To whom is Prufrock speaking to? Is it woman or us? What is the 'overwhelming questions' that he repeats many times?
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The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock Questions
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To whom is Prufrock speaking to? Is it woman or us? What is the 'overwhelming questions' that he repeats many times?
We think it is a listener, an unidentified companion of Prufrock. The listener could also be Prufrock's inner self, one that prods him but fails to move him to action. As to the "overwhelming question". Eliot appears to have borrowed this phrase from James Fenimore Cooper's 1823 novel, The Pioneers. In this case most scholars believe that the "overwhelming question" , the focus of all of Prufrock's musings in the poem, is most likely a marriage proposal or a question about a woman's requited or unrequited feelings for him.
"Let us go then, you and I" indicates that Prufrock has someone to talk to, but it seems reasonable to assume that he is talking to some sort of alter ego. Most of the poem is a kind of "thinking out loud" as Prufrock considers some of the large questions that trouble all men and women. He focuses on his "self image" when he talks about his life being measured in coffee spoons. Prufrock's problem is partly that he is thoughtful but unable to "move" - even when he thinks he has answered the questions of his life, he cannot move forward.
Thanks so much for your analysis ~ :D
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