This article contains affiliate links; if you click such a link and make a purchase, we may earn a commission.Taylor Swift on Why Criticism Is a ‘Huge Fuel’ for Her—and What She Really Thinks of Fan Theories

Alyssa BaileyTue, April 28, 2026 at 7:53 PM UTC

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Taylor Swift spoke to The New York Times about songwriting in a 30-minute interview.

The singer touched on a wide range of topics, including how she feels about her fans’ theories and the criticism she receives.

She also spoke about why music needs more male confessional musicians, and how her own songwriting has evolved as she has gotten older.

Taylor Swift has given her first major interview of the year to The New York Times, speaking in-depth about her songwriting.

In the 30-minute video, the singer goes through her discography and details her writing process. She also candidly addresses what she has accepted about being a public figure, how criticism has inspired some of her best music, and what she thinks about fan analyses of her lyrics.

There was a lot to take in during the discussion. Here, some of her most revealing quotes.

Swift on being a public figure

While discussing “mirrorball,” Swift shared her feelings on being in the spotlight, along with what she has accepted about the attention artists like her receive.

“Being a person in the public eye, I’ve really begun to realize that you are a mirror,” she said. “You are a mirror for your fans, for the media, for people on the internet, for just random—just people who don’t even really care about your music, but they know who you are. However they feel about themselves and their life will be projected on how they perceive you. A public person who makes art is a mirror ball. And that’s part of why I’ve been able to keep my wits about me through all this because I know that, and I’m really kind of aware of that dynamic, but I’m still endlessly fascinated by people, by the human experience, by why people are the way they are, by the ways that they feel emotion.”

She spoke about how she decides to publish “shockingly vulnerable confessions” in her song, recalling what she did with the “mirrorball” verse, “I’ve never been a natural. All I do is try, try, try.”

“You say that at first, and I remember writing that and being like, ‘Oh my god, this feels like—do you want to say this?’” she recalled. “And I’m like, ‘Actually, I feel like a lot of people feel that way.’ That always overrides my discomfort with if a line feels too true, because I don’t really think that there’s anything that’s too true.”

Swift on confessional songwriting—and why there should be more male artists doing it

Swift began by discussing the treatment of herself and other women in the last decade, before expanding into why having more male confessional artists would be good for everyone.

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“The 2010s was a time for women in the entertainment industry that we don’t need…we’ll talk about it later,” she quipped. “We’re all still limping away from that. And I think that conversations are much more healthy now around, ‘There’s a difference between art and going and ranting on an Instagram Live.’ There’s a difference. This is a song; this takes craft; this takes skill; this takes expertise.”

She then spoke about why Sombr’s songwriting excites her so much, calling herself a “massive fan.”

“His lyrics are so intensely confessional,” she said, citing one, “‘I don’t want another man’s child to have the eyes of the girl I can’t forget.’ Are you kidding me? Having a male artist say stuff like that is really good for the cause of women to be able to say stuff—if there’s any way we can make confessional songwriting a little bit more of something that isn’t like, people… [seeing you as] being messy.”

She broadened her scoop, asking, “Are rap beefs messy or are they confessional? Let’s make it a music conversation rather than just ganging up on the female artists. And I think the more male artists that are messy, or emotionally complex or confessional or upset, the happier I am.”

Gareth Cattermole/TAS24 - Getty ImagesSwift on how her songwriting evolved over time

The singer detailed the shift in her own songwriting over the years: “I can only speak to me but as I’ve grown up, the intensity of the sort of no-pun-intended ‘message in a bottle’ nature of my songwriting has shifted and changed into something else,” she said. “It used to be like, ‘I can’t tell a person how I feel so I’ll write it in this song.’ And that was really important for me at the time that it was important for me. It’s also important when you’re in your early 20s, and there’s someone you shouldn’t talk to and you don’t want to call them because they’re bad for you and it’s toxic. So you just—you write it in the song, and that’s where it lives, like almost as a method of self-control or self-preservation or something. But for the Folklore album and everything like that…it wasn’t as a response to having a public life and the intrusions that come with that. It was really more of just wanting to challenge myself a writer.”

How Swift feels about fans guessing who her songs are about

Toward the end of her interview, Swift spoke about her fan base, touching on their traditions, before getting into her feelings about the way some of them dissect her music.

“They love for an emotional song to be Track 5,” she said. “There’s special things like that, but at the same time, there’s sort of so many of them now, which is great, but there’s corners of my fan base who are going to take things to a really extreme place. There’s nothing I can do about that. There’s people who are going to try to do detective work, figure out the details. ‘Who is that about? What is this?’ When it gets a little bit weird for me is when people act like it’s sort of a paternity test, like, ‘This song’s about that person.’ Because I’m like, ‘That dude didn’t write the song. I did.’ But that’s part of it. You have to hold tight to your perception of your art and your relationship with it. And then you just kind of have to like, [blows], ‘There it goes. Hope you like it. If you don’t now, hope you do in five years, and if you never do, then I was doing it for me anyway.’”

How criticism has inspired some of Swift’s best art

Swift doesn’t read all the comments, but some commentary about her has inspired great songs. “Criticism has been a huge fuel for me,” she said. “It’s been a huge jumping-off point, like a creative writing prompt or something. There’s so many songs in my career that would not exist, like ‘Blank Space’ would not exist if I hadn’t had people being like, ‘Here’s a slideshow of all her boyfriends.’ And then ‘Anti-Hero’ is a song that I’m so proud of still. Like, that song doesn’t exist if I don’t get criticized for every aspect of my personality that people have a problem with or whatever.”

She shared the advice she gives to other new artists and songwriters about how to handle the noise. “I’m like, ‘Why are you reading your comments? Like, that’s too much of it. Like that’s—you’re inundating yourself with too much criticism that doesn’t really have a focus,’” she said. “But I think a little bit of it, you got to just be like, ‘This is part of it. Don’t make this make you stop writing or make you edit yourself or whatever. If it’s an interesting point to you to kind of respond to, then that’s a gift for you to be able to write something—maybe you wouldn’t have written something that day. But don’t like, God. Don’t go to the Notes app and post it. Write about it. Make art about this. Don’t respond to trolls in your comments. That’s not what we want from you. We want your art.”

Watch her full interview here.

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