literary essay on dead poets society

Dead Poets Society

53 pages • 1 hour read

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Chapters 1-5

Chapters 6-10

Chapters 11-15

Character Analysis

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Discussion Questions

Describe Todd Anderson’s character arc as it relates to the theme of finding your voice . In what ways does Mr. Keating help him? In what ways does Neil?

Compare and contrast the characters of Charlie and Cameron. Be sure to track their growth or regression throughout the novel and focus on their relationship to the rules of Welton.

In Dead Poets Society , Welton is a symbol for the isolation that comes along with striving to maintain certain traditions and standards. Pick one character that experiences isolation in the novel and explain how they escape (or don’t escape) that feeling of loneliness.

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Dead Poets Society Is a Terrible Defense of the Humanities

The beloved film's portrayal of studying literature is both misleading and deeply seductive.

I’ve never hated a film quite the way I hate Dead Poets Society . I expect that them’s fighting words, at least in some quarters; at least I hope they are. Because I’m trying to pick a fight here.

I was in the last year of my English literature Ph.D. program in the summer of 1989, when Dead Poets Society was released. My younger brother Scott, who really didn’t have the money to spare, slipped my wife, Robyn, and me a 10-dollar bill (these were simpler times) and told us he’d watch our kids so we could go out to see it. No one in my family quite understood what I wanted to do for a living or, having finished my bachelor’s degree, why I’d spend seven more years in school to do it; but having seen Dead Poets Society , Scott believed he finally had an idea of what I wanted to do with my life, and more important, why.

We went to the movie and watched, often swept up in the autumnal New England beauty of Welton Academy (the real-life St. Andrew’s School, in Middletown, Delaware). But I walked out horrified that anyone would think that what happens in Mr. Keating’s classroom—or outside of it, because so many of his poetry-derived “life lessons” are taught outside the classroom, after all—had anything to do with literary study, or why I was pursuing a graduate degree in English. I think I hate Dead Poets Society for the same reason that Robyn, a physician assistant, hates House : because its portrayal of my profession is both misleading and deeply seductive. For what Keating (Robin Williams) models for his students isn’t literary criticism, or analysis, or even study. In fact, it’s not even good, careful reading. Rather, it’s the literary equivalent of fandom. Worse, it’s anti-intellectual. It takes Emily Dickinson’s playful remark to her mentor Thomas Higginson, “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry,” and turns it into a critical principle. It’s not.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m all for passion in the literature classroom. Harvard poetry professor Helen Vendler uses two lines from Wordsworth’s The Prelude as the title for an essay about teaching: “What we have loved, / Others will love …” That second line concludes, “and we will teach them how.” That’s how I teach, or hope to teach: with my heart on my sleeve, perhaps, but with my brain always fully engaged. I’m fortunate to do what I love for a living, and I know it. That’s how I was taught, in high school especially. I’m an English professor today because I had Mr. Hansen in ninth grade, and Mr. Jackson in eleventh.

But passion alone, divorced from the thrilling intellectual work of real analysis, is empty, even dangerous. When we simply “feel” a poem, carried away by the sound of words, rather than actually reading it, we’re rather likely to get it wrong. We see Mr. Keating, in fact, making just this kind of mistake during one of his stirring orations to the boys of Welton. In a hackneyed speech about resisting conformity that he seems to have delivered many times before, Keating invokes that oft-invoked but rarely understood chestnut, “The Road Not Taken”: “Robert Frost said, ‘Two roads diverged in a wood and I / I took the one less traveled by / And that has made all the difference.’”

Wha—? Has Keating actually read the poem from which he so blithely samples? For Robert Frost said no such thing: a character in his poem says it. And we’re meant to learn, over the course of that poem, that he’s wrong—that he’s both congratulating and kidding himself. He chooses his road ostensibly because “it was grassy and wanted wear”; but this description is contradicted in the very next lines—“Though as for that, the passing there / Had worn them really about the same,” and—more incredibly still—“both that morning equally lay / In leaves no step had trodden black.” He wants to claim to have taken the exceptional road, if not the spiritual high road; but he knows on some level that it’s a hollow boast.

Keating hasn’t actually read “The Road Not Taken” in any meaningful sense; rather, he’s adopted it, adapted it, made it his own—made it say what he wants it to say. His use of those closing lines, wrenched from their context, isn’t just wrong—it’s completely wrong, and Keating uses them to point a moral entirely different from that of Frost’s poem. (In a like manner, how often has Frost’s “The Mending Wall” been quoted out of context in debates about immigration reform? “Good fences make good neighbors,” indeed.)

The film’s anti-intellectualism is both quite visceral and quite violent. When his students first sit down with their new poetry anthology, Keating tricks a student into reading aloud a few sentences from the banal introduction written by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D.—a cartoonish version of academic criticism that opens with a split infinitive!—before instructing them to tear those pages out of their books. (Though generic-sounding, the essay’s title, “Understanding Poetry,” mischievously nods to the most influential poetry text of the 20th century, Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren’s Understanding Poetry [1938].) Although he employs mock-heroic terms, Keating makes it clear that they’re fighting for their spiritual lives:

This is a battle. A war. And the casualties could be your hearts and souls. Armies of academics going forward measuring poetry. No! We’ll not have that here: no more Mr. J. Evans Pritchard. [Notice how he’s just been stripped of his professional credential.] Now in my class you will learn to think for yourselves again. You will learn to savor words and language. No matter what anybody tells you, words and ideas can change the world.

Their textbook now purged of any taint of critical thought, the students are freed to enjoy an unmediated encounter with poetry in the raw.

This style of working with poetry—what’s sometimes termed poetry “appreciation,” as distinct from poetry criticism—is the m.o. of the Dead Poets Society, Welton’s bookish version of Yale’s Skull and Bones. Mr. Keating explains the purpose of the group to his inner circle of students in a conspiratorial whisper:

The Dead Poets were dedicated to sucking the marrow out of life. That’s a phrase from Thoreau we would invoke at the beginning of every meeting. A few would gather at the old Indian cave and read from Thoreau, Whitman, Shelley, the biggies—even some of our own verse—and in the enchantment of the moment we’d let poetry work its magic … We were Romantics. We didn’t just read poetry, we let it drip from our tongues like honey.

(“We would invoke ”? “Our own verse ”? Who’s writing this stuff?)

If the Welton School officials and parents suspect that Mr. Keating is leading his students astray, Pied Piper-like, there is at least something to that charge. Or rather, he’s sending them astray, without ever really leading them. The first meeting of the reconvened society ends with one of the students reciting Vachel Lindsay’s notorious 1919 poem “The Congo,” a text whose racial politics are ambiguous at best; about it, W.E.B. DuBois wrote, “Mr. Lindsay knows little of the Negro, and that little is dangerous.” Whatever the poem’s real or intended politics, the spectacle of an all-white clique of prep-school boys capering out of a cave into the night while chanting the poem’s refrain (“THEN I SAW THE CONGO, CREEPING THROUGH THE BLACK, / CUTTING THROUGH THE JUNGLE WITH A GOLDEN TRACK”)—well, shudder . Shades of “What Makes the Red Man Red?” from Disney’s Peter Pan . The setting, after all, is the “old Indian cave.”

For all his talk about students “finding their own voice,” however, Keating actually allows his students very little opportunity for original thought. It’s a freedom that’s often preached but never realized. A graphic example is presented in one of the film’s iconic moments, when that zany Mr. Keating with his “unorthodox” teaching methods suddenly leaps up onto his desk. Why? “I stand on my desk to remind myself that we must constantly look at things in a different way,” he helpfully declaims. How bold: He’s standing perhaps two and a half feet off the ground. Ralph Waldo Emerson, in his essay “Nature,” had made the same point rather more radically, suggesting that one “Turn the eyes upside down, by looking at the landscape through your legs.”

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Keating then has the boys march up to the front, of course, and one by one and two by two they mount his desk and they, too, “look at things in a different way”—exactly the different way that he has. After each has experienced this “small alteration in [his] local position” (Emerson), he steps or leaps off the desk, as if a lemming off a cliff: Keating’s warning, “Don’t just walk off the edge like lemmings!” unfortunately serves only to underscore the horrible irony of this unintended dramatic metaphor. Even when the students reprise this desktop posture at the film’s close, in a gesture of schoolboy disobedience (or perhaps obedience to Keating), we realize that while the boys are marching to the beat of a different drum, it’s Keating’s drum. Or they’re dancing to his pipes.

One of the strangest things about watching the film again, 25 years on—for while I’ve long loathed it, until now I’d never actually revisited it—is that I now find myself sympathizing not primarily with the plucky and irreverent John Keating, but to a surprising degree with his “old fart” colleagues whom I’m clearly supposed to find benighted. (It’s also a revelation to watch a young Ethan Hawke, before he could really act—and a young Robert Sean Leonard [Dr. Wilson on House ], before he couldn’t.) Smarmy to the end, Keating, when interrogated about his teaching antics by the school’s headmaster, quips, “I always thought the idea of education was to learn to think for yourself.” The film gives us no evidence that he’s done this for Neil, Todd, Knox, and Charlie. And while too cynical by half, the headmaster’s response is one with which I sympathize a good deal more now than I did back then: “At these boys’ age? Not on your life. Tradition, John. Discipline. Prepare them for college and the rest will take care of itself.” On some level, Keating is a Lost Boy who refuses to grow up. It’s hard to forget, in this connection, that Williams went on to play Peter Banning/Peter Pan two years later in Steven Spielberg’s parental guilt-fueled remake of that story, Hook .

Why does all of this matter? In part, because Dead Poets Society might well be the most enduring and beloved picture ever made about teaching the humanities. While many English professors dislike and distrust the film, there’s another large contingent, even among those who teach literature in high school and college, that loves it. And I’m not deaf to its charms. Compared to his colleagues, Mr. Keating is a thrilling teacher, a breath of fresh air, and rightly beloved. The rote repetition and memorization taking place in adjoining classrooms makes his teaching seem quite vibrant.

But while avoiding the pitfalls of dull pedagogy, Keating doesn’t finally give his students anything in its place besides a kind of vague enthusiasm. Next door, Mr. McAllister’s students are declining Latin— Agricolam, Agricola, Agricolae, Agricolarum, Agricolis, Agricolas, Agrilcolis ; out in the hallway, in front of the trophy case and faded photographs of old Weltonians, Keating preaches it. “Carpe diem,” he entreats, during their first class period together.

With its 25th anniversary nearly upon us, the enduring popularity of Dead Poets Society —voted the greatest “school film” ever made, and often named by viewers as one of the most inspirational films of all time, according to a 2011 piece in The Guardian —has a great deal, I believe, to tell us about the current conversation concerning the “crisis in the humanities.”

Certainly it has been an interesting few years for humanists. Since the economic downturn of 2008, enrollments in humanities courses across the country have declined; at the same time—the flip-side of the coin—colleges and universities are seeing a sharp increase in students majoring in those disciplines which, rightly or wrongly, are thought to ensure better employment prospects at the conclusion of one’s studies. This titanic (if cartoonish) battle, often characterized as STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) versus humanities—Big Science, little man—has been splashed across the higher-education and broader popular press, and has clearly captured the public imagination. The headlines in the Chronicle of Higher Education suggest the contours of the “crisis”: “ The Humanities’ Value ” (“Why should society support the humanities when so many people are suffering from the effects of the economic crisis?”); “ In the Humanities, How Should We Define ‘Decline’? ” (“Colleagues nationwide were stunned to learn a few weeks ago that a French department and four other humanities departments at SUNY-Albany were being sacrificed for their ‘underperformance’”); and even “ It’s Time to Stop Mourning the Humanities ” (“As we are forced to sell out to corporate models of higher education, let’s at least be sure to sell high”).

In the conversation about the fate of the humanities, these disciplines are often caricatured to the point of being unrecognizable to those of us in the component fields. The most alarming version—one, I’m arguing, that has been propagated by Dead Poets Society —is what I’ve taken to calling “sentimental humanities”: humanities content stripped of all humanities methodology and rigor. This is a feel-good humanities—the humanities of uplift. The film is of no help as we try to find our way out of our current standoff—and to the degree that it unconsciously stands in for humanities pedagogy and scholarship, it does real damage. I believe, in particular, that there are two fundamental problems with allowing this Dead Poets Society, sentimentalized version of the humanities to serve as our model for what it means to be deeply and passionately engaged in the study of music, art, language and literature, history, philosophy, religion—of human culture. Call them resistance and acceptance.

Though few will say so publicly, there are those with a stake in the debate who resist granting a greater role in contemporary higher-ed curricula to the humanities. When they resist, it’s often the sentimental humanities that they’re resisting: the conception that the humanities, as a group of disciplines, is more about feeling than thinking. That the humanities is easy, a soft option; that the humanities doesn’t train thinkers. Or more often, and more explicitly, that the humanities don’t train employees. North Carolina governor Pat McCrory made headlines last year by telling the state’s high-school seniors, “If you want to take gender studies that’s fine. Go to a private school, and take it. But I don’t want to subsidize that if that’s not going to get someone a job.” Even our president, with a social science degree (political science) and two years at a liberal arts college (Occidental), has repeatedly trumpeted the importance of technical education and vocational training. Though he’s since apologized , humanists across the country groaned when Obama quipped, at a General Electric plant in Wisconsin on January 30, that “folks can make a lot more, potentially, with skilled manufacturing or the trades than they might with an art-history degree.”

Oh: and that it’s the refuge of narcissists. No matter the text that he’s ostensibly engaged with, Mr. Keating, like Hamlet in Stéphane Mallarmé’s wonderful description, is forever “reading in the book of himself.” This is what Keating’s namesake John Keats (referencing Wordsworth) called the “egotistical sublime.” Recently, some pioneering work in neuroscience has begun to suggest what English teachers have long known: that the power of literature is the power of alterity, creating the possibility of encountering the other in a form not easily recuperable, not easily assimilable to the self. “Imaginative sympathy,” we used to call it. To read literature well is to be challenged, and to emerge changed.

But for Keating, it’s the text (like Frost’s poem) that is changed, not the reader. He does the same thing to the Whitman poem “O Me! O Life!” that he recites to his students. Used as the voiceover for a recent iPad ad , Mr. Keating’s pep talk quotes the opening and closing lines of the poem, silently eliding the middle: “Oh me! Oh life! / of the questions of these recurring, / Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish, /… / What good amid these, O me, O life? // Answer. // That you are here—that life exists and identity, / That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.” He’s quoting from Whitman, he says, but the first line he omits is telling: “Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?).” Go back and add that line to the quotation and see how it alters the whole. For Keating—and one fears, examining the scant evidence the film provides, for his students—every poem is a Song of Myself. This, then, is what’s at stake in Keating’s misreadings—I’m not interested simply in catching a fictional teacher out in an error. But he misreads both Frost and Whitman in such a way that he avoids precisely that encounter with the other, finding in poetry only an echo of what he already knows—what he’s oft thought, but ne’er so well expressed.

And when advocates for the STEM fields do make room at the table for the humanities, it’s too frequently this toothless, much-diminished variety they have in mind. Keating says, “We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute.” But I fear that too often, when we do find a place for the humanities in the curriculum, we do so precisely because they are. Cute. Because they make us feel all warm and fuzzy.

The last time our country experienced a “crisis in the humanities,” it coincided precisely with the rise of (largely Continental) literary theory in U.S. English and comparative literature departments in the 1970s and early ’80s. David Richter cleverly calls his classroom anthology of these theoretical readings Falling into Theory , for there’s a fully developed narrative of Edenic purity and postlapsarian cynicism that lies just beneath the surface of the public backlash against the ascendancy of literary theory.

