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    Harvard’s Taylor Swift Scholars Have Thoughts on ‘The Tortured Poets Department’

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    The students taking Harvard University’s class on the singer are studying up. Their final papers are due at the end of the month.Fans of Taylor Swift often study up for a new album, revisiting the singer’s older works to prepare to analyze lyrics and song titles for secret messages and meanings.“The Tortured Poets Department” is getting much the same treatment, and perhaps no group of listeners was better prepared than the students at Harvard University currently studying Ms. Swift’s works in an English class devoted entirely to the artist. The undergraduate course, “Taylor Swift and Her World,” is taught by Stephanie Burt, who has her students comparing Ms. Swift’s songs to works by poets and writers including Willa Cather, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth.On Thursday night, about 50 students from the class gathered in a lecture hall on campus to listen to Ms. Swift’s new album. Mary Pankowski, a 22-year-old senior studying history of art and architecture, wore a cream sweatshirt she bought at Ms. Swift’s Eras tour last year. The group made beaded friendship bracelets to celebrate the new album, she said.When the clock struck midnight, the classroom erupted into applause, and the analysis began. First, the group listened through the album once without discussing, just taking it all in.Certain lines, however, immediately caused a stir, said Samantha Wilhoit, a junior studying government — like a reference to the singer Charlie Puth and the scathing lyrics to the song “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived,” Ms. Wilhoit, 21, said.A line from the song “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart,” in which Ms. Swift sings, “I cry a lot but I am so productive,” also seemed to resonate, Ms. Wilhoit said, laughing.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      in Television

      ‘S.N.L.’ Invites University of Phoenix to the House Antisemitism Hearing

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      The satire was only slightly less awkward than the real thing, in a freewheeling episode hosted by Adam Driver. Olivia Rodrigo was the musical guest.Sometimes even an up-to-the-minute comedy show like “Saturday Night Live” can’t quite stay ahead of the news cycle. Hours after it was announced that Elizabeth Magill, the president of the University of Pennsylvania, was resigning after an appearance before Congress in which she appeared to evade questions about whether students should be punished for calling for the genocide of Jews, “S.N.L.” led its broadcast with a satirical recreation of the Tuesday hearing.The result was a sketch that was only somewhat less uncomfortable than the real-life event it was mocking.This week’s broadcast, hosted by Adam Driver and featuring the musical guest Olivia Rodrigo, opened by spoofing a C-SPAN broadcast of a House committee hearing in which university presidents had testified about antisemitism on their campuses. Heidi Gardner, playing Magill, was joined by Chloe Fineman as Sally Kornbluth of M.I.T. and Ego Nwodim as Claudine Gay of Harvard.Chloe Troast, playing Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, the House Republican who grilled the university presidents, told the presidents: “Now I’m going to start screaming questions at these women like I’m Billy Eichner. Antisemitism, yea or nay?”Troast added, “Yes or no: Is calling for the genocide of Jews against the code of conduct for Harvard?”Nwodim replied, “Well, it depends on the context.”Following an equally unsatisfying answer from Gardner, Troast announced to Fineman: “M.I.T. Lady, chance to steal. And keep in mind, if you don’t say yes, you’re going to make me look good, which is really, really hard to do.”“Could I submit an answer in writing at a later date?” Fineman answered.