Learning Paths » 5A Interacting
Analysis
Right from the title the intelligent reader understands that the present poem is not a traditional love poem at all. The title The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock seems to suggest the idea of a strange man who wants to conquer a woman with a love song. The intelligent reader should expect a song about love in which the sound level covers a relevant place.
At the beginning of the poem there is a quotation from Dante's Divina Commedia, in particular from the XVII canto of Inferno, in which Guido di Montefeltro confesses his identity to Dante and Virgilio, because he believes that they will not return to the real world. The present epigraph represents an essencial element in the structure of the poem, that orientates the reader and sets the atmosphere. It describes the ideal listener: one who is as lost as the speaker and will never betray to the world the content of Prufrock's present confession.
In addiction the poet sends the reader some signals in order to make him understand that what he is going to read is something unusual.
S'io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza più scosse.
Ma perciocché giammai di questa fondo
Non tornò vivo alcun, s'i' odo il vero,
Senza tema d'infamia ti rispondo.
The poem is organized into XX scenes, which are composed by free verses, most of them are iambic pentameter. The present poem consists of the juxtaposition of scenes, since it is a modernist poem. The juxtaposition of scenes sets the dramatic atmosphere.
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised 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:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"
Let us go and make our visit.
The first scene goes from line 1 to line 12. Right from the start the protagonist is speaking with his own consciousness and the reader is invited on a trip somewhere.
The poem is announcing that it is a "dramatic monologue" because it is written on the voice of a speaker other than the poet. The choice if the dramatic monologue focuses the reader's attention on conscience, structuring principle of the monologue. The reader knows from the title the name of the speaking voice : J. Alfred Prufrock, a presumably middle-aged man, he is probably walking in a suburb. It's not clear who Prufrock is singing to, but the clever reader can easily image that the addressee is someone who Prufrock loves. He also tells the time of the day we are taking this trip: evening. But this is not an ordinary evening because it is spread out against the sky like a patient etherised upon a table. This is a very shocking comparison that juxtaposed the evening to a patient strapped to an operating table. The present one is not a common way to start a love song. Going on T. S. Eliot sends the reader a lot of signals. Reading lines that goes from 4 to 7 the intelligent readers realizes he is walking along a seedy district of the city. Half-deserted streets, cheap hotels and sawdust restaurants are the key words that make the reader aware of the impurity of the setting. Reminding the previous epigraph from Dante's Inferno, the reader feels in a different kind of hell: the one of a modern city.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo
In the second scene (lines 13,14), that is also the refrain of the song, women are entering and leaving a room talking of Michelangelo, the famous Italian painter. The present lines seem to have nothing to do with Prufrock but they do if the smart reader tries to add them to the general atmosphere. They must be high-class women and their action is completely pointless. They represent today's common people and nowadays' vulgarity. People talk about everything even if they do not know anything. In addiction these lines present an incredible singsong rhyme that will result annoying if you listen to it for a long time.
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
The third scene goes from line 15 to 22. The poem goes back to talk to Prufrock and the seedy district. Streets are filled with a yellow fog which suggests nasty weather. It is also useful for the reader to imagine the location of the poem. The characteristics of the yellow fog seem to suggest the movements of cats.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
The following scene goes from line 23 to 34. The quotation there will be time is taken from the metaphysical poem To His Coy Mistress written by Andrew Marvell (English poet of 17th century). To His Coy Mistress is a poem about a man that loves a woman but she is so shy and in order to the speaking voice life is too short to play games, so it is time to get serious. The intent of the protagonist is to make the woman understand that she is wasting time because of her coyness.
Prufrock, however, uses the reference to time in exactly the opposite way. In fact he thinks his life is plenty of time for delays. As a consequence in the entire entire scene he wastes time describing the fog and not revealing his question. The speaking voice repeats the same phrase there will be time as if he tries to convince himself.
In the 5th scene (lines 35,36): refrain
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?"
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair
[They will say: "How his hair is growing thin!"]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin
[They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!"]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
The following scene goes from line 37 to 48. Prufrock describes himself, he seems worried about what people will say about him and his appearance. From such behaviour the intelligent reader can understand a new essential characteristic of the speaking voice: he is a superficial man.
Going on he still insists he has plenty of time and everything could change in a minute if a person makes a decision in his opinion.
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
In the 7th scene (lines 49-54) the speaking voice is trying to convince himself and the reader he is a wise man with lots of experience. But at the same time he appears as a cowardly man that is reaching a reason not to ask his important question.
