Key Facts

• • Full Title: The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
  • Author: T. S. Eliot (1888–1965)
  • Written Time: 1910–1911
  • First Published: 1915 in Poetry: A Magazine of Verse; later included in Prufrock and Other Observations (1917).
  • Genre: Modernist Poem, Dramatic Monologue
  • Form: Free verse with irregular rhythms and fragmented structure
  • Rhyme Scheme: No fixed rhyme scheme (occasional rhymes appear)
  • Tone: Nervous, reflective, ironic, and melancholic
  • Point of View: First-Person (the inner voice of J. Alfred Prufrock)

• Setting:

• Time Setting: Early 20th century: modern, urban, and mechanical age
• Place Setting: A dull, foggy city, symbolic of spiritual emptiness and loneliness in modern life