“Am I winning this hearing?” Troast said in disbelief.Bowen Yang, playing Representative Mark Takano, Democrat of California, posed further questions to the panelists. What if someone on campus yelled, “I poisoned the water supply?” he asked.Nwodim answered, “If they poisoned it with diversity, that could be wonderful.”What if they yelled, “Fire!” in a crowded theater?Gardner replied, “I’d be excited the theater was crowded because I support the arts.”Breaking from reality, the “S.N.L.” sketch added Kenan Thompson, who was playing the president of the online University of Phoenix.Asked if he would condemn antisemitism, Thompson said, “Well, my campus is the internet, so antisemitism is kind of our most popular major. And our mascot is porn.”But he told Troast that his school would consider offering a course on the subject. “Lady, we’ll offer a course on anything,” he said. “The only mandatory courses we have are how to login to the University of Phoenix online and how to set up autopay.”Opening monologue of the weekTrue fans of Adam Driver — Driverheads, we call ourselves — don’t appreciate him only for his breakthrough roles in “Girls” and the “Star Wars” franchise but also for unexpected moments like when he sang “Being Alive” in “Marriage Story.”In his fourth monologue as “S.N.L.” host, Driver didn’t break into song, but he did play a lovely piano as he shared his year-end wish list with Santa Claus. Among the things he asked for were five pairs of Chinos (for having just turned 40) and for “Star Wars” fans to stop blaming him for killing Han Solo. (“I didn’t kill Han Solo,” he said. “Wokeness killed Han Solo.”) Maybe next year we’ll get our wish and Driver will sing another Sondheim number.’Tis the season of the weekTechnically, the big year-end “S.N.L.” Christmas episode isn’t until next week, but the show didn’t waste any time getting into the Yuletide mood with a slew of sketches that were holiday-themed — and very, very weird. If any of them could be described as down-to-earth, there was this one in which Driver and Dismukes play the mustachioed host and guest at a dinner party where neither will budge when the other one holds out a tray of food and declares: “Beep beep.”Then there’s the filmed segment in which the seasonal spirit inspires Mikey Day to contact a friend he lost touch with (Driver), only to find that the old acquaintance has grown very crazy and now has a companion named Big Filthy (Devon Walker). And finally there’s the sketch set at a TV shopping channel, where Driver plays a confectioner selling a Santa Claus chocolate that takes on an unfortunate shape when it is unwrapped. Happy holidays (until next week, when we wish you happy holidays again)!Weekend Update jokes of the weekOver at the Weekend Update desk, the anchors, Colin Jost and Michael Che, riffed on Hunter Biden’s indictment for tax evasion and on the congressional hearing on antisemitism on college campuses.Jost began:A federal indictment issued this week against Hunter Biden alleges that he evaded paying over $1 million of taxes between 2016 and 2020. And they’re only catching him now? Man, this is super embarrassing for whoever was president from 2016 to 2020. The indictment claims that instead of paying taxes, Hunter Biden spent his money on drugs and escorts. But honestly, it would have been more surprising if he remembered to do his taxes during that time. No one finishes doing cocaine with a hooker and is like, could I get a receipt?Che continued:Speak for yourself. If convicted, Hunter Biden could be sentenced to up to 17 years in prison, which would be the first time any Biden has successfully completed a sentence.Later, Jost added:The president of the University of Pennsylvania has resigned after appearing to dodge questions about genocide during a Congressional hearing on campus antisemitism. She will be replaced by literally anyone who knows you say genocide is bad. The whole crazy part is that the whole point during her speech was that free speech on campus should never be punished. And then she was immediately punished for her speech.Weekend Update dance number of the weekIn still another peculiar segment inspired by the year-end holidays, Fineman stood in front of the Weekend Update desk and told the anchors, “The sexiest gift you can give your partner is trying something new in the bedroom.” Before things could get much weirder, Fineman explained that she meant the hybrid hip-hop/ballet dance performed by Julia Stiles at the end of her 2001 romantic drama “Save the Last Dance.”While explaining the film, Fineman delivered a faithful rendition of this dance — no small feat — and apparently earned the approval of the real-life Stiles, who joined her at the end. Now can we get an equally heartfelt tribute to Stiles’s TV debut on “Ghostwriter”?Parental instincts of the weekIf only because it was funny and as weird as anything else from this week’s show (and maybe because my editor just recently became a parent himself: Congratulations, Austin), here’s a sketch in which Driver plays a visually disturbing and yet somehow surprisingly plausible baby accompanying his mother (Sarah Sherman) on his first-ever plane ride.If the sight of Driver’s adult head placed on a baby’s body doesn’t haunt your dreams, the sound of his scream when he believes his teddy bear has disappeared surely will. More

