SOURCE: “Understanding ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’,” in Robert Frost's Chicken Feathers and Other Lectures, edited by Arthur R. Husboe, The Augustana College Press, No. 1, November, 1969, pp. 33-44.

[In the following essay, Fryxell discusses major themes in “Prufrock.”]

T. S. Eliot is one of the best known poets in the twentieth century. And yet, when “The Waste Land,” which is Eliot's longest, his most difficult, and certainly his most controversial poem, was first published in the year 1922, T. S. Eliot was comparatively unknown, despite a volume of poetry he had written entitled Prufrock and Other Observations, which appeared in 1917, and which contained, among other poems, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” In the years after The Waste Land, Eliot's output was not particularly great in terms of the number of lines which he wrote or in terms of the number of poems which he wrote. And yet yearly his stature as a poet, as a critic, and as a dramatist grew so that today it has become almost heretical to say that he is not the foremost poet of the twentieth century. Eliot reached that stature partly because what he has had to say to the modern age seemed so peculiarly appropriate; partly because in his poems, in his plays, and in his essays, Eliot has traced the way out of the wasteland of the twentieth century; partly because the language of Eliot's poetry has come more and more to be the peculiarly appropriate idiom for the twentieth century; and partly because a host of critics and teachers have explicated Eliot's poems so frequently that what he has had to say has become reasonably well known and reasonably understandable. And this is what I am going to try to do with “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” but I don't have the time to comment on every line or image within the poem.

All of Eliot's poems are essentially dramatic: they are either dramatic monologues, as is the “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” or dramatic lyrics, such as “Animula,” for instance. All his poems are intensely concentrated pieces of intellectual and emotional conflicts, in which as in the metaphysical poems of the seventeenth century poet John Donne, for instance, emotion and thought are fused and made one. The difficulty for the average reader in the twentieth century comes in part, at least, in Eliot's avoidance in his poems of the normal transitions found in the past and his dependence within them upon a whole host of allusions. Too often, as a matter of fact, in the highly touted “Waste Land” these allusions are so plentiful and so obscure that reading the poem is like solving a literary crossword puzzle. The result is that the essential meaning of the poem, I think, gets lost in the forest of allusions and the lack of transitions within the poem.

Eliot's poems certainly are complex poems; they're never simple ones, and Eliot himself justified their complexity by arguing that the poet, who is to serve as the interpreter and critic of a complex age, must write complex poetry; and certainly, I think, we would all agree that our age is a complex age. Eliot's constant use of allusions in his poems is based upon his theory that the poet of today should write as if all the poets of the past were looking over his shoulder. The modern poet, then, must be conscious of the tradition which he has inherited, and he must carry on that tradition himself. The Waste Land is a cluttered mass of altered quotations; Eliot alters these quotations deliberately in order to suggest the loss of the vitality of the traditions of the past: poetic, moral, aesthetic, religious, social. It is the debasement of that tradition which has brought about the spiritual and the intellectual sterility of the modern age. And it is this wasteland of the twentieth century, this intellectual, spiritual, moral, aesthetic sterility which is the theme of the poem.

Allusion-jammed, though Eliot's poetry is, and dealing with complex emotions and complex ideas as he does, the language of his poems is still concrete; the images which he uses are fresh; they are striking and never completely decorative. And so, for instance, in the “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” the evening is described as being spread out against the sky like a patient etherized upon a table. This image is fresh and striking; it is a most unusual kind of image, and the image is also functional: that image describes the passivity of the evening as Prufrock sees it. Of course, everything in the poem is seen through Prufrock's eyes. The image also describes something of the half-dead condition of Prufrock himself, who is helpless, finally, as is a patient who is etherized upon a table. Or take the description of the yellow fog as if it were a cat. That description is a striking, vivid image, describing the slow settling of the fog over the city, and it suggests possibly also Prufrock's renunciation of his decision to disturb his universe of dilettante ladies by bringing a breath of real life to them. “The fog,” we are told, “curled once about the house, and fell asleep.” And so, too, in the course of the poem, Prufrock allows his decision to fall asleep. The cat image, here, also, suggests sex. This is another desire of Prufrock which ends finally in inertia. Prufrock's failure in love is synonymous, you see, with the whole failure of society; his hopeless isolation is synonymous with the isolation of each trimmer from his fellow trimmers in Eliot's Waste Land.

