprecating joke, I think. (We were kids.) (I was a kid.) He said, “Oh my god, no. Like, who cares whether other people think it’s good? You’re the one listening to it.” He got quite passionate about it. I think he said something about liking indie shit.
I can’t tell you how grateful I am for that conversation. Ciaran-whoever instantly saw and demolished an insecurity my so-called friends took advantage of. It was one of the splinters that broke me away from them. I also apply it to other aspects of my life. I believe passionately, for example, that no genre of literature is inherently inferior so long as you’re enjoying it. Different things are valuable in different ways. Nowadays, I might be private about it, but I refuse to apologise for my music taste. I won’t let even my sister follow me on Spotify, because I like to make sure my choices are purely for me.
*
Objectively, I know I don’t have any relationship with Taylor Swift, the person, but that line is more blurred than with most celebrities. I connect with her music, and she is a writer on every song. The majority of her songs are widely known to be based on extremely personal experiences, and many of them resonate with a time or moment in my own life. Because of this – the emotional connection to my life, the knowledge of an emotional connection to hers – it can feel more like a connection with the person than the art. Then, it can be difficult to maintain a critical distance, to establish the necessary boundaries for evaluating a billionaire/public figure/etc. I cannot critically evaluate Taylor Swift without acknowledging my personal investment in her music. I cannot separate my personal investment from the media phenomenon she is and which surrounds her.
This sense of knowing the person due to the intimacy of the lyrics is, in my eyes, why certain facets of her fanbase are so dedicated, almost to an extreme. Maybe one reason I was so reluctant to visibly praise Swift was to dissociate myself from this fanbase, who will send death threats or spend thousands on merch. Their relationship with the art appears, from the outside at least, to be inextricably linked with Swift the person. Because this is something I grapple with (and also, I genuinely have no interest in the easter eggs), I try to make it clear that I am not one of them. Yet, I find it hard to believe that there’s not some internalised misogyny in my attitude towards this group and my desired distance from them, too.
One of my cousins once told me that as a man, small talk with other men is easy because you can always fall back on football. While obviously this is a generalisation, I can apply this same theory to meeting another Taylor Swift fan. If you establish that a new acquaintance has the same level of lyrical knowledge, you have an immediate shorthand to discussing a broad range of emotions, stories, and scandal. You can get deep but stay surface level. Chat at the office kitchen sink is sorted. You’re good to go.
*
These days, I am fascinated by the evolution of public perception of Swift: how it seems to echo the state of mainstream feminism at any given point in time, and what that meant for me as a baby feminist growing up.
The conversations I remember having as a teen were about how problematic Swift was, how she used autotune, and how “You Belong With Me” was anti-feminist. I don’t remember having an issue with YBWM when it was first released. In fact, it fits with many of the not like other girls narratives of the time, especially those aimed at a young female audience: High School Musical and Twilight became The Hunger Games and Divergent. It was only retroactively, when feminism – or a version of it – broke into our teenage mainstream, that my friends and I began to find issues with the song, not seeing that in criticising it we were projecting a new version of not like other girls onto ourselves. (I’m not saying YBWM is inherently unproblematic – I think there’s an interesting conversation to be had there, but it’s not the one I was having in 2013.) Swift’s first public embrace of feminism, while promoting 1989 at the then-peak of her fame and popularity in 2014, seemed triumphant at first. It was validating to me as a young girl just starting to see the world through this newly-discovered lens. Then, along with my peers, I began to criticise Swift for the narrow confines of her activism. At the time I believed I was applying a more nuanced understanding of feminism to the discussion; now I’m not so sure.
I consistently struggle to identify a balanced line between criticism and unnecessary aggression when it comes to Taylor Swift. In 2016, when Swift’s dramatic fall out of public favour was celebrated online, users of the hashtag #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty were blatantly delighted to have an excuse to hate her. I am less interested in the whole Kanye feud than in a number of criticisms at the time that were framed around social issues. One critique that feels blatantly unfair in hindsight was that Swift was too thin and it wasn’t a healthy body image to portray to young girls; ironically, Swift has since shared that she herself was suffering from disordered eating during this period. Another issue centred around white feminism, referring to feminism which prioritises white wealthy women’s experiences at the expense or exclusion of women of colour or minorities; it fails to address how patriarchy intersects with other forms of oppression. One prominent example occurred when Nicki Minaj complained that her extremely successful video for “Anaconda” wasn’t nominated for MTV video of the year because of institutional bias, and Swift publicly interpreted this as an attack on her own nomination, directly responding to Minaj on Twitter.
