ENGL 364 Dr. Helen Bittel "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" Study Guide Instructions: Complete any 4 of the following 8 question clusters. Please note that these questions were designed to accommodate a diverse group with different types and levels of prior. Use your best judgment to choose the clusters that seem most likely to enhance your understanding of the poem and to best address your own interests. FYI, the "smaller" questions within each cluster are intended as prompts or suggestions and not as a definitive outline. You are not expected to answer each systematically (or to cover as much ground as the prompts themselves), but only to provide substantive and well-supported responses to the poems, responses that goes beyond "what" and into "why it matters" (i.e. go beyond identifying the rhyme scheme or recurrent imagery and speculate on their significance within the poem). Who? 1. What does the poem directly reveal about Prufrock (i.e. through actions, descriptions, and assertions)? Indirectly (i.e. through language choices, style, assumptions, implied attitudes)? What? 2. Situation/Action. What is the poem "about"? Clearly Prufrock is very frustrated man. What seems to be the source of his frustrations? His own limitations? The city? Modern life? Women? What in the poem makes you think this? How? 3. Form. To what genre of poetry does this poem belong (sonnet, lyric, etc.)? Take a few stanzas and map out the rhyme scheme. What does it look like and how does it contribute to the mood and development of the poem? What do you make of the irregular rhythms of the poem? Which lines get repeated, and why might Eliot have chosen these for repetition? 4. Title. Why do you think that Eliot chose this title? Is this poem a "love song," or is the title strictly ironic? Originally this poem was titled "Prufrock among the Women"; why might Eliot have changed it? Does the change of title change the meaning (or at least the emphasis) of the poem? Does it alter your expectations as a reader? 5. Allusion. This poem is rife with literary allusion, especially to Hamlet, The Odyssey, and the biblical story of John the Baptist. Choose one of these and consider how it contributes to the development of the poem. If we "get" this allusion, how does it enhance our understanding of the poem? What does it reveal about Prufrock without stating it directly? Why? 6. Putting the poem in context. What seems to be "modern" and especially "modernist" about this poem? What, if anything, does it share with the romantic poetry we read earlier in the semester? With any of the Victorian poetry? Implications for readers today. 7. Is there anything in the poem that you think might speak especially powerfully to people in our own time and culture? What and why? Do you think that it speaks to today's readers for similar reasons and in similar ways, or in different ones? How so? Is there anything in the poem that---due to differences in cultural context---might be especially difficult for contemporary readers to appreciate or sympathize with? What and why? Potpourri 8. Is there any else that you think might be important in understanding how the poem works that we have not covered above? What and why? Contact the English Department at: 570-348-6219. E-mail: English@marywood.edu.

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Last update August 19, 2004
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