Passage 070 · 1915
"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"
Main effectThrough cohortative imperative, passive patient-evening, and clinical simile, Eliot creates modernist anti-romanticism. Form performs disillusion—syntax that sets up romantic expectation (evening against sky) then violates it through simile. Grammar as modernist shock.
Device index
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Tropes
Explicit comparison.
Speaking to specific addressee.
Schemes
Sentence continuing across line breaks.
No words highlightedSyntax
"Let us go"—first person plural imperative suggests mutual action. Not "I will go" or "You should go" but "Let US go"—syntax creates partnership.
"then"—suggests this follows from something (unstated). Syntax implies previous conversation or thought.
"you and I"—appositives to "us," making explicit who "us" includes. Creates intimacy through grammatical specification.
"When the evening is spread out"—subordinate temporal clause sets scene. The passive voice "is spread out" makes evening the patient, not agent.
"Like a patient etherized upon a table"—prepositional phrase introduces simile that subverts romantic expectations. Syntax is conventional (Like X upon Y) but content is modernist shock. The past participle "etherized" suggests medical procedure, unconsciousness. Syntax through verb choice transforms romantic evening into clinical scene.
Close reading
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Cohortative Imperative
"Let us go"—first person plural imperative suggests mutual action. Not "I will go" or "You should go" but "Let US go"—syntax creates partnership.
Temporal Adverb
"then"—suggests this follows from something (unstated). Syntax implies previous conversation or thought.
Appositive Pronouns
"you and I"—appositives to "us," making explicit who "us" includes. Creates intimacy through grammatical specification.
Temporal Clause
"When the evening is spread out"—subordinate temporal clause sets scene. The passive voice "is spread out" makes evening the patient, not agent.
Shocking Simile
"Like a patient etherized upon a table"—prepositional phrase introduces simile that subverts romantic expectations. Syntax is conventional (Like X upon Y) but content is modernist shock.
The past participle "etherized" suggests medical procedure, unconsciousness. Syntax through verb choice transforms romantic evening into clinical scene.
Stylistic Effect
Through cohortative imperative, passive patient-evening, and clinical simile, Eliot creates modernist anti-romanticism. Form performs disillusion—syntax that sets up romantic expectation (evening against sky) then violates it through simile. Grammar as modernist shock.