So if, by one logic, the humanities is dismissed as too lightweight, in another they’re banished unless they bear themselves modestly, “come / on little cat feet.” The humanities fell from grace, then, as an unfortunate consequence of its politicization and turn to theory. In this narrative, the “crisis” in the humanities is wholly of its own making: It’s our own damn fault.

In the humanities, unlike the other branches of higher learning, any amount of analysis is liable to be dismissed as “paralysis by analysis” (in the way Keating dismisses Dr. J. Evans Pritchard’s critical method as “measuring poetry”). Those making such a charge might invoke these lines from Wordsworth’s “The Tables Turned”: “Our meddling intellect / Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:— / We murder to dissect.” These lines (especially the last) are much more familiar than the poem from which they’re taken. But I’ve pulled a Keating on you: I’ve taken them out of context, for the first line of the quatrain is, “Sweet is the lore which Nature brings.” Wordsworth suggests that we murder not literature, but nature, with our “meddling intellects” (in order, paradoxically, to create literature in the first place). If Wordsworth and the Romantics sometimes argue for an anti-intellectual (or merely non-intellectual) relationship to nature, they never offer this as a theory of reading, as Keating consistently does.

But many people like misreading “The Tables Turned,” and like their poetry, as the Car Talk guys would say, “unencumbered by the thought process.” There’s a reason there’s no Dead Novelists Society: for poetry, in the public imaginary, is the realm of feeling rather than thinking, and the very epitome of humanistic study. To understand how preposterous and offensive this stipulation is, turn it around. Imagine what would happen if we suddenly insisted that physics professors were ruining the beauty and mystery and wonder of the natural world by forcing students memorize equations. Or if we demanded that the politics department stop teaching courses in political theory.

The resistance to the humanities: In one of its guises, that of Dead Poets Society, it finally comes down to a preference for fans over critics, amateurs over professionals. Everyone engaged in the debates swirling around the humanities, it seems, is willing to let humanists pursue their interests as amateurs, letting “poetry work its magic … in the enchantment of the moment.” Some of those who wish us well—so long as it doesn’t cost them anything, in terms of faculty lines, or course enrollments, or research funding—enjoy a fan’s relationship to the humanities themselves, and at best hope for the same for their students.

Scholars and teachers of the humanities, however: We will insist on being welcomed to the table as professionals.

Dead Poets Society | Main Themes

Dead Poets Society is a timeless masterwork that still impacts readers’ mind. This essay examines the deep issues present in this literary masterpiece, providing readers with an insight into the thought-provoking concepts that enthrall readers of all ages.

Table of Contents

Main Themes

Seize the day – carpe diem:.

The core idea of this work is carpe diem, encouraging people to enjoy each moment. In today’s fast-paced world, this theme’s encouragement to live truthfully and seize life’s opportunities is still applicable. The novel’s characters struggle to follow their genuine inclinations and break away from societal expectations.

Conformity vs. Individuality:

A major subject that emerges throughout the story is the conflict between individuality and conformity. Readers are encouraged to consider the significance of remaining true to oneself as the characters negotiate the strict expectations of society and their families. Despite social pressure, this topic is a potent reminder to accept individuality.

Poetry and Literature’s Transforming Power:

This work highlights the transforming Power of poetry and Literature. Students learn how words can inspire, question, and stir thought from their lively English teacher, Mr. Keating. This theme invites readers to recognize the enormous influence that Literature may have on influencing viewpoints and promoting personal development.

Legacy and Influence:

The novel’s narrative is deeply entwined with the idea of legacy. The thought of making a lasting impression weighs heavily on the characters, and they start to doubt the direction others have set for them. This subject encourages readers to shape their futures by getting them to consider their own goals and the legacy they hope to leave behind.

Questioning Authority:

Dead Poets Society, questions the idea of deferring to authority without question. Motivated by Mr. Keating, the students challenge social norms and pose questions to those in positions of authority. This subject fosters a sense of autonomy and the bravery to question the current quo by challenging readers to assess the institutions around them critically.

A group of students at an all-boys prep school forms the Dead Poets Society under their English teacher’s influence, challenging traditional norms and exploring the power of poetry.

Carpe Diem,” or “Seize the Day,” is a famous line from this work, emphasizing the importance of living in the moment.

The melancholy in this work stems from the conflicts between the students and societal expectations, culminating in a tragic event.

The moral story of this work revolves around individuality, challenging conformity, and the impact of inspiring teachers on students’ lives.

N. H. Kleinbaum wrote the novelization of the movie, but the original screenplay for Dead Poets Society was penned by Tom Schulman.

In summary, “Dead Poets Society” offers a timeless examination of the human condition through its underlying themes. These themes, which include the appeal to seize the moment, the conflict between originality and conformity, and the transformational potential of literature, are relevant to all age groups.

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One of the classic films about poetry, Dead Poets Society stars Robin Williams, Robert Sean Leonard, and Ethan Hawke. Directed by Peter Weir ( Picnic at Hanging Rock, Green Card, Master and Commander ), Dead Poets Society is set in the late 1950s in an East Coast boys' prep school, Welton Academy. Robin Williams plays the school's new English teacher and Welton alumnus, John Keating, who inspires his students to love poetry, and to live life to its fullest potential.

After discovering that their new teacher was once a member of the Dead Poets Society, a secret society that met and read poetry, Keating's students decide to resurrect the group. They begin sneaking off to the woods late at night to read Frost , Tennyson , and other poets, and in doing so learn to appreciate great poetry and form deep friendships.

Poetry is read and discussed throughout much of the film; a central scene involves a performance of Shakespeare 's A Midsummer Night's Dream and poetry recitations are sprinkled liberally throughout the movie. One of the most memorable scenes depicts the students' defiant recitation of Walt Whitman's "O Captain! My Captain!" to their beloved teacher. Winner of the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay and nominated for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor, Dead Poets Society is a moving story about gaining the freedom to be oneself in the face of adversity.

Directed by Peter Weir (1989). Rated PG.

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Essay about Dead Poets Society: Film Analysis

Anyone can prepare themselves to become a stronger writer. It takes practice and self motivation to proceed in the process to get better. It’s not easy, but with determination it can be accomplished. In the film, Dead Poets Society, a new English teacher, John Keating, uses atypical methods of teaching to reach out to his students at an all-boys preparatory academy. Through his lessons, his students learned to overcome the pressures from their families and school and tried to pursue their dreams.

In “Part 3” of Cal Newport’s, How to Become A Straight-A Student, Newport provides tips on how students can prepare themselves to write powerful essays. The film can translate well into the book written by Newport because students can use the themes presented in the movie to help them overcome obstacles in the writing process. Writing has roadblocks like life, we have to conquer it to improve. While the objective from Dead Poet’s Society differs from “Part 3” of Cal Newport’s, How to Become a Straight-A Student, it can be implied that the power to becoming a strong writer is to overcome obstacles.

Sometimes it’s hard to keep an open mind for new ideas, but exploring and discovering different perspectives can help benefit the grade you receive on your paper. It will spark the audience’s interest because of the engagement of a divergent outlook. In the film, Keating says, “I stand upon my desk to remind myself… that we must constantly look at things in a different way. The world looks very different from up here… Just when you think you know something you have to look at it in another way… When you read, don’t just consider what the author thinks, you must consider what you think” (Weir, Dead Poets Society).

He stands on the desk to emphasis how looking at things from another viewpoint can change a person’s perspective. There isn’t only one way to look at ideas and objects. For your paper, try and find a unique perspective of your own and write your thesis. If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask. Sometimes a seed is needed to help you get started. Ask for opinions from your friends and professors. As stated in the text, “[They] will help you identify pieces of your structure that are unclear or unnecessary” (Newport 185). A perspective can be compared to a thesis.

It will change and evolve as you continue in the paper-writing process (Newport 157). It’s inevitable, just like how it’s inevitable for perspectives to stay the same. Don’t wait too long to get started, find your own standpoint and just write your thesis. Your thoughts matter. Once a standpoint is found, your voice needs to be heard. Building up the courage to express oneself through words will be beneficial and helpful in the process of becoming a strong writer. In the film, Keating is teaching his students that they do not need to be resigned to what the author thinks.

He tells his students, “You must strive to find your own voice. Because the longer you wait to begin, the less likely you are to find it all” (Weir, Dead Poets Society). This quote conveys that it’s best not to wait too long to find the courage to find your own voice and express it. This is similar to “Part 3” when Newport quotes a straight-A student saying, “I don’t believe in sitting in front of a blank screen and just starting to write, hoping it will come to you” (Newport 141). Waiting for ideas to come to you will waste your time.

You have to do whatever it is necessary to get the creative juices flowing. To become a powerful writer, a student must prepare to present their ideas in their own voice. You don’t get better overnight. Newport writes, “the hard truth is that the only way to get better at organizing and presenting your thoughts is through practice” (Newport 175). You get better as you practice. Writing may be intimidating, but taking the time to practice can help you improve. Making the most of the present time can help your paper become extraordinary.

In the film, on the first day of class, Keating takes his students out to have their lesson in the hallway, instructing them to observe the pictures on display because, even though they’ve passed it many times, they haven’t really looked at it. He tells his students, “Seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary” (Weir, Dead Poets Society). His message was to make the most of their lives, leave behind a legacy, because eventually death will come. When you are writing, you should limit your distractions and focus on the task at hand.

Making the most of your time will result in more work being completed. In “Part 3,” Newport states, “The key to effective paper writing is breaking down tasks into manageable units” (Newport 144). He is conveying that breaking down the writing process will be more organized and efficient than rushing to get it done. Once you’re done with the draft of your paper, come back to the thesis. “Don’t be afraid to leave room for ambiguity” (Newport 157). Be vague with the thesis. In life, students may not know how to become extraordinary and it’s okay to not know.

There is a broad list of opportunities. They will get there, but they have to take the steps towards that goal or find a way to get there. Writing a great paper doesn’t come to a person all at once, creating productive steps can help get to that level of work. However, if steps are made and there is no time being spent to complete them, it’s useless. Use your time wisely and your paper can become extraordinary. You don’t need to be a superhero to become a strong writer. The power is already in you, you have to find it and bring it out.

Don’t be afraid to think outside the box for ideas, it will help bring attention to your paper. Once your ideas are found, use your own voice to express it in your writing. You don’t have to be resigned to a certain way of thinking. Make sure to spend time on writing your paper. Ideas will only be ideas if you don’t do the work. It may seem impossible to write an amazing paper right off the bat, but make it possible by practicing. You become a strong writer as you overcome the roadblocks. It’s only impossible if you don’t make it possible.

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"Dead Poets Society" is a collection of pious platitudes masquerading as a courageous stand in favor of something: doing your own thing, I think. It's about an inspirational, unconventional English teacher and his students at "the best prep school in America" and how he challenges them to question conventional views by such techniques as standing on their desks. It is, of course, inevitable that the brilliant teacher will eventually be fired from the school, and when his students stood on their desks to protest his dismissal, I was so moved, I wanted to throw up.

Peter Weir's film makes much noise about poetry, and there are brief quotations from Tennyson, Herrick, Whitman and even Vachel Lindsay, as well as a brave excursion into prose that takes us as far as Thoreau's Walden. None of these writers are studied, however, in a spirit that would lend respect to their language; they're simply plundered for slogans to exort the students toward more personal freedom. At the end of a great teacher's course in poetry, the students would love poetry; at the end of this teacher's semester, all they really love is the teacher.

The movie stars Robin Williams as the mercurial John Keating, teacher of English at the exclusive Welton Academy in Vermont. The performance is a delicate balancing act between restraint and schtick.

For much of the time, Williams does a good job of playing an intelligent, quick-witted, well-read young man. But then there are scenes in which his stage persona punctures the character - as when he does impressions of Marlon Brando and John Wayne doing Shakespeare.

There is also a curious lack of depth to his character compared with such other great movie teachers as Miss Jean Brodie and Professor Kingsfield. Keating is more of a plot device than a human being.

The story is also old stuff, recycled out of the novel and movie " A Separate Peace " and other stories in which the good die young and the old simmer in their neurotic and hateful repressions. The key conflict in the movie is between Neil ( Robert Sean Leonard ), a student who dreams of being an actor, and his father ( Kurtwood Smith ), who orders his son to become a doctor and forbids him to go onstage. The father is a strict, unyielding taskmaster, and the son, lacking the will to defy him, kills himself. His death would have had a greater impact for me if it had seemed like a spontaneous human cry of despair, rather than like a meticulously written and photographed set piece.

Other elements in the movie also seem to have been chosen for their place in the artificial jigsaw puzzle. A teenage romance between one of the Welton students and a local girl is given so little screen time, so arbitrarily, that it seems like a distraction. And I squirmed through the meetings of the "Dead Poets Society," a self-consciously bohemian group of students who hold secret meetings in the dead of night in a cave near the campus.

The society was founded by Keating when he was an undergraduate, but in its reincarnate form it never generates any sense of mystery, rebellion or daring. The society's meetings have been badly written and are dramatically shapeless, featuring a dance line to Lindsay's "The Congo" and various attempts to impress girls with random lines of poetry. The movie is set in 1959, but none of these would-be bohemians have heard of Kerouac, Ginsberg or indeed of the beatnik movement.

One scene in particular indicates the distance between the movie's manipulative instincts and what it claims to be about. When Keating is being railroaded by the school administration (which makes him the scapegoat for his student's suicide), one of the students acts as a fink and tells the old fogies what they want to hear. Later, confronted by his peers, he makes a hateful speech of which not one word is plausible except as an awkward attempt to supply him with a villain's dialogue. Then one of the other boys hits him in the jaw, to great applause from the audience. The whole scene is utterly false and seems to exist only so that the violence can resolve a situation that the screenplay is otherwise unwilling to handle.

"Dead Poets Society" is not the worst of the countless recent movies about good kids and hidebound, authoritatian older people. It may, however, be the most shameless in its attempt to pander to an adolescent audience. The movie pays lip service to qualities and values that, on the evidence of the screenplay itself, it is cheerfully willing to abandon. If you are going to evoke Henry David Thoreau as the patron saint of your movie, then you had better make a movie he would have admired. Here is one of my favorite sentences from Thoreau's Walden, which I recommend for serious study by the authors of this film: " . . . instead of studying how to make it worth men's while to buy my baskets, I studied rather how to avoid the necessity of selling them." Think about it.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Film credits.

Dead Poets Society (1989)

130 minutes

Robert Sean Leonard as Neil Perry

Josh Charles as Knox Overstreet

Dylan Kussman as Richard Cameron

Ethan Hawke as Todd Anderson

Robin Williams as John Keating

Gale Hansen as Charlie Dalton

Directed by

• Tom Schulman

Photography by

Produced by.

• Steven Haft
• Tony Thomas
• Paul Junger Witt
• Maurice Jarre
• William Anderson

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Essays on Dead Poets Society

The Dead Poets Society is a timeless film that explores the power of literature and poetry to inspire and provoke change. Writing an essay on this film is important because it allows you to delve deeper into its themes, characters, and impact on the audience.

When writing an essay on Dead Poets Society, it is important to first familiarize yourself with the film. Watch it multiple times, taking note of key scenes, character development, and the overall message of the story. This will help you form a solid foundation for your essay.

Next, consider the themes of the film. Dead Poets Society touches on themes such as individuality, the power of literature, and the conflict between tradition and personal expression. These themes can be used as the basis for your analysis and argument in your essay.