I want to be clear that I am not looking to absolve Swift of accusations of white feminism (I believe many of these critiques are valid), nor do I think it’s my place to do so. My point is that valid criticism and the pursuit of social justice were not the only factors at play in her public cancellation by the masses. The aggression and vindictive glee which surrounded Swift’s temporary public downfall demonstrate, in my opinion, not a reaction to the fair critiques but a societal affirmation of individuals’ pre-existing misogyny towards Swift. Even as a self-proclaimed feminist and an admirer of her songs, I was not immune. I was convinced that the discomfort I felt about Swift was not me shaming myself for liking girly things or having girly emotions: I told myself I felt that way because Swift was problematic. The irony is painful. I essentially used feminism as a tool to disguise and shield myself from my own internalised misogyny.
It’s not that I think we should be uncritical of public figures, especially ones we tend to hero-worship. But we do as a society love to make a villain out of a successful woman, and I believe feminist language has been weaponised to disproportionately villainise Swift. This is unwarranted but more importantly, it’s unproductive. Feminism requires all individuals to interrogate their own biases if any real change is to be made. If the real issues at hand dissolve into discussions of Swift’s epic villainy, we lose sight of the ways we ourselves are complicit.
I now see feminism as a movement towards equality that at its best targets systemic oppression and institutions while allowing for individual growth and mistakes. This means that Swift’s feminism is allowed to evolve. However maybe even reaching this conclusion is misspent energy. We are much more diligent about holding Swift accountable than our own politicians. I’m putting more effort into this essay than into my local elections.
The discourse which surrounded Swift’s potential new relationship in early 2023 is a more recent incarnation of these discussions. People were unhappy with the actions of a rumoured love interest, to the point an open letter from fans required Swift to, as Angie Martoccio from Rolling Stone puts it, take responsibility for the actions of the men around her. I see the argument for minimising the harm done to vulnerable groups when in a position of public power, of course I do. I was deeply uncomfortable with Swift’s apparent proximity to this man’s racist comments. But I was also uncomfortable with the insistence on official acknowledgement from Swift – when the relationship itself had not yet been officially acknowledged. There is a sense of entitlement to public accountability for every private decision. Fans seem to think they should get approval on any romantic partner this adult woman chooses.
Of course cultural icons are important signifiers of acceptable behaviour, and they have a lot of influence. But the way Swift’s romantic choices are taken as more serious indicators of her political values than her own actions or lack of action on current issues “betrays the gendered nature of the response to her celebrity”, according to Chiara Giovanni from Teen Vogue. Would we do this if she were a man? Is it even fair for me to use her career trajectory to analyse my own relationship with feminism? Her current heights of popularity have surpassed even her own past success, with her tour ticket sales crashing Ticketmaster and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) breaking records set by Swift herself with 2022’s Midnights. I doubt such cultural domination can be sustainable. The higher the pedestal, the further there is to fall.
I hope that I now have a healthy relationship with Swift’s public persona, that I can openly acknowledge my admiration for her without ignoring potential flaws. Many critiques of her politics strike me as valid, especially when observing how those politics feel subservient to her brand (an empire in itself), and I continue to grapple with the possibility that various criticisms and aspects of her legacy may have affected my relationship with her more fundamentally if I wasn’t white. I was able to be disappointed when it emerged in 2022 that Swift’s private jet was responsible for more emissions than any other that year, and dismiss the excuse from her publicity team that she frequently loans it out. (Even here, I see the reflection of cultural discourses on feminism: as focus shifts towards the entanglement of capitalism and patriarchy, the scrutiny on Swift turns to the environmental and ethical implications of her extreme wealth.) With all that said, what she symbolises to me currently is my own ability to be uncritical of public consensus, when I believe myself to be thinking critically of the issues or public figures under discussion. I like Swift today, but it’s fashionable to like her right now. Will I still follow the crowd next time public opinion changes? Will the crowd be justified? The change could even happen by the time this essay is published.
