Marjorie Analysis: Evermore as Amalgamation {12/17/20 WP}

There’s a sadness to Taylor’s voice.  Her Grandmother Marjorie is not dead to Taylor, because her advice can still be heard.  She sings, “I still feel you all around.”  This song means a lot to me personally, because I had/have a very close relationship with my grandma.  And I believe the sentiment that someone can live in your heart, and mind.  “What died didn’t stay dead, you’re alive in my mind” is the primary purpose of the song. 

But it’s still an amalgamation like the rest of the songs on Evermore.  The same sentiment of keeping a person within yourself, after they’ve passed away, applies to career endings (and break ups too).  I think a teeny work sentiment is in the lyrics, a little bit of Taylor needing to remember her grandmothers advice, b/c she’s taking advantage of Joe too much, and the secondary subject of the song is Karlie.

[Verse 1]

Never be so kind

You forget to be clever

Never be so clever

You forget to be kind

These lyrics could address Taylor’s music career.  She needs to balance being nice with being business savvy.

What does Marjorie mean?  Greek, Persian, Hebrew, Irish, Latin: [one of the meanings is] Child of light.

Light = sun = Karlie.  What a konvenient and apt koincidence!

[Verse 3]

The autumn chill that wakes me up

You loved the amber skies so much

Amber is a yellow, even golden color.  And you know who that represents.  Karlie.

Long limbs and frozen swims

Long, tall limbs like Karlie might have?  Frozen like the ground in Hoax.

You’d always go past where our feet could touch 

Symbolic for risk-taking?

“I’d hold you as the water rushes in” [Dancing with our Hands Tied, aka the Kissgate song]

And I complained the whole way there 

Taylor is always afraid and hanging back.  Maybe she’s refusing to come out of the closet.

The car ride back and up the stairs

I should’ve asked you questions

I should’ve asked you how to be

Asked you to write it down for me

Should’ve kept every grocery store receipt

‘Cause every scrap of you would be taken from me

I get that this is a little story of a memory Taylor has with her grandmother.  But the verse does double-duty here, invoking some Kaylor symbolism.  

Tall, sunshiny Karlie and Taylor were in love.  Karlie had dated women more publicly before Taylor.  And Taylor was reluctant to come out or seem gay.  Car rides are a feature of many songs about Karlie, and going up to their secret place with boarded up windows for privacy.  And now that it’s over, Taylor wishes she had been a bit more skeptical, and cynically kept some receipts of their relationship transgressions.  But this is in the song, because she can hold the good Kaylor times in her heart too.

The song quickly addresses her boyfriend/beard as well.

[Verse 2]

Never be so politе

You forget your power

Nevеr wield such power

You forget to be polite

Well He is English and they’re known for their manners.  She may be walking over him and stepping on his feelings by using him for publicity when she needs to, but neglecting to mention him in any real way otherwise.  So both Joe and Taylor need to balance their power dynamic with agreeability.  Nobody should be a tyrant, nobody should be a doormat.

[Outro]

And if I didn’t know better

I’d think you were singing to me now

If I didn’t know better

I’d think you were still around

I know better

But I still feel you all around

I know better

But you’re still around

The outro applies to everyone in the song.  Taylor’s grandmother is the primary subject of the song, whos voice is literally in the song.  Taylor still remembers her advice, and holds her in her heart.  But she also holds her memories of BMR good-times, and Kaylor-love in her heart.  Those good memories will always be with her.  Even though she knows better.