Dolly Parton knew how loved she was. It wasn’t an accident — it was always part of her plan. Even as a girl, growing up dirt-poor in the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, she planned to grow up into a star everyone would know. The country queen wore the whole story of American music on her shoulders like a coat of many colors. That’s how she became the most universally beloved of American singers, a sequined superstar who also happened to be a ferociously original genius. “I was telling my own stories, speaking my own feelings,” Parton told Rolling Stone in 1975. “I’m a pretty bold person.”
That’s why the whole world is in shock at the news of her death on Aug. 25, at 80 — Dolly had been treating reports about her health with all of her customary humor. She was cracking jokes about it just the day before. It’s hard to imagine a world without Dolly Parton. But thanks to her music, that’s not a world we’ll ever see.
People fell in love with her self-proclaimed “Backwoods Barbie” image and her larger-than-life personality. Yet behind the glitter, Dolly was the toughest, most soulful of songwriters, fighting to make her way as a woman in Nashville, pouring her heart into the tortured genius of songs like “Jolene” or “Down from Dover.” She’s like Aretha Franklin or Brian Wilson or Stevie Wonder — a visionary with an endless imagination for how far American music could reach. We’re grieving for Dolly now because she represents the best in us.
