Throughout the semester, we have listened to a range of Taylor Swift’s music while reading various texts she references within and through her music. For your final essay, I want you to contemplate the question of why this all matters. Why is it worth considering the plays, poems, novels, and stories that someone like Swift references in her work? Why are these pieces of literature worth reading and understanding in their own right? What do we gain from reading them both separately and as a unit, and as a result, why is it important to understand what we would call the “intertextuality” of music and literature?
You should cite examples from no fewer than four (4) of the non-Taylor Swift materials we studied this semester, in addition to any of Swift’s music and media you wish to discuss. Include in-text citations where necessary; you do not need to include a separate works cited page unless you cite something that we haven’t looked at in class.
While your essay should reflect careful attention to detail and quality of writing, its primary goal should be to communicate the concepts and ideas you have learned across the semester.
Materials Studied in class: The Great Gatsby, The Lake Poems, Alice and the Adventures is Wonderland, Frost and Dickinson