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?
The following scene goes from line 55 to 61. Right from the start of the scene Prufrock speak about eyes and the intelligent readers can easily understand that he is afraid of eyes that see and judge him.
Mr Prufrock imagines himself "sprawling on a pin" and put, "wriggling," on a wall. He does not like people who see him. In the scene he also compares his life to a used-up cigarette (butt-ends). The protagonist is afraid of being wrong and other people will judge him.
And I have known the arms already, known them all
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
It is perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
The 9th scene goes from line 62 to 69. Right from the start of the scene Prufrock sounds tired and bored. Here he sees women as arms. At the end of the scene the protagonist has not already told the reader his problem because he does not know how to begin.
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?...
In the 10th scene Prufrock wonders how to begin to talk about a problem, a difficult subject. The only new is that he defines himself a lonely man.
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
In the following scene (lines 73-74) Mr Prufrock compares himself to a crab. The smart reader can easily understand that the crab is the perfect image of the protagonist because it seem suited to a single objective: protect itself.
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep... tired... or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
In the 12th scene (lines 75-86) some time is passed because the protagonist has already drunk his tea (in line 34 he has not drunk it yet). J. Alfred Prufrock feels as if his best days are behind him. He speaks about the eternal footman, person who helps rich people doing things.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all"
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: "That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all."
The 13th scene goes from line 87 to 98. Prufrock talks as if he has already passed up on his opportunity to do that important thing. He compares the effort it would required to take on "some overwhelming question" to squeezing the entire universe into a ball.
Prufrock compares his task of asking the question to Lazarus. The episode in the Bible narrates that Dives, a rich man, dies and gets sent to Hell ; around the same time Lazarus, a poor man, dies and gets sent to Heaven. Dives asks the prophet Abraham to please send Lazarus back to earth to warn his brothers to mend their ways or they'll end up in Hell. Abraham is like, "No way, man. If your brothers didn't get the message already, what with all the prophets and such who have been running around, one dead guy coming back to life isn't going to save them." But Prufrock's behaviour is more like Dive's one.
In the last lines of the scene the protagonist communicates his conviction that it is a good idea not to try and risk and he also replies that he was misunderstood. Unfortunately the intelligent reader can only suppose what the question was because Prufrock was too afraid of getting rejected.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor
And this, and so much more?
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
"That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all."
The following scene goes from line 99 to 110. Once again the reader can see a man without courage to act and take his own responsibilities. Prufrock justifies himself saying he is not able to explain what he really means. He is afraid of the risk of rejection.
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous -
Almost, at times, the Fool.
The following scene (lines 111-119) contains a Shakespeare's reference. In Hamlet the protagonist is so undecided, he cannot decide whether or not to kill his uncle. In the present scene Prufrock admits he is not like Hamlet: he has already made a decision. Prufrock defines himself an attendant lord, not a prince. He is just an easy tool.
I grow old ... I grow old ...
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
The 16th scene covers lines 120 and 121. Mr. Prufrock can no longer hide that he is getting older and older. He blew his opportunity to ask the question. He has failed to make a big decision.
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
Prufrock is still trying to make all kinds of tiny decisions, now that he has missed his big chance. As always, he's interested in the small pleasures of food and fashion, like the peach and the white flannel trousers.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
The following scene covers only line 125. In the previous scene Prufrock has revealed he has heard some mermaids singing. Now he underlines they were no singing for him. I think that the series of ocean images convey Prufrock's emotional distance from the real world.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
The present scene goes from line 126 to 128. Mermaids look like they are surfing on the waves with their tails. The only troubling sign is that the waves have "white hair," which makes the intelligent readers think of old people.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
The last scene goes from line 129 to the end of the poem. Prufrock says he has lost time with sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown until the human voice has woke him. This is kind of an "it was all a dream" ending. Eliot dismantles the romantic notion that poetic genius is all that is needed to trumph over the destructive forces of the world. Prufrock has been dreaming the whole time because the real life makes him suffer, it implies responsibilities. He has not the courage to believe in life because he was afraid to fail.
This is the reason why he has not tried to pose his "overwhelming question". There is one element that is completely clear in the poem: Prufrock's story does not turn out well, at all.
To conclude the whole poem deals with non-events and missed opportunities. The choice of the title "Love Song..." is a little bit ironic, a disillusioned antithesis to the youth traditionally suggested by the "love" theme.
Dri & Trevisan