--On Thursday, April 03, 2003 7:01 PM -0600 Carrol Cox <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> Ken Armstrong wrote:
>>       Why not, Jennifer? Seems pretty clearly to be the main character of
>> the poem.
>
> The title isn't "My love song,"

Carrol,

  Sorry, help me with the logic of that. Prufrock is not a character
because the title of the poem is The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, not
My Love Song. And therefore we can conclude...what?


  and while I had never thought of it one
> way or another before, one _could_ gloss the title as "What a character
> with a name like J. Alfred Prufrock would say to his coy mistress, had
> such a character had the courage to speak out loud."

  Mmmm, wouldn't he in fact have said something else in that scenario?
Because then he would not be in the position he's in, so he would be
speaking to the putative her, not to us, yes? Or maybe he'd be the strong,
silent type. All idle speculation, I know.

  I've never cared
> for discussions of "Gerontion" that treat Gerontion as a "character,"
> and perhaps seeing Prufrock as a character is equally misleading.
> "Gerontion" is an echo chamber; perhaps so is "Prufrock."

  Well, there sure is a lot if I-ing, me-ing, and my-ing going on.

Ken