E23: Show and Tell - Mad Women

There’s nothing like a mad woman, what a shame she went mad.  What better way to celebrate Valentine’s Day than with some songs about women scorned? In this episode, we bring to you three songs that represent mad women. Maansi kicks off the discussion with the scornful, vengeful mad woman in “Better Than Revenge,” Jodi walks us through the woman who’s driven to insanity in “mad woman,” and Jenn wraps up the discussion with an example of the mad woman who is stuck in bonus track “right where you left me.” We close out the discussion by acknowledging how all of these songs are indicative of a movement that’s giving women everywhere the opportunity to reclaim the “mad woman” stigma. Did we know this episode would drop on Valentine’s Day when we recorded it? No. Are we mad about it? Not at all!   Mentioned in this episode:  Hildegard of Bingen Sigmund Freud Mean Girls “Before He Cheats,” Carrie Underwood “Mama’s Broken Heart,” Miranda Lambert “Jolene,” Dolly Parton “Vigilante shit,” Taylor Swift The Country of the Blind, HG Wells Game of Thrones Great Expectations, Charles Dickens Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf Pride & Prejudice, Jane Austen Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte The Female Malady, Elaine Showalter  Villette, Charlotte Bronte Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See Cinderella’s Sisters: A Revisionist History of Foot Binding, Dorothy Ko “Mama’s broken heart,” Miranda Lambert Looking for an audio book? Check out our Libro.fm playlist https://tidd.ly/47uhRVI ***   Episode Highlights:  [01:47] Intro to “mad women” & hysteria [09:43] “Better than revenge,” Speak Now [33:52] “mad woman,” folklore [50:52] “right where you left me,” evermore [1:13:02] Reclaiming the mad woman   Subscribe to get new episode updates: aptaylorswift.substack.com/subscribe   Follow us on social!  TikTok → tiktok.com/@APTaylorSwift Instagram → instagram.com/APTaylorSwift YouTube → youtube.com/@APTaylorSwift Link Tree →linktr.ee/aptaylorswift Bookshop.org → bookshop.org/shop/apts Libro.fm → https://tidd.ly/47uhRVI   This podcast is neither related to nor endorsed by Taylor Swift, her companies, or record labels. All opinions are our own. Intro music produced by Scott Zadig aka Scotty Z.