The vocabulary that Eliot uses in his poems will range from the obscure or foreign word, including Sanskrit incidentally in The Waste Land, to the slang of the pub or to the colloquialism of the everyday man or woman in the streets. Occasionally, despite his occasional learned quality, that vocabulary is the idiom of the twentieth century, and Eliot's occasional use of a rare word or foreign expression, helps, I think, to shock the reader into an awareness of what Eliot is doing, because that rare word or foreign expression is usually placed near an ordinary word and sometimes near a slang expression. Eliot, like the French symbolists who influenced him greatly, experimented drastically in his poetry, but essentially Eliot still uses traditional rhythms and poetic devices; throughout “Prufrock” he uses the poetic refrain and repetitions with variations on the essential pattern. These are two devices which are nearly as old as poetry; however, in the hands of Eliot, they do take upon themselves a new vitality.

“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” concerns one of Eliot's Wastelanders. Prufrock is a member of the decadent aristocracy, just as Sweeney, in “Sweeney Among the Nightingales,” is representative of Eliot's proletariats in the Prufrock volume of poetry. The various characters that Eliot depicts in this, his first volume of poetry, are almost below the level, really, of animals and human beings. These characters seem to feel no real passions and they have no real thoughts; they are machines without the gas or oil that keeps a machine going. They run on momentum without a genuine spark of life within them. Prufrock himself is something of an exception, but not much of a one.

Prufrock lives in a world in which art and music have become the idle conversation of dilettante women, who are spiritually, sexually, and intellectually dead, who spend their lives in an eternal round of afternoon tea parties, who may talk of art because it is expected that the class to which they belong should know something about it, but for whom the meaning and the vitality of art have long since been drained in the cycle of their teacups. Prufrock is one of this group. Prufrock is a dilettante like “the women who come and go—talking of Michaelangelo.” Prufrock, we come to see, is as fastidious about his dress as they are, is as spiritually, sexually, and intellectually dead as they are. Like them, Prufrock has measured out his life “in coffee spoons,” and his life has been as empty, as meaningless as theirs has been.

Prufrock is a trimmer. I trust that many of you, at least, know that trimmers were those souls in Dante's Inferno who were condemned to the vestibule of hell because they had never really lived, although they were supposedly alive; but they never really did enough evil to be sentenced to hell, and they never did enough good while they were alive to get to purgatory to start their way up to heaven. The Trimmers were lifeless, spiritless, mindless people; and for the trimmers when the world ends, Eliot, in “Choruses from the Rock,” gives a fitting epitaph when he writes this:

“Here were decent, godless people.
Their only monument the asphalt road
And a thousand lost golf balls.”

For the trimmers in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” the last line of their epitaph would have to be altered slightly to read, “… and a thousand drained tea cups.” You see, we can't even imagine Prufrock playing golf.

Eliot uses Dante's trimmers in order to characterize the twentieth century. For Eliot, the vast majority of men and women of the twentieth century are trimmers: they are intellectually and spiritually dead, afraid of life, afraid of living, afraid of facing either good or evil and of experiencing really either, afraid of taking sides either for or against God, living in a sterile land; breeding spiritually and intellectually sterile children, slaves to the machine and conventions of the age, fearful of speaking out against either, fearful of taking either the way which leads to spiritual regeneration or the way which leads to damnation.

Prufrock and the women referred to in his love song are trimmers, who differ from others in the “Waste Land” in that their economic and social status is different from that, say, of Sweeney's. Prufrock himself differs from the women in two ways. The first is that his sex is different; after all, he's supposed to be a man, and apparently Prufrock has had at least a glimpse of something more vital in life than they have. And it's this glimpse, this insight into a different kind of life which he wants to give them and thus to disturb their universe. But before the end of the poem, Prufrock is emasculated, and he renounces forever his plan of disturbing the world that he knows.

The “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is a song of defeat, of despair; it is the song of a man who gives up forever, knowing that although the mermaids who sing the song of life and of whom he has had a glimpse do not really sing after all to him. It is the song of a man who comes to see that he is only the Polonius of his little world, not its Hamlet. He is fit, like Polonius, to be an attendant lord, one that would 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—
At times almost the Fool.

J. Alfred Prufrock is no Hamlet who will disturb and rectify the evil of his world, the evil which consists for Prufrock in its decadence, its spiritual, moral, intellectual, sexual, aesthetic sterility. Hamlet can cleanse the rottenness of Denmark; Prufrock can get only a glimpse of the sterility of this world, but he is helpless to do anything about it. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is thus his swan song to life, but it's also a song that he himself sings, for the poem is a dramatic monologue. He sings it in an effort to justify himself for not following the impulses, the suppressed desires of his alter-ego. And the effort damns him. But because the poem also shows that he has come to know his own inadequacies, to know that he is a trimmer, I think finally we do pity J. Alfred Prufrock. I always have.

