J. Alfred Prufrock and Hamlet

"The Love-Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot, narrates the story of an overwhelmingly nostalgic man who dwells over making something out of his life but, at the end, is unable to make up his mind about it. Aside from directly comparing himself to Prince Hamlet, or rather comparing himself to what Prince Hamlet is not, Mr. Prufrock and Mr. Hamlet have a lot more in common than they are aware of.

On one side, Mr. Prufrock is, as previously stated, a sentimental man who suffers from a lack of self-confidence. He is submerged in a "hundred indecisions", questions himself about daring to "disturb the universe", and finally continually contemplates the possibility of acting but retracts himself from doing so; "In a minute there is time for decisions and recision which a minute will reverse" (Line 47). This proves Mr. Prufrock to be a man of contradicting thoughts, of need for self-assurance, and of great misery and struggle. His grief even becomes slightly funny, for it is simply ridiculous. Nevertheless, perhaps what is most worrying about Mr. Prufrock is not his annoying sadness but his incapability of actually doing something with his life instead of over-thinking everything over and over again.

An interesting thing about Prufrock, though, is the way in which he compares himself to Prince Hamlet. He says that he is not Prince Hamlet at all and goes on into explaining, rather, what he is. This includes being the prince's advisor, glad to be of use, cautious, unable to express himself eloquently, and, at times, "the Fool". This comparison has a lot more profoundness to it now than it did before reading Hamlet. However, I slightly disagree with the way in which Prufrock places Hamlet on a pedestal. Perhaps Prufrock does not know about it, but he and Hamlet are very much alike when it comes to their inability to act. 

Hamlet, although a prince, is actually a very indecisive guy who suffers, just like Prufrock, from lack of self-confidence and love. It takes Hamlet a whole play to make up his mind about avenging his father's murder and he becomes nearly mad when it came to Ophelia, his beloved crush. In most of Hamlet's soliloquies throughout the play, he shows signs of abysmal nostalgia and misery, to a point where the famous question is asked, "To be or not to be?". To act or not to act? To live or not to live? To disturb the universe or not to? This is something J. Alfred Prufrock would certainly ask himself, but unlike Hamlet, he would take this question as rhetorical and have "not to be" as an unquestionable answer. 

The only thing that saves Hamlet from falling into J. Alfred Prufrock's dark world is the fact that he was able to make up his mind at the end and acted, killing his father's murderer. He disturbed the universe in which he lived but was able to die with the satisfaction of having actually done something with his life. The struggle of not knowing what to do, whether to act or not, could potentially be a lot more suffocating than the act of doing something, whatever it is. If J. Alfred Prufrock found some inspiration, the way Hamlet did in Fortinbras' army, he could perhaps make up his mind about accomplishing something before time ran up. This would make him a lot less pathetic, for being forever indecisive is much more pitiful than failing in whatever you decide to do.