The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock in popular culture

T. S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is often referenced in popular culture.
Film and television
The poem is quoted several times, by various characters, in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (1979).
The film I've Heard the Mermaids Singing (1987) directed by Patricia Rozema takes its title from a line in the poem; as does the film Eat the Peach (1986), directed by Peter Ormrod.
In the film Midnight in Paris, Gil (Owen Wilson) mentions the poem to T.S. Eliot as he walks into a taxi.
Music
*James McMurtry sings “I measure out my life in coffee grounds” in his song “Charlemagne′s Home Town,” a variation of the verse “I have measured out my life with coffee spoons”.
*Frank Turner also references Prufrock in the song title “I knew Prufrock before he got famous” on his album Love Ire & Song.
*"Afternoons & Coffeespoons", a song by the Canadian pop rock group the Crash Test Dummies, is built on references to the poem, and namedrops Eliot himself.
* Sting sings in The Police 1979 album Reggatta de Blanc "The afternoon has gently passed me by, the evening spreads its sail (itself?) against the skyes.." clearly evokes:
LET us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Literature
Novels that reference the poem include The Long Goodbye (1953) by Raymond Chandler, the young adult novel The Chocolate War (1974) by Robert Cormier, The Eternal Footman (the title of which also comes from the poem) by James K. Morrow, and When Beauty Tamed the Beast by Eloisa James. The August 1972 issue of National Lampoon featured an article by Sean Kelly entitled "The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover" which began "We'd better go quietly, you and I." Humorist Kinky Friedman also wrote a novel entitled The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover. The Young Adult novelists John Green and Sarah Dessen make references to the poem in their respective novels The Fault in Our Stars and Dreamland. In The Austere Academy in A Series of Unfortunate Events the Baudelaire orphans attend Prufrock Prepatory School.
 
< Prev   Next >