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American society Stagnation between World War I and World War II
The world wars changed American society. During World War I in 1939, the American economy stagnated. The American culture between the world wars was characterized by unemployment, wage stagnation, price increase due to increased international competition. Americans had low purchasing power, which caused the expansion of social programs at home. The period, however, saw increased opportunities for women and African Americans. The paper evaluates the theme of stagnation in the American society between world war I and world war II by assessing the characters in T. S. Eliot’s “J. Alfred Prufrock,” William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily,” and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “Babylon Revisited.” It provides an analysis of the type of stagnation suffered, its causes, and the diverse ways that stagnation affects the lives of the characters.
T.S Elliott “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”
Eliot, in his poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” focuses on love from women that seem to elude Prufrock. The main character Prufrock is a balding and insecure middle-aged man who stands by and does nothing watching his life pass him by until he becomes old. Prufrock lives in a stagnation of a mediocre life, which is dull and uneventful. ‘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’ (Eliot, 23), which illustrates that he stand idly as a stagnant pool.
The poem reflects the type of stagnation which Prufrock suffers from as he lives in a world where today is similar to yesterday and is the expected to be the same tomorrow ‘And indeed there will be time To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”.(Eliot, 46). Prufrock’s stagnation is caused by the feeling of inadequacy and the fear of making decisions. His anxieties and obsessions fuel his choice to stagnate. He abstains from making decisions, fearing that the outcomes will be wrong. Prufrock constantly worries that he will make a fool out of himself and people will ridicule him. His stagnation hinders him from taking any action until he is too old “I grow old . . . I grow old. / I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled” (Eliot 121). The main impacts of his stagnation are loneliness, alienation, and pessimism. Prufrock only sees the negative aspects of his life and those of others. He also misses his chance to make a connection with the women and get himself a wife.
William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily”
In A Rose for family, Faulkner depicts stagnation using the character of Emily. Emily is born to an aristocratic family during the civil war. Emily’s life stagnates mainly because of the environmental factors and also her personality. As the last descendant of the family, Emily and her father rejects reality and stagnates onto their former aristocratic glory to preserve their noble image. Emily’s father plays a crucial role in deteriorating and shaping Emily’s character. By turning all the potential suitors of Emily away as not being good enough. “… the Griersons held themselves a little too high for what they were. None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily …” (Faulkner, 77). The father forces Emily’s life to stagnate, turning her into and strange, old-fashioned, and solitary woman. Her resolution to fight for change has a tragic end as it results in murder “as if that quality of her father which had thwarted her woman’s life so many times had been too virulent and too furious to die” (Faulkner, 79).
Emily’s type of stagnation is cultural as it seeks to maintain the practices of the old South. Her stagnation is caused mainly by her father, who is patriarchy with strict adherence to the traditional culture of the South. Her father stagnates her life by denying her the right to make any decisions, forcing her to spend all her days caged at home, thereby confining her thoughts and desires. Town residents also caused her stagnation and living in the past due to their judgments, criticism, and discussions of her choices. Emily, therefore, stagnates on the idea of marriage and happiness, which she presumes to have with Homer. Her stagnation leads to a tragedy as she poisons Homer and keeps him in the house preservation of their love ‘The man himself lay in the bed….The body had once lain in the attitude of an embrace, but now the long sleep that outlasts love, that conquered even the grimace of love, had cuckolded him … (Faulkner, 81).
- Scott Fitzgerald’s “Babylon Revisited”
In “Babylon Revisited,” Fitzgerald depicts Charlie Wales as a young man who is struggling to deal with the aftermath of the Stock Market Crash of 1929. Charlie’s stagnation results from the past, fueling an engagement to a slow-moving process as a trial for rebuilding his life. Charlie’s type of stagnation is based on atonement- an effort to make amend for his past mistakes. His stagnation is caused by the wild extravagant and alcoholic tendencies of his early years. Even though the wild days have passed, Charlie is unable to escape them. “I heard you lost a lot in the crash,” he says, “I did,” responds Charlie, “but I lost everything I wanted in the boom.” (Fitzgerald, 5, 5) His actions show how hard he tried to avoid the reminders of the former Paris, but the impact follows him everywhere he goes.
Charlie’s life is stagnant, and he cannot move on as long as he is in Paris. The hotels remind him of drunken meals. The streets haunt him, and changes made strike him as odd, reminding him of his failures “the only restaurant he could think of that was not reminiscent of champagne dinners and long luncheons that ended in a blurred and vague twilight” (Fitzgerald, 2.1). Marion continually reminds him of his mistakes, his failed marriage. His stagnation in the past reflects into the present. Because of his past actions, he cannot live with his daughter Honoria. His party friends Duncan and Lorraine make it hard for Charlie to shake off the past. His former destructive lifestyle put on hold his life making him wonder how long he will live in the past and pay for his mistakes.
Works Cited
Eliot, Thomas Stearns. “The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Poetry 6.3 (1915): 130-135.
Faulkner, William, John Carradine, and Anjelica Huston. A rose for Emily. Paderborn, De: Verlag F. Schöningh, 1958.
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. Babylon revisited: and other stories. Simon and Schuster, 2008.