Prufrock, the fastidious dilettante, shows not only his pathetic deadness but his cowardice, his fear of the eyes and the words of the women with whom he associates, his apprehension regarding the bald spot in the middle of his head, his concern with his digestion, his pride in his dress, his inadequacies as a prophet of the rebrith of life which his particular world needs. He is no John the Baptist who comes to see, to herald the coming of a savior. Instead he fears the remarks of the women about his bald spot, and he knows that their footman, like the eternal footman, Death, has looked upon him and snickered.

Eliot builds his poem around the repetition of three central themes or motifs. The first of these is the time theme. This is given in the refrain, “And indeed there will be time.” The time theme serves as an excuse for Prufrock for not disturbing his universe, for there is always time to put things off, as talking to his alter-ego—the “you” in the “Let us go now, you and I”—he shows that he will put off telling these women, and he will put off revealing his suppressed desires, apparently, for one of these women. There is always a tomorrow, there is always time, as Prufrock says,

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 of days and 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.

And there will be time for Prufrock to change his mind about disturbing his universe; there will be time for Prufrock to put off doing it forever; there will be time to say farewell to the glimpse of real life he has had. There will be time for Prufrock to sink back eternally among the rounds of teacups.

The second theme of “Prufrock” is the “Do I dare” theme, in which Prufrock questions his ability to disturb his universe. This theme, allied as it is with the first theme and with the third theme as all three are allied one with the other, underscores the essential spiritual and moral cowardice of this man. Deliberately, Eliot has Prufrock begin this theme with a grandiose question when Prufrock asks, “Do I dare disturb the universe?” But before the end of the poem, this question degenerates into “Do I dare to eat a peach?” This symbolizes in its degeneration not only Prufrock's moral cowardice but also his essential concern with himself, from the outgoing desire to aid others in the question “Do I dare disturb the universe?” to the ingoing concern with his digestion.

The third theme is one of world weariness, which is begun in the line “For I have known them all already, known them all.” This theme underscores Prufrock's weariness with the life that he leads, which is shown most effectively in the line “For I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.” As Eliot develops this theme, he shows also Prufrock's bondage to the life which he is so weary of and his inability to bring any life to the half-alive world in which he lives. This theme is modified to stress Prufrock's renunciation of his plan. Prufrock must find some excuse for not doing what he, or rather, I should say, what his alter-ego, had hoped to do; and so he finds it by rationalizing that it would not have been worthwhile after all to bring his breath of life into the sterile world, that he would have been misunderstood, that to bring life into this world he would have had to be like Lazarus come to life, “Come back to tell you all.” But he is not a John the Baptist, not a Hamlet. He is only, finally, a pathetic trimmer, J. Alfred Prufrock, growing old, with a bald spot in the middle of his hair, which he is going to try to conceal from the prying eyes of the women of his circle. He's only J. Alfred Prufrock, who has had a vision of life, but who comes to see that the mermaids who sing the song of life, of rebirth from the deadness and emptiness of his universe, do not sing to him. He is only J. Alfred Prufrock, who has lingered for a few minutes by the chambers of the sea, which could have brought a rebirth of life to him, which could have made it possible for him to be like Lazarus raised from the dead, but who has been awakened by the human voices of his women—that is, these half-alive, intellectually and spiritually sterile female trimmers—and who has been drowned by their voices commenting about the bald spot in the middle of his hair.

These interlocking and interweaving themes help to unify the poem. The epigraph which precedes this poem, unifies the poem also. As always in the poetry of Eliot, in the “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” the epigraph is important. And as is frequently true of his poetry, the epigraph here is taken from Dante. This epigraph comes from lines 61-66 of the 27th Canto of the Inferno, where the flame of Guido is asked to identify himself. The flame replies in this way, “If I thought my answer were to one who could ever return to this world, this flame should shake no more, but since none ever did return alive from this depth, if what I hear be true, without fear of infamy I answer thee.” If you remember your Dante, you will remember that the eighth bolgia or ditch, in the eighth circle of the Inferno, is given over to evil counselors, and their punishment is to be concealed in flames. Despite Guido's reluctance to name himself, he has just before this spoken rather rudely and rather harshly to the two travellers in Hell, Dante and Virgil, and Guido does tell his story to them. Eliot uses this epigraph, in part, to suggest the tone of this poem, which is at once mocking and serious. Prufrock is an inept ridiculous person—he is as ridiculous, by the way, as his name, and there are probably no more ridiculous names than “J. Alfred Prufrock.”

