Podcast
The Swiftie and The Scholar
A weekly podcast exploring the lyrics, lore, and literary legacy of Taylor Swift. Hosted by Angela McDow, the Swiftie, and Dr. Jerry Coats, the Scholar, we read between the lines AND the liner notes. Join us each week for lyrical deep dive through Taylor Swift's eras.
- Music Commentary chart
- #18
- Episodes
- 66
- Releases
- Weekly
- Typical length
- 1 hr 19 min
- On air since
- 2025
- Latest episode
- 5 days ago
Episodes
66 episodes, newest first
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1 hr 54 min
The Illusion of Liberation in Babylon
Season 1, Episode 63
Show notes
Buckle up, y’all. We’ve got a beefy one for you today! We’re tackling Babylon from Taylor Swift’s The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore. I think we all knew this one would give Uncle Jerry plenty to think about and chew on and teach from, and he did not disappoint. Maybe grab your breakfast or dinner and a nice beverage and get comfy, because this is our longest episode yet.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
The Autobiography of Red – Anne Carson
Angela’s Reaction Video – The Encore
Professing Literature: An Institutional History – Gerald Graff
What Does "Mene, Mene, Tekel, Parsin" Mean?
Ozymandias – Percy Bysshe Shelley
Where The Wild Things Are – Maurice Sendak
Miniver Cheevy – Edwin Arlington Robinson
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1 hr 30 min
Art Becomes Memory in Tim McGraw
Season 1, Episode 62
Show notes
In this episode, we are taking it back to the very beginning with Tim McGraw from Taylor Swift’s debut album. Uncle Jerry finds plenty to discuss and is charmed by hearing both young Taylor’s early poetics and her country twang.
Works Cited:
Frame story or frame structure
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54 min
BONUS: Interview with Sarah Anderson, Author of Fallow Bonus
Season 1
Show notes
Today I have something a bit different for you! I sat down with Sarah Anderson, author of Fallow, to discuss getting published, her love of short stories, how she wrote the main character of the book, and so much more. All of the books we discussed are linked below.
Fallow – Sarah Anderson:
Take Me to Kirkland – Sarah Anderson: https://joylandpublishing.com/fiction/take-me-to-kirkland/
The Best American Short Stories 2025 – Celeste Ng, Nicole A. Lamy:
Marlena – Julie Buntin:
Famous Men – Julie Buntin:
Health Trackers Are Everywhere. Do Babies Need Them Too? – The Daily:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5QNrdUSF28Vsxla5a0exzK?si=TPgMlCapQwy4AJuqP1ptoQ
Temporary – Hilary Leichter:
The Quick and the Dead – Joy Williams:
The Visiting Privilege – Joy Williams:
All Fours – Miranda July
The First Bad Man – Miranda July
Margo’s Got Money Troubles – Rufi Thorpe
East of Eden – John Steinbeck
The Maltese Version – Katy Simpson Smith
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1 hr 46 min
Folklore as a Unified Literary Work | Wrapping Up Folklore: Part 2
Season 1, Episode 61
Show notes
We did it! One album down, lots to go. Uncle Jerry takes us through alllllll the unifying themes, devices, questions, and more (13 to be exact) of the folklore album as a whole. Thanks for coming on this journey with us!
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
Sonnets from the Portuguese 20: Beloved, my Beloved, when I think – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
*Aurora Leigh: A Norton Critical Edition – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
*Morphology of the Folktale – V. Propp
*The Uses of Enchantment: The Meaning and Importance of Fairy Tales – Bruno Bettelheim
*Fairy Tales and the Art of Subversion – Jack Zipes
*Fairy Tale as Myth/Myth as Fairy Tale – Jack Zipes
*The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales – Jack Zipes
*The Great Fairy Tale Tradition: A Norton Critical Edition – Jack Zipes
*Literary Theory: An Introduction – Terry Eagleton
*Retelling / Rereading: The Fate of Storytelling in Modern Times – Karl Kroeber
*Linguistic Criticism – Roger Fowler
*From the Beast to the Blonde: On Fairy Tales and Their Tellers – Marina Warner
*No Go, the Bogeyman: Scaring, Lulling, and Making Mock – Marina Warner
[anyone lived in a pretty how town] – e.e. cummings
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird – Wallace Stevens
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – James Joyce
*Slaughter-House Five – Kurt Vonnegut
*The Catcher in the Rye – J. D. Salinger
*Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Hilary Duff is trying to listen to the healthy part of her brain – Los Angeles Times
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1 hr 9 min
Wrapping Up Folklore: Part 1
Season 1, Episode 60
Show notes
Well, guys, we’ve really stressed Uncle Jerry out with this one. He went so deep on the folklore album as a whole that this episode focuses mostly on the prologue and how it sets up this new style of storytelling, different from all her previous albums. Hope you enjoy, and we’ll see you back here next week for Part 2!
