"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" paints a picture of the modern city marked by paralysis, alienation, decadence, and repression. Prufrock is a modern man who can see the superficiality of the social values ​​of middle-class society, but who does not have the will to break away from them and act on his desires. He can see the potential happiness that action would bring—the possible joy, love, and companionship—but he is paralyzed and unable to perform any necessary action. Prufrock critiques modern society as a place where superficial social rituals predominate and individuals are repressed, alienated, and detached from any meaningful existence. The poem is narrated by a character, Prufrock, who takes his audience not on a physical journey but rather into his own mind, where he reveals his own desires while ultimately accepting his own indecision and paralysis. Prufrock reveals his mental vision of urban life through fragmented and juxtaposed images that reflect the fragments of the ruined city. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get Original Essay “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” is written in the form of a dramatic monologue, revealing the city to the reader through the representation of Prufrock's psyche. Prufrock invites his audience to walk with him "through some half-deserted streets" (4) and imagines walking up the stairs a fully dressed woman with "a collar firmly fixed on her chin" (42), and yet he There is no textual evidence that the world he presents exists anywhere except in his own imagination. The world Prufrock presents extends only to the limits of his own mind, and the city he describes is his own subjective view of the world. The poem's title deceptively suggests Prufrock's potential for happiness, but this notion is immediately contradicted by the epigraph to Dante's Inferno, where a character trapped in flames agrees to speak to Dante about his life in hell. Likewise, Prufrock is trapped in his own inner hell of alienation and annoyance and shares this world with his audience. The “you” that Prufrock addresses in the first line of the poem is ambiguous; it could be a woman, or the reader, or even Prufrock's own alter ego. Regardless of the recipient's identity, the line "Let's go then, you and I" (1) is a true invitation to a journey of introspection through Prufrock's personal hell. The poem is saturated with images of the modern world. , images that reveal the alienation and decadence of the modern world. The first two lines of the poem are rather romantic and resemble a real love song: “Let us go then, you and I, / When the evening spreads across the sky” (1-2). However, the impossibility of the poem as a love song is established in the poem's next line, where Prufrock compares the sky not to a romantic image but rather to an "ethereal patient on a table" (3). The first image is romantic and pastoral, while the second reveals a colder and scientific image which depicts an unconscious character on an operating table. The juxtaposition of these two images, from pastoral to urban, reveals the decadence of the modern city into a place devoid of control and action, a place of paralysis. This image of paralysis reveals Prufrock's own inability to do anything and his inability to identify with the beauty of the world. The third stanza contains more detailed details about the city Prufrock envisioned. Prufrock describes the fog descending over the city as well as the smoke, sewers, chimneys and terraces, all contributing to the dreary metropolis that is home to "good hotelsone-night market” (6) and “sawdust restaurants” (7). The “yellow fog that rubs its back on the windows” (15) and that licks “its tongue into the corners of the evening” (17) resembles a cat that is falling asleep. This image of a fog immediately engulfing the city represents the city as oppressive and claustrophobic, the sleeping cat also represents the security and comfort found in old routines that Prufrock cannot muster the will to change. The image of the cat is fragmented, recognizable as a cat only by its actions of licking, rubbing and sleeping. The use of the color yellow further illustrates the collapse of the town of Prufrock since yellow is the color of decadence. This image adds to the impression of an ethereal atmosphere and is also strongly reminiscent of a dreamlike state, lending credibility to the idea that the city and what is happening there is a projection of Prufrock's thoughts and n do not exist in reality. While the seemingly ethereal cat relates to the metaphor of paralysis, the image of Prufrock as an insect further illustrates his state of anxiety and his inability to escape absurd social customs. He imagines himself “stuck and squirming against the wall” (58), trapped by social conventions and constantly watched by other members of society. This explains his excessive self-consciousness and worry about his appearance to others. The image of Prufrock fully dressed with "a collar firmly fixed on his chin" (42) also appears restrictive and further shows how restrictive and oppressive social mores are. Prufrock finds the rituals of upper-middle-class society, a world of “tea, cake, and ice cream” (79), completely senseless. He finds the conversation of “women [who] come and go / Talikng of Michelangelo” superficial and pretentious. Prufrock describes society in fragments of the domesticated world, his actions, if he took any, would interrupt them, like “the cups, the marmalade, the tea, / Among the china” (87-88) and “the novels,. .. the teacups,... the skirts dragging on the floor” (102). In accordance with societal expectations, Prufrock led an unsatisfying and controlled life: “I measured my life with teaspoons” (42). The image of the teaspoons captures the domestic routines that trapped him. Although these social mores and rules of behavior are restrictive and eliminate individuality, Prufrock finds their familiarity strangely comforting and safe and cannot bring himself to break away from them. Further fragmentation occurs with the characters in the poem. The woman Prufrock imagines going to see is given neither a face nor a name, but is described in terms of body parts. Prufrock's inability to describe the woman in any detail reflects his inability to confront her. By reducing her to parts of his body, he again avoids confrontation with her and avoids rejection. In fact, all the characters in the poem are reduced to disembodied actions and actions. These are “the voices that die with a dying fall” (52), the “faces you meet” (27), and the “hands / That lift and drop a question on your plate” (29-30). Only Prufrock himself is presented with any kind of visual detail: "My morning coat, my collar standing firmly to the chin, / My tie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin ---" (42-43). Yet even this image of a fully clothed Prufrock is fragmented by the gaze of others into baldness and thin arms and legs. Prufrock is extremely self-conscious and consumed by trivial thoughts about his aging appearance: "(They will say, 'How his hair is getting thinner!')" (41)2E This concern for his appearance to others exists to such a degree that he -even is not.