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      in Music

      A Harvard Professor Prepares to Teach a New Subject: Taylor Swift

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      Swift-inspired classes are sweeping colleges across the country.The syllabus is much like what one might expect from an undergraduate English course, with texts by William Wordsworth, Willa Cather and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. But there is one name on the list that might surprise budding scholars.Taylor Swift.In the spring semester, Stephanie Burt, an English professor at Harvard University, will teach a new class, “Taylor Swift and Her World.” Nearly 300 students have enrolled.The class is part of a wave at academic institutions around the country, including New York University and the University of Texas at Austin. Stanford has invoked the Swift song “All Too Well (Ten Minute Version)” with a course planned for next year titled “All Too Well (Ten Week Version),” and Arizona State University offered a psychology class on Ms. Swift’s work.Next year, the University of California, Berkeley plans to offer “Artistry and Entrepreneurship: Taylor’s Version,” and the University of Florida will school undergraduates in Ms. Swift’s storytelling. The Florida course’s description begins with the words “ … Ready for it?” — an allusion to the song from the album “Reputation.”In a conversation with The New York Times, Professor Burt, 52, discussed her love of Ms. Swift’s music and what exactly her students will be studying. This interview has been edited and condensed.Let’s start with the big question. Are you a Swiftie?Ten or 12 years ago, I noticed that of all of the songs that one would hear in, you know, drugstores and airports and bus stations and public places, there was one that was better than all the other songs. I wanted to know who wrote it. It was just a more compelling song lyrically and musically, just a perfect piece of construction. It was “You Belong With Me.”“Fearless” got you!It turned out she had a lot of other great songs. The thing that made me really think about her as an artist whose process and career I wanted to learn more about and thought about a lot was when I saw “Miss Americana,” the documentary.What about it?It really does such a great job of showing both how much support she’s had — she’s someone who’s come from a good deal of privilege and had parents who really wanted to help her realize her dreams, which, you know, honestly, I have, too — but also how she worked to become herself, and how she has become someone who makes her own decisions in a way that brings people along with her and doesn’t alienate people. I realize that she could probably take fewer private jet flights.The Harvard campus.David Degner for The New York TimesMs. Swift during an August concert in Inglewood, Calif.Michael Tran/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesDo you have a favorite era?It bounces between “Red” and “Folklore”-slash-“Evermore.”Let’s talk a little bit about the coursework. What is on the syllabus?Each week pairs some body of her work with some body of work by other people. We are reading two different Willa Cather novels. We’re reading a novel by James Weldon Johnson about a performing artist who’s got a very different relationship to his own career in his hands. We are reading a contemporary novel by Zan Romanoff about One Direction fandom.We’re going to read some Wordsworth, Wordsworth being a Lake District poet. She sings about the poets of the Lake District in England. Wordsworth also writes about some of the same feelings that Taylor sings about: disappointment in retrospect, and looking back and realizing that you’re not the child you were, even though you might want to be.What songs are going to be paired with those texts?We are reading Coleridge’s “Work Without Hope.” “Work Without Hope,” of course, being Coleridge’s version of “You’re on Your Own, Kid.”Of course. How about homework?The written work will include a couple of conventionally argued academic essays, where the student needs to make a well-supported argument with clearly framed evidence in easy-to-follow prose. One of them has to be on a Taylor topic. One of them has to be about something else that we read for the course. So you can’t write about nothing but Taylor Swift and get a good grade.Is there a final?The third of the three papers is the final assignment. I have such mixed feelings about final exams because they stress people out. They’re a pain to give and they’re no fun. On the other hand, Harvard students are also often taking other classes that absolutely demand a lot of time from them, especially if they’re, for example, future doctors. Or they have other commitments that eat up a lot of the time. If you don’t do something to make sure they feel like they have to do the reading, they will sometimes, regretfully, blow off reading.Any chance of a guest lecture by (the honorary) Dr. Swift?I have tweeted at her, and I would welcome her presence if she would like to pop in, but she is quite busy.A Harvard class about Taylor Swift feels ripe for detractors. What would you say to people who might criticize such a subject as unserious or not worthy of rigorous study?This is a course that includes plenty of traditionally admired dead people who’ve been taught in English departments for a long time, who I not only admire but am teaching in this course. Taylor’s work is the spine. If you don’t appreciate this body of songwriting and of performance, that’s not my problem. But they should remember literally everything that takes up a lot of time in a modern English department was at one point a low-prestige popular art form that you wouldn’t bother to study, like Shakespeare’s sonnets and, in particular, the rise of the novel. Can I quote Wordsworth?Please.Others shall love what we have loved and we will teach them how. If you’re going to teach people to love something that they see as obscure or distant or difficult or unfamiliar, your best shot at doing that honestly and effectively is to connect it to something that people already like. More

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      in Theater

      Robert Brustein, Passionate Force in Nonprofit Theater, Dies at 96

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      A critic and dramatist himself, he started repertory companies at Yale and Harvard and fiercely defended the art form, even if it meant feuding with playwrights.Robert Brustein, an erudite and contentious advocate for profit-indifferent theater, in the service of which he wore many hats — critic, teacher, producer, director, playwright and even actor — died on Sunday at his home in Cambridge, Mass. He was 96. His death was confirmed by his wife, Doreen Beinart.Mr. Brustein was dean of the drama school at Yale and founded and ran the Yale Repertory Theater and the American Repertory Theater at Harvard, producing well over 100 plays and securing them in the regional theater firmament. He also taught at Yale as well as at Harvard.A prolific writer with the zeal of an environmentalist and the moral certainty of a martyr, he reviewed stage productions for The New Republic for more than 50 years. In many books and in countless newspaper and magazine articles, he argued for brave theater, intellectual theater, nonpandering theater, and worried that the art form was being attenuated by the profit motive.Mr. Brustein was a passionate defender of the resident, nonprofit theaters whose ranks expanded across the United States in the last decades of the 20th century, and as such he was perpetually concerned that they not be corrupted by commercial interests. The Broadway megahit “A Chorus Line,” in one instance — originally produced in 1975 by the Public Theater in New York — had made it clear that a hit show could funnel many years of economic fuel back to the source.“The basic aim of the commercial theater is to make a profit,” he said in an interview with The New York Times in 1990. “The basic aim of noncommercial theater, in its ideal form, is to create the condition whereby works of art can be known. And I don’t think these are compatible aims.”A public intellectual and supporter of the arts, Mr. Brustein delivered opinions that were often respectfully received but that just as often incited exasperation or outrage. Theater people, after all, are not especially fond of being called sellouts. When Frank Rich left his post as chief drama critic for The Times in 1994, his valedictory essay singled out Mr. Brustein:“I rarely had ugly confrontations with anyone in the theater, and my mail from theater people, even at its angriest, was civilized,” Mr. Rich wrote. “In 13 years the few significant exceptions invariably involved Robert Brustein.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.We are confirming your access to this article, this will take just a moment. However, if you are using Reader mode please log in, subscribe, or exit Reader mode since we are unable to verify access in that state.Confirming article access.If you are a subscriber, please  More