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
*Starship Troopers – Robert A. Heinlein
*Shakespeare's Sonnets & Poems – William Shakespeare
*Sonnets from the Portuguese – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
*Astrophil and Stella – Sir Philip Sidney
Anecdote of the Jar – Wallace Stevens
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1 hr 9 min
The Despair and Persistence of This is Me Trying
Season 1, Episode 59
Show notes
We’ve made it to the end of the folklore road! Join Uncle Jerry and Angela as they discuss this is me trying, where the duo finds some Typical Taylor, ambiguity, paradox, multiple meanings, and so much more.
Come back for the next two weeks as we wrap-up discussion of the album as a whole.
Works Cited:
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1 hr 14 min
The Secretive Destruction of Illicit Affairs
Season 1, Episode 58
Show notes
Today we’re covering our penultimate folklore poem with Illicit Affairs. Uncle Jerry finds this song fits perfectly within the category of folklore, and shows us just how Taylor Swift’s use of language showcases the lack of love in this song.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
The Road Not Taken – Robert Frost
*The Pleasure of the Text – Roland Barthes
Sonnet 138 – William Shakespeare
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58 min
The Paradox and Parallelism of Peace
Season 1, Episode 57
Show notes
Did we finally find Uncle Jerry’s least favorite folklore poem? And maybe Angela’s too? In this episode, we dissect Peace from Taylor Swift’s 2020 album, and Uncle Jerry finds many paradoxes and double meanings, while struggling to find a window to crawl through into the narrative.
Works Cited:
You’ve Got a Friend in Me – Randy Newman
Two Sleepy People – Fats Waller
Stuck in the Middle With You – Stealers Wheel
You Are My Sunshine – Jimmie Davis
Standing In The Rain – John Paul Young
Standing In The Rain – Al Green
Standing In The Rain – Electric Light Orchestra
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1 hr 51 min
Time’s Mystic Meandering in Invisible String
Season 1, Episode 55
Show notes
Buckle up, folks. This is a long one! Invisible String is up next in our folklore canon, and Uncle Jerry showed up PREPARED. He and Angela chat through folktales about the red thread, handfasting ceremonies, and more before diving into the poem. They then get into a long and philosophical conversation about fate and predestination and Forrest Gump.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
All in green went my love riding – e.e. Cummings
Leaves of Grass – Walt Whitman
Pope Innocent III and Handfasting
2 Kings 14:21 – 16 as the age of ascension
*The Sun Also Rises – Ernest Hemingway
Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
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1 hr 22 min
The Lives We Didn’t Live in The 1
Season 1, Episode 55
Show notes
We have the opening track of folklore for you today! Uncle Jerry and Angela discuss the relatable way Taylor Swift writes about the ruminations about the different lives we never got to live during this discussion of The 1.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
The Windhover – Gerard Manley Hopkins
Ernest Hemingway’s Iceberg Theory
*The Great Gatsby – F. Scott Fitzgerald
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1 hr 19 min
The Devastating Paradox of Hoax
Season 1, Episode 54
Show notes
In this episode, we are covering Hoax, the closing track from 2020’s folklore. Uncle Jerry starts out a bit iffy on his feelings about the poem, but talking through it with Angela helps him find extra meaning.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
Faithless Love – Linda Ronstadt
i sing of Olaf glad and big – e.e. cummings
*Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
Jonah 3 – Jonah Goes to Nineveh
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1 hr 19 min
The Tragedy of Miscommunication in Exile
Season 1, Episode 53
Show notes
Continuing along our folklore journey, this episode covers exile, the collaboration between Taylor Swift and Bon Iver. Uncle Jerry teaches us about different types of exile and how they appear across literature and folk tales. We then dig into the poem and Uncle Jerry admits to Angela that he almost cheated and listened to the song because he was so ready to hear how they spoke over each other.
Also, ICYMI, we will be finishing the entire folklore album. Stay tuned over the next few weeks as we tackle the remaining tracks and then do a comprehensive overview.
Song discussion starts at 19:12
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
Just Give Me a Reason – Pink ft. Nate Ruess
The Divine Comedy – Dante Alighieri
Gilgamesh, Nature, and Civilization
Poems From Exile: Ex Ponto, Book I – Ovid
*Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky
*A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – James Joyce
Polyphony in Contemporary Literature
Ballad meter or common measure
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1 hr 3 min
Finding Life’s Meaning in Epiphany
Season 1, Episode 52
Show notes
We are tackling one of the most underrated tracks from Taylor Swift’s folklore album, epiphany. The poem compares past war tragedies to 2020’s pandemic, and Uncle Jerry uses the poem to teach us about Hemingway’s Iceberg Theory.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner – Randall Jarrell
The Angels at Hamburg – Randall Jarrell
Rhapsody on a Windy Night – T. S. Eliot
The Song of Hiawatha – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Ernest Hemingway’s Iceberg Theory
*Death in the Afternoon – Ernest Hemingway
*Man's Search for Meaning – Viktor E. Frankl
Sonnet 19: When I consider how my light is spent – John Milton
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1 hr 24 min
Imagined Futures in Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus
Season 1, Episode 51
Show notes
We are back in our Tortured Poets Era with Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus. This song was much-requested and was voted on by our Patreon subscribers. Angela and Uncle Jerry talk through the poem and Uncle Jerry concedes that sometimes we try to find too much meaning in certain images.
