Реферат: On The Love Song Of J. Alfred

What is odd about Prufrock is that, while he is impotent to act because he cannot begin to speak, he states what he feels about himself in an eloquent and poetic manner, worthy of any social setting, and probably enough to garner the interest of the women:

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. (ll.75-78)

The flow and beauty of these lines demonstrates that Prufrock is capable of speaking about love in poetic style, so he should not be insecure. Again, it Is the understanding that Prufrock is speaking as though he were come back from another place, like Dante, that allows him to reveal his emotions in such heightened language. Prufrock has skill with language throughout the poem, but it is not Prufrock in the setting that is relating the scene. It is not the Prufrock of the scene that can quote from Marvell and Shakespeare; instead, it is the Prufrock of another place that is speaking in the poem. All this is given by Eliot?s use of a passage by Dante, but without the context of the poem as a whole, looked back on, as it were, the epigraph makes little sense and seems out of place. When taken in retrospect, the reference to Dante is not only appropriate, but it explains how a character as insecure and inarticulate as Prufrock can say exactly what he means in the poem (through the poet), but not in the scene in the poem.

Eliot draws, perhaps, on his own experiences to write The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, but he extrapolates his sensations into the neurotic Prufrock, his alter ego. Since a poem spoken by Prufrock might have been unimaginative, Eliot chooses the device of a dramatic monologue to make his observations of the human condition. His use of the epigraph works well with the monologue to allow Eliot to write in the first person, and the technique keeps the poem fresh, even after several readings. It is more rewarding for a reader to make sense of a difficult poem, or a poem that makes its point in a very subtle manner, than it is to simply state an observation in plain language. Eliot makes a simple observation and keeps the reader interested by using unusual techniques that are both subtle and effective.

T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 6th ed. Vol. 2. ed. M. H. Abrams New York, London: Norton, 1993.