Comparative Essay between “Fight Club” and “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”

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After reading and evaluating the works of T. S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club, there are various discussion points pertaining to the connection between tragedy and human conditions. Herein, tragedy is the result of a specific human condition, disengagement. This essay aims to identify and explain the behavioural traits between characters in two literary works which leads to a disengagement by the characters from a typical social environment.

In Palahniuk’s Fight Club, Tyler Durden is a conformist to society that experienced a personal tragedy which led him to disengage from the societal normality and found an organization known as Fight Club, an underground street fighting competition. Tyler was once an aspiring businessperson. His failure was the cause of his conformity. Tyler then began to work as a security guard, primarily conducting after hour duties. This led him to begin stealing left over human fat to create the ingredients for the manufacture of explosives with the aim of supplementing his income (Schuessler). Here a personal tragedy, specifically failure, led to a behavioural condition known as disengagement. Tyler retracted himself from the typical American societal expectations and rebelled through forms of crime and backlash.

Tyler’s failure as a businessperson and his overall frustration with the societal functions in the United States led him to conform to regular societal norms. Jack Moore, a contrasting character, who suffers from insomnia as a result of frustration with a standardized and plain lifestyle. Both Jack and Tyler eventually conform from society through different avenues, each with unique and contrasting impacts on their lives. Jack and Tyler engage in co...

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...l experienced a human condition as a result of their respective tragedies. Each individual diverted their emotions towards various elements in their efforts to comply with societal demands. As a result of fear, lack of confidence and suppression of society each individual reacted to their personal societal challenges through the human condition of disengagement from their respective societies.

Works Cited

Elliot, Thomas Stearns. The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. Prufrock and Other Observations. 1917.

Palahniuk, Chuck. Fight Club. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1996.

Pioch, Nicolas. The Webmuseum. 25 October 2005. 17 May 2011 .

Poetics. 16 March 2011. April 2011 .

Schuessler, Zachary. A Psychological Analysis of Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club. 3 May 2007.

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