The ridiculous is part of the tone of the poem; on the other hand, it is true that the condition of this trimmer and the defense which he gives do reflect the sterility of the twentieth century. Guido's false counsel was to advise Pope Boniface to promise a great deal but not to fulfill many of his promises, and for this advice, this former friar and monk was placed in Hell by Dante. The “you” in Prufrock, like Guido, would be the counsellor in his world; however, as the “I” in Prufrock argues, his counsel would be as foolish, finally, as the advice that Polonius gives in Hamlet.

In the poem, Prufrock finds his excuse for not disturbing his universe, because in the words of Guido, “None ever did return alive from this death.” But Prufrock, in answering his alter-ego, his suppressed self—the “you” in “Let us go then you and I”—can answer the “you” without fear of being exposed, because none has ever returned alive from the depths of the psychological drama which is carried on in this poem between the “I” on the one hand of Prufrock and the “you” on the other hand. Prufrock returns from the depths of the psychological drama, figuratively speaking, dead, and the advice that he gives, you see, is locked up forever in himself.

The “I” at the beginning of the poem is the objective part of the duality which constitutes J. Alfred Prufrock; the “you,” as George Williamson has observed, “is the amorous self, the sex instinct, direct and forthright, but now suppressed by the timid self, finding, at best, evasive expression, always opposed by fear of the carnal which motivates the defensive analogy. It is to this buried self that Prufrock addresses himself and excuses himself. His love song is the song of a being divided between passion and timidity; it is never sung in the real world, for this poem develops the theme of frustration, of emotional conflict, dramatized by the “you” and ‘I.’”

Characteristic of Eliot's poems, the “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” contains a number of literary allusions. Here, the literary allusions are far less numerous than they are in The Waste Land, but as in The Waste Land they function in developing the overall psychological drama found within the poem. Some of these allusions are very obvious, such as the reference to Hamlet or the reference to Polonius or the reference to John the Baptist. Other allusions, I think, however, are somewhat less noticeable, like the reference to Hesiod's book Works and Days, found in the line, “and time for all the works and days of hands.” Hesiod had addressed his book to his brother, Perses, urging his brother to toil; in Eliot, the reference becomes an ironic commentary upon Prufrock's inability to toil, to disturb his universe. And I trust that my students at least caught the reference to Marvell's “To His Coy Mistress.” It's found in these lines: “To have squeezed the universe into a ball To roll it toward some overwhelming question.” The lines of Marvell which Eliot echoes are these: “Let us roll all our strength and all Our sweetness up into one ball.” These lines are found in the conclusion to Marvell's witty and lascivious argument to his coy mistress not to be so coy, but to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh while they can because time is running out. In Prufrock, the lines end in frustration; it would never have been worthwhile for Prufrock, so he argues, to be like Lazarus, to rise from the dead to disturb the universe of his dilettante women. In Marvell, the lines suggest life and the pleasures of life; in Eliot, they suggest death, frustration, sexual repression.

Again, as is typical with Eliot's poetry, in the “Love Song” there is a pattern of images which run throughout the poem in order to help give unity to it. And so the cat image, which I have called attention to already, in the description of the fog—the cat which curled “once about the house and fell asleep”—is suggested later in the lines

“And in 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.”

A sea image is at least suggested in line 7 of the poem in the line “And sawdust restaurants with oyster shells.” Oysters become crabs, as later Prufrock incongruously wishes, “I should have been a pair of ragged claws / Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.” And the sea image becomes dominant at the end of the poem as Prufrock fancies himself walking on the beach with white flannel trousers and sees that although he has heard the mermaids singing, they have not sung to him. Instead he has lingered in the chambers of the sea until he is jarred out of his dream world by the intruding reality of human voices which wake the “you” and the “I”; thus the desires of the “you” are drowned as Prufrock reveals his frustrations and his total inability to disturb his universe.

There are other patterns and images, such as the street image, for instance, but the ones I've mentioned will give you, I trust, an idea of Eliot's pattern of images. And finally, since my time is more than up, let me comment on Eliot's use of just one rhyme within the poem, found in these lines: “Should I, after tea and cakes and ices, Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?” The two words which rhyme, of course, are “ices” and “crisis,” and the rhyming of these two words is deliberately ridiculous, as ridiculous as Prufrock is himself at times, as ridiculous as Prufrock certainly is here: he's a sexually repressed man, growing old, with a bald spot in the middle of his hair, who can't, you see, even rise to any kind of passion. Thus, his love song can never be anything but a song of frustration, of despair; it can never be sung to anyone except the “you,” and the wishes and the desires of that “you” lose to the “I,” who has revealed why the “you” in Prufrock's monologue can never dominate the man's actions.