*
The first time I caught Covid (I got a mild dose) was at a Taylor Swift club night, and I maintain that it was entirely worth it. I could sing along to every song. The atmosphere was so good that going to the toilet was a risk in case they played a favourite (“Enchanted” came on while I was in the queue) and I wasn’t worried about being harassed once the whole night.
*
My history of misapplying feminism when it comes to Swift stretches into the present. It emerged Swift had separated from her long-term boyfriend in 2023, and within days of this becoming public knowledge, I saw a clickbait headline about Swift’s new man that could have come directly from the archives of 2015. It was only when her six-year relationship ended that I realised how much it must have protected her from discourse like this – and, more significantly, I began to suspect she had deliberately narrativised that relationship in her music in order to protect herself. By referring to marriage, forever, I played the field before I found someone to commit to, et cetera, Swift turned the sexual history for which she had been slut-shamed into a prelude to a monogamous, committed relationship. That history is much more palatable in this context to a society still apparently uncomfortable with female sexuality. Indeed, some of Swift’s most directly sexual songs (“Don’t Blame Me,” “So It Goes,” “Dress,” “False God”…) could be written about a long-term partner and still be less scandalous than less explicit songs referencing shorter relationships.
When I saw that 2023 clickbait, I thought, god, leave the poor woman alone, let her be single for a minute. So when it was apparently confirmed that she had almost immediately began dating again, I was somewhat disappointed. Surely the healthy choice would be to take some time to herself, and surely she had proven by now that she didn’t need a man? Then I had to check myself – because why on earth should I be entitled to an opinion? Can she not do what she damn well pleases?
*
Most guys are too smart to flinch when Swift is mentioned these days. I can’t decide whether this is a result of her current heights of success, or if her success is facilitated by this approval. Even still, and even with my now-committed love of her, it can be a conflicted conversation. There was the one who said this is so idealistic on hearing the lines: I don’t like a gold rush…Everybody wants you, Everybody wonders what it would be like to love you, because, I suspect, that was what he had expected to hear, without waiting for the edge to that song: I don’t like that falling feels like flying ‘til the bone crush. There have been multiple men who’ve promised me they’ll listen to folklore, only to skip to the Bon Iver track. Or the guy who did listen to all of folklore, then told me songs about relationships are superficial and her lyrics are like something he could write himself.
Then there’s the guy who told me he was once a fan but had weaned himself off her, as part of the same lifestyle change that made him go to the gym and resist falling in love. He saw the music as too feminine and too emotional – or maybe those were the same thing – and he was trying to be somebody else. Permission to embrace Swift’s music may be more widespread, but it has not yet fully extended to men. It still makes me sad for him. I said Can you not just go to the gym and still have “Dress” on your playlist? But he wouldn’t listen to my story about Ciaran-whoever.
Swift’s most frequently chosen subject matter is one in which women are condemned for taking matters too seriously. The media and the mob have tried again and again to dismiss her for writing too much about relationships and her love life (to the point where she herself parodied their characterisation of her in the song “Blank Space”). But in elegantly articulating her experiences, she asserts her personhood over and over. She validates not only the emotions and behaviours which are so often demonised – obsessive, shrill, slutty, boy-crazy – but their validity as serious artistic subject matter.
As women, we are constantly looking for green flags that suggest we can feel safe with a man, that he’s not going to hurt us , that he sees us as a person. Recognising my bodily autonomy means recognising my personhood. So does recognising the validity of my emotions. This is probably more internalised sexism, but seeing men react positively to mentions of Taylor Swift gives a certain automatic trust. I’m not saying this reaction is correct or advisable but recognising the artistic value of Swift’s female-centric, emotions-driven music has always been such a green flag to me, not least because negative reactions tend to be extremely negative, leaving the sense that I need to justify not only Swift’s music but my own emotions.
