The Lovesong of J.Alfred Prufrock

Question 1

Quote about people involved

Answer 1

Let us go then, you and I

2nd Person language → Suggests distinction

Question 2

Quote about sky and etherised patient

Answer 2

When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;

Juxtaposition → Contrast of idealism and realism → Chaos + Lost

Question 3

Quote about the overwhelming question

Answer 3

To lead you to an overwhelming question …

Motif → Ambiguity unanswered → Mediocrity

Question 4

Quote about making visits

Answer 4

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.

Heroic Couplet → Crappy rhyme → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 5

Quote about Michelangelo

Answer 5

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

Allusion + fragmentation + nursery rhyme form → A tarnishing of the arts → Mediocrity

Question 6

Quote about yellow gas

Answer 6

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the
window-panes.

Zoomorphic language → Nature is being subverted → Chaos

Question 7

Quote about murdering and creating

Answer 7

There will be time to murder and create

Juxtaposition → human nature is divisive → Chaos + Lost

Question 8

Quote about indecisions and revisions and whatever

Answer 8

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

Hyperbole → many ways to waste our time + mundane actions → Mediocrity

Question 9

Quote about bald spot

Answer 9

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]

Motif + {forget} → insecurity → Mediocrity

Question 10

Quote about the universe and disturbing

Answer 10

Do I dare
Disturb the universe?

Motif + Rhetorical Question → insecurity → Mediocrity

Question 11

Quote about coffee spoons

Answer 11

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

Imagery → Misery → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 12

Quote about Kafka (not actually Kafka)

Answer 12

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Imagery → Misery → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 13

Quote about the sea floor

Answer 13

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

Imagery → Misery → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 14

Quote about cakes and ice and crisis

Answer 14

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

Motif + Juxtaposition + Rhetorical Question + Heroic Couplet → Misery → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 15

Quote about the footman

Answer 15

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat,
and snicker,

Imagery → Misery → Mediocrity + Pity

Question 16

Quote about not being a prophet

Answer 16

I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;

Negative declarative → Misery → Mediocrity

Question 17

Quote about head on platter

Answer 17

Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,

Motif → Insecurity → Mediocrity

Question 18

Quote about the squeezing the universe into a ball

Answer 18

To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball

Imagery → Misery → Mediocrity

Question 19

Quote about it being impossible to say stuff

Answer 19

It is impossible to say just what I mean!

Anacoluthon → Failure of language → Mediocrity

Question 20

Quote about Hamlet

Answer 20

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Allusion + Diction → Logically wrong to be Hamlet → Mediocrity

Question 21

Quote about being on the beach

Answer 21

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach

Declarative → Mundanity → Mediocrity

Question 22

Quote about mermaids not singing to him

Answer 22

I do not think that they will sing to me

Negative Declarative → Imagination fails him → Mediocrity

Question 23

Quote about drowning

Answer 23

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

Diction → Realism → Mediocrity