In addition, it is crucial to analyze the characters in the film and their development throughout the story. How do the characters’ actions and decisions drive the plot forward? How do they contribute to the overall message of the film?

When writing your essay, it is important to support your arguments with evidence from the film. Use quotes and specific scenes to back up your points and provide a deeper understanding of the film.

Finally, make sure to proofread and edit your essay before submitting it. Check for grammar and spelling errors, and ensure that your argument is clear and well-supported.

In conclusion, writing an essay on Dead Poets Society is important because it allows you to explore the film's themes, characters, and impact. By familiarizing yourself with the film, analyzing its themes and characters, and supporting your arguments with evidence, you can create a compelling and insightful essay.

What Makes a Good Dead Poets Society Essay Topics

When it comes to writing an essay on Dead Poets Society, choosing the right topic is crucial. A good essay topic should be thought-provoking, relevant, and engaging. To brainstorm and choose an essay topic, consider the themes, characters, and plot of the movie. Think about what aspects of the film resonate with you and what you are passionate about. Consider the historical context and social issues the film addresses. A good essay topic should also be specific and focused, allowing you to explore it in depth.

Best Dead Poets Society Essay Topics

• The role of non-conformity in Dead Poets Society
• The impact of Mr. Keating's teaching methods on the students
• The theme of carpe diem in the film
• The portrayal of individualism vs. tradition in Dead Poets Society
• The significance of poetry in the movie
• The character development of Neil Perry
• The influence of the setting on the characters' actions
• The role of societal expectations in the film
• The symbolism of the cave in Dead Poets Society
• The theme of friendship and loyalty in the movie
• The impact of the boys' secret society on their lives
• The conflict between personal passion and parental expectations
• The use of cinematography to convey the film's message
• The significance of the title "Dead Poets Society"
• The portrayal of adolescence and coming-of-age in the movie
• The relationship between Mr. Keating and the students
• The theme of rebellion and its consequences
• The significance of the final scene in Dead Poets Society
• The impact of Neil's death on the other characters
• The representation of free thinking and self-expression in the film

Dead Poets Society Essay Topics Prompts

• Imagine you are one of the students at Welton Academy. Write a journal entry reflecting on the influence of Mr. Keating's teachings on your life.
• Create a character analysis of Neil Perry, exploring his motivations, strengths, and weaknesses.
• Write a persuasive essay arguing for or against the role of conformity in society, using examples from Dead Poets Society to support your argument.
• If you could change the ending of the film, how would you rewrite it? Explain your reasoning and the impact of your alternative ending on the film's message.
• Imagine you are a film critic reviewing Dead Poets Society. Write a critical analysis of the movie, discussing its strengths, weaknesses, and overall impact.

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Famous Poems and Best Poets

A Reflection on the Movie “Dead Poet’s Society”

History constantly witnesses the never-ending struggle between tradition and innovation. As an old adage goes, “the only constant thing in this world is change” and it is indeed true. The society that we have today is a by-product of continuous changes changes that generations before us believed to be for the better. Thus, history serves as a “storehouse” of information that can help us understand change and how the society we live in came to be. The definition of History as a “natural tension between tradition and Innovation” Is best represented in the movie Dead Poet’s Society.

Set in 1959, the movie is the story f students at the respected “Walton Academy”, an all-boys preparatory school In Vermont. Such schools were (and often still are) very conservative institutions that serve as high schools for parents who Insist on sending their children to the best universities. The story is an all-common scene in our history. A traditional way of living and doing things is initially present. Almost everyone is conforming to that tradition since it is the “best” way people know on how to do things.

Not everybody may be happy but the familiarity that the tradition brings provides comfort and security. Then come long a different (either good or bad) Idea to change how things are originally done. The traditionalists will resist and even condone the change while the proponents of Innovation will try to prove that the change Is for the better. The changes may persist in a particular society, and as the time goes on, these changes will be embedded on the culture until it becomes the new tradition, which new changes will, again, try to contest.

And again, the whole cycle begins. In the movie, the tradition is represented by the educational system where students memorized and translated the central works of the distant past, learning ancient engages, rhetoric, and simple mathematics by rote. Professors emphasized accuracy and not comprehension. Conservative and conformist, Walton, like any other early colleges had little Interest either In expanding knowledge or in Inciting critical thinking. Lessons were infused with a deeply religious vision of the world and of the duties both as a citizen and as a family-member.

The colleges saw themselves as bulwarks against change, training the pastors, doctors, and lawyers of the next generation. Largely driven by a sense of tradition, the school Imposes out-dated teaching techniques on both its teachers and its students. The students are encouraged to mindlessly take in facts and regurgitate them on command. The teachers are expected to teach according to a rigid set of rules. But change arrived regardless, driven by the needs of a growing society. The innovation in the movie is represented by John Keating, the newest professor at other professors at the academy, Keating actually speaks to the students.

So unique and out of the ordinary are his words that the students are awe-struck, and uncertain how to respond. Whereas other teachers merely lecture and delegate, Keating pushes his students to be involved, to think, to use their minds. He believes that education requires the student to think for himself. He emphasized that the students must be free to question and to learn in the way that they learn best. He also wants to ensure that they really learn to experience life, to “suck the marrow” out of it.

Through this encouragement, he was able to reach his students like none of the teachers before him did, though few schools accept the basic premise of his teachings and Walton Academy is no exception. Coming into conflict with John Seating’s motivating speeches about finding one’s own voice are years of tradition, involving both the academy and the families whose hillier attend the academy. These two irrepressible forces (Seating’s innovative way of teaching and Welter’s traditional system of education) are destined for a collision, which is brought about by this age-old conflict of traditional compulsion versus freedom and flexibility.

Keating rejects tradition and refuses to teach by the old methods. The school refuses to accept change. And so the battle begins. Seating’s first act of business is to ask one of the students to read the first four lines of Robert Hayrick’s “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time,” the most famous “carper mime” or “seize the day” poem in English: “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may: / Old time is still a-flying; / And this same flower that smiles today, / Tomorrow will be dying. ” Keating follows this up with a reminder that we are “food for worms. This is a somewhat unorthodox invocation of the time-honored adage about life being too short. It is certainly appropriate for a teacher to use this perhaps unusual but highly effective method to drive home the point that young people are only young for a “short” time and that they should thus make the most of their time by seizing the day, thus making their “lives extraordinary. The fact that all this takes place in front of a class picture of a long-ago student body on the wall (the members of which are by that time probably all dead) Just delivers the point Keating is making with that much more relevance and effectiveness.

In the scene where Keating asks the students to tear the pages out of their textbook, we witness the second major scene involving Seating’s ingenious and most effective teachings methods. Part of the secret of Seating’s success with his students is, of course, the fact that he levels with them, that he tells them (and occasionally shows them, too) what he firmly believes is the truth. The essay, “Understanding Poetry,” by J. Evans Pritchard, Ph. D. , is indeed “excrement” (to use Seating’s own characterization of it).

The “greatness” of a poem is not to be grafted onto horizontal and vertical lines where the first represents the “perfection” (as to rhythm, meter, and rhyme) and the second the “importance” (as to theme) of a given poem. As Keating tells the students after they have torn the offending pages from the book, “we don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the engineering, these are all noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life.

But poetry, tatty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. ” It is in the next classroom scene that Keating performs his famous stunt of standing upon the desk to remind the students that – as he puts it – we “must constantly look at things in a different way. ” “Just when you think you know something,” he tells them a moment later, “you have to look at it in another way. ” He urges them to think when they read “not Just what the author thinks. Consider what you think” as well. He urges them, too, to find their own voices.

There is no time to waste. The more habitual their thinking becomes, the more difficult it will be to change it later on. It is interesting to reflect in this connection on the fact that both George McAllister, a fellow teacher, and Mr.. Nolan object (the first mildly, the second vehemently) to Seating’s attempt to make 17-year-olds think for themselves. On the other hand, the case of Neil (one of Seating’s students) and his father represents an altogether different standpoint on how we can view tradition and innovation.

It is a tradition during that time for a child to follow his parents (father, in particular) regardless of the child’s personal preference. In the movie, Nil’s relationship with his father is a case of misunderstanding and lack of immunization. Mr.. Perry wanted what was best for his son, which led to extremely high expectations. Neil wanted to find out who he was and what he wanted to do. Neil was unable to discuss his opinions and options with his father, and Mr..

Perry was unwilling to look at Nil’s outlook on life, as it did not appear as Neil had a concrete idea of what he wanted to do. This cyclical pattern led Neil to conclude that suicide was the only way to gain control of his life and stand up to his father. Mr.. Perry was a traditionalist, which unfortunately meant he had a difficult time expressing affectionate emotions. He also had a large number of expectations because like any parent, he ultimately wanted the best for his son, a 16-17 year old with a bright future ahead of him.

Unfortunately, Neil never really saw or understood that his father only wanted what was best for Neil. He only saw the tyrant-like authority figure who constantly demanded that Neil achieve greatness in academia and who obeyed him unquestioningly. In this situation, the father and son were like strangers, each with a specific perception of the other, but neither really knew who the other was. This perpetuated the cycle of misunderstandings between the two and eventually played a major role in Nil’s suicide.

At that moment, it is evident that Neil is not happy with the traditional way his father treats him. He wanted a change, but he never really stood up to his father. There were times he tried, like when Mr.. Perry told Neil he should drop some extracurricular activities, but he did so in the presence of others, which created a hostile environment between the two. The story of Nil’s life would have been different if he was Just brave and innovative enough to think of ways on how he an positively affect his father’s belief without antagonizing him.

It would have been what Neil wanted and what they could do to compromise. Nil’s situation is an example where change is inevitable. But the inability of the characters to cope with these changes led to their own destruction. In general, we can say that while we have held fast to our common values as a society and as an individual, the one true constant in this world has been that of creative change. If our institutions hope to remain relevant to our society and to our state, this tradition of adaptation and evolution must continue.

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Published in Essays

The Case Against ‘Dead Poets Society’

“Dead Poets Society” (1989) is a beautifully filmed and affecting movie that was nominated for several Academy Awards and won the award for best original screenplay. The film, which stars the late Robin Williams as an energetic and innovative English teacher named John Keating, is set in the late 1950s at an elite boys’ boarding school in New England: the fictional Welton Academy.

At Welton, boys are offered a rigorous and traditional education. They are drilled in Latin verbs; they solve advanced math problems; they memorize historical facts. In what was by 1989 a reductionist and ideological rendering of a 1950s educational setting, Welton students are never explicitly encouraged to find joy in any of their scholastic pursuits. Or, really, in anything.

Mr. Keating and his real-life counterparts now dominate secondary and post secondary education. That’s a problem.

That is, until Williams’s young Mr. Keating—himself a Welton graduate, a well-regarded English teacher and a student of romantic poetry—arrives on the scene.

At Welton, Keating’s first class consists of walking his pupils into the school’s hallway to peruse framed photographs of Welton alumni. There, Keating tells the students that they may henceforth address him not as Mr. Keating but as “O Captain, My Captain!”—a reference to Walt Whitman’s 1865 poem about the death of President Abraham Lincoln. Then, maintaining the class’s focus on the photographs of Welton students of yore, Keating recites the first line of Robert Herrick’s 1648 poem, “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time”: “gather ye rosebuds while ye may.” The boys must, Keating tells them, “seize the day,” because mortality looms. “We are food for worms, lads,” says Keating, so live for the moment. Carpe diem .

Keating’s second lesson for the Welton students involves literally ripping out of their poetry books an essay by a scholar named J. Evans Pritchard titled “Understanding Poetry.” This essay purports to offer a graphing formula by which one can ascertain any given poem’s so-called greatness by plotting its “artfulness” on one axis and its “importance” on the other. The exercise conveys Keating’s conviction that the pedagogical and academic theory called New Criticism, which emphasized close reading and aesthetics (and which dominated instruction in literature from the 1940s until the late 1960s), is in fact “excrement.” In his class, Keating tells his pupils, there will be no “armies of academics going forward, measuring poetry…you will learn to think for yourselves.”

Keating’s semantic brilliance make his philosophy go down like the coolest, sweetest beverage on a hot summer day.

It’s all very heady stuff. The boys begin meeting in a cave at night to read poetry to one another in an attempt to resurrect the forbidden Dead Poets Society, in which Mr. Keating participated as a Welton student. The teens are mesmerized and inspired by Keating, just as generations of viewers have been mesmerized and inspired by the film of the same name. I confess to having been so myself when I first saw the film at age 15. Especially for those of us who came early to a love of literature, Keating’s semantic brilliance and theatrical self-assurance make his philosophy go down like the coolest, sweetest beverage on a hot summer day.

The problem? The film’s fictional Keating and his real-life counterparts—who now dominate secondary and post-secondary education—mostly poison the young people whose intellectual and spiritual thirst they mean to quench.

Healthy Order and Healthy Disorder

Before Keating exerts his influence, Welton is a place where many boys are thriving. We see boys sneaking transistor radios into dorms, boys contemplating how to steal the girlfriends of public-school athletes, boys forming regular study groups and occasional cheating alliances, boys bustling with the restless physical energy that, more than any other characteristic, defines male youth.

That is, we see boys pushing against the boundaries that their parents and teachers have set—exactly as healthy teens should.

Are those boundaries overly narrow and constraining, and therefore due for reform? In some cases, absolutely—and tragically so. Animated by class anxiety and therefore deeply concerned about his son’s academic performance and professional trajectory, Mr. Perry, the father of a boy named Neil, forces his son to withdraw from a position as assistant editor of Welton’s yearbook so that he can focus exclusively on his course work. Worse, given Neil’s deep penchant for acting, Perry forbids his son from participating in a local production of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Neil defies his father by participating in the play anyway and ultimately commits suicide when his parents fail to understand the depth of his commitment to the theater and continue to insist that he become a doctor.

Before Keating exerts his influence, Welton is a place where many boys are thriving.

In the wake of Neil’s death, the Welton administration dismisses Mr. Keating, blaming his unorthodox instructional methods and the Dead Poets Society for the tragedy. This is, of course, unfair to the well-intentioned Keating, who was trying to help Neil explain to his father just how much he loves acting.

Still, as anyone who has spent any time around teenagers (especially teenage boys) knows, their primary limitation is not an inability to seize the day; it is an inability to plan for the future. Indeed, teens’ impulsivity and recklessness is best met with exactly the kind of regimentation, order and authority that Welton as a whole was attempting to provide.

This is the same kind of regimentation, order and authority with which adults of every race, religion and class engaged with teenagers until the 1960s. And, of course, it sometimes had its excesses. Any claim to mathematically measure the “greatness” of poems is self-evidently asinine. More important, a father’s attempt to make significant life decisions for his healthy and self-aware teenage son, without his input, was bound to be counterproductive in every possible way.

But these excesses of the 1950s educational order, as depicted in “Dead Poets Society,” are made-up exceptions that prove the overwhelming rule: Healthy teens need order if they are to court and create developmentally healthy disorder. Being without boundaries to push and structures to push against leads to exactly the type of solipsistic, faux introspection that gives rise to the existential angst for which teens have been known ever since we accepted as a cultural rule that, in the words of Bob Dylan, “mothers and fathers throughout the land” should not “criticize what you can’t understand.”

As anyone who has spent any time around teenagers knows, their primary limitation is not an inability to seize the day; it is an inability to plan for the future.

