Scarlet Letter
What is a scarlet letter? It is a reference to the book “The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The book explores themes of legalism, sin, and guilt. A young woman called Hester Prynne gave birth to a baby of unknown parentage and is therefore punished. Her punishment requires her to stand on a scaffold for three hours, exposed to public humiliation, and to wear the scarlet “A” for the rest of her life. The major theme of the book is shaming and social stigmatisation.
We're all bored, we're all so tired of everything We wait for trains that just aren't coming We show off our different scarlet letters Trust me, mine is better
Lyrics from New Romantics
'Cause you were Romeo, I was a scarlet letter And my daddy said, "Stay away from Juliet" But you were everything to me I was begging you, "Please don't go," and I said
Lyrics from Love Story
It’s interesting that Taylor Swift used this reference on two seperate occasions. “We show off our different scarlet letters” could be interpreted as her and another person having different social stigmas. In my opinion, New Romantics is a very queer song however that will require a seperate post. She once again uses the term in Love Story with the lyric “I was a scarlet letter” when it doesn’t make much sense in the context of the song. Once again, Love Story will require a seperate post to fully interpret the song. I just wanted to have a post specifically about her usage of this term.
