Okay, today is the day to talk about this wonderful, wonderful poem. I remember hearing that TS Eliot was not British (American) though he longed to be so and that he even adapted a British accent despite the fact that he was born and grew up in Missouri. For a man that seems to fit the caricature of the man portrayed in Miniver Cheevy, TS Eliot actually accomplished quite a bit. He wrote a number of ridiculously well-known poems. He even wrote the book of poems that was later used as the source material for the musical Cats. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature about mid-century. Anyways, he's a famous and grossly talented guy.
This poem was my first introduction to him. It has also been something of a cyclical poem for me, always re-entering my life when I thought I had read it/studied it enough. I first read it at home, then later read and studied it during high school and again in college. In college, I wrote a brief re-interpretation of Prufrock for an English class. Later, actually a few weeks ago, it was accepted for publication by a nationally distributed journal of short verse. (Yay! me.)
So, I have a long history with this poem and I hold great love and affection for it. This post would be too long if I were to talk about every angle of the poem, so I will mention just a few great things.
I love the opening of the poem. I once said I would memorize the whole poem, all the way through. While I know bits from the entire poem, the only stanza I have memorized in full is the first. "LET us go then, you and I,/When the evening is spread out against the sky...." I love how it sets the stage and then takes you away from the city you thought you were walking about and plants you in a crowded art museum. I love how this poem constantly does that; that it isn't linear; how it doesn't take place in a particular location (or maybe it really does, but I don't think N ever fully explains where that is); how the only constant thing that is given is a portrait of the titular character.
And what a picture that is! Prufrock, this poor, sad man, lost in the modern age; lost under the eyes of countless strangers; lost while he tries to make up his mind; lost while he gathers courage. Aw!!! My heart goes out to him even as I laugh at him and yet I marvel at his turns of phrase. Oh, Prufrock! An everyman and yet so singular!
And, oh my goodness, I have so many favorite lines. I have never before had this much difficulty in hi-lighting just one. Oh, um, hem-haw.........
Favorite line: "In a minute there is time/For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse."
If anyone should read this post, maybe, perhaps, you'll comment by hi-lighting your own favorite line?
Saturday, October 10, 2009
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Eliot was a bank loan officer, and I've thought it would make a good comedy skit to have somebody try to get a house loan from him. Stream of consciousness, the 3rd law of thermodynamics related to a declining Western civilization, please return to tradition, especially Christianity. Style might be his most lasting contribution. William Carlos Williams wrote him a letter condemning "The Wasteland" because he thought that poem delivered poetry into the hands of a priesthood, an elite who had to interpret it for the rest of us. ACtually, with training and repetitin, both Prufrock and Wasteland because pretty easy to read.
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