But, of course, mothers and fathers can understand just fine. The only thing more anti-intellectual than some self-important college professor presuming to quantify the greatness of Shakespeare is some self-important English teacher presuming to teach impressionable boys to think for themselves by using them to unquestioningly validate his own credulous and oversimplified relationship to romantic verse. Keating demanded, remember, that his students rip out “Understanding Poetry” by the fictional foil, Pritchard—not that they develop arguments for refuting it or, forbid the thought, for agreeing with it. Keating does not want the boys to think for themselves—not really. He does not want them to think at all, in fact. He wants them to feel as he does.

When Keating is confronted by Welton’s headmaster, Mr. Nolan, and questioned about his unorthodox teaching methods, he replies that he “always thought the idea of educating was to learn to think for yourself.” What Nolan says in response includes what are meant to be the most villainous and regressive lines of the film: “At these boys’ ages! Not on your life. Tradition, John. Discipline. Prepare them for college, and the rest will take care of itself.”

All reductions to absurdity and excesses notwithstanding, the fictional Nolan has it right.

‘Lean on Me’

If only all the real-life Keatings had listened to voices like the fictional Nolan’s for the past several decades instead of—with some notable exceptions, many of them Catholic—systematically eradicating schools’ embrace of tradition and discipline, which once served as the necessary counterweight to teens’ natural drive to embrace the idea of carpe diem .

If they had, then another 1989 film about education, “Lean on Me,” would not remain so sadly relevant. Released just three months before “Dead Poets Society,” “Lean on Me” chronicles the drastic measures taken in 1987 by a real-life principal, represented in the film by the character Joe Clark (played by Morgan Freeman), to rescue an inner-city New Jersey high school. His task: to transform a “cauldron of violence” in which about one-third of the students could pass the New Jersey Minimum Basic Skills test into a safe, positive environment in which more than three-quarters of students demonstrated basic skills.

By the mid-1970s, the educational philosophy espoused by Mr. Keating in “Dead Poets Society”—that is, the hegemonic rejection of tradition and the emphasis on enthusiasm over discipline—had become normative in schools of education in American universities. Hence, ideologically motivated educational philosophies from out-of-touch academics had trickled down into the nation’s primary and secondary schools, particularly those serving the neediest urban students.

When Clark arrives at Eastside High, he finds rampant violence, chaos and underachievement. He recognizes instantly that these elements of disorder have one common cause: the Eastside High teachers’ unwillingness to claim discipline and order as values, and to enforce those values through legitimate authority.

When Clark arrives at Eastside High, he finds rampant violence, chaos and underachievement.

By the 1980s, too many such educators had been influenced by real-life Mr. Keatings. So when Clark yells that “discipline is not the enemy of enthusiasm,” his colleagues are deeply skeptical. When he assumes total authority, in deference not to the niceties of an abysmally failing status quo but to the demands of a reality he hopes to create in which “the minds of the young are set free,” his colleagues find this unilateral wielding of (legitimate) power jarring.

This is unsurprising, since by the time Clark gets to Eastside, the chaos has become so intractable that he must expel 300 “incorrigible” students to protect the other 2,700. He chains school doors (in violation of the fire code) to keep drug dealers out; and, despite the overwhelming popularity of his approach among the mostly minority parents in the Eastside community, he is under constant threat from a politicized school board and a self-interested mayor.

Leading up to 1989 and through the years that followed, when it would have been difficult (but not impossible) for us as a nation to do the hard work of heeding Mr. Clark and reforming our public schools accordingly, we chose to adopt Mr. Keating’s self-reverential, feel-good style instead—and to do so where we could least afford it.

We have little desire to break with conventional unwisdom. Like the boys of “Dead Poets Society,” we are too busy feeling to think.

Absent strict boundaries and consistent discipline, privileged teens like those in “Dead Poets Society” might develop the kind of sophomoric self-importance that causes themselves angst and others annoyance. More urgently, though, for underprivileged teens like those in “Lean on Me,” the consequences of discarding time-tested rigor in favor of misguided tolerance have been truly dire.

Today, about one-third of American fourth graders overall are proficient in reading. In 2019 (before Covid-19 measures took an even further toll), in one of the poorest large cities in the nation, my native Philadelphia, exactly 20 percent of high school students proved proficient in algebra. Meanwhile, the school superintendent in a socioeconomically depressed Philadelphia suburb that has been experiencing a rise in student-perpetrated violence and bullying pleaded with district parents to “please speak to your children about appropriate conduct on their way to and from school and in school.” The district, he said, is “putting our staff, our emergency responders, and other students in potentially unsafe situations.”

The fictional Clark, by contrast, after expelling 300 troublemakers, tells the remaining students, “You will not be bothered in Joe Clark’s school” and upbraids his fellow faculty members: “This is an institution of learning, ladies and gentlemen. If you can’t control it, how can you teach?”

This kind of swift, certain and consistent discipline—this insistence that socioeconomically disadvantaged students will not be subjected to victimization in their own schools—turned the real-life Eastside High around in the 1980s. With teachers rather than students in charge, Eastside was able to offer its students both academic rigor and supportive community. Similar reforms could yield similar results—even today.

But we have little desire to work that hard or to break with conventional unwisdom. Like the boys of “Dead Poets Society,” we are too busy feeling to think—for ourselves or at all.

So across the country, we as a society do tragically little that would require authoritative, honest and unsparing action over a sustained period of time to improve the lives and prospects of the students and families who need it most. Because that would be unpleasant, plodding work and would not feel good—and who wants that, what with each of our self-serving days on earth numbered?

Carpe diem , indeed.

Correction : A previous version of this piece incorrectly referred to the boarding school in the film as Dalton Academy. The school is called Welton Academy.

Elizabeth Grace Matthew is a visiting fellow at Independent Women’s Forum and a contributor to Young Voices. Her writing has appeared in USA Today, The Hill, Deseret News, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Law and Liberty, Real Clear Books & Culture and The Philadelphia Inquirer.

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Dead Poet's Society Week Long Lesson Plan USING THE FILM "THE DEAD POET'S SOCIETY" AS THE BASIS FOR TEACHING THE POETRY COURSE IN ENGLISH LITERATURE

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Vladimir Vukomanovic Rastegorac

Psychological and anthropological studies offer evidence that children think about death regardless of the place and time in which they live. Though nobody knows precisely when the children's conceptualization of death finishes, it can be assumed that the adoption of the sub-concepts about death begins at a preschool stage and ends around the age of 12 at the latest. The conceptualization, however, does not depend solely on the children's age: it is related to their cognitive development, (un)experienced death of a close person, and many other factors. This fact indicates that, as far as discussing death with children is concerned, one should not create an image of a homogenous group, but rather of many recepients who may respond differently to this kind of discussion. From a socio-historical perspective, avoiding conversations about death with children, which is quite common in the modern society, is determined mainly by social and cultural factors. Despite Philippe Aries' claim that in the West, and up to the 18th century, the room of a dying person could not be imagined without children, today, family members supress their grief for the deceased in front of the children. The reason for making death a taboo may lie in the socially imposed obligation to contribute to collective happiness which must not be compromised at any cost. Therefore, it should be born in mind that overlooking the topic of death is not an ideologically innocent act either: especially if it occurs at school, which can be rightly considered as an ideological apparatus of the state. The silence surrounding the topic of death in schools can be stopped by using the literary works which deal with this issue. This theme can be covered in the Serbian language and literature classes, and the second part of the paper offers the solutions how this can be accomplished...

Huda Fakhreddine

Auden’s famous complaint that ‘poetry makes nothing happen’, and Blanchot’s that art is useless to the world and to itself, are often cited as a truth about the practical uselessness of creative practice. Blanchot’s is, of course, an insistence on the autonomy of art, while Auden’s is a line from a poem – it is his elegy for WB Yeats, written to mourn not only a dead poet, but also the loss of peace (written, as it was, in the shadow of World War 2). Yet each writer has chosen writing, and ‘artistic’ writing, to complain that art/writing has no capacity to influence society or effect change. This is a bleak view of poetry and what it might be able to contribute to social needs: to knowledge, to understanding, and to the possibility of engendering change. Though it is perhaps a reasonable perspective, given the fact that poetry is about the aesthetic rather than about social action, I still wish to interrogate this attitude, to explore the possibility that poetry can in fact make some things happen: and, in particular, that it can generate knowledge and therefore new ways of seeing and of doing.

Catherine Wilson

Poetry, drama and the novel present readers and viewers with emotionally significant situations that they often experience as moving, and their being so moved is one of the principal motivations for engaging with fictions. If emotions are considered as action-prompting beliefs about the environment, the appetite for sad or frightening drama and literature is difficult to explain, insofar nothing tragic or frightening is actually happening to the reader, and people do not normally enjoy being sad or frightened. The paper argues that the somewhat limited and problematic epistemological framework for dealing with the question of fiction-induced emotions has been enhanced by a better empirical understanding of the role of the emotions in social animals and in our individual hedonic economies, as well as by a more generous philosophical assessment of what counts as 'real'. Literary works can be understood further as monuments to experiences of loss that memorialize the highly pleasurable attachments associated with them. The term 'poet' in the title of this article refers to the literary artist in general, following the usual translation of the term in Freud's essay, 'The Relation of the Poet to Daydreaming'. 1 Its subject matter is the 'Anna Karenina problem', the 'paradox of car-ing', which has a double aspect. 2 First, the mode of generation and ontological status of literature-generated emotions remains contentious; there is no general agreement on whether we can actually care about things that never happened and people who never existed. Second, the pleasurable nature of the aesthetic experiences of grief, fear, anxiety, and other negative emotions remains puzzling, in the absence of better elucidation of the psychological mechanisms allegedly at work in catharsis or aesthetic distancing. Grief has meanwhile been undertheorized by philosophers. This is understandable. To the philosopher, the salient phenomena are attachment, the building and maintenance of social bonds, and cooperative activities. Moral and political philosophy have much to say about care, community, responsibility to others, and related topics. Neglect, secession, and aban-donment attract less attention, for it is hard to talk about that which is not. Yet we recognize that emotional life consists of cycles of attachment and loss and that their evolutionary roots are deep and wide. 3 Friends drift away or move away, and we replace them with new friends; the children whose needs structured our lives grow up and move out so as to have children of their own; we tear up the hearts of others and get our own torn up too. Ordinary conversation testifies to the centrality of these attachments and losses in people's lives.

Steve Newman

Christopher Norris

Christopher Norris is Emeritus professor at Cardiff University. Recently, he began to address philosophical questions through poetry. In his paper, he explains why. Rather than expressing definite ideas in an elegant way, poetry can be intended as a process from which new ideas (also philosophical ones) can emerge. The result are a number of poems which cover a variety of issues, ranging from philosophy to politics, arts, history of ideas and science. Itinera has already begun to publish a few of these poems in previous issues and is now presenting three of them on painters (Turner, Matisse, Magritte).

The Iowa Review

Gerald Bruns

Journal of Philosophy of Education

Soyoung Lee

Teaching poetry presents difficulties of various kinds, and these can be illustrative of wider curricular and pedagogical challenges. This paper considers questions of knowledge and remembrance as they arise in two poems-Paul Celan's Todesfuge and Seamus Heaney's 'Mid-Term Break'-placing these in relation to Jean-François Lyotard's conception of the immemorial. Lyotard is concerned with a kind of repression in dominant conceptions of knowing and thinking, and with the insulation from experience that this effects. I shall argue that, in reading the poems, it is not so much the seeking of essential meanings that is at stake as a turning of attention to what cannot be fully grasped or contained. Towards the end, and with reference to Stanley Cavell, I discuss how refinement of judgement in relation to works of art can lead the way in shaping responsibility in our ethical and political lives. Such responsibility will be evident in our very words where these presuppose, depend on and are addressed to those of others.

Peter G Epps

This conference poses the question “Has Fiction Lost its Faith?” I suggest that this question is roughly the same as that asked in the title of Dana Gioia’s 1991 essay, “Can Poetry Matter?” If literature and literary study make any substantive contribution to the common good, it must be because both poetry and criticism are bound up with the active life in much the way teaching is, as a traditionary and culture-making work. The cultural moment that leads us to ask such questions as “Has Fiction Lost its Faith?” and “Can Poetry Matter?” is also the moment for which poems such as Holderlin’s “Bread and Wine” were written. As those who concern ourselves with poetry “in lean years”—also translated “the destitute time”—we will certainly want to take counsel in the matter. Beginning with the unlikely pairing of Martin Heidegger and Francis Schaeffer, and picking up some guidelines from St. Thomas Aquinas, I hope to identify some of the material conditions for a poetry that keeps faith and matters. [...] In a culture experiencing “the destitute time,” poetry can matter when poets called into close contact with the definite and plurivocal nature of the sacraments wrestle with the implications of that understanding for every part of life. Our culture’s rapid political and epistemic pendulum swings merely perpetuate the “divided field” of human reason that Schaeffer correctly diagnoses, but cannot cure with univocal propositions. It ought to be possible, however, to engage in a poetics of adjustment to the status of creature that richly explores analogical language and the allegorical understanding of history and lived experience; this should be most possible for those richly engaged in the sacramental life of the Church.

Katharina Kehbel

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Dead Poets Society

N. h. kleinbaum, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

Faced with the crushing conformity of boarding school life, John Keating inspires many of his students to rebel against the repressive, sometimes tyrannical culture at Welton Academy. The students’ rebellion takes many different forms, some internal (“freeing their minds” from conformity) and some external (drinking, sneaking off campus, playing pranks, etc.). At the end of the novel, we see an extreme form of rebellion against conformity and repressiveness: Neil Perry ’s tragic suicide. In general, the novel draws an important distinction between rebellion for the sake of rebellion and rebellion grounded in sincerity and passion.

In his earliest lessons at Welton, Keating underlines a concept that lies at the core of any fruitful rebellion against conformity: passion. A good life, he argues, is a passionate life, lived according to the individual’s unique talents and interests. Discovering one’s own unique talents, he implies, can take a lifetime—but doing so is inherently worthwhile because it yields true, fulfilling happiness. By the same token, Keating suggests that the lives of many adults are unsatisfying because they lack any true passion: people go through life without feeling love, whether for art, work, or other people. Keating’s lessons suggest that true rebellion must be personal before it becomes external: for example, an adult who gives up an unsatisfying job to pursue his passion is “rebelling” against society, without using violence or interfering with other people’s lives. Put another way, rebellion against the status quo has to be the result of passion, not the other way around.

As Keating’s students learn more and more from him, they’re inspired to rebel against their parents and against the Welton administration. But many of the students also misinterpret Keating’s ideas, celebrating rebellion for its own sake. Keating’s students seem more interested in rebelling against their parents and teachers than in standing up for what they’re truly passionate about. For instance, Charlie Dalton pulls an elaborate prank on Headmaster Nolan , seemingly for no other reason than that he wants to embarrass Nolan in front of the entire student body (Charlie claims to be standing up for women, but his claim is not very convincing—see “Men, Women, and Love” theme.) Keating later reprimands Charlie for his actions, suggesting that pranks and similar kinds of rebellion can be harmful when motivated by childish destructiveness, rather than sincere conviction. In general, many of Keating’s students mistake the thrill of disobedience for genuine passion.

Keating’s lessons in non-conformity and “seizing the day” could be interpreted as inciting rebellion, but ultimately, Keating is really a moderate figure. He wants his students to stand up for what is right, but also get along with their parents and teachers by communicating openly and honestly. Most of all, Keating wants his students to “rebel” against society in a personal, individual way: by altering their thinking, pursuing their sincere passions, and sharing these passions with other people. Keating encourages his students to get along with their teachers and parents: he encourages Charlie to exercise caution at Welton, and urges Neil Perry to talk to his father about his love for acting instead of going behind his father’s back. Though the novel ends in a tragedy of passion (Neil’s suicide, which is based in his love of acting and rebellion against his father), it seems that many of the other students ultimately take Keating’s real lessons to heart, rebelling against Nolan by standing on their desks , but only as a sincere show of solidarity with Keating himself.

