Jessica Diaz
Eng 102
Professor Reape
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

4/15/14
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
The Inability to Love In the poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” it is not really about love in which the title could be misleading. It is about an older man’s inability to love but desperately wants the attention and affection from a woman. Prufrock has spent his entire life analyzing situations and overthinking. It is because of his insecurities, social anxiety, and now his aging appearance which has completely hindered him from doing the things he wants to do, which is to be with a woman romantically or perhaps just for companionship.
First, Prufrock’s insecurities and low self-esteem affects his love life greatly. He is a lonely and unhappy man who is portrayed as someone who is in despair and helpless. He has realized his missed opportunities in his younger days and as a result he has never allowed himself to come close to a woman or fall in love. He feels as though he has never accomplished anything in his life and is aware of his weakness. He poses the inability to love and doesn’t believe that good things will ever happen to him. His desires to be touched or loved by a young woman becomes more of a fantasy rather than reality.
Secondly, in the setting at the social gathering, he mentions, “In the room the women come and go talking of Michelangelo (13). He wonders how they could possibly be interested in him when they are discussing one of the greatest artists in history. He also asks a recurrent question “How should I presume?”(54). Although, he would love to engage in conversation with a woman, he just can’t seem to connect with people the way he wants to or go about approaching a woman. Lacking this confidence interferes with what he would like to do or say. This just emphasizes how his character is defined by fear and anxiety. He is a man who wants to take that next step forward but afraid of how it will turn out. He continually procrastinates and postpones meeting a woman by saying, “There will be time.”(37).
Lastly, since Prufrock is an insecure middle aged man, he continuously worries that he will make a fool of himself and that the women will ridicule him for his overall physical appearance. He wonders if he should even dare to approach a woman and disturb the universe (46). After all, his hair is thinning, he now has a bald spot in the middle of his hair, and his arms and legs are thin (40). Toward the end of the poem, he mentions, “I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think they will sing to me” (124). He doubts that any woman would even talk to him because of his elderly appearance. A mermaid is young, elegant, and beautiful. Unlike Prufrock, he thinks he is ugly, old, and self conscious about the clothes he wears. His fear of being rejected and criticized overpowers his decision to engage in conversation.
In summary, if Prufrock could have learned to reverse the way he has lived his life for all this time, have self-assurance within himself, and stop overthinking about the “what if”, he would have lived a happy, exciting, and fulfilling life that he has always desired. Unfortunately, because of his insecurities and social anxieties, he has lost direction in himself which forced him to live this bleak and lonely life.