The Ultimate Test

“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” a poem by T.S. Eliot, is full of allusions.  These allusions are numerous and a reader may read over many of them without even realizing it.  In fact, to fully grasp everything that Eliot is presenting in this work a reader must read the poem multiple times and have a vast background.  In reading this poem myself I did not understand all of the allusions, and I had the version with footnotes.  However, after some discussion, in class, I was able to better appreciate all the work that went into this poem.  The poem even starts off with a reference, an excerpt from Dante’s Inferno, and the excerpt is not even in English, it is in Italian.  If my edition did not have the footnotes I would have had no idea what it meant or where it came from.  Then the shots keep coming, in forth stanza Eliot mixes in two references to two old poems that I envision most readers have never heard of, or read for that matter.  Then, as a good poet should, he references Shakespeare which, I assume, more readers would understand.  He follows that with a biblical reference, an amateur move of course.  That is just a brief synopsis of the allusions that Eliot put into his poem.  To read and understand all of the references a person needs to be educated and rather keen on literature.  Because of this, I equate this poem with an inside joke between friends.  I feel this way because the only people who could completely understand this poem, without having to do research, would most likely be other poets.  Overall, this poem is definitely a discussion starter and worth a read, and it most definitely tests a person knowledge of literature.