Who Is Clara Bow, and Why Did Taylor Swift Name a Song After Her?

Besides routinely setting music records and racking up Grammy Awards, Taylor Swift likes to cite female entertainment pioneers and role models such as punk rocker/poet Patti Smith and songwriter/singer Stevie Nicks in public statements or her songs.

On her The Tortured Poets Department album, one of Swift’s songs is titled “Clara Bow.” Swift was inspired by Bow, a female motion picture star in the early 20th century. Here’s what we know about her.

The ‘It’ Girl

To those who aren’t cinephiles, Bow was a movie star whose career began in silent films and successfully transitioned into talking pictures. Bow was called the “It” girl, and at the apex of her career, the so-called Jazz Era baby projected sexuality and a vulnerability that made her Hollywood’s biggest star.

She starred in Wings, a World War I movie in which she was the love interest of two American pilots. The film won the first Academy Award for Best Picture. During her career’s “talkies” period, she starred in The Wild Party, Dangerous Curves, and The Saturday Night Kid and retained her position as filmdom’s top box-office star.

Flapper

Bow played a flapper in many films, the quintessential party girl of the 1920s. Bow observed that something else was beneath the happy-go-lucky facade that resonated with audiences. In a Vogue article that quoted her, she said: “All the time the flapper is laughing and dancing, there’s a feeling of tragedy underneath. She’s unhappy and disillusioned, and that’s what people sense.”

Bow knew about unhappiness. As a poor child in Brooklyn, she was sexually abused by her father. Her mother suffered from mental illness and was eventually institutionalized by her father. The experiences from her youth made Bow strong, independent, bold, and ambitious, qualities that didn’t always sit well with a male-dominated movie industry.

Career Declines

“[Bow] has an early quality that is rare among our screen luminaries,” writes Elizabeth Greer for Motion Picture Classic (via Screening the Past). However, that brightness wasn’t enough to keep her career from being brought down by small drama.

Bow’s career began to decline when her secretary was involved in a financial scandal. During the trial, salacious details of Bow’s private life became public, adding to previous stories about Bow’s uninhibited behavior. Her secretary went to prison, and the years of stress caused Bow to have a physical and emotional breakdown.

‘Clara Bow’

In an interview with Variety, Swift said “Clara Bow” was her commentary on how the music industry treats newcomers by denigrating performers who had come before them and suggesting to the new arrivals that they can be better.

Swift added that is how women are taught to see themselves. Swift selected women archetypes of greatness in the entertainment industry, such as Clara Bow and Stevie Nicks.

The Tortured Poets Department

The Tortured Poets Department is Swift’s 11th studio album, released in April. Swift announced the record’s release at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards on Feb. 4, after winning Best Pop Vocal Album for her 10th studio album, Midnights.

She has 14 Grammy Awards wins and 52 nominations. Swift has 13 chart-topping albums on the Billboard 200 and has summited the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart 11 times. A Bloomberg analysis at the end of 2023 puts her wealth at $1.1 billion.