Taylor Swift honors Dolly Parton’s ‘everlasting’ legacy in heartfelt tribute

Taylor Swift is paying tribute to one of the most legendary artists in country music: Dolly Parton.

“A world without Dolly doesn’t feel possible, real, or right,” Swift told Page Six in a statement following Parton’s death Tuesday at the age of 80. “But because of the eternally generous way she spent her time on this earth and the countless lives she changed for the better, her legacy will be an everlasting one.”

The “Cruel Summer” singer called Parton “truly the gift that kept on giving.”

“Dolly gave us someone to look up to while encouraging us to be who we are as individuals. Somehow she was able to give us her lessons about the world gently and honestly, simultaneously, and oftentimes hilariously,” Swift continued. “She managed to give the world the ultimate mystery and fantasy in some corners of her life, but to give full transparency in the ways that counted.”

Swift went on to praise the “Jolene” singer for being “true grace and true grit, all in one dazzling person,” noting that “she possessed the softest heart when it came to the struggles of others, and a backbone of steel to defend her own self worth as an artist.”

“Along with her other fans, I am so grateful for all of it,” she added. “For the melodies and lyrics she wrote that thawed even the coldest hearts. For the millions of books she provided children all over the world so that they might fall in love with stories the way she did. For the tightropes she walked so that young girls like me could grow up dreaming of joining the circus too.

Swift concluded her statement, saying, “Dolly, I’ll think of you each step of the way.”

The “9 to 5” icon died Tuesday while surrounded by loved ones following a secret battle with cancer, her heartbroken family announced.

“After bravely facing a brief battle with cancer, Dolly departed her Earthly life today at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center surrounded by loved ones,” Parton’s reps confirmed to Page Six, though they did not disclose what type of cancer she was battling.

Swift and Parton had publicly supported and praised each other for years, though they never worked together.

In 2010, after Swift became the youngest-ever CMA Entertainer of the Year at 19 at the 2009 awards, Parton was quick to praise the rising country singer as “a great role model for young people.”

“I say, yay, Taylor Swift. I think she is a smart, beautiful girl. I think she’s making all the right moves,” Parton told CNN’s Larry King.

“She’s got a good head on her shoulders. She’s surrounded with wonderful people. Her songs are great. She keeps herself anchored. She knows who she is and she’s living and standing by that,” she added.

The pair also crossed paths in person in 2010, posing backstage at the Grand Ole Opry’s 85th anniversary celebration in Nashville in what appears to be the only public photo of them together.

By 2016, Swift had firmly established herself as a pop star following the blockbuster success of her 2014 album “1989,” and Parton was impressed.

While promoting her own album, “Pure & Simple,” she told Vanity Fair that Swift had done “amazing” work “bridging that gap” between country and pop.

Parton came to Swift’s defense in 2022 after Blur frontman Damon Albarn questioned whether Swift actually wrote her own songs.

Parton pushed back in an interview with HollywoodLife, saying Swift was “a great writer — with or without anybody” and that she “really [gets] rubbed wrong sometimes when people mistreat the artist.”

In 2023, Swift praised Parton as “a force of evolution and transformation in our industry,” adding that her “sense of humor and mischief” were her favorite things about the country legend in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter.

By 2024, Swift was in the middle of her Eras Tour and had released “The Tortured Poets Department,” while Parton was still keeping tabs on her — and her romance with Travis Kelce.

She called Swift and Kelce’s relationship their “little love affair,” adding, “I’m thinking people love romance,” she told E! News that November.

The two pop stars’ connection became more personal this year through Parton’s Imagination Library, the icon’s “book gifting program that mails free, high-quality books to children from birth to age five, no matter their family’s income.”

In July, Swift and Kelce donated $2 million to the children’s literacy program, which Parton founded in 1995.

“Hey, when you have your firstborn, can I have it? Because that is gonna be one special baby!” Parton joked in a video message thanking Swift and Kelce.

Swift referenced that work in her tribute, honoring Parton for “the millions of books” she provided to children around the world.

The Imagination Library has distributed more than 300 million books since its launch.