Why did T. S. Eliot write the poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”?

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Why did T. S. Eliot write the poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”?

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There is not a known explicit statement of purpose from Eliot on his intent in writing this poem, but the reader can construct some ideas based on Eliot’s life, history, and the construction of the poem.

T. S. Eliot wrote The Love Song of J. Alred Prufrock at some point between 1910 and 1911, when he was still completing his undergraduate degree. It was not published until 1915, when he was already settled in England. Eliot became a member of a cohort of writers that became emblematic of the “Lost Generation,” those that came of age during World War I. This group of writers, which included Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway, expatriated to Europe and convened in Paris.

Perhaps the identity of this Lost Generation is most indicative of a common mindset at the time Eliot wrote this poem. This generation was disillusioned by the horrors of World War I and, as a result, began questioning the status quo. Generally, as a result, this generation didn’t feel the need to have permanent roots; they were more nomadic. They were concerned with mortality and its purpose (leading to a focus on youthful ideals) and challenged social conventions.

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock is regarded as signifying the transition to Modernism from Romanticism, before Modernism was a recognized form. There are many questions about its content that are unknowable—is Prufrock speaking to another, or is it all internal dialogue? What is his “overwhelming question”? These questions aren’t answered, but the reader is able to know that Prufrock is a disillusioned middle-aged man confronting feelings of isolation and frustration with the modern world. He finds it difficult to be decisive, and the poem is a translation (perhaps word for word) of his own mental musings.

Comparing the ideals of the Lost Generation to the content of the poem would suggest that Eliot was capturing the concerns, fears, and emotions that many people felt at the time of its publication.

Eliot began writing the poem in 1910 through 1911 when he was twenty-two years old. He later stated that

It was partly a dramatic creation of a man of about 40 I should say, and partly an expression of feeling of my own through this dim imaginary figure.

The figure of Prufrock represented for Eliot a way to examine what he called a “complex.” Eliot was interested in exploring an idea central to the poem, that of a man who is so afraid of doing or writing anything wrong, so caught up in being timid and hesitant, that he never produces anything at all.

If the poem is, as Eliot says, partially “an expression of feeling of my own,” he seems to have been concerned with his own fear of being paralyzed by self-doubt or hesitancy. To better explore this feeling, he created the persona of an older man who truly hasn’t achieved anything because of his fears.

While the poem may have stemmed from Eliot’s personal fears, it caught a sense that the culture of the time, though it seemed prosperous and progressive, was actually caught in a malaise. This would become a central theme of modernism.

Eliot wrote this poem to communicate the intense feeling of alienation and of running out of time experienced by so many people in the time of Modernism. Eliot presents the reader with a man who is obsessed about the passing of time and how time is literally running out for him. He is a man who is shown to want to avoid commitment of any sort or limiting himself, but at the same time he is aware that he is being forced into making choices everyday that limit his freedom. Note the way that this is focused on in the following quote:

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea.

The repetition of the phrase “there will be time” shows how important a concept time is in this poem. Not only does the concept of time reinforce the way in which a plethora of options gradually become less and less of a reality for humans as they grow old, it also parallels the concerns that J. Alfred Prufrock has about his appearance and his fear of being ridiculed for his “bald spot in the middle” of his hair and the thinness of his limbs. T. S. Eliot therefore wrote this poem partly in order to communicate the impact of aging on a Modern man such as J. Alfred Prufrock and to capture the frailty of the human condition.

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