Rebellion and Passion ThemeTracker

Rebellion and Passion Quotes in Dead Poets Society

He jumped dramatically onto his desk and turned to face the class. “O Captain! My Captain!” he recited energetically, then looked around the room.

Did most of them not wait until it was too late before making their lives into even one iota of what they were capable? In chasing the almighty deity of success, did they not squander their boyhood dreams? Most of those gentlemen are fertilizing daffodils now!

Keating grabbed onto his own throat and screamed horribly. “AHHHHGGGGG!!” he shouted. “Refuse! Garbage! Pus! Rip it out of your books. Go on, rip out the entire page! I want this rubbish in the trash where it belongs!”

He stood silent at the back of the room, then slowly walked to the front. All eyes were riveted on his impassioned face. Keating looked around the room. “What will your verse be?” he asked intently. The teacher waited a long moment, then softly broke the mood. “Let's open our texts to page 60 and learn about Wordsworth's notion of romanticism.”

“Ah,” McAllister laughed, “free thinkers at seventeen!” “I hardly pegged you as a cynic,” Keating said, sipping a cup of tea. “Not a cynic, my boy,” McAllister said knowingly. “A realist! Show me the heart unfettered by foolish dreams, and I'll show you a happy man!”

The point is that for the first time in my whole life I know what I want, and for the first time I'm gonna do it whether my father wants me to or not! Carpe diem, Todd!

“I feel like I've never been alive,” Charlie said sadly, as he watched Neil go. “For years, I've been risking nothing. I have no idea what I am or what I want to do. Neil knows he wants to act. Knox knows he wants Chris.”

Todd stood still for a long time. Keating walked to his side. “There is magic, Mr. Anderson. Don't you forget this.” Neil started applauding. Others joined in. Todd took a deep breath and for the first time he smiled with an air of confidence.

“God, I can't take it anymore! If I don't have Chris, I'll kill myself!”

I'd like to announce that I've published an article in the school paper, in the name of the Dead Poets Society, demanding girls be admitted to Welton, so we can all stop beating off.

Charlie held the receiver out to Nolan. “It's God. He said we should have girls at Welton,” Charlie said into the phone as a blast of laughter from the students filled the old stone chapel.

“There is a place for daring and a place for caution, and a wise man understands which is called for.” Keating said. “But I thought …” Charlie stammered. “Getting expelled from this school is not an act of wisdom or daring. It's far from perfect but there are still opportunities to be had here.”

"Yes, and acting!” Neil bubbled. “It's got to be one of the most wonderful things in the world. Most people, if they’re lucky, live about half an unexciting life. If I could get the parts, I could live dozens of great lives!”

“What is wrong with old habits, Mr. Overstreet?” “They perpetuate mechanical living, sir,” Knox maintained. “They limit your mind.”

“Talk to him, Neil,” Keating urged. “Isn't there an easier way?” Neil begged. “Not if you're going to stay true to yourself.”

“You have opportunities I never dreamed of!” Mr. Perry shouted. “I won't let you squander them.” He stalked out of the room.

“Damn it, even if the bastard didn't pull the trigger, he …” Todd’s sobs drowned his words until, finally, he controlled himself. “Even if Mr. Perry didn't shoot him,” Todd said calmly, “he killed him. They have to know that!”

“Cameron's a fink! He's in Nolan's office right now, finking!” “About what?” Pitts asked. “The club, Pitts. Think about it.” Pitts and the others looked bewildered. “They need a scapegoat,” Charlie said. “Schools go under because of things like this.”

As Nolan started down the aisle toward him, Knox, on the other side of the room, called out Mr. Keating's name and stood up on his desk too. Nolan turned toward Knox. Meeks mustered up his courage and stood up on his desk. Pitts did the same. One by one, and then in groups, others in the class followed their lead, standing on their desks in silent salute to Mr. Keating.

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Taylor Swift's 'Tortured Poets' is written in blood

On Taylor Swift's 11th album, The Tortured Poets Department , her artistry is tangled up in the details of her private life and her deployment of celebrity. But Swift's lack of concern about whether these songs speak to and for anyone but herself is audible throughout the album. Beth Garrabrant /Courtesy of the artist hide caption

On Taylor Swift's 11th album, The Tortured Poets Department , her artistry is tangled up in the details of her private life and her deployment of celebrity. But Swift's lack of concern about whether these songs speak to and for anyone but herself is audible throughout the album.

For all of its fetishization of new sounds and stances, pop music was born and still thrives by asking fundamental questions. For example, what do you do with a broken heart? That's an awfully familiar one. Yet romantic failure does feel different every time. Its isolating sting produces a kind of obliterating possessiveness: my pain, my broken delusions, my hope for healing. A broken heart is a screaming baby demanding to be held and coddled and nurtured until it grows up and learns how to function properly. This is as true in the era of the one-percent glitz goddess as it was when blues queens and torch singers organized society's crying sessions. It's true of Taylor Swift , who's equated songwriting with the heart's recovery since she released " Teardrops on my Guitar " 18 years ago, and whose 11th album, The Tortured Poets Department , is as messy and confrontational as a good girl's work can get, blood on her pages in a classic shade of red.

Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and 50 more albums coming out this spring

Turning the Tables

Taylor swift is the 21st century's most disorienting pop star.

Back in her Lemonade days, when her broken heart turned her into a bearer of revolutionary spirit, Swift's counterpart and friendly rival, Beyoncé , got practical, advising her listeners that while feelings do need tending, a secured bank account is what counts. "Your best revenge is your paper," she sang .

For Swift, the best revenge is her pen. One of the first Tortured Poets songs revealed back in February (one of the album's many bonus tracks, it turns out, but a crucial framing device) is called " The Manuscript "; in it, a woman re-reads her own scripted account of a "torrid love affair." Screenwriting is one of a few literary ambitions Swift aligns with this project. At The Grove mall in Los Angeles, Swift partnered with Spotify to create a mini-library where new lyrics were inscribed in weathered books and on sheets of parchment in the days leading up to its release. The scene was a fans' photo op invoking high art and even scripture. In the photographs of the installation that I saw, every bound volume in the library bears Swift's name. The message is clear: When Taylor Swift makes music, she authors everything around her.

For years, Swift has been pop's leading writer of autofiction , her work exploring new dimensions of confessional songwriting, making it the foundation of a highly mediated public-private life. The standard line about her teasing lyrical disclosures (and it's correct on one level) is that they're all about fueling fan interest. But on Tortured Poets , she taps into a much more established and respected tradition. Using autobiography as a sword of justice is a move as ancient as the women saints who smote abusive fathers and priests in the name of an early Christian Jesus; in our own time, just among women, it's been made by confessional poets like Sylvia Plath, memoirists from Maya Angelou to Joyce Maynard and literary stars like the Nobel prize winner Annie Ernaux. And, of course, Swift's reluctant spiritual mother, Joni Mitchell .

Even in today's blather-saturated cultural environment, a woman speaking out after silence can feel revolutionary; that this is an honorable act is a fundamental principle within many writers' circles. "I write out of hurt and how to make hurt okay, how to make myself strong and come home, and it may be the only home I ever have," Natalie Goldberg declares in Writing Down the Bones , the most popular writing manual of the 20th century. When on this album's title track, Swift sings, "I think some things I never say," she's making an offhand joke; but this is the album where she does say all the things she thinks, about love at least, going deeper into the personal zone that is her métier than ever before. Sharing her darkest impulses and most mortifying delusions, she fills in the blank spaces in the story of several much-mediated affairs and declares this an act of liberation that has changed and ultimately strengthened her. She spares no one, including herself; often in these songs, she considers her naiveté and wishfulness through a grown woman's lens and admits she's made a fool of herself. But she owns her heartbreak now. She alone will have the last word on its shape and its effects.

This includes other people's sides of her stories. The songs on Tortured Poets , most of which are mid- or up-tempo ballads spun out in the gossamer style that's defined Swift's confessional mode since Folklore , build a closed universe of private and even stolen moments, inhabited by only two people: Swift and a man. With a few illuminating exceptions that stray from the album's plot, she rarely looks beyond their interactions. The point is not to observe the world, but to disclose the details of one sometimes-shared life, to lay bare what others haven't seen. Tortured Poets is the culmination of a catalog full of songs in which Swift has taken us into the bedrooms where men pleasured or misled her, the bars where they charmed her, the empty playgrounds where they sat on swings with her and promised something they couldn't give. When she sings repeatedly that one of the most suspect characters on the album told her she was the love of her life, she's sharing something nobody else heard. That's the point. She's testifying under her own oath.

Swift's musical approach has always been enthusiastic and absorbent. She's created her own sounds by blending country's sturdy song structures with R&B's vibes, rap's cadences and pop's glitz; as a personality and a performer, she's all arms, hugging the world. The sound of Tortured Poets offers that familiar embrace, with pop tracks that sparkle with intelligence, and meditative ones that wrap tons of comforting aura around Swift's ruminations. Beyond a virtually undetectable Post Malone appearance and a Florence Welch duet that also serves as an homage to Swift's current exemplar/best friendly rival, Lana Del Rey , the album alternates between co-writes with Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner, the producers who have helped Swift find her mature sound, which blends all of her previous approaches without favoring any prevailing trend. There are the rap-like, conversational verses, the reaching choruses, the delicate piano meditations, the swooning synth beats. Antonoff's songs come closest to her post- 1989 chart toppers; Dessner's fulfill her plans to remain an album artist. Swift has also written two songs on her own, a rarity for her; both come as close to ferocity as she gets. As a sustained listen, Tortured Poets harkens back to high points throughout Swift's career, creating a comforting environment that both supports and balances the intensity of her storytelling.

It's with her pen that Swift executes her battle plans. As always, especially when she dwells on the work and play of emotional intimacy, her lyrics are hyper-focused, spilling over with detail, editing the mess of desire, projection, communion and pain that constitutes romance into one sharp perspective: her own. She renders this view so intensely that it goes beyond confession and becomes a form of writing that can't be disputed. Remember that parchment and her quill pen; her songs are her new testaments. It's a power play, but for many fans, especially women, this ambition to be definitive feels like a necessary corrective to the misrepresentations or silence they face from ill-intentioned or cluelessly entitled men.

"A great writer can be a dangerous creature, however gentle and nice in person," the biographer Hermione Lee once wrote . Swift has occasionally taken this idea to heart before, especially on her once-scorned, now revered hip-hop experiment, Reputation . But now she's screaming from the hilltop, sparing no one, including herself as she tries to prop up one man's flagging interest and then falls for others' duplicity. "I know my pain is such an imposition," Swift sang in last year's " You're Losing Me ," a prequel to the explosive confessional mode of Tortured Poets , where that pain grows nearly suicidal, feeds romantic obsession, and drives her to become a "functional alcoholic" and a madwoman who finds strength in chaos in a way that recalls her friend Emma Stone's cathartic performance as Bella in Poor Things . (Bella, remember, comes into self-possession by learning to read and write.) " Who's afraid of little old me? " Swift wails in the album's window-smashing centerpiece bearing that title; in " But Daddy I Love Him ," she runs around screaming with her dress unbuttoned and threatens to burn down her whole world. These accounts of unhinged behavior reinforce the message that everybody had better be scared of this album — especially her exes, but also her business associates, the media and, yes, her fans, who are not spared in her dissection of just who's made her miserable over the past few years.

Listen to the album

I'm not getting into the dirty details; those who crave them can listen to Tortured Poets themselves and easily uncover them. They're laid out so clearly that anyone who's followed Swift's overly documented life will instantly comprehend who's who: the depressive on the heath, the tattooed golden retriever in her dressing room. Here's my reading of her album-as-novel — others' interpretations may vary: Swift's first-person protagonist (let's call her "Taylor") begins in a memory of a long-ago love affair that left her melancholy but on civil terms, then has an early meeting with a tempting rogue, who declares he's the Dylan Thomas to her Patti Smith; no, she says, though she's sorely tempted, we're "modern idiots," and she leaves him behind for a while. Then we get scenes from a stifling marriage to a despondent and distracted child-man. "So long, London," she declares, fleeing that dead end. From then on, it's the rogue on all cylinders. They connect, defy the daddy figures who think they're bad for each other, speak of rings and baby carriages. Those daddies continue to meddle in this newfound freedom.

In this main story arc, Swift writes about erotic desire as she never has before: She's "fresh out the slammer" (ouch, the rhetoric) and her bedsheets are on fire. She cannot stop rhapsodizing about this new love object and her commitment to their outlaw hunger for each other. It's " Love Story ," updated and supersized, with a proper Romeo at its center — a forbidden, tragic soulmate, a perfect match who's also a disastrous one. Swift peppers this section of Tortured Poets with name-drops ("Jack" we know, " Lucy " might be a tricky slap at Romeo, hard to tell) and instantly searchable references; he sends her a song by The Blue Nile and traces hearts on her face but tells revolting jokes in the bar and eventually reveals himself as a cad, a liar, a coward. She recovers, but not really. In the end, she does move on but still dreams of him hearing one of their songs on a jukebox and dolefully realizing the young girl he's now with has never heard it before.

Insert the names yourself. They do matter, because her backstories are key to Swift's appeal; they both keep her human-sized and amplify her fame. Swift's artistry is tied up in her deployment of celebrity, a slippery state in which a real life becomes emblematic. Like no one before, she's turned her spotlit day-to-day into a conceptual project commenting on women's freedom, artistic ambition and the place of the personal in the public sphere. As a celebrity, Swift partners with others: her model and musician friends, her actor/musician/athlete consorts, brands, even (warily) political causes. And with her fans, the co-creators of her stardom.

Her songs stand apart, though. They remain the main vehicle through which, negotiating unimaginable levels of renown, Swift continually insists on speaking only for herself. A listener has to work to find the "we" in her soliloquies. There are plenty of songs on Tortured Poets in which others will find their own experiences, from the sultry blue eroticism of " Down Bad " to the click of recognition in " I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can) ." But Swift's lack of concern about whether these songs speak for and to anyone besides herself is audible throughout the album. It's the sound of her freedom.

Taylor Swift: Tiny Desk Concert

She also confronts the way fame has cost her, fully exploring questions she raised on Reputation and in " Anti-Hero ." There are hints, more than hints, that her romance with the rogue was derailed partly because her business associates found it problematic, a danger to her precious reputation. And when she steps away from the man-woman predicament, Swift ponders the ephemeral reality of the success that has made private decisions nearly impossible. A lovely minuet co-written with Dessner, " Clara Bow " stages a time-lapsed conversation between Swift and the power players who've helped orchestrate her rise even as she knows they won't be concerned with her eventual obsolescence. "You look like Clara Bow ," they say, and later, "You look like Stevie Nicks in '75." Then, a turn: "You look like Taylor Swift," the suits (or is it the public, the audience?) declare. "You've got edge she never did." The song ends abruptly — lights out. This scene, redolent of All About Eve , reveals anxieties that all of Swift's love songs rarely touch upon.

