Examples Of Allusion In The Love Song Of J Alfred Prufrock

T. S. Elliot uses allusions in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock because by doing so he grabs meaning and significance from certain works and inserts that meaning in to his own work in only a few words. Consequently, Elliot’s use of Hamlet by William Shakespeare and the comparison between characters, allows one to see the struggle that Prufrock goes through. Throughout the poem, Prufrock spends the entire poem wondering if he should "disturb the universe" by asking an "overwhelming question" to a woman; he lets the question float around in his mind along with his fear and uncertainty. He wonders if it "would have been worth it, after all," to have asked the question just to have her respond, "That is not what I meant at all. That is not it, at all.” Prufrock states “No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;Am an attendant lord.”(Love Song.111-12) meaning, he is not a royal, or brave, like Hamlet was. Instead, he says that he was "deferential, cautious, a bit obtuse, almost ridiculous, a fool."(Love Song.115-19) Alluding to Hamlet helps one understand that he feels enormous stress.

When it comes to tragedy, both works are of a different types of tragedy. Hamlet as a text is a revenge tragedy, which is when someone who was murdered sends someone else to avenge them but at the end of the day both the person avenging and the person who committed the murder die. In Eliot’s Love song of J. Alfred Prufrock, there is no vengeance, so it is not a revenge tragedy, but it is a tragedy nonetheless because tragedy is also defined as a kind of poetry that provokes pity. If there is any type of emotion produced from Elliot’s work it is pity. Prufrock is a character that one can find annoying but still feel a pinch of sorry