Jessica Nosalski Mr. Sorenson 10/15/2013 Imagery Within The Love Song of J.

Alfred Prufrock Within the 18th century, the modern world was taking a drastic change that many were ill-prepared for. New technologies and advancements left older ideologies and truths in the past, making way for undiscovered facts and ideas. This rapid change left many individuals perplexed, uneasy, and unable to deal with the changing world. T.S. Eliots The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock uses specific imagery to convey these sentiments within the poem his imagery foreshadows how individuals associated imminent doom with the continuation of the modern world. Imagery within the beginning segments of the poem creates a decrepit and sordid image that foreshadows doom. Even nature has been affected since the evening sky is described as being spread out against the sky / like a patient etherized against a table (Eliot, 2-3). Nature is portrayed as being very cold and mechanical with the use of the word etherized which displays a clear disconnect with nature. The juxtaposition of a grim surgery versus natural beauty is very startling and shows that Eliot is foreshadowing the disjuncture that individuals are feeling within the modernist time period. Nature again leaves the reader unsettled when Eliot describes yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window panes (15). The yellowness of the fog connotes the negative archetype of the color yellow, which is most often associated with illness. This imagery allows the reader to connect to medicine and doctors again, this time however associating the word yellow with thoughts of pus or jaundice. The fog is also being personified as a cat in this line, rub[bing]

Nosalski 2 its back along the windows. Transforming this fog into a creature that surrounds the house is a frightening and unsettling image, and one that also portrays a sense of looming danger. The imagery in the poem also focuses on the lack of a substantial reason to live and exist. Prufrock in this poem is overly concerned with his appearance and does not care about anything of value; his life has passed him by and he describes his journey so far as being measured outwith coffee spoons (51). Coffee spoons connote a kind of normal aspect of life that everyone can still relate to, despite the changes that modernity has brought. This also connotes a kind of realization and sadness however, since at the end, an individuals could really just amount to an amount of coffee spoons, despite what that person thinks that they have accomplished. Eliot uses Prufrock as an example of the types of individuals that are being created because of modernity. These people are overly focused on the superficial aspects of life and thus have no true reason to live. Eliot exhibits this within the epigraph from before the poem. The epigraph explains that the individual will only tell his story because senza terma dinfamia ti rispondo (Eliot 1) since the person hearing the story will die. This both shows how futile individuals attempts to control modernity have become and also foreshadows the eventual end of the poem. Prufrock is only telling us about his life and his thoughts because he is certain that he will soon die and that the reader will die with him. With that, his predictions become true. Prufrock ends his sorrow tale by saying that till human voices wake uswe drown (Eliot 131). Drown is used to show the reader how powerful individuals are against both modernity and morality it is something that will inevitably happen to everyone and this again shows how Eliot

Nosalski 3 viewed the consequences of modernity. Individuals are unable to die of a natural cause because this inescapable force will eventually capture and destroy them. With all the negative imagery that is shown within the poem, what are clear positive signs within the poem and how important are they in relation to the negative imagery?

Works Cited Eliot, T.S. The Wasteland, Prufrock and Other Poems. New York: Dover Publications. Print.