One reason Swift went from being a normal-level pop star to sharing space with Beyoncé as the era's defining spirit is because she is so good at making the personal huge, without fussing over its translation into universals. In two decades of talking back to heartbreakers, Swift has called out gaslighting, belittling, neglect, false promises — all the hidden injuries that lovers inflict on each other, and that a sexist society often overlooks or forgives more easily from men. In "The Manuscript," which calls back to a romantic trauma outside the Tortured Poets frame, she sings of being a young woman with an older man making "coffee in a French press" and then "only eating kids cereal" and sleeping in her mother's bed when he dumps her; any informed Swift fan's mind will race to songs and headlines about cads she's previously called out in fan favorites like "Dear John" and "All Too Well" — the beginnings of the mission Tortured Poets fulfills.

Reviews of more Taylor Swift albums on NPR

In the haze of 'Midnights,' Taylor Swift softens into an expanded sound

Let's Talk About Taylor Swift's 'Folklore'

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The Old Taylor's Not Dead

The Many New Voices Of Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift Leaps Into Pop With 'Red'

Swift's pop side (and perhaps her co-writers' influence) shows in the way she balances the claustrophobic referentiality of her writing with sparkly wordplay and well-crafted sentimental gestures. On Tortured Poets , she's less strategic than usual. She lets the details fall the way they would in a confession session among besties, not trying to change them from painful memories into points of connection. She's just sharing. Swift bares every crack in her broken heart as a way of challenging power structures, of arguing that emotional work that men can sidestep is still expected from women who seem to own the world.

Throughout Tortured Poets, Swift is trying to work out how emotional violence occurs: how men inflict it on women and women cultivate it within themselves. It's worth asking how useful such a brutal evisceration of one privileged private life can be in a larger social or political sense; critics, including NPR's Leah Donnella in an excellent 2018 essay on the limits of the songwriter's reach, have posed that question about Swift's work for years. But we should ask why Swift's work feels so powerful to so many — why she has become, in the eyes of millions, a standard-bearer and a freedom fighter. Unlike Beyoncé, who loves a good emblem and is always thinking about history and serving the culture and communities she claims, Swift is making an ongoing argument about smaller stories still making a difference. Her callouts can be viewed as petty, reflecting entitlement or even narcissism. But they're also part of her wrestling with the very notion of significance and challenging hierarchies that have proven to be so stubborn they can feel intractable. That Swift has reached such a peak of influence in the wake of the #MeToo movement isn't an accident; even as that chapter in feminism's history can seem to be closing, she insists on saying, "believe me." That isn't the same as saying "believe all women," but by laying claim to disputed storylines and fighting against silence, she at the very least reminds listeners that such actions matter.

Listening to Tortured Poets , I often thought of "The Last Day of Our Acquaintance," a song that Sinéad O'Connor recorded when she was in her young prime, not yet banished from the mainstream for her insistence on speaking politically. Like Swift's best work, its lyrics are very specific — allegedly about a former manager and lover — yet her directness and conviction expand their reach. In 1990, that a woman in her mid-20s would address a belittling man in this way felt startling and new. Taylor Swift came to prominence in a culture already changing to make room for such testimonies, if not — still — fully able to honor them. She has made it more possible for them to be heard. "I talk and you won't listen to me," O'Connor wailed . "I know your answer already." Swift doesn't have to worry about whether people will listen. But she knows that this could change. That's why she is writing it all down.

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A field guide to the references on Taylor Swift’s ‘The Tortured Poets Department’

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Taylor Swift release day always arrives with a thicket of real-life allusions to ancient myths, literary heroes and local bars alike. The 31-track (!) “Tortured Poets Department” is packed with new poets to read, bands to discover and weird vacation towns to visit, and here’s a brief field guide to the best of them. As you’re crushing “Florida!!” calling in your wellness checks on the 1975’s Matty Healy today, be sure to send Patti Smith’s “Just Kids” back up the book charts too.

Charlie Puth The pop singer behind the “Furious 7” tribute to the late Paul Walker “See You Again,” along with the top-10 hits “Attention” and “We Don’t Talk Anymore.” She’s right, he is underrated!

Dylan Thomas The Welsh poet (and famously volatile drinker) behind much-beloved poems like “And Death Shall Have No Dominion,” “Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night,” beloved stateside for his broadcast of “A Child’s Christmas in Wales.” A famous resident at New York’s Chelsea Hotel, he died at 39 from pneumonia and other ailments.

Patti Smith The poet and rocker defined an entire generation of New York artists, through and through. Her memoir about her friendship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, “Just Kids,” will inspire bright young things for time immemorial, and albums like “Horses”and “Easter” still sound as bracing they did on release day.

The Blue Nile The Scottish electronic rock band known for suave and evocative synth arrangements, whose 1989 album “Hats” was famously a formative album for the 1975’s Matty Healy, who was especially fond of the song “Downtown Lights.”

Per chairman Taylor Swift, here’s what we know about ‘The Tortured Poets Department’

Clara Bow The silent era actor who popularized the term “It Girl,” she epitomized the free-spirited “flapper” of the era, and later became a cautionary example for how the entertainment industry chews up talented and beautiful young women.

Destin A small town on the Florida Panhandle, halfway between the military city of Pensacola and the “Redneck Riviera” of Panama City Beach, near where Hurricane Michael hit in 2018.

Jehovah’s Witnesses An offshoot of Christianity famous for going door-to-door recruiting in dark suits, looking a lot like a certain British rock singer.

Stevie Nicks The Fleetwood Mac singer whose ethereal, mystic aesthetic has long been songwriting, vocal and fashion inspiration for young singers, yet as Swift put it, it’s “hell on earth to be heavenly.”

Taylor Swift She finally gets meta as she riffs on a newcomer who will inevitably be compared to her, with an “edge she never did,” only to have the biz grind her down too.

The Black Dog A pub in London now likely to become the U.K.’s version of the constantly swarmed Beachwood Cafe .

Cassandra A ancient Trojan priestess who was fated to be a prophet but never believed, most famously about Greek troops hiding inside the Trojan Horse.

‘The Bolter’ In the novels of the British writer Nancy Mitford, it’s a nickname given to the narrator’s mother, a serial monogamist who cycles through relationships. A real-life inspiration, Lady Idina Sackville, scandalized 1920s high society in the U.K. and its colony in Kenya.

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All the References in Taylor Swift’s Title Track ‘The Tortured Poets Department’

A re you ready for it? Taylor Swift ’s 11th studio record, The Tortured Poets Department , is finally here, and it’s clear she has a lot to say about her recent bouts of heartbreak. On the (surprise!) double album ’s title track, she’s specifically focused on a breakup with someone who isn’t her longtime love Joe Alwyn . The references on “The Tortured Poets Department” seem to point to a different London boy : The 1975’s Matty Healy , who, if he knows what’s good for him, will stay off the internet for a few days because people definitely have feelings about Swift going long on their two-month situationship which ended last June.

But Healy’s not the only one who gets a shout out on track 2, a melodramatic ode to a guy who, for better or worse, is cut from the same cloth as her. And just like that one of the greatest Welsh poets of all time, an iconic punk rocker, and Charlie Puth have all earned themselves a spot in Swiftian lore.

Below, an explanation of all the references you need to make sense of “The Tortured Poets Department.” 

Matty Healy

Who uses typewriters anyway? Well, Tom Hanks , for starters, but let’s assume Swift isn’t writing love songs about the nicest guy in Hollywood leaving one at her apartment. All signs point to Healy, who told GQ five years ago that a typewriter is one of the things he can’t live without. (Interestingly enough, in that same interview, he talked about his notebook, another thing he cherishes, being mostly full of “stories that I write about my dreams of being in love with other pop stars.”) The fact that the man in this song left one of his favorite things at Swift’s home feels like a sign pointing to just how head over heels he was for her. Too bad she’s more of a quill pen kind of girl . 

For another clue that Healy is the object of this song’s affection, look no further than Swift’s later reference to her man being “a tattooed golden retriever.” Healy, who is covered in tattoos , certainly fits the bill. Not to mention, he has ink inspired by one of the original Beat poets William S. Burroughs, who could certainly be described as tortured . But it’s a rather interesting analogy to make being that, in dating parlance, golden retrievers are known to be wholly loyal, supportive, goofy, and laidback, which doesn’t quite fit with The 1975 singer’s chaotic public persona . It does, on the other hand, sound more than a bit like someone else Swift knows . (This song is not about her current beau, though fans sure think “The Alchemy” is.)

Dylan Thomas

Swift may be hopelessly devoted to her new guy, but what she makes clear on the title track’s rather scathing chorus is that Dylan Thomas he is definitely not , going so far as to laugh in his face for being delusional enough to ever think such a thing. (It’s worth noting that Healy has been known to dabble in poetry .) The wildly popular Welsh poet, who got his start in the 1930s, was known for his hyper emotional style of lyrical poetry that was full of clever wordplay and visual imagery. He was considered a New Romantic for the way in which used the Romantic era of the late 18th century and early 19th century as inspiration to create a literary style all his own. One of his most famous works is 1931’s Do not go gentle into that good night , which urges readers to fight bravely against death no matter when it comes.

Perhaps, after reading his poetry, you won’t be surprised to learn that Thomas had a reputation for being quite the tormented artist. As he got older, he struggled with alcoholism , which led him to act erratically. His friends would say his drinking was his way of coping with his shyness, depression, and financial instability. In her 1982 memoir, Thomas’ wife, Caitlin Thomas, said that her marriage to the poet “was not a love story proper; it was more of a drink story.” When she died 12 years later, the New York Times would describe her as Thomas’ “drinking and brawling partner.” 

Thomas died in 1953 at the age of 39 after collapsing at Manhattan’s Chelsea Hotel where he had an apartment. The legend goes that he drank 18 whiskies in a row and went into a coma, dying of acute alcohol poisoning. (Fun fact: Swift’s friend and Eras Tour opener Phoebe Bridgers released a song called “Dylan Thomas” in 2019 with her band Better Oblivion Community Center that nods to his much mythologized demise. Spoiler: this isn’t the track’s only connection to Bridgers.) However, it is now believed that Thomas died of pneumonia that had gone undiagnosed by his physician. 

Patti Smith

Swift is undoubtedly one of music’s best modern songwriters, but on this track she makes it clear she has nothing on Patti Smith , who’s been called a “ punk poet laureate ” thanks to her 1975 debut, Horses, a clever blend of free form poetry and punk rock. But Smith is more than a charismatic musician , she is the author of several poetry collections and books including two bestselling memoirs, 2010’s Just Kids, which focused on her early life and friendship with photographer Robert Mapplethorpe , and 2012’s M Train , which looked at her life and career after Horses.  

Smith has never topped the music charts, but she has won countless awards for her work, including the National Book Award in 2010 and, the following year, the prestigious Polar Music Prize , often called “the Nobel Prize of Music.” (Like Dylan Thomas, she also spent some time at the Chelsea Hotel, but we’ll save that for a little later.) Clearly, there is no shame in feeling a little inadequate compared to her. It’s just a wee bit surprising to hear that a newly minted billionaire pop star who has basically broken every musical record feels that way. Smith seems to be in Swift’s camp as well. In 2019, she came to Swift’s defense after the latter was criticized for not being more politically outspoken. “She’s a pop star who’s under tremendous scrutiny all the time,” Smith told the New York Times . “And one can’t imagine what that’s like.”

The Chelsea Hotel

It’s safe to say, the infamous residence hotel located in, as its name suggests, the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan would be a fitting headquarters for the Tortured Poets Department. Built between 1863 and 1865, the newly renovated 12-story hotel has long been a respite for promising artists like Leonard Cohen, Janis Joplin, and Thomas Wolfe who were looking for cheap rent and few frills as they pursued the bohemian lifestyle.

Playwright Arthur Miller, who stayed there for six years following his 1961 divorce from Marilyn Monroe , called it “the high spot of the surreal.” He meant this quite literally; more than a few times he had gotten high off the marijuana smoke that often wafted through the halls. “There are no vacuum cleaners, no rules and shame,” Miller said of the place where he would end up writing the play After the Fall . 

The Chelsea Hotel is also where Bob Dylan wrote Blonde on Blonde , Andy Warhol shot parts of his experimental film Chelsea Girls , and Sid Vicious allegedly stabbed his girlfriend Nancy Spungen to death. As previously mentioned, Dylan Thomas and Patti Smith both lived there, but they never crossed paths. Sixteen years after Thomas’ death, Smith moved into room 1017, the smallest in the hotel, with Mapplethorpe for a rate of $55 per week. “The Chelsea was like a dollhouse in the Twilight Zone, ” Smith wrote in Just Kids. “With a hundred rooms, each a small universe.” 

Shortly after Swift’s new album dropped, the Chelsea Hotel excitedly posted on their Instagram Story that they were “screaming” over the song, which they were turning way up, and “ready to welcome Swifites.”  Those who are looking to book a room for a night will pay at least five times what Smith did 55 years ago. 

Jack Antonoff

On “The Tortured Poets Department,” Swift’s closest confidante is “Jack,” which is undoubtedly a reference to her friend and longtime producer Jack Antonoff , who has worked on all four of the re-recordings of her old albums (aka the “Taylor’s Versions” ), as well as seven records of all original material, including her latest. (He is a co-writer on the title track.) He also produced The 1975’s 2022 album, Being Funny in a Foreign Language, making him someone who knew both parties intimately. 

If Entertainment Tonight ’s sources are to be believed , Antonoff was the matchmaker who brought the musical duo together. And there are clues that he was there from the very beginning of this short-term relationship. Antonoff was hanging out with Swift and Healy at members-only Casa Cipriani in New York, where they were first spotted holding hands . Days later, the two were again photographed together, this time leaving Electric Lady Studios where Swift was recording with Antonoff. 

Thanks to Swift’s shoutout on the title track, it’s safe to assume things might have been a little awkward for Antonoff after the two split up. Being that Healy did not attend Antonoff’s wedding this past summer but Swift did, one could venture to guess that she got custody of Jack in the breakup. 

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Dead Poets Society

By peter weir, dead poets society the poetry of dead poets society.

Dead Poets Society features a myriad of famous poets and their works. As one example, John Keating tells the more daring among his students that they may refer to him as "O Captain! My Captain!" a reference to Walt Whitman's poem of the same title. Born in 1819, Walt Whitman considered the American Civil War one of the central events of his life. A staunch Unionist throughout the conflict, he grew to love President Abraham Lincoln after an initially indifferent opinion of him. He wrote "O Captain! My Captain!" about Lincoln following his assassination. The poem, one of the most well-known classic poems of today, is classified as an elegy to the late president. That the students use it to refer to Mr. Keating , particularly in the iconic final scene of the film in which they proclaim it as they stand on their desks, draws a direct parallel between Lincoln and Keating as revered men gone too soon—in Lincoln's case, referring to his death, and in Keating's, to his being fired.

The boys invoke a famous quote by Henry David Thoreau at the beginning of each meeting of the Dead Poets Society: "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life..." The quote is taken from Thoreau's book Walden , which he wrote about spending more than two years on his own in a small cabin by Walden Pond in Concord, Massachusetts. The book focuses on living simply and with purpose, and has been called everything from a social experiment to satire to a manual for self-reliance. No doubt, the cited quote mirrors what the boys themselves do through the Dead Poets Society: going to the woods to recite poetry to one another, and eventually to express themselves in many ways, including storytelling, dancing, and playing the saxophone. Many of the boys feel that the academic shackles that hold them are unjust, and some, especially Neil, fear that when it's their time to die and begin "fertilizing daffodils," as Mr. Keating glibly put it, that they will "discover that [they] had not lived." The quote is therefore an effective and appropriate one to use to begin each of the Society's meetings.

Dead Poets Society Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Dead Poets Society is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

What’s the theme of dead poets society rip it out

Do you mean the scene where Keeting asks his class to rip out the Pritchard text? He wants them to avoid conformity by ripping a text that treats poetry like a math equation.

