This is no expression in pride in posting this literary revision, because there is only me here (and for some reason blogging is an environment where i will willingly write, whereas the cold MS word page repulses me). And if anyone is here, sod off, this is my territory (despite being theoretically a public domain).

Prufrock is the prototype of the modern man subject to the weighty predicaments manifest in contemporary urban existence. The first line sets up reader expectations of a journey and the ultimate attainment of an original purpose. By the end of this poem, this expectation is devestatingly left unfulfilled. Acutely aware of his impotency in a superficial and judgemental world, he stagnates upon his intention, probing his very motives for action and finding them weak and not even wholly of his own architecture.
The theme of artifice involved in everyday being is augured at the beginning of the poem in the fractured identity implicit in 'you and I'; half being the inert, sensitive psyche and the other constituting the pseudo personality or facade. Self is arrogated by culture, context and company; pre-determined by others through simplistic denomination. One is hence compelled to defer to that narrowly defined definition or "formulated phrase" to honour expectations and keep in line with inextricable social doctrine. Prufrock's cruel enlightenment to the fact his capacity to exist as an autonomous agent is inevitably curtailed is the source of his indecision to commit to any course of action. He senses the futility of embarking on the making of resolve; unable to invest his faith in anything, repeating the rhetorical question- "but would it have been worth it, after all?". With anguished honesty he remarks "in short, i was afraid". Fearful to follow through with his engagement to any kind of relationship and the destruction of his delusion that has manifested in his being so long for it to be shattered would be tantamount to the negation of self. He hence opts with despairing resignation to relinquish his quest for love and fruitfulness to preserve and safeguard his pride against a hollow society. In a somewhat disdainful tone he states he has 'known [women] known them all', characterising them in metonymic terms as 'eyes' or 'arms'; or pluralised, as in 'the women come and go'. This expansive generalisation signifies that Prufrock is not only a victim of society, but a representative of an impersonal social mentality that his sensibility is so inflicted by.

Styled as an intimate dramatic monologue, Prufrock remarks drily upon his superficial surroundings and inadequate self with a self-deprecating, ironic tone. The juxtaposition of issues of great gravity and trivialities (reinforced by child-like, buoyant rhyme) causes a descent into bathos. Abrupt anti-climaxes, such as from "be time for a hundred visions and revisions/before the taking of toast and tea" mockingly point towards the absurd proximity between the profound and the trite. They act also as a cynical tool examining Prufrock's individual paralysis and shortcomings. "Oh do not ask what is it" he says of the aforementioned "overwhelming question", "let us go and make our visit". He pointedly evades being pressed to articulate this question for the very reason that he cannot. Miserably he struggles to define meaning behind his mundane existence, but is unable to source any, and soon becomes overwhelmed by the ugliness of the urban civilisation to which he belongs. His mindset is mirrored in the description of the city surroundings; "the yellow fog which rubs its back against the window panes" is personified as cat-like and insidious; a claustrophobic presence.

Ultimately, Prufrock consigns himself to his fate in terms of sub-human alienation and withdrawal- "I shoud have been a pair of ragged claws/scuttling across the floors of silent seas." Despite being a highly cultivated and imaginative man, he cannot make the transition from potentonal into actual. Unlike the Hamlet he alludes to, he was not 'meant to be'; there need not be a dramatic culmination or finale; an eventual termination to procastination. His is a minor role in life; "deferential, glad to be of use, an easy tool...almost, at times, the Fool".

I is off now.