Works Cited:
Sadie and Maud – Gwendolyn Brooks
maggie and milly and molly and may – e.e. cummings
Sonnet 12 – William Shakespeare
Sonnet 60 – William Shakespeare
Sonnet 73 – William Shakespeare
My Boyfriend’s Back – The Angels
Cold Cold Heart – Hank Williams
To His Coy Mistress – Andrew Marvell
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1 hr 25 min
Finding Agency in Dear John
Season 1, Episode 50
Show notes
We’re back in our Speak Now era with Dear John. Angela explains the lore behind this quintessential track 5 from Taylor Swift, and Uncle Jerry talks himself into being a fan of this poem.
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
*A Farewell to Arms – Ernest Hemingway
A Dear John Letter – Jean Shepard & Ferlin Husky
Dear John Letter – Whitney Houston
The Scholar-Gipsy – Matthew Arnold
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1 hr 29 min
The Peak of Innocence in Seven
Season 1, Episode 49
Show notes
This week is the one year podcast anniversary, and Angela saved this song especially for this episode. But before we tackle seven from folklore, Angela and Uncle Jerry reflect on the past year and Angela surprises him with a little quiz to see just how much he’s learned about Taylor Swift and swiftie culture.
Thanks for being here with us!
*Links with an asterisk are affiliate links, which allow us to make a small commission on your purchase at no cost to you. Thanks so much for your support!
Works Cited:
To His Coy Mistress – Andrew Marvell
American Primitive – Mary Oliver*
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1 hr 37 min
Superficial Celebrity Criticism in Shake It Off
Season 1, Episode 48
Show notes
We’re taking it back to 1989 with the only Taylor Swift song Uncle Jerry knew before we started this project. Angela expected this to be a quick, simple episode, but Uncle Jerry found a lot of deeper meaning in the glitter gel pen poem.
Works Cited:
A Handbook to Literature – William Harmon & Hugh Holman – Aff Link
Goblin Market – Christina Rossetti
Why We Oppose Pockets for Women – Alice Duer Miller
Stars – Richard Dyer – Aff Link
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1 hr 9 min
The Mosaic of Love in State of Grace
Season 1, Episode 47
Show notes
Today we return to Angela’s beloved Red era with State of Grace! Uncle Jerry surprises her with his excitement about the poem, and they go through all the ideas of love Taylor presents throughout the opening track.
And there’s gravy all over the plate!
Works Cited:
Kinetic or kinesthetic imagery
A Midsummer Night's Dream – William Shakespeare – Aff Link
A to Z Horoscope Maker and Interpreter – Llewellyn George – Aff Link
The Literate Mode of Cicero's Legal Rhetoric – Dr. Richard Leo Enos Ph.D. – Aff Link
Manos: The Hands of Fate – (1966)
Hesiod – Richard Lattimore – Aff Link
Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun – William Shakespeare
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1 hr 9 min
The Coming of Age Narrative in You’re On Your Own, Kid
Season 46, Episode 1
Show notes
Angela finally introduces Uncle Jerry to a pivotal track 5 from Taylor Swift’s discography—You’re On Your Own, Kid. They discuss the real life events that could have inspired the song and Uncle Jerry talks about other pieces of pop culture that tell a similar story.
Works Cited:
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain – Aff link
The Divine Comedy – Dante Alighieri – Aff link
Sonnet 73 – William Shakespeare
Keep a-Goin’ – Frank L. Stanton
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1 hr 9 min
The Chronicles of Conflict in The Great War
Season 1, Episode 45
Show notes
In this episode, Uncle Jerry and Angela tackle The Great War from 2022’s Midnights. Uncle Jerry wrestles with the idea of using a horrific event as a metaphor, and he teaches all about the many floral symbols used throughout the poem.
Works Cited:
The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady – Edith Holden – Aff Link
The Great War and Modern Memory – Paul Fussell – Aff Link
The Strange Destiny of Rupert Brooke Hardcover – John Lehmann
Memoirs of an Infantry Officer: The Memoirs of George Sherston – Siegfried Sassoon – Aff Link
Goodbye to All That – Robert Graves – Aff Link
All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)
War Poems – Wilfred Owen – Aff Link
Dulce et Decorum Est – Wilfred Owen
Poetry of the First World War: An Anthology – Tim Kendall – Aff Link
In Flanders Fields – John McCrae
The History and Rhymes of the Lost Battalion – Buck Private McCollum – Aff Link
Crimson & Clover – Tommy James and the Shondells
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