Explore Keating's influence on his students and how his encouragement of originality and "carpe diem" affect them.

I can't write your essay for you but can make a general comment. One of Keating’s main, overarching lessons for the boys is the idea of “seizing the day”—that is, making the most of the time they have now and taking advantage of the opportunities...

According to Pitts, all of the girls go for “jerks”. Do you agree with his assessment? Why or why not?

Well, this is a pretty subjective answer from personal experience. Many many years ago I was captain of the chess team in high school. Lets just say girls were not clamouring to wear my jacket. The hockey players,they used to throw pucks at our...

Study Guide for Dead Poets Society

Dead Poets Society study guide contains a biography of director Peter Weir, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Dead Poets Society
• Dead Poets Society Summary
• Character List
• Director's Influence

Essays for Dead Poets Society

Dead Poets Society literature essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of the film Dead Poets Society directed by Peter Weir.

• Authority Against Individualism: Dead Poets Society and The Rabbits
• Dead Poets Society: The Powerful Thought of Individuality
• Identity in Dead Poets Society and Frost's Poetry
• Exploring Transitions: Educating Rita and Dead Poets Society

Wikipedia Entries for Dead Poets Society

• Introduction

Taylor Swift releases ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ double album ahead of Record Store Day: Highlights

Catch up on all things 'The Tortured Poets Department':

• Fans celebrated Swift's midnight release of "The Tortured Poets Department" with listening parties and themed gatherings . Many critics praised Swift in their reviews.
• Swift surprised fans at 2 a.m. ET with news of 15 extra songs.
• The album features collaborations with Post Malone and Florence + the Machine. Swift described writing the album as deeply personal. "Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it," she said.
• NBC News' resident Swifties stayed up to blog the biggest takeaways after the album's release.

Vinyl industry rep says pandemic-era manufacturing bottlenecks have eased

"The Tortured Poets Department" is set to be released in special-edition "ghost"-colored vinyl, available both directly through Swift's website and exclusively at Target.

During the pandemic, that might have alarmed vinyl record buyers. As vinyl plants shuttered and employees were sidelined, vinyl production ground to a halt, causing reports of weekslong backlogs and orders going unfulfilled outright.

But in an interview with NBC News on Friday, Dustin Blocker, president of the Vinyl Records Manufacturing Association, said those issues have been resolved and that suppliers now have more than enough capacity to handle any orders coming their way, including massive ones like Swift's.

"In Q3 2023, we saw the [production] timeline start to go back to normal," Blocker said. "And in Q4 it really got back to normal. Now, everyone, including the huge plants, takes only 8-12 weeks [to produce] ... so it's very good news for everyone."

Blocker said any price increases on the supply side sparked by the bottlenecks have essentially reversed.

So, the $40 price tag on the Target edition of "TTPD" is most likely the result of choices made by Swift, her label and the retailer, he said.

Jack Antonoff is sharing BTS pics

Saba Hamedy

Jack Antonoff is giving Swifties what they want: more content.

The Bleachers frontman, who is also Swift’s longtime collaborator and friend, shared pictures of Swift and collaborators on the album, including Florence Welch .

The acting U.S. secretary of labor has a question for Taylor

Acting U.S. Labor Department Secretary Julie Su has a key question for Taylor Swift and her "Tortured Poets Department":

"Is this department unionized?" she wrote in a post on X .

Su, 55, has served as acting secretary since March 2023; she has faced stumbling blocks to being confirmed full time for the role over her perceived pro-union bias .

Destin celebrates Swift shoutout

Nicole Duarte

The city of Destin, Florida, is here for the Swiftie boost.

Google searches for the beach town shot up minutes after Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department” was released. The album mentions Destin in the song “Florida!!!” featuring Florence + The Machine.

The city is celebrating the shoutout:

As is Destin's mayor:

Trump gets a question on Taylor

Vaughn Hillyard

A reporter who is part of the pool following Donald Trump on Friday at his hush money trial was able to get in a question to the former president about the new albums.

Trump didn't engage.

Taylor Swift reveals ‘Dateline’ as an inspiration for ‘Florida!!!’

Maddie Ellis, TODAY

Taylor Swift has taken over radio stations, from Channel 13 on SiriusXM to iHeartRadio briefly renaming itself to iHeartTaylor and sharing messages from the songwriter.

Swift revealed in a soundbite played on iHeartRadio that “Florida!!!” — the eighth track of the album and featuring Florence + the Machine — was inspired by “Dateline.”

“I’m always watching, like ‘Dateline,’” Swift said with a laugh. “People, you know, have these crimes that they commit where they immediately skip town and go to Florida. They try to reinvent themselves, have a new identity, blend in.”

It’s the same with heartbreak, she said.

“I think when you go through a heartbreak, there’s a part of you that thinks, ‘I want a new name. I want a new life,’” she said.

Or perhaps in Swift’s case — a new era?

Read more at TODAY.com.

The double album appeared to avoid leaks

Kaetlyn Liddy

The standard edition of "The Tortured Poets Department" is said to have been leaked ahead the album's release. The origin of the apparent leaks is unclear, but none of the songs on the extended "anthology" version of the album seem to have been compromised.

Leaks of major artists' work sometimes occur when physical copies of the album arrive prematurely at record stores or department stores, before the tracks are released on streaming platforms. Fans suspect the surprise drop of the double album was a factor in the 15 extra tracks avoiding leaks.

The extra content was so unexpected that the lyrics of the anthology version have yet to be uploaded to Spotify .

‘The Tortured Poets Department’ broke a Spotify record in 12 hours

"The Tortured Poets Department" is already Spotify’s most-streamed album in a single day this year, edging out Beyoncé's "Cowboy Carter" in less than 12 hours, Spotify confirmed to NBC News.

Swift currently holds the all-time record for most streams in a day by album and by artist for 2022's "Midnights."

Who are The Blue Nile? About the Scottish band named by Swift

In the album's ninth track — "Guilty as Sin?" — Swift name-drops a beloved '80s Scottish band, The Blue Nile.

"Drowning in The Blue Nile. He sent me 'Downtown Lights.' I hadn’t heard it in a while," Swift says in the song.

"Downtown Lights," released in 1989, was the peak of The Blue Nile's commercial success in the U.S., with the song reaching No. 10 on the Billboard American Modern Rock Tracks chart. 1989 is also Swift's birth year and the title of her fifth studio album.

Known for their avoidance of publicity, The Blue Nile has released just four albums since forming in 1981.

Fans share their theories and joy on social media

It wouldn't be a new Taylor Swift album without fans wondering who it's about or decoding the names mentioned in each song. (Who is Cassandra , Taylor?)

That speculation will surely continue, but now that the album is out, fans can't believe their luck. Reactions on social media praised the sonic and lyrical range of the album, saying that "everybody gets everything," whether you listen to Swift for her synth-pop hits or her intimate folk songs.

Author and creator John Green couldn't wait to wake up his daughter to tell her she gets 31 new Taylor Swift songs today.

By the numbers: Will Taylor Swift break her own album sales marks?

Dania Kalaji

“The Tortured Poets Department” blasted to No. 1 on the U.S. iTunes album sales chart following its release. But will it live up to the success of her previous discography?

Here are all of Swift’s bestselling albums in the U.S. ranked to date, according to data from the Recording Industry Association of America.

“Fearless” (2008): 10 million units

“1989” (2014): 9 million units

“Red” (2012): 7 million units

“Taylor Swift” (2006): 7 million units

“Speak Now” (2010): 6 million units

“Reputation” (2017): 3 million units

“Lover” (2019): 3 million units

“Midnights” (2022): 2 million units

“Folklore” (2020): 2 million units

“The Taylor Swift Holiday Collection” (2008): 1 million units

“Evermore” (2020): 1 million units

TikTok rolls out new features to celebrate new album

Daysia Tolentino

As Swifties show their love for "The Tortured Poets Department" on TikTok, they have the chance to be featured in a "Fan Spotlight" carousel that highlights videos with the #TORTUREDPOETSDEPARTMENT hashtag.

TikTok released a "Taylor Swift In-App Experience" that serves as a landing page for all things "TTPD." Fans can complete challenges in exchange for limited-edition "TTPD" profile frames and some Taylor-related searches unlock animations inspired by the album. Searches for "Taylor Swift," "Taylor Nation," and "The Tortured Poets Department" lead fans to the landing page.

The features are particularly notable because Swift's music was pulled off the platform earlier this year as part of a disput between TikTok and Universal Music Group, though many of her tracks returned earlier this month .

Fans on TikTok have already been loving "TTPD," sharing numerous theories , tears and rankings .

Swift's song 'Fortnight' with Post Malone hits No. 1 on Apple

Jason Abbruzzese

That didn't take long.

The song "Fornight" off Swift's new album quickly hit No. 1 on Apple's top song chart. It features rapper and singer Post Malone.

Swift also took the next four spots with "The Tortured Poets Department," "So Long, London," "My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toy," and "Down Bad."

The National's Aaron Dessner on working with Swift: 'some of the most lyrically acute, intricate, vulnerable and cathartic' songs

Aaron Dessner, a musician who is part of the rock band The National, posted to Instagram about working with Swift on the album along with a pic of her in a studio.

He said that he has now worked with swift on more than 60 songs, including 17 across her newest release.

"I am forever grateful to Taylor for sharing her insane talents with and trusting me with her music. I believe these songs are some of the most lyrically acute, intricate, vulnerable and cathartic Taylor has ever written and I am continually astonished by her skills as a songwriter and performer," he wrote, adding in thanks to a long list of other artists and producers.

Will Swift break her own streaming records?

The October 2022 release of Swift's 10th studio album, "Midnights" shattered records on Spotify and Apple Music.

"Midnights" became Spotify's most-streamed album in a single day with 184.6 million streams when it debuted. Swift also broke the record for most-streamed artist in a single day on Spotify with 228 million streams.

The album also become the biggest album of all time by a female artist in Apple Music history by first-day and first-week streams worldwide.

Can Swift outdo herself?

Will Swift's album inspire a new college course?

As Swift became increasingly synonymous with American pop culture, universities around the country started creating entire courses dedicated to studying her lyricism and impact.

Some courses focus on Swift as a business and marketing mastermind, while others analyze her storytelling techniques with all the detail and skill of poetry analysis.

Time will tell whether this new album will inspire yet another college course. Our guess is with all the literary references, it's sure to be on some professors minds.

Read more in NBC News' article here .

Saturday is Record Store Day

The release of "The Tortured Poets Department" will come just in time for a notable day in the music industry calendar: Record Store Day on April 20. The annual event has been observed since 2007 to celebrate independent record stores and is often accompanied by exclusive drops by major artists.

Swift has yet to announce a special event, but the date is marked in the TTPD Timetable on her Instagram, suggesting she might have something up her sleeve.

Swift describes new album: 'Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it.'

Patrick Smith

Taylor Swift has offered fans a glimpse into the creative process behind "The Tortured Poets Society" and the emotions that inspired it.

In a press release Friday morning to accompany the new release, the artist said:

"The Tortured Poets Department. An anthology of new works that reflect events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time — one that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure.

"This period of the author’s life is now over, the chapter closed and boarded up. There is nothing to avenge, no scores to settle once wounds have healed. And upon further reflection, a good number of them turned out to be self-inflicted.

"This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page. Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it.

"And then all that’s left behind is the tortured poetry."

To sleep or stream? Swifties question staying up even later

Can you wait until the morning to listen to the 15 extra songs on Swift's anthology?

If you answered no, you're not alone. Online, fans joked that they didn't expect to get this little shut eye.

Among the fans: Gen Z Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla.

"I got votes in the morning. Do I sleep or listen" he wrote .

Others had similar thoughts.

"TAYLOR I HAVE A JOB OH MY GOD" wrote one fan, tagging the artist on X .

"lol Taylor I have to get up early to run errands before work please" wrote another X user.

Leave it to Swift to give us adrenaline to keep us all up a little longer.

'The Tortured Poets Department' becomes Swift's longest album

With the surprise release of 15 additional songs, "The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology" has 31 tracks.

That now makes it Swift's longest album, edging ahead of "Red (Taylor's Version)" by just one track.

A list of all 15 of the extra 'Anthology' songs

• “The Black Dog”
• “imgonnagetyouback”
• “The Albatross”
• “Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus”
• “How Did It End?”
• “So High School”
• “I Hate It Here”
• “thanK you aiMee”
• “I Look in People’s Windows”
• “The Prophecy”
• “Cassandra”
• “The Bolter”
• “The Manuscript”

Surprise: a double album!

"The Tortured Poets Department" is a secret DOUBLE album.

In a 2 a.m. ET surprise, Swift announced an extra 15 songs.

"I’d written so much tortured poetry in the past 2 years and wanted to share it all with you, so here’s the second installment of TTPD: The Anthology," she wrote on X . "15 extra songs. And now the story isn’t mine anymore… it’s all yours."

It's 2 a.m.

Now what, Taylor?

ICYMI: Swift's powerhouse publicist Tree Paine gets profiled by WSJ

Swift's longtime publicist, Tree Paine, whom many fans know by name, was the subject of a lengthy Wall Street Journal article published Thursday ahead of the new album's release.

While she declined to be interviewed for the story, it delves into how she became one of the most powerful people in the entertainment industry since she joined Swift's camp in 2014.

“There isn’t a publicist in NY, LA or Nashville that wouldn’t jump at an opportunity to work with someone as talented as Taylor Swift and her management team,” Paine said at the time, according to the New York Post .

Read the full story here.

Couples are now wary of Swift's 'Lover' as a love song

Elena Nicolaou, TODAY

“Lover” — at least until recently — was widely received as one of Swift’s classic love songs. When the album of the same name came out in 2019, its title single was declared  first dance song material , or even a “ wedding waltz .”

In the song, Swift paints a portrait of quiet intimacy. Her wild “Red” days, of thrilling romances with highs and lows and uncertainties in between, had settled into something steadier with one person, captured by a simple chorus: “You’re my, my, my, my lover.”

But that interpretation is now in question, as Swift recasts some of her songs in a different light. Ahead of the release of “The Tortured Poets Department,”  she released five playlists on Apple Music , sorting old songs into groups inspired by the five stages of grief, or “heartbreak.”

Aaron Dessner is credited as a songwriter on five of 16 tracks

Dessner, who is a member of the bands The National and Big Red Machine, is one of two producers who worked on "The Tortured Poets Department."

He's credited as a songwriter on five of the 16 tracks on the standard album.

Dessner first collaborated with Swift on her eighth studio album, “Folklore,” for which he shared in the Grammy win for album of the year. He made several guest appearances with Swift on the U.S. leg of the Eras Tour, joining her onstage during the acoustic set for performances of songs they wrote together.

Here's what some critics are saying in their reviews

Angela Yang

The critics have spoken. Here's a roundup of some of their takeaways on "The Tortured Poets Department."

Billboard ’s Jason Lipshutz praised Swift’s boldness for releasing a “knowingly messy, wildly unguarded breakup album” at what’s arguably the peak of her career. It's more mature than her past heartbreak albums, he writes, and “not everyone will love it, but the ones who get it will adore it fiercely.”

Variety ’s Chris Willman wrote that the album can serve as an “unapologetically dramatic” soundtrack to listeners’ own heartbreaks.

Labeling it Swift’s most personal album yet, Rolling Stone ’s Rob Sheffield described it as “the cathartic confession of a woman who thought she had adulthood — and adult romance — all figured out, only to find herself realizing she knows nothing.”

