In Bartleby the Scrivener; the lawyer, also the narrator, had power over Bartleby in the beginning of the story by hiring him; but then slowly the power diminishes and it causes Bartleby to have power over the lawyer, when he starts replying to everything the lawyer asks of him to with “I would prefer not to.” He doesn’t say “I will not” which confuses the lawyer who takes it as a simple “no.” The lawyer appears to be a kind man that tries to help Bartleby, but he actually is a weak owner of a business and has no power over his employees. He could have saved Bartleby if he would have just faced the problem instead of running away to another office. In the story the author makes Bartleby appear to be a defiant character, but he is actually …show more content…
Such behavior can be linked to the fact that the lawyer also ran from the office when he didn’t know how to deal with Bartleby; but he chose not to face the situation and be the authority that he was. The lawyer did try to help Bartleby in the beginning, but I see it as a charity case; and that the lawyer only did so for to relieve his own conscience, because if the lawyer indeed did want to help Bartleby he would have never left for another …show more content…
According to Petri Liukkonen, Melville lost his fame and readers, and was unable to support his family and had to depend on his father-in-law’s wealth. “In 1855 Melville had a breakdown – he started to believe that he was not going to get fame with his writing.” (Petri Liukkonen, 4) Melville was lost and didn’t know how to recover from what had happened to him; so I said before he ran away and went on a voyage to Europe. Melville gave up on his writing since it didn’t bring him any income; and so he found a job as a customs inspector, where it gave him a regular income that he could depend on unlike his
In the beginning of each story, characters are both shown as “ideal” characters in that their characteristics give the characters their first perceived amiableness. In “Bartleby the Scrivener” Melville uses distinguishing characteristics to solely represent Bartleby from the others in the story. He enters the story first, as a response to an advertisement for a position as a scrivener in a law office. Melville states, “A motionless, young man one morning stood upon my office threshold, the door being open for it was summer. I can see that figure now – pallidly neat, pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn!” (Meyer 149). Here he makes it known that just by seeing Bartleby’s presence when he first enters the law office; he is exactly what the unnamed lawyer was inquiring about. He was by far unlike other characters in the story. He had no vices or hang ups, the first presence and his stature, he came their wiling and ready to ...
The author of the story presents the questions of what is valuable in society and how those that resist these values are dealt with and answers them through Bartleby's actions from his life to his death. Society values things such as money and working to make money where human things such as sentimentalities and emotions are not worth holding onto and when one refuses to work he is left with choices of imprisonment in a cell or imprisonment in a job where Bartleby instead chose to die, to be free of such a world that does not value freedoms and humanity.
In Melville’s, “Bartleby the Scrivener,” a lawyer’s idea of relationships is tested. As a bachelor, his disconnection with people is an obstacle he has to overcome. The relationships between his coworkers and himself are simple and detached until Bartleby is introduced. The lawyer is befuddled at the unique behavior that this character displays and cannot help but take particular interest in him. When Bartleby is asked to work, he simply says, “I would prefer not to,” and when he quits working, he begins to stare at the wall (1112). This wall may symbolize the wall that the lawyer has built up in an attempt to ward off relationships, or it may simple symbolize Wall Street. When the lawyer finds out that Bartleby is l...
While the narrator never specