The+Love+Song+of+J.+Alfred+Prufrock

**T.S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot** (1888-1965)

Born in St. Louis, Missouri on September 16, 1888, T.S. Eliot was a renowned poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary and social critic of the Twentieth Century. Growing up, Eliot struggled with recovering from a congenital double inguinal hernia which meant he could not participate in playing sports with other children; this circumstance isolated Eliot and caused him to be an avid reader and develop a love for literature. At age 25, he moved to England and remained there for the remainder of his life. He published his first collection of poems, //Prufrock and Other Observations//, in 1917. Due to his fanatical love for literature, his short poems were heavily influenced by other literary works, such as Dante's //Inferno// and various works of Shakespeare; he would often make allusions to other works off the top of his head without much research. Most of his works are considered embodiments of the Modernist movement, a movement which looked back to the best practices of poet's of the previous times and cultures. In 1948, Eliot received a Nobel Prize in Literature for his "outstanding, pioneer contribution to present-day poetry". Due to heavy smoking, Eliot suffered from lung-related diseases, such as bronchitis, for a number of years; on January 4, 1965, Eliot died of emphysema. **"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"** (1917) media type="youtube" key="JAO3QTU4PzY" width="560" height="315" align="center"

//S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse// //A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,// //Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.// //Ma percioche giammai di questo fondo// //Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,// //Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.// Let us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the sky Like a patient etherized upon a table; Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets, The muttering retreats Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells: <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Streets that follow like a tedious argument <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Of insidious intent <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To lead you to an overwhelming question ... <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Oh, do not ask, “What is it?” <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Let us go and make our visit.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">In the room the women come and go <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Talking of Michelangelo.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And seeing that it was a soft October night, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And indeed there will be time <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">For the yellow smoke that slides along the street, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">There will be time, there will be time <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">There will be time to murder and create, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And time for all the works and days of hands <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">That lift and drop a question on your plate; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Time for you and time for me, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And time yet for a hundred indecisions, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And for a hundred visions and revisions, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Before the taking of a toast and tea.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">In the room the women come and go <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Talking of Michelangelo.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And indeed there will be time <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?” <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Time to turn back and descend the stair, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">With a bald spot in the middle of my hair — <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”) <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin — <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”) <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Do I dare <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Disturb the universe? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">In a minute there is time <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">For I have known them all already, known them all: <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I have measured out my life with coffee spoons; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I know the voices dying with a dying fall <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Beneath the music from a farther room. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">So how should I presume?

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And I have known the eyes already, known them all— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Then how should I begin <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And how should I presume?

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And I have known the arms already, known them all— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Arms that are braceleted and white and bare <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!) <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Is it perfume from a dress <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">That makes me so digress? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And should I then presume? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; line-height: 1.5; text-align: center;">And how should I begin?

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? ...

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I should have been a pair of ragged claws <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Smoothed by long fingers, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Asleep ... tired ... or it malingers, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I am no prophet — and here’s no great matter; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And in short, I was afraid.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And would it have been worth it, after all, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">After the cups, the marmalade, the tea, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Would it have been worth while, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To have bitten off the matter with a smile, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To have squeezed the universe into a ball <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To roll it towards some overwhelming question, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">If one, settling a pillow by her head <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Should say: “That is not what I meant at all; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">That is not it, at all.”

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And would it have been worth it, after all, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Would it have been worth while, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And this, and so much more?— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">It is impossible to say just what I mean! <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Would it have been worth while <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">And turning toward the window, should say: <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">“That is not it at all, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">That is not what I meant, at all.”

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Am an attendant lord, one that will do <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">To swell a progress, start a scene or two, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Deferential, glad to be of use, <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Politic, cautious, and meticulous; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse; <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">At times, indeed, almost ridiculous— <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Almost, at times, the Fool.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I grow old ... I grow old ... <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach? <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I do not think that they will sing to me.

