Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
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Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
The poem has an epigraph of a six-line quotation from Canto of the Inferno by an Italian poet known as Dante. The word Inferno means the horror of Hell. The author of this poem chooses this epigraph because it implies various things. One, It suggests that the poem is probably not about good people but is subjected to those people who pretend to be good but are actually evil or wicked. The poem is set in relation to Hell. Two, it suggests that Prufrock, the one singing the love song, is probably worried about his reputation just like Guido. Moreover, Prufrock tells about his story because he knows that no one will return to earth to expose his doings.
The first epigraph in the poem is relevant to the experiences of the speaker in various ways including the following: It originates from Dante’s Inferno which means that the following poem will portray some hellish and darkish occurrence. If for instance, the epigraph is a comment by Prufrock, then it means that Prufrock has realized how depressed he is and therefore that’s why we can see he is inclined to illustrate his situation in some kind of hyperbolic terms. On the other hand, if we suppose that the epigraph is what Eliot commented about Prufrock, then we can say that the epigraph contributes to the dark tone that the poem portrays and also implies that the poem has some other significance besides Prufrock’s situation. In general, the epigraph is indicative of the tendency of Eliot of examining modern occurrences by comparing and contrasting such experiences to those of the past as depicted in the classic literature.
The epigraph clearly implies the theme of secrecy considering the manner the orator talks with a sense of secrecy to Dante, just the same way the author talks with a sense of secrecy to the reader in the first lines of the poem. The epigraph also suggests the aspect of duality in various ways. The same way the orator of the epigraph talks to another person is the same way the orator of the poem talks to another person. Furthermore, the same way the orator of the epigraph feels ashamed of his hypocrisy is the same way the orator of the poem feels ashamed of the double life he lives( to mean a life of behaving differently from what you feel). Moreover, the comment on the epigraph is relatable to what can be termed as a Prufrock’s inferiority complex. This is because Prufrock feels inferior to those surrounding him, the same way the orator of the epigraph feels inferior to those people who did not live a hypocritical life as well inferior to the man he addresses in the poem.
At the end of the poem, Prufrock says, “I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.” It continues in lines 129 to 131 with “We have lingered in the chambers of the sea/ by sea-girls wreathed with. “Seaweed red and brown/ Till human voices wake us and we drown”. Prufrock believes these mermaids would not sing to him because he wants to show us that even evil-doers will not waste their time on him. He feels that he is useless and not worthy of any attention. He also believes that even if the mermaids sang to everyone, they would not sing to him because, according to him, he is very useless and worthless.