Characters and speaker

The poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T. S. Eliot involves a first-person narrator or lyrical speaker – J. Alfred Prufrock, and a recipient of his monologue whose identity is debatable, as various critics have assumed the speaker to be talking with himself, a woman or the reader. Additionally, the speaker talks about other people and experiences whom we can associate with society in general and which we will analyse in connection to the speaker.

J. Alfred Prufrock

As the title of the poem announces, the speaker is J. Alfred Prufrock, a fictional lyrical character which can also be associated with a persona of the poet himself.

The poem being a dramatic monologue, most of the speaker’s traits are conveyed directly by himself.

Outer characterisation

His outer characterisation reveals that he is a middle-aged man who is thin and is losing his hair:

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair —
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin —
(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”) 

Prufrock describes himself as growing old and wearing “the bottoms of my trousers rolled” and having a lot of worldly experience: “For I have known them all already, known them all:”

Inner characterisation

The inner traits of the speaker and his relationship with himself and the world are, however, more important.

The speaker also seems to be a man with sexual desires and wants to ask the listener a question, but stalls the decisive moment because he is “afraid”. Because he is hesitant and does not trust himself, he postpones taking action and contemplates his urban surroundings...