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">I have seen them riding seaward on the waves <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Combing the white hair of the waves blown back <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">When the wind blows the water white and black. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">We have lingered in the chambers of the sea <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Till human voices wake us, and we drown. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;"> <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">**<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; font-size: 120%;">Theme ** <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">As the title of this poem suggests, the main topic in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is love. However, a theme throughout this poem is the trying transformation one must undergo to uncover true love rather than infatuation. For the entire duration of this poem, Prufrock speaks in the first person and seems to be more concerned with his image and appearance to others than his loved one who he is taking on a walk in this "love song". When taking this into consideration, one must understand the difference between true love, which can be described as thinking of another person before yourself, or infatuation, which is just a false show of lust or affection. It is hard to tell throughout the poem whether Prufrock is cowardly or just simply shy when he debates "do I dare?" presumably to tell his loved one how he feels but then he turns "back and descend[s] the stairs". Whether the love is real or not, Prufrock's hesitation holds him back and he ends up alone, transforming from a talkative awe-stricken man to a depressed soul who would rather live in the ocean. Another theme Eliot explores is the notion that one should live each moment in the present and the consequences of not doing so. This poem rarely settles on the present (besides the first stanza when Prufrock invites us to join him) but instead goes back and forth between the future that could happen and the past that has already happened. Prufrock seems to avoid the present because he is dealing with the issue of whether or not to "disturb the universe", or the present, therefore he becomes paralyzed and is unable to make any decision at all. However, by not focusing on what is right in front of him, Prufrock misses his opportunity and he ends up alone. **<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; font-size: 120%;">Imagery ** <span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">There is an abundance of imagery in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" which aid the reader in truly experiencing Prufrock's journey through "half deserted streets" and "sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells". The beginning of this poem is one of most well known openings of any poem solely because of the intense images it brings to one's mind: "When the evening is spread out against the sky/ Like a patient etherized upon a table". An opening of this kind was extremely unheard of during the time and even today it is regarded as a bit extreme and graphic; the fact that Eliot is comparing the night sky to an open patient on the Operating Room table about to undergo surgery seems a bit odd but also immediately puts this image in one's brain. Setting the stage with these kind of opening lines is a daunting task because the reader now expects the rest of the poem to be as image provoking as these lines. However, Eliot does not disappoint and the rest of this poem is decorated with ornate fantasy-like details describing the frigid ocean like "sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown" and gritty scenes in the street like "the yellow smoke that slides along the street/ rubbing its back upon the window-panes" which allows the reader to visualize this epic walk we are talking with Prufrock.

**<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; font-size: 120%;">Meter ** <span style="font-family: Courier New,Courier,monospace;">Though this poem is overall a dramatic monologue, Eliot experiments with a few different forms of meters and forms throughout the poem; there are different rhyming schemes, like AABCCDEFFGHH in the first stanza and JJKJLMNM in the second staza as well as standalone verses like the repeated "The women come and go, Talking of Michelangelo". The basics of a successful dramatic monologue is so that the reader can learn more about the speaker as the poem goes on, but not learn too much at one time. In ironic twist, Eliot uses rhyming couplets which are sometimes referred to as "heroic couplets"; however, the speaker is the complete opposite of a hero. Despite these changing meters, most lines do not have a rhyming scheme but follow the iambic pentameter, which could have been influenced by Shakespeare's works seeing as he often used this meter in his plays. **<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; font-size: 120%;">Emotion ** <span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">The emotion of this poem is all over the place, much like Eliot's wording and thought process; however, overall it leaves one with an overwhelming sense of lost opportunity and uneasiness. Because of the eerie and seemingly random subjects of this poem (mermaids, peaches, tea, cake, Michelangelo, etc.), it is difficult for the reader to focus on one area of this poem, which provokes a feeling of frantic <span style="font-family: Courier New,Courier,monospace;">paralyzation, exactly the feeling that Prufrock examines in this poem; he feels as if he must be doing something and there is enough time, however he ends up accomplishing nothing. The startling and rattled emotions one takes from this poem illuminates the central theme of seizing each moment given. <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;"> __**<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: center;">Works Cited **__ <span style="display: block; font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace; text-align: justify;"> Jacobson, B. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. 16 Feb. 2010. Jacobson Illustration. Web. 16 Mar. 2015. <http://jacobsonillustration.blogspot.com/2010/02/love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock.html>.

<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock Introduction.” Shmoop. Shmoop University, 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 16 Mar. 2015. <http://www.shmoop.com/love-song-alfred-prufrock/summary.html>.

<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">“Modernism.” Craig White’s Literature Courses. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Mar. 2015. <http://coursesite.uhcl.edu/HSH/Whitec/terms/M/modernism.htm>.

<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">Peters, Julian. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Comic strip. Julian Peters Comics. Word Press, 16 Mar. 2015. Web. 16 Mar. 2015. <http://julianpeterscomics.com/2015/03/16/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock-by-t-s-eliot-page-15/>.

<span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">Worthen, John. T.S. Eliot. London: Haus, 2011. Print. <span style="font-family: 'Courier New',Courier,monospace;">