Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow

This article explores two stylistically very different texts of the modernist period, T.S. Eliot’s poem ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley’s novel Crome Yellow, through the comparative perspective of satire. It argues that they have more in common that may be at first supposed....

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Main Author: Alan Ali Saeed
Format: Article
Language:Arabic
Published: Salahaddin University-Erbil 2023-04-01
Series:Zanco Journal of Humanity Sciences
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Online Access:https://zancojournal.su.edu.krd/index.php/JAHS/article/view/388
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author Alan Ali Saeed
author_facet Alan Ali Saeed
author_sort Alan Ali Saeed
collection DOAJ
description This article explores two stylistically very different texts of the modernist period, T.S. Eliot’s poem ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley’s novel Crome Yellow, through the comparative perspective of satire. It argues that they have more in common that may be at first supposed. The article argues in particular that the figure of Prufrock, the speaker of Eliot’s poem, provides the model for Denis Stone, the poetic protagonist of Crome Yellow as it is shown in a comparative reading of the two texts, seen in terms of their modernist historical context. Satire is often thought of as too didactic a literary mode to be amenable to modernism which places its emphasis instead on aestheticism and artistic experimentation and not providing lessons on how human being can be better. However, this is not always the case and Eliot’s self-satirising character Prufrock has important attributes that struck a chord with the generation, who like Huxley, lived through the horrors of World War One. The character of Prufrock with all his neurotic procrastination, failed romantic yearnings and doubts about his own masculinity came to inform Huxley’s own perspective on his protagonist Denis Stone in his novel and the article draws on Freud’s psychoanalytic explanation of neurosis to establish this. In conclusion, the article proposes that this comparative reading of ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Crome Yellow in terms of satire requires us to see modernist satire as a novel, innovative, non-didactic form of satire, which in its tragi-comedy can be seen as directly implicated in British attitudes to both modernity and World War One.   
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spelling doaj-art-65f3218cbb034bc28df0a73e90d0e6982025-08-20T03:43:43ZaraSalahaddin University-ErbilZanco Journal of Humanity Sciences2412-396X2023-04-0127210.21271/zjhs.27.2.21Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome YellowAlan Ali Saeed0English Department, College of Languages, University of Sulaimani-Sulaimani This article explores two stylistically very different texts of the modernist period, T.S. Eliot’s poem ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley’s novel Crome Yellow, through the comparative perspective of satire. It argues that they have more in common that may be at first supposed. The article argues in particular that the figure of Prufrock, the speaker of Eliot’s poem, provides the model for Denis Stone, the poetic protagonist of Crome Yellow as it is shown in a comparative reading of the two texts, seen in terms of their modernist historical context. Satire is often thought of as too didactic a literary mode to be amenable to modernism which places its emphasis instead on aestheticism and artistic experimentation and not providing lessons on how human being can be better. However, this is not always the case and Eliot’s self-satirising character Prufrock has important attributes that struck a chord with the generation, who like Huxley, lived through the horrors of World War One. The character of Prufrock with all his neurotic procrastination, failed romantic yearnings and doubts about his own masculinity came to inform Huxley’s own perspective on his protagonist Denis Stone in his novel and the article draws on Freud’s psychoanalytic explanation of neurosis to establish this. In conclusion, the article proposes that this comparative reading of ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Crome Yellow in terms of satire requires us to see modernist satire as a novel, innovative, non-didactic form of satire, which in its tragi-comedy can be seen as directly implicated in British attitudes to both modernity and World War One.    https://zancojournal.su.edu.krd/index.php/JAHS/article/view/388Modernism, T. S. Eliot, Prufrock, Aldous Huxley, Crome Yellow, Satire.
spellingShingle Alan Ali Saeed
Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
Zanco Journal of Humanity Sciences
Modernism, T. S. Eliot, Prufrock, Aldous Huxley, Crome Yellow, Satire.
title Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
title_full Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
title_fullStr Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
title_full_unstemmed Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
title_short Satire in Modernism: A Comparative Study of T.S. Eliot's ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and Aldous Huxley's Crome Yellow
title_sort satire in modernism a comparative study of t s eliot s the love song of j alfred prufrock and aldous huxley s crome yellow
topic Modernism, T. S. Eliot, Prufrock, Aldous Huxley, Crome Yellow, Satire.
url https://zancojournal.su.edu.krd/index.php/JAHS/article/view/388
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