An antihero is a character who, though they might occasionally do the right thing, often does so for the wrong reasons. The term first came into use in 1714, though the idea of a character who is cowardly or morally grey is far older.

She signed with Big Machine Records in 2005 and achieved prominence as a country pop singer with the albums Taylor Swift (2006) and Fearless (2008). Their singles "Teardrops on My Guitar", "Love Story", and "You Belong with Me" were crossover successes on country and pop radio formats and brought Swift mainstream fame.

Jack Antonoff co-wrote 11 and co-produced all 13 tracks with Swift on the standard edition. Aaron Dessner worked on four tracks for the 3 a.m. Edition.

The term 'anti-hero' comes from the Greek language: 'anti' means against and 'hero' means a defender or protector. While anti-heroes have been present in literature since Ancient Greek drama, the term was used first at the beginning of the 1700s.