WAIT. There is SO much to unpack here.
1 - F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote some of “This Side of Paradise” while he was in a military training camp LITERALLY CALLED “CAMP TAYLOR”. lol it is true, look it up.
2 - “This Side of Paradise” focuses (like a lot of Fitzgerald’s books) on love warped by greed and status seeking. Similar to how TS6 was probably supposed to be about love but the initial themes were then warped by the selfishness and exploitation of the media and other people in the industry. In the book basically this guy goes through life falling in love with different women, only to be let down in some way by each one and he ends the book going back to his old haunts, reconnecting with his past, and considering what he has learned from it all. He makes peace with himself and is content just being himself, ending the novel with the quote "I know myself, but that is all–”. Taylor has gone through love and been let down, but has come out knowing herself better than before. That last line of the book sounds a whole lot like “She lost him but she found herself and somehow that was everything”.
3 - Depending on what edition you read, the final line in “This Side of Paradise” ends in either a period (implying that there is not more to come) or a dash (implying that there is more to come). Since Taylor’s contract with Big Machine is ending, she probably isn’t sure if or when she is going to record new music after this. Is TS7 a period or a dash?!?!
We all know the story of Adam and Eve (because…christian imperialism), so I’m not going to recount it here. But this whole thing plays on that story. The first two points are reaching a little, but in the context of the last two, they’re relevant.
1 - To start off - we already know that Taylor loves her Eve imagery:
This may be a biiiiiit of a stretch, but lets go back to 1989 for a moment, which starts off with Welcome To New York…aka The Big Apple. Let us not forget that this era was also the era that she wrote her open letter to Apple (the company) and then later did multiple high profile ad campaigns with them. The gif above is from the Blank Space video, so also the 1989 era. Basically apples are popping up everywhere in this era. The most obvious symbolism of the fruit is that it’s forbidden, but it also represents knowledge and immortality - both which are important for the Paradise theory. BUT ALSO the old Taylor literally eats the apple during this era, the “original sin” which moves her into the next stage of her life, which we find is much more fraught and difficult.
2 - 1989 may start with the big apple, but it ends with New Years Day…which comes after New Years EVE. (Emphasis on the EVE.) On New Year’s EVE this year she 1- released her Reputation Tour on Netflix and 2 - threw a signature Taylor Swift party, which was the end to her reputation posts. Tbh she’s bringing a lot of attention to NYE. Eve is a scapegoat in the Bible, and literally every bad thing that has ever happened in the history of the world is blamed on her. Pretty similar to how the media treats Taylor, especially before the release of Reputation.
Total stretch, maybe, but worth thinking about.
(Also Calvin Harris’s real name is Adam, lol)
3 - Let us not forget the snake. In the story of Adam & Eve the snake is the one who ruins everything. TS6 changed course with all the drama and feuding, starting with #TaylorSwiftIsASnake and the whole snake emojis thing. The snake was the instigator, and it caused TS6 to be Reputation, as opposed to whatever it was supposed to be before the drama. The innocence that was in the previous albums was lost, and instead the themes of deceit and pain took over as well as the imagery of the snake.
(Also notable that the first snake explosion on instagram was involving the break up with Adam…and in the Bible the snake is also when things started to go poorly for Adam & Eve.)
(Also - back to the pair of dice - the faces where it says “Little Games” and “TS” are normally both ones. When you roll two ones it’s called Snake Eyes.)
HOWEVER - snakes can shed their skin, and because of this they also a symbol of rebirth……………..THUS………..
4 - The old Taylor - the “good girl” before the snake - is dead. But because she was good and pure when she died she went to paradise:
IN CONCLUSION - TS7=Paradise makes so much sense.
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
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