Taylor Swift’s Album Prologues, Explained

Cover image for Swiftly Sung Stories' page containing analysis of every Taylor Swift album prologue. A vintage-vibe teacher's desk displays a stack of books, an hourglass, a neatly-tied stack of papers, a quill pen, and an antique typewriter, and the black chalkboard behind the desk reads: "Taylor Swift's album prologues: what they say, what they mean, and why they matter".

Taylor Swift has included a prologue of sorts ever since her self-titled debut album. But over the years, they’ve evolved from a simple list of thank-yous into vivid essays about her songwriting.

With each Taylor’s Version album, she’s also written a new prologue, giving us backstory on the album, and narrating what her life was really like at the time of the original release.

Here’s every album prologue: the full text, what it means, why it matters, and how Taylor uses her introductions to draw us into her intricate world.

Taylor’s Prologues