What Is The Awareness Of This Change In George Eliot's Poetry

Superior Essays
The Modernist writers were aware that they were living in an age which was undergoing massive change. Virginia Woolf famously said “on or about December 1910 human character changed.” Awareness of this change radically affected their writing. The investigations of Freud, Marx and the new developments in the empirical sciences influenced their worldview and their works of art. The stable worldview that writers like George Eliot were used to was changing. The idea of the organic growth of an individual and of society was no longer in vogue. In its place there was the awareness of fragmentation. Organic unity no longer existed. In the visual arts in place of the landscape paintings of the previous century the20th century saw experiments like cubism …show more content…
A few lines later he imagines his head brought on a platter like a cooked lobster. In “Sweeney Among The Nightingales” animal imagery is much more frequently used. The poem describes a “dive” which is frequented by prostitutes and people of low repute. Sweeney in the first stanza of the poem is described in animalistic terms. The image that we get of Sweeney is more ape than man. Another important theme in Eliot’s poetry is the fear of growing old. Prufrock is ashamed at the bald spot in the middle of his head and he always keeps referring to it. He is constantly worried about how he looks, how others perceive him, the slight frame of his body is a source of embarrassment for him. Some critics are of the opinion that the “overwhelming question” that Prufrock faces is his love for a certain young lady. Prufrock is uncertain whether he will be accepted by this lady or not. This “question” is raised to an almost metaphysical level. Love is no longer a simple matter concerning two individuals for Prufrock the question has an almost cosmological significance. For Prufrock it is easier to “squeeze the universe into a ball” than to ask the question that is bothering him. Prufrock because of his inability to resolve the “overwhelming question” has a diminished

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    The reader can make assumptions that the “you” is either the reader or, making assumptions from the ironic title again, a mysterious lover, but as the story progresses the mere “you and I” format starts to break and it is reveal that Prufrock is simply talking to himself. Samet Guven points out that if “you” is refered to Prufrock, then “you” can be interpreted as Prufrock’s ego speaking; an “ego [that] is conscious of the norms of the society and tries to repress his desires” (81). Again, as the reader progresses through the poem, the reader will immediately notice that the poem is not a romantic love song to Prufrock, but a gloomy poem that depicts Prufrock’s insecurities and…

    • 1392 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The figurative language so artfully embedded in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” furthers the at times almost tangible sense of the passing of time as the speaker lays out his story as if he were setting the table for a meal. One such instance presents itself when, in the first stanza, the speaker unceremoniously lays out the initial setting, saying, “When the evening is spread out against the sky / Like a patient etherized upon a table” (2-3). This simile places the poem in a peaceful setting during the night when nothing will disturb the events that take place. The comparison of the evening to a patient on a table implies that the evening seems as if it were dead as the simile provides a stark image of a dead body in a morgue or a body laying in an open coffin during a viewing party. This simile also implies that the setting is at peace, it has yet to be disturbed by the chaos of time.…

    • 1461 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Modernism and Cubism European society went through great changes during the last half of 19th Century and the beginning of 20th Century. Industry had a rapid development as the processes started to become more mechanical and machines increased their importance in manufacture processes. As the society entered to a new age known as “Modern”, the artistic approach to life also changed, introducing new artistic currents based on the Modernism. The current essay intends to provide a wider explanation of Modernism and the subsequent avant-gardes focusing on Cubism and why do I consider that it greatly represents the changes of the modern time.…

    • 1935 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Romanticism In Miss Brill

    • 2025 Words
    • 9 Pages

    To what extent are modernist works more interested in the inner world of the imagination and subjective perception than the outer world of social life? Discuss with reference to two texts. The works of ‘Miss Brill’ by Katherine Mansfield (1920) and Tonio Kroger by Thomas Mann (1903) include fundamental modernist characteristics, such as a fragmented structure, free indirect discourse and an epiphany. These literary techniques help shape the struggle both authors present between the inner world of the imagination and the outer world of social life.…

    • 2025 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Deception in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” The poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S. Eliot, was one of Eliot’s first major poems that gave him national recognition. It is a satirical poem about the “difficult” task of talking to women. It follows the life and thoughts of the main character J. Alfred Prufrock as he ironically attends a party of high stature in a seemingly shallow location within a city comparable to London.…

    • 1353 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    T.S Eliot was a modernist poet. “The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock” was the first published poem by Eliot and established him as a writer with a unique voice. Eliot covers motifs of existentialism, sexual inadequacy, emasculation and morality in…

