The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock

"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is, as we can tell from the title (the name of the "singer"), a VERY ODD Love Song. Click here to listen to Eliot reading the poem as you read along. Once done, tell us about the speaker in the poem: What is his mood? What causes it? What does he tell us of his inability to act on his passions--or perhaps to HAVE passions?

I have a long standing relationship with Eliot and this particular poem, so here's hoping I can to this thing justice. Prufrock was a Forensics piece for me in my Senior year. A strange selection for an 18 year old girl at the time, I know, but my teacher helped me choose it and I liked it.

The poem is from an aging man observing his surroundings. He and his partner are wandering alone. They are restless, or at the very least he is, "The muttering retreats//Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels" He asks her not to question what they have and what they do, "Oh, do not ask, 'What is it?'//Let us go and make our visit." I feel his restlessness comes from his age and insecurity of it. While he can not stay still himself, he knows "indeed there will be time" for all things. Again we see his restlessness, "And times yet for a hundred indecisions//And for a hundred visions and revisions." He feels he will be judged in these times of his aging, "They will say: 'How his hair is growing thin!'" "They will say: 'but how his arms and legs are thin!'" because he feels they all notice and they all will judge him for how he has grown old. Even for as how he worries about his age, he acknowledged that he is old, that he has seen many things. "For I have known them all already, known them all-//Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons". One of the most vivid examples of Prufrock's fear of being judged is here:

"And I have known the eyes already, known them all-
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase.
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?"

How should he start to explain his life and his feelings or thoughts? How will his life add up to others? He doesn't know what's expected of him when he is there being judged by the world. Still, he knows that these concerns aren't important in the long run. "Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,//I am no prophet- And here's no great matter." He knows in the end, he is insignificant . "I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,//And I seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,//And in short, I was afraid."

Yes--odd for a young girl's forensics exercise, but glad you liked.
Good reading here, except in the identification of the audience--gender is not specified, and isn't the audience whoever reads it?
Again, I have no other bones to pick with your reading, though I'd like your thoughts on what this poem says about modern (circa 1920s) love and romance, or whatever else you think Eliot was trying to do/show in writing it.
OH--and how about the final lines and his self-comparison to charaters in Hamlet?