The dramatic monologue “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock was written by Thomas Stearns Eliot and published in June of 1915. Eliot was born in St Louis, Missouri on September 26, 1888, where he grew up and lived until the age of eighteen. After high school, Eliot studied at Harvard University in Cambridge, MA and the Sorbonne in Paris, France. Eventually, Eliot ended up in England where he married his wife Vivien and spent the remainder of his life.
Throughout his college years, Eliot was active in the writing of literature, even having some of his early poetry published in the Harvard Advocate. In England, Eliot met and befriended fellow expatriate Ezra Pound, who was very impressed with the quality of Eliot’s work. Pound encouraged Eliot to publish his poetry professionally and “The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock” appeared in the June 1915 edition of Poetry. T. S. Eliot is widely recognized as a literary genius and a pioneer of the Modernist movement in literature (T.S. Eliot).
The Modernist Movement ushered in the twentieth century and artists of all genres wanted to create in a new and modern way to express themselves. The early twentieth century was a time of new beginnings; the world was becoming a more industrialized and urban place. People everywhere wanted a new fresh perspective in life and art. Life was faster and artists wanted to shake off the confines of the Victorian Age and let their art reflect the world around them in a more realistic way.
T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound played an important part in the creation of the Modernist Literature movement. .The “real life” aspect of the Modernist Movement changed the arts by
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In the last stanza, Prufrock is with the mermaids who have rejected him, but he is okay with that, it’s what he is used to. Prufrock imagines himself as being part of an undersea world where he can hide from humanity. Time, age and bald spots don’t matter in this place, Prufrock is able to drift along and he even mentions drowning (l.131). Prufrock wants to escape from his mundane existence, but he really doesn’t have the motivation to test his comfort level and change things.
Eliot, T. S. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” Inside Literature, Reading, Responding, Arguing. Ed. R. S. Gwynn & Stephen Zani. New York. Penguin. 2007. 996-1000. Print.
"Eliots The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." N.p., 28 Feb. 2014. Web. 01 Mar. 2014.
"T. S. Eliot." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, 28 Feb. 2014. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.
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