And unlike on past albums, Swift doesn’t portray herself as a victim in this one, wrote the Los Angeles Times ’ Mikael Wood. Instead, the album emanates “a proudly villainous energy as Swift embraces her messiest and most chaotic tendencies.”

Jack Antonoff, Swift's longtime collaborator, posts love for album

Antonoff, Swift’s longtime collaborator and friend, shared his love for the new album on X .

"Love this album more than I can say," wrote Antonoff, who worked on “The Tortured Poets Department” as a producer.

Antonoff also co-wrote eight of the album's tracks.

Swifties are starting to post reax on X

In typical fashion after a Swift album drops, reactions from fans are pouring in online, and they TEND TO COME IN ALL CAPS.

As any Swiftie will tell you, listening to new music from the artist always proves to be a collective emotional experience.

Spotify appears to be holding it together (so far)

The last time Swift debuted a brand-new album, Spotify crashed. No major issues so far this time around.

Shoutout to the engineers and people behind the scenes who are probably working overtime to make sure Swifties don't panic.

We have a new countdown

Don’t go to bed yet! Taylor Swift’s Instagram page is displaying a new countdown to 2 a.m. ET. This wasn't on the timetable ...

Swift releases statement after album drop

In her first social media post after “The Tortured Poets Department” was released, Swift shared a statement about the album online.

These songs reflect her experiences from a moment in time that was equally “sensational and sorrowful,” she wrote, adding that it is a chapter now closed.

“Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it,” Swift wrote. “And then all that’s left behind is the tortured poetry.”

Who is Clara Bow?

Daniel Arkin

The 16th and final track on the album is named for Clara Bow, one of the leading lights of Hollywood’s silent era.

Bow, unlike a lot of stars from the 1920s, managed to successfully pivot to roles in talkies by the end of the decade. She co-starred in “Wings” (1927), which today is probably best known as the first movie to win the Oscar for best picture.

I’m not a Swiftie, so I don’t have much insight into how Taylor’s music connects to Bow’s acting career — but I’m curious how this track will be interpreted by the die-hards.

The album is here

BRB, we’re busy listening with the rest of y’all.

You can now choose a Swift-themed chat for your Instagram DMs

Instagram users can now set their direct message conversations to a new chat theme inspired by “The Tortured Poets Department.”

Bars, venues hold special Swift parties

On the eve of Swift’s album drop, event venues across the country (and around the world) hosted release parties so Swifties could get their first listen of the “The Tortured Poets Department” on the dance floor.

At Pianos in New York, music from across Swift’s discography will play until the new album drops at midnight. Attendees are encouraged to come in themed outfits and friendship bracelets, and the bar will be serving Swift-inspired cocktails.

In Los Angeles, El Cid is hosting a listening party complete with fan-made merch, giveaways and a themed wall for photos. Attendees can also expect performances from drag queen Jade Jolie, who appeared in Swift’s “You Need to Calm Down” music video.

Several Swiftie-themed events are also being held across the Washington, D.C., area, according to The Washington Post, which compiled a list .

A Swiftie mom and daughter are hosting their own album party

Kristie Gilmore, 36, is ready to celebrate with her daughter, who was born shortly after Swift's “1989” album and has been a Swiftie ever since.

Gilmore decorated her Boston-area apartment with balloons, signs and stickers in the color palette of “The Tortured Poets Department.” She sprinkled the table with handmade confetti of the album’s logo and made TTPD-themed “membership cards” for themselves and each of her daughter’s friends.

“They’ve been counting down since Taylor announced this album,” Gilmore said, adding, “They’re just hanging out, having a dance party. They’re gonna try to stay up till midnight and listen to it.”

What are the track lengths?

The average track length on “The Tortured Poets Department” is 4 minutes and 4 seconds, making it the third longest album across Swift’s discography.

The longest song is “But Daddy I Love Him,” which clocks in at 5 minutes and 40 seconds.

“I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)” is the shortest song, at 2 minutes and 36 seconds.

Travis Kelce shared his early thoughts about the album

Ahead of the Super Bowl, Swift's boyfriend, Travis Kelce, the star tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs, weighed in on the new album.

“I have heard some of it, yes. It is unbelievable,”  Kelce said . “I can’t wait for her to shake up the world when it finally drops.”

The couple , who have become the internet's favorite love story , were most recently spotted at Coachella 's first weekend.

Taylor Swift beat reporter speaks to NBC's Hallie Jackson

USA Today’s Taylor Swift reporter , Bryan West, spoke with NBC News about the album drop and all the Easter eggs being spotted by fans.

Swift's music is back on TikTok despite UMG dispute

Kalhan Rosenblatt

Some songs that Swift fans know “All Too Well” returned to TikTok this month, months after they were removed.

The songs were among the many tracks Universal Music Group pulled off TikTok after the label and the platform  failed to reach an agreement  this year. (UMG has no relationship to NBCUniversal, the parent company of NBC News.)

UMG, known as one of the “Big Three” global music companies, cleared its music from TikTok in late January, saying it was doing so because of a lack of compensation for artists and songwriters. TikTok previously fired back at UMG, accusing the company of putting “their own greed above the interests of artists and songwriters.”

The economics of 'The Tortured Poets Department'

Doha Madani

Die-hard Taylor Swift fans will be spending a pretty penny on her latest album release as she releases four variants of the album with one exclusive track each.

Each variant of “The Tortured Poets Department” is named after the bonus song found at the end of the album: “The Manuscript,” “The Bolter,” “The Albatross” and “The Black Dog.” If a fan wanted to collect them all, the minimum for $13.99 CDs at a store would cost at least $55.96 before taxes.

Longtime Swifties are already familiar with her tendency to provide deluxe editions, as anyone who was around for her original “1989” release can recall the Target exclusive that included three bonus tracks and three voice memos recorded by Swift. 

Her “Midnights” release included a Target exclusive track that was added to streaming only months later, and in May she released a new song on “Midnights (The Late Night Edition).” But this is the first time Swift has put an exclusive song on each individual variant, with no clear timeline for when they might be added to streaming. 

2024: The year of Post Malone and the pop girlies

Rebecca Cohen

Fresh off of a collab with Beyoncé on "LEVII'S JEANS" from her now-famed "Cowboy Carter," Post Malone finds himself on another major release of 2024: Swift's "The Tortured Poets Department."

He joins Swift on the album's first song, "Fortnight." Swift announced that "Fortnight" would be the album's lead single and the song for which she is releasing a music video 8 o'clock tomorrow night.

"I’ve been such a huge fan of Post because of the writer he is, his musical experimentation and those melodies he creates that just stick in your head forever," Swift wrote on social media. "I got to witness that magic come to life firsthand when we worked together on Fortnight."

While best known for more rap-focused songs, Post Malone is clearly making the rounds in the pop music scene, having also recently collaborated with Noah Kahan on "Dial Drunk." But his back-to-back appearances on arguably two of the biggest albums from pop artists this year raise the questions: Is Post Malone becoming a pop girlie? Is he just having a moment? Or is it all of the above?

There's a book about Swift's impact headed to bookshelves

Rolling Stone writer and music historian Rob Sheffield's book "Heartbreak Is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music" will debut Nov. 12.

He's expected to dive further into Swift’s music and fan connection.

Swifties are celebrating with their own listening parties

Many Swifties are sharing their elaborate party setups online as they prepare to celebrate the album release at home.

Karen Rothdeutsch, 25, has decked out her bedroom in upstate New York with “The Tortured Poets Department”-themed decorations, complete with a platter of homemade cupcakes decorated to match Swift’s various vinyl variants.

“I just made my space a little more immersive for my first listen,” Rothdeutsch told NBC News. “I’ll be sitting in my bed with a box of tissues and a notebook, writing down my thoughts and probably checking into Twitter every so often to see what everybody’s thinking about it.”

She said she procured the decorations over the course of several weeks, but the whole setup cost her less than $100. While she decorates on a budget, she said she did splash out on the vinyl variants and collector’s edition CDs.

Swift's new album is already breaking a Spotify record

Spotify said on X that the “The Tortured Poets Department” became the most pre-saved album countdown page in the streaming service’s history.

Since its launch on March 28, TTPD's countdown page has ticked down to the album’s drop, now just hours away.

Was Swift's Grammys dress a 'Fortnight' Easter egg?

The white gown Swift wore to the 2024 Grammys, where she announced "The Tortured Poets Department," appears to have been an Easter egg.

Swift appears to be wearing a very similar dress in the teaser for the "Fortnight (feat. Post Malone)" music video, which will debut 8 p.m. ET tomorrow.

Swift was also pictured hugging Post Malone at the ceremony. Some fans online pointed out a similar shot of the two singers that appears in the teaser for the music video.

Swift drops 'Fortnight' music video teaser

Swift blessed fans with a teaser for “Fortnight (feat. Post Malone)," the album's first single.

"At this hearing, I stand before my fellow members of The Tortured Poets Department with a summary of my findings. Album tonight. Fortnight music video tomorrow at 8pm et," Swift wrote in a post on X , which was accompanied by a short video clip.

The black-and-white teaser gave a sneak peak of the visuals for the music video. It's a combination of dramatic period gowns and a bleak medical setting in this supercut that is reminiscent of "Poor Things," which Swift's longtime friend Emma Stone recently won the best actress Oscar for.

Swift had announced she'd be dropping a music video at 8 p.m. ET tomorrow by sharing a “TTPD Timetable” on her Instagram page this week.

Merch is here — and already selling out

Hours before the album’s release, themed merchandise for “The Tortured Poets Department” is now available to order online.

The merch drop includes hoodies, crewnecks and gold jewelry branded with the album’s logo. A display case for the album vinyls seemingly sold out within minutes.

ICYMI: The Eras Tour concert film is on Disney+

In case you need something to do as you count down to the new album, “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” is on Disney+. Swift announced the film would be available for streaming in February.

The film features all songs from the three Los Angeles tour dates during which it was filmed at SoFi Stadium. They include “cardigan,” as well as four additional acoustic surprise songs from the tour: “I Can See You,” “Maroon,” “You Are in Love” and “Death by a Thousand Cuts.”

Swifties online are freaking out over purported ‘leaks’

The internet was at it again this week, with some online circulating what they said were leaks of Swift's new album. It is unclear from where and when the apparent leaks originated, but one Reddit thread is already filled with commentary.

As early as Tuesday, "taylor swift leak" appeared to be blocked from searches on X. Instead, when a user tried to search the phrase, a blank page popped up with the message, "Something went wrong. Try reloading."

The secret message has been decoded

The sixth and final word of the secret message, “mortem,” was revealed today, hidden in the lyrics of the song “Begin Again.”

The complete secret message is: “We hereby conduct this post mortem.”

In a collaboration with Apple Music, Swift sorted some of her existing songs into thematic playlists , along with audio messages from her.

The messages seemed to confirm some fans’ theories that the playlists mirrored the five stages of grief — denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance — indicating that the new album may grapple with grief or loss. Swift later used a song from each playlist to reveal a hidden word on Apple Music every day leading up to the release of “The Tortured Poets Department.”

Swift sets fans loose on an international puzzle

Swifties had a big day yesterday after murals with QR codes were unveiled in cities around the world, including Mexico City, Paris and Chicago.

Fans stumbled upon the murals, which Swift had not announced, and scanned them to find a link to a YouTube Shorts video. Every mural had a unique code that led to a different video, each revealing a new letter as part of a word puzzle.

Fans came together online to help decode the puzzle, which seemed to hint at the new album's first track, because it spelled out "for a fortnight."

Swifties in Los Angeles flock to Spotify pop-up library

Many Los Angeles Swifties celebrated the new album with a pop-up library installation in partnership with Spotify.

The three-day event, which runs through today at The Grove, featured a sneak peek at some of the album's lyrics.

Fans posted videos of themselves lined up for hours to get a glimpse at the installation.

A manuscript was front and center at the installation, revealing new lyrics periodically as the pages were turned over the course of three days.

Many fans online tried to identify other potential Easter eggs in the pop-up library, such as a bust of a peace sign, quill and fountain pens and a globe that appeared to be pointing to Florida, the name of a track on the album.

Why is the album called 'The Tortured Poets Department'?

Fans were quick to note that “The Tortured Poets Department” is the longest title for a Taylor Swift album by a large margin, a distinction previously held by her third album, "Speak Now." Before "TTPD," "Speak Now" was her only album title consisting of more than one word.

Speculation surrounding the new album and its uncharacteristic title has primarily revolved around Swift’s  2023 breakup  with British actor Joe Alwyn after their six-year relationship.

After the album announcement, a  2022 Variety interview  between Alwyn and Paul Mescal resurfaced on X. The pair revealed in the interview that they were both members of a WhatsApp group chat titled the Tortured Man Club, prompting some fans to  draw parallels  between Alwyn and Swift’s upcoming album.

The true meaning of “The Tortured Poets Department” remains to be seen, but the album's rollout has featured references to famous poems like Charles Baudelaire’s “The Albatross,” among other literary references.

Clues keep coming

Speculation continues to grow over clues for lyrics, song titles and the album’s first music video.

Not much from Miss Swift so far

It's been a notably quiet rollout for "The Tortured Poets Department."

No themed Instagram grid overhaul, no lead singles, not even a cryptic calendar leading Swifties on wild goose chases for potential Easter eggs.

A week before the release, Taylor Swift was rocking out at Coachella instead of feeding her fans who are desperate for a hint of what's to come.

Aside from a hand-painted QR code on the side of a building in Chicago, a planned exhibit at The Grove in Los Angeles in partnership with Spotify and a quick video released Tuesday that appears to leave the "Midnights" era in the dust as viewers tour The Tortured Poets Department, Swift has been silent on what we can expect.

In the video , posted to her Instagram account, we did get a glimpse of a schedule that only showed release day, and on it, the promise of a music video on Friday at 8 p.m. ET. Fourteen tick marks beneath led some to think the music video could be for the 14th track on the album, or for the leading song, "Fortnight," since a fortnight is 14 days.

Swifties believing in the latter theory proved to be correct. Swift announced that the music video would be for "Fortnight" in a Thursday afternoon social media post.

Swifties online continue to grasp for any details to try to figure out what this mastermind might have in store for her beloved fan base.

What songs are on the new album?

Here's what songs are on the track list.

• "Fortnight (feat. Post Malone)"
• "The Tortured Poets Department"
• "My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys"
• "So Long, London"
• "But Daddy I Love Him"
• "Fresh Out the Slammer"
• "Florida!!! (Florence + the Machine)"
• "Guilty as Sin?"
• "Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?"
• "I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)"
• "I Can Do It With a Broken Heart"
• "The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived"
• "The Alchemy"
• "Clara Bow"

Swift has also announced four bonus tracks: "The Manuscript," “The Bolter,” “The Albatross” and “The Black Dog.” Each bonus track will be available on a separate vinyl variant and won't be on the streaming version of the album.

When does 'The Tortured Poets Department' drop?

Swift's 11th studio album, "The Tortured Poets Department," will be released Friday at 12 a.m. ET, or 9 p.m. PT.

It will be available for purchase on vinyl, on cassette, as a digital album and in CD form. It will also be on several streaming services, including Spotify and Apple Music.

But if you plan to stream “The Tortured Poets Department” right after its release, be prepared for potential delays. When Swift’s most recent brand-new album, “Midnights,” was released, Spotify  briefly crashed  because of intense demand.

Angela Yang is a culture and trends reporter for NBC News.

Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.

Rebecca Cohen is a breaking news reporter for NBC News.

is culture and trends editor for NBC News Digital.