By Sarah Elezaby
With barely eighteen hours’ notice, Taylor Swift released Evermore as a surprise album on December 10, 2020 at midnight.
Fans woke up to an Instagram post around six in the morning and desperately called their friends to clear their plans for the night. When it came out, I was one of the many sitting over Facetime with my best friend listening to the album track by track. I wasn’t the biggest TSwift fan before Folklore, the preceding album, but since the release of Evermore in particular, I’d say she’s a genius.
Her ingenuity to me comes down to one simple thing, her story telling ability. So many of the songs have multiple layers of meaning waiting to be unpacked. My English major brain goes on a field trip whenever I play these songs. I keep searching for the hidden messages asking myself: what does it mean?
I’ve done that quite a bit recently with one of my favourites, “tolerate it.” The internet has been a bust for any insightful thoughts on the song, and so I’ve decided to bless you with my thoughts on the subject. Look no further for the best interpretation of “tolerate it” to date.
“tolerate it” follows the inner monologue of someone in an emotionally abusive relationship as they think about what living with their partner is like. Although the song itself might not be emotionally triggering, my analysis can be for some as it spells out the implicit abuse she’s experiencing. A lot of my thoughts on the song come from personal experience, as I fill in the blanks with educated guesses. So don’t take what I have to say as law. You too can fill in the blanks with your own experience which is partly why it’s so emotionally affective.
Bring up the song if you’re able, and press play so you can follow along with lyrics below, pausing at the end of the verse to read my thoughts beside it. I refer to the main character as Taylor below, but let me be clear, I don’t necessarily think Swift is writing from personal experience. I also assume her partner is male which isn’t specified, simply because it’s easier to name him as he when there’s only one ‘he’ in the story.
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I sit and watch you reading with your head low
I wake and watch you breathing with your eyes closed
I sit and watch you
I notice everything you do or don’t do
You’re so much older and wiser, and I
Okay, first verse in and she’s already said she’s “watch[ing]” like three times. The fourth time is implied because she notices everything he does/doesn’t do – sounds like walking on eggshells, right? So, we know we have something to be nervous about we’re just not sure what it is until she stipulates: you’re so much older and wiser, which throws herself into the submissive position discrediting whatever she thinks, says, or feels.
I wait by the door like I’m just a kid
Use my best colors for your portrait
Lay the table with the fancy shit
And watch you tolerate it
If it’s all in my head, tell me now
Tell me I’ve got it wrong somehow
I know my love should be celebrated
But you tolerate it
Our suspicions are confirmed about the power dynamics between them are confirmed. She likens herself to “just a kid” making him, and his thoughts and opinions, more important because he’s “so much older and wiser.”
Her best self is what she puts into this relationship, “for [his] portrait” for his public appearance – something narcissists are often concerned with. And she knows something is wrong, but almost expects to be gaslighted when she says, “tell me I’ve got it wrong somehow.” Maybe because that’s the response she usually gets…
I greet you with a battle hero’s welcome
I take your indiscretions all in good fun
I sit and listen
I polish plates until they gleam and glisten
You’re so much older and wiser, and I
A battle hero you say? This man is larger than life in her mind and that fits the profile for a narcissist: The It Man. They’re used to getting what they want, and Taylor’s repeated excuse at the end of the verse reflects manipulative tactics he’s likely used to do exactly that. She tells herself that he knows best because she’s probably heard him say that to her a million times in words or actions.
I wait by the door like I’m just a kid
Use my best colors for your portrait
Lay the table with the fancy shit
And watch you tolerate it
If it’s all in my head, tell me now
Tell me I’ve got it wrong somehow
I know my love should be celebrated
But you tolerate it
Despite everything he’s done, she reverts to this pattern, reverts to appeasing her abuser, the faun trauma response. She’ll do her best, give her all, do everything possible to get something more out of him than simply toleration. But it isn’t until the next verse that she realizes it won’t ever happen. “Tell me I’ve got it wrong somehow” hits different for me in this verse. I feel like she’s finally seeing what’s wrong, but doesn’t want to believe it, a step further from her blissful ignorance last verse.
While you were out building other worlds, where was I?
Where’s that man who’d throw blankets over my barbed wire?
I made you my temple, my mural, my sky
Now I’m begging for footnotes in the story of your life
Drawing hearts in the byline
Always taking up too much space or time
You assume I’m fine, but what would you do if I
The rhythm changes here as Swift spits out the first two questions, turning the tables on him. She’s moved from denial to anger – a grief response. Like a typical wolf in sheep’s clothing this man brought down her emotional guards, only to withdraw love and compassion once he became her “temple…mural…[and] sky.”
Taylor starts to reclaim agency in this section, tired of being in the “footnotes” as opposed to the “byline” where the author is named. Wanting to take control of the story, she explores her feelings that have been repressed because they “t[ook] up too much space [and] time.”
I break free and leave us in ruins?
Took this dagger in me and removed it?
Gain the weight of you then lose it
Believe me, I could do it
These threats are liberating, but in the darkest way. She’s taken the first step to stop “waiting by the door like [she’s] just a kid” but the only way she can imagine freedom, the only way she can imagine leaving is by “t[aking] this dagger in me.” Even after 50 plays I didn’t realize what she was saying here until I absentmindedly brought my fist to my chest and ripped it away. “Took” is such a scary way to describe stabbing yourself because it implies gain. You take your sister to the store, take a donut from the box, take the dog on a walk. It’s about adding something to you. Take it with you.
What I’m not completely certain on is “gain the weight of you then lose it.” My best guess is, if she takes this dagger in, it’s the weight of him that drives it, the weight of his oppression that drove her to do this. But she took it in, and she can remove it, ending her life, and losing the weight of the relationship.
If it’s all in my head tell me now
Tell me I’ve got it wrong somehow
I know my love should be celebrated
But you tolerate it
You don’t realize one day that you were abused and never question it again. Swift slips back into the role of the observer because it’s so easy to slip back into. She hasn’t recognized an escape that doesn’t involve death because abusers seem unstoppable like the “battle hero” she likens him to. They defy reason, after they defeat your better reasoning.
I never considered until now the fact that the song doesn’t have a happy ending. Because she recognized how bad things were, I felt like she had won, but we don’t know if she ever discovered another way of escape, or whether she’s still stuck there… or worse.
Because you can interpret this song however you like, I’m going to hold onto the idea that she will get out one day, and that this was just a glimpse of her life before that day came.
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