Discuss Eliot’s treatment of the theme of the modern city in Essay exam

Discuss Eliots treatment of the theme of the modern city inPreludes. Also refer to The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock if youwish.In both Preludes and The love song of J. Alfred Prufrock, themodern city is one of the main themes. Eliots fascination with themodern city could stem from the fact that he was an American, and sowhen he moved to England in 1915, the modern city was a part ofEngland of which he was in awe. Eliot was also influenced by theFrench poet, Charles Baudelaire who explored the poetic possibilitiesof the more disreputable aspects of the modern metropolis. I believe thatthis is what Eliot is doing in Preludes I believe he is exploring thepoetic possibilities of the city.In Preludes, Eliot begins the poem with The winter evening settlesd aver / With smell of steaks in passageways / Six oclock. Here, Eliothas personified the weather and made wide use of sibilance. By usingsibilance, he makes the passageways seem eerie and mysterious. Eliotthen continues with The burnt -out ends of smoky long time / And now agusty rain shower wraps. These two landmarks suggest endings, as life isfirstly compared to a cigarette, where it burns away to nothing andthen the line And now a gusty shower wraps makes use of patheticfallacy, as the turbulent day in the city is over, just like the gustyshower has finished. The last two lines of the stanza create theimpression of a city atmosphere which is dingy and dark And at thecorner of the street / A lonely nag horse steams and stamps. The cabhorse could mirror people in the city, as many of them are lonely, andat the corner of the street suggests isolation and dinginess entangledwith a familiar city image.In the second stanza, El... ...mirroring the harsh world which the city is. The worlds revolvesuggests that in cities people are living in their own differentworlds, behind masquerades, which is a theme also present in TheLove Song of J. Alfred Prufrock with the line To prepare a face tomeet the faces that you m eet.In Preludes and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, Eliotilluminates the modern city in a very harsh light. Eliot seems tofocus on the negative points of the city such as its darkness, retirement and how threatening it can be. This could be due to thefact that Eliot was writing about these city themes after Darwinism,and just before World War One, when the city and polish wereseen as the things which would eventually destroy man. Eliotdiscusses the theme of the modern city truthfully and writes about itin the stark way in which he views it.