    • 733 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Moderns were a culmination of writers and painters, overall artists in their respective fields, that all shared unique and creative thoughts, ideas, and works. Some, such as Picasso and Hemingway, were greatly influenced by the likes of others at the salon, such as Gertrude Stein. For those people to come together at this specific point in time was a unifying and powerful moment for the world. “The War to End All Wars” had just ended, taking millions of lives with it, and many nations around the world were looking to restore the happiness, joy, and freedom that had previously made the world feel so alive. For the Moderns, they were able to express war time events, in hopes that it will bring others back to the happy times even stronger.…

    • 290 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    An Explication of “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” by T.S. Elliot, is a poem about a man’s psychological state of mind as he is walking through town on his way to visit a woman to ask her an important question. Instead of focusing on the woman and what he wants to ask her, he focuses on what others think of him and how he is not good enough for her. Prufrock gets himself all worked up about his physical and mental inadequacies and ends up not meeting the woman to ask her the question. Elliot uses allusion, imagery, and figurative language in this modernistic poem by making connections to past literature, describing elements that the audience can sense, and making comparisons of objects, situations,…

    • 1283 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Rather than make a comparison to a fish in a school, or a horse as part of a herd, Prufrock wishes he was a crab in a silent sea. Stating he wants the sea to be empty shows he wants to be alone. Why would somebody who is spending a whole poem talking about people and activities that involve multiple people, wish to be a crab all alone in an empty sea? By comparing himself to the crab in the silent sea, Prufrock shows how isolated he really is and that he is in no rush to end his isolation. Still consisting of physical isolation like in “Prufrock”, Eliot writes the poem “Rhapsody on a Windy Night,” which is about a single person traveling through city streets passing the night alone.…

    • 1657 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Eliot sees in modern man. He seems to believe that when modern man conforms to society, he will eventually lack spontaneity. As shown in line 51: “I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;” wherein Prufrock explains that he has not been living his life impulsively and because of this, it leads him to think in lines 84-86: “I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker, / And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, / And in short, I was afraid.”…

    • 1148 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In comparison, Eliot lent a decidedly more neurotic sense of self-doubt and deprecation to the character of Prufrock in his poem The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. “Time to turn back and descend the stair, with a bald spot in the middle of my hair-(they will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”) Prufrock furthermore contemplates his circumstances as he ostensibly ponders aloud “Do I dare disturb the universe? For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse”.…

    • 1007 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Modernism and Modernisms - Semester 1 The modernist building that I will be discussing in this essay is the Barcelona Pavilion. The Modern Period began from the late 19th Century all the way to early 20th Century. “Modernism, in the arts, a radical break with the past and the concurrent search for new forms of expression.”…

    • 1059 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    What Is Postmodernism?

    • 1074 Words
    • 5 Pages

    What is Postmodernism? According to Merriam Webster dictionary ,Post-Modernism is “of relating to or being any various movements in reaction to modernism that are typically characterized by a return to traditional materials and forms by ironic self reference and absurdity “ (Webster, Merriam). The very term "postmodern" was, in fact, coined in the forties by the historian, Arnold Toynbee (Felluga).Postmodernism cannot be historically a specific year, and however, its ideas are around the mid-1970. The concepts of postmodernism affected many aspects of art, education, literature, film, sociology, technology, and etc. To begin to understand postmodernism, one must first analyze the two movements in an earlier time which is modernism and the…

    • 1074 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Eliot wanted to change his life by giving him a gift for his sadness, loneliness and empty life that Silas had passed for years, replacing the gold with a child, which Eliot present that a real treasure in life is a human in this case, the child. Godfrey is not brave enough, he is submitted such a coward and a selfish by not admitting his child as his. He just gave money to Silas to buy new clothes for her. He returns to the Red House thinking of Nancy and promising her to be the man how she would like to have one, also having in mind his brother Dunsey if he returns what is going to happen, and about the child , would it be better to tell Nancy or not, is he going to throw away his happiness or just leave the things as they now.…

    • 1219 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Old modernism still performs valuable critical work because it serves as a geographical and aesthetic model that reproduces many of the main features of world-systems tinged theories of world literature; it functions as core modernism. Even as critics bring in new texts and authors, they are often read, directly or indirectly, against the modernist classics of old modernism. For example, Pound, Eliot, and Woolf have all become modernist mainstays; their works and theories permeate every aspect of it, from books and journals to courses at every level. In a way, they have developed into some of the “men and women of 1890 to 1945” due to their privileged place in the canon of modernism, as well as the budding one of late modernism (and they have kept their place in new modernist studies for good measure). The context of world literature enables us to read Pound, Eliot, and Woolf, and their theorizations of literary space, as modernist precursors to current trends that are attempting to chart the burgeoning realm of global aesthetic flow.…

    • 1726 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays