brilliant!

I had caught snippets of it and heard some commentary on it a long time ago--but you nailed it--the death/lazarus theme.

-sidenote-
the Hamlet vs Polonius-the five minutes of fame you're bringing up. agreed--it's a valid criticism. had a suspicion for a long time what this was about--the theme punctuated by the famous--"Dare I eat a peach?"

think I found the answer- (well it's a stab at an answer)

Eloit--damn. he was my age when he wrote this. holy crap. 29.

but 1917--on through the twenties, one of the major themes they were playing with was the balance/contrast between the Apollinian and Dionysian. (home.uchicago.edu/~shburch/...aper.html)
Thomas Mann mentions it specifically in 'Death In Venice'

I'm copy/pasting a paragraph from the rag that fleshes out the issue at hand:
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This principle which the Apollinian so exemplifies is an idea of man's singular individuality. Along with this individuality goes the idea of self-knowledge and moderation, "and so, side by side with the aesthetic necessity for beauty, there occur the demands "know thyself" and "nothing in excess." (46) These measured, delineated ideas of the individual were met on the other hand with the free spirited Dionysian idea of self-abnegation and excess, in which "everything subjective vanishes into complete self-forgetfulness." (36) No longer is the subjective "I" held sacred; instead the Dionysian becomes a symbol of primal unity and "each one feels himself not only united, reconciled and fused with his neighbor, but as one with him." (37) Under the Dionysian influences the principium individuationis collapses, and the universality of the whole instead of the individual is revered.
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essentially what I'm saying is that I'm *not* so sure it's about the chasing for glory--well it is--but Prufrock is the epitome of the Apollinian--to the point where simply the concept of "eating a peach" represents engaging in an experience which completely subsumes the individual into a sensory experience--
which--going back to your metaphor--would be tantamount to death of the Apollinian. The Apollinian measures out his life in coffee spoons.
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we are islands. but I'm also seeing Prufrock as a criticism of the Apollinian--of the profoundly individual--of the isolated. And especially when we are like Lazarus, when we've had experiences which isolate us--when we've seen traumatic things
--death--
we run the risk of becoming even more Prufrock. More isolated. Because we watch the motions of other people and it's like watching the women come and go talking of Michaelangelo--

I see him looking for connection. He wears his trousers rolled and walks across the beach. He looks for connection--and finds only illusory dreams.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
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sigh. I hope he's not right. that we're united- one with each other- until we speak. until we really do hear each other and see the true distance.