*
It’s hard for me to choose a favourite lyric from Swift, but I have always had a real grá for the opening track from folklore and the line: If you never bleed you’re never gonna grow. I have always liked to identify the silver linings of past pain, to see how those difficult experiences have shaped me for the better, but this line also seems to encapsulate what I love about Swift’s music. Again and again, Swift demonstrates the value of everyday emotions and pain, makes them epic and ordinary, isolating and universal. She gives her audience permission to engage with those feelings. Nowadays, I don’t care who is watching me sing along.
Bibliography
Ahlgrim, Callie. “Only 23 albums in history have sold 1 million copies in a single week – here they all are.” Business Insider, updated 2 November 2023, https://www.insider.com/best-selling-albums-all-time-one-week-2021-10. Accessed 30 November 2023.
Armstrong, Jennifer Keishin. “Taylor Swift’s Feminist Evolution.” Billboard, 1 July 2016. https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/taylor-swift-feminism-impact-7423962/#!. Accessed 29 January 2024.
Asmelash, Leah. “Taylor Swift sends flowers to Don McLean after song breaks record held by ‘American Pie’.” CNN, 6 December 2021, https://edition.cnn.com/2021/12/04/entertainment/taylor-swift-don-mclean-record-flowers-cec/index.html. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Bohanan, Rebecca. “Taylor Swift And Her Brand Of Feminism.” HuffPost Entertainment, 25 July 2016. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/taylor-swift-and-the-bran_b_11101662. Accessed 29 January 2024.
Ezaydi, Shahed. “What is white feminism and how does it harm women of colour?” Mashable, 13 March 2023. https://mashable.com/article/white-feminism-explained. Accessed 29 January 2024.
Forbes. “Profile | Taylor Swift | Musician.” Forbes, Taylor Swift (forbes.com). Accessed 19 November 2023.
Giovanni, Chiara. “Taylor Swift and Matty Healy Relationship Backlash Reveals the Hypocrisy of Political Critique of Celebrities.” Teen Vogue, 30 May 2023. https://www.teenvogue.com/story/taylor-swift-matty-healy-relationship-backlash-hypocrisy-political-critique-celebrities-op-ed. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Hubbard, Nathan and Princiotti, Nora. Every Single Album, https://open.spotify.com/show/7yOItp0P3MZIVLYyFB2SnH?si=-0yyYdIkRUGOJssybFTEew. Accessed 2022-2024.
Johnson, Tyler. “Taylor Swift Is Over Party: Twitter Users Celebrate Singer’s Downfall.” The Hollywood Gossip, 13 July 2016. https://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/slideshows/taylor-swift-is-over-party-twitter-users-celebrate-singers-downf/. Accessed 29 January 2024.
Lansky, Sam. “2023 Person of the Year | Taylor Swift.” TIME, 6 December 2023. https://time.com/6342806/person-of-the-year-2023-taylor-swift/. Accessed 23 January 2024.
Lipshutz, Jason. “Taylor Swift & Nicki Minaj’s Twitter Argument: A Full Timeline with Katy Perry, Ed Sheeran & More.” Billboard, 23 July 2015. https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/taylor-swift-nicki-minaj-twitter-argument-timeline-6641794/. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Lynskey, Dorian. “Beatlemania: ‘the screamers’ and other tales of fandom.” The Guardian, 29 September 2013, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/sep/29/beatlemania-screamers-fandom-teenagers-hysteria. Accessed 7 June 2023.
Martoccio, Angie. “We Wouldn’t Be Having This Conversation If Taylor Swift Was a Man.” Rolling Stone, 30 May 2023, https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/taylor-swift-shouldnt-apologize-for-dating-matty-healy-1234742895/. Accessed 31 May 2023.
McIntyre, Hugh. “Taylor Swift’s ‘1989 (Taylor’s Version)’ Sold 1 Million Copies In Less Than A Week.” Forbes, 2 November 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/hughmcintyre/2023/11/02/taylor-swifts-1989-taylors-version-has-sold-one-million-copies-in-less-than-a-week/. Accessed 30 November 2023.
O’Donoghue, Caroline (host) and Cownie, Jen (guest). “Midnights by Taylor Swift with Jen Cownie.” Sentimental Garbage, 18 May 2023, https://spotify.link/fQsL6gcMWAb. Accessed 19 May 2023.
