Fate vs. Free Will in The Prophecy
4/23/20261 hr 21 min
We are getting witchy today as we dive deep into The Prophecy from Taylor Swift’s 2024 album, The Tortured Poets Department. Uncle Jerry teaches us about some specific references to tarot and the occult in literature, and how that shaped a few of his interests. Angela tells the story of a tarot reading that Taylor received from a friend, and how she thinks it inspired this song.
Works Cited:
The Collected Poems of W.B. Yeats – William Butler Yeats – Aff Link
The Secrets of the Belline Oracle – Sylvie Steinbach – Aff Link
Visconti-Sforza Tarot Cards – The Morgan Library
Visconti Sforza Tarot Cards Cards – Stuart R. Kaplan – Aff Link
Miniature Rider-Waite® Tarot – Pamela C. Smith – Aff Link
Rider Waite Gold Foil Tarot Deck – Aff Link
Tarot Revelations – Joseph Campbell, Richard Roberts – Aff Link
A to z Horoscope Maker and Delineator – Llewellyn George – Aff Link
A Treatise on the Astrolabe – Geoffrey Chaucer – Aff Link
Antithesis – Rhetorical Device
Gimpel the Fool: And Other Stories – Isaac Bashevis Singer – Aff Link
The Miller’s Tale – Geoffrey Chaucer
Morphology of the Folktale – V. Propp – Aff Link
Taylor Swift’s Tarot Card Revelation Proves None of Travis Kelce Romance Was Accidental
The Swiftie and The Scholar Grading Matrix
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First 90 secondsSpeaker 00:00
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Speaker 10:28
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Angela McDowell· Host0:57
[upbeat music] Welcome to The Swiftie and the Scholar, the podcast where we examine the lyrics, lore, and literary legacy of Taylor Swift. I am Angela McDowell, the Swiftie.
Jerry Coats· Host1:14
And I am Dr. Jerry Coates, the scholar.
Angela McDowell· Host1:17
How you doing?
Jerry Coats· Host1:18
You know, I was... I've been looking forward to this.
Angela McDowell· Host1:21
Good.
Jerry Coats· Host1:21
Um, yeah, because we, we recorded August, Betty, and Cardigan in a marathon session.
Angela McDowell· Host1:29
We certainly did.