Trace the Inner Conflict of Prufrock in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock".

Inner Conflict of Prufrock in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Prufrock is the central figure or the protagonist of the poem, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and what passes within his consciousness, form the substance of the poem. There are dramatic clashes and conflicts, not in action, but in thought and emotion, and thus his indecision, his neurosis and his sense of his own impotence

are vividly portrayed. The image of the evening as a patient, ‘etherised upon a table’, the behaviour of the fog which is likened to a cat, Prufrock’s own conception of himself as a worm wriggling of the wall at the point of a needle etc. are all symbolic of his indecision, despair, inactivity and mental vacuity. With the progress of the poem the poet probes deeper and deeper into his consciousness and the past and the present are telescoped and fused.

Thus all through the poem Prufrock is shown to be a tragic figure, despairing and pessimistic. He suffers from paralysis of will. He has romantic dreams but fails to act and fulfil them. His tragedy results from his failure to make a choice. He is afraid both to propose to his lady and to change his life.

 

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