O’Donoghue, Caroline (host) and Cownie, Jen (guest). “Midnight pt II with Jen Cownie.” Sentimental Garbage, 8 June 2023, https://spotify.link/hVwbZSjMWAb. Accessed 8 June 2023.
Recording Academy Grammy Awards. “Taylor Swift | Artist.” Grammy, https://www.grammy.com/artists/taylor-swift/15450. Accessed 30 November 2023.
Savage, Mark. “Here are just some of the records Taylor Swift's Folklore has broken.” BBC News, 3 August 2020, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-53635437. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Savage, Mark. “Taylor Swift launches Eras tour with three-hour, 44-song set.” BBC News, 18 March 2023. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-64999388. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Sisario, Ben. “Taylor Swift Wins Album of the Year, Breaking A Record.” The New York Times, 4 Feb 2024. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/04/arts/music/taylor-swift-grammy-album-of-the-year.html. Accessed 5 February 2024.
Snapes, Laura. “Taylor Swift: claims about private jet use ‘blatantly incorrect’, says spokesperson.” The Guardian, 2 August 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/aug/02/taylor-swift-private-jet-carbon-emissions-blatantly-incorrect. Accessed 7 June 2023.
Spotify Newsroom. “Taylor Swift Breaks Two Records With ‘Midnights,’ Becoming the Most-Streamed Artist on Spotify.” Spotify, 22 October 2022, https://newsroom.spotify.com/2022-10-22/taylor-swift-breaks-two-records-with-midnights-becoming-the-most-streamed-artist-on-spotify/. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Swift, Taylor. “All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version).” Red (Taylor’s Version),2021.
Swift, Taylor. “Don’t Blame Me.” Reputation, 2017.
Swift, Taylor. “Dress.” Reputation, 2017.
Swift, Taylor. “False God.” Lover, 2019.
Swift, Taylor. “gold rush.” evermore, 2020.
Swift, Taylor. “ivy.” evermore, 2020.
Swift, Taylor. “So It Goes...” Reputation, 2017.
Swift, Taylor. “the 1.” folklore, 2020.
Swift, Taylor. “The Man.” Lover, 2019.
Swift, Taylor. “You Belong With Me (Taylor’s Version).” Fearless (Taylor’s Version),
2021.
“Taylor Swift breaks The Beatles' chart record.” BBC News, 16 April 2021. https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-56769853. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Wilson, Lana. Miss Americana, 2020. Accessed 29 November 2023.
Wood, Becca. “Taylor Swift Tour Sales Crash Ticketmaster, Leaving Fans ‘Heartbroken’.” Today, 15 November 2022, https://www.today.com/popculture/music/taylor-swift-ticketmaster-tour-frustration-ticket-sales-rcna57345. Accessed 11 June 2023.
Zaleski, Annie. “‘It’s a more expansive, inclusive version’: how women reshaped the history of the Beatles.” The Guardian, 1 March 2022, https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/mar/01/its-a-more-expansive-inclusive-version-how-women-reshaped-the-history-of-the-beatles. Accessed 7 June 2023.
With thanks to Ella McGill
ARTIST BIO
Carol McGill has had work appear in Sonder Magazine, Crannóg, Ropes and The Ogham Stone, among others. She was awarded the 2022 Childrens Books Ireland Raising Voices Fellowship. In 2020 she founded the Morning Coffee Writing Competition. She received an Arts Council Agility Award in 2022.
Special thanks to the writer for trusting us with her work.
Thanks to all of you readers for reading! Be sure to like, follow, and share.
We have more wonderful creatives coming up this week. Stay tuned for another 'Wordy' Tuesday (20 Feb) post featuring NonFiction by Christina Hennemann, and 'Rhythm-Verse' Thursday (22 Feb) with poetry by Diarmuid Cawley and song lyrics by Madelinksi. And don't forget our Feast Your Eyes Sunday (18 Feb) post featuring the artwork of Laura Davis.
Follow us:
Instagram @thebelfastreview
Twitter/X @belfastreview
댓글