“August” was the first song Taylor Swift wrote in the Folklore love-triangle sequence.
The three connected songs are “August,” “Cardigan,” and “Betty.” They explore the same fictional relationship from different viewpoints: the unnamed summer-romance narrator in “August,” Betty in “Cardigan,” and James in “Betty.”
Swift began with the perspective of a girl in an undefined relationship, then developed the wider story around the characters and their overlapping memories. This approach helped Folklore move beyond autobiographical interpretation into deliberately imagined narratives.
A common misconception is that “Cardigan” came first because it was Folklore’s lead single and one of its best-known tracks. In the writing sequence, however, Swift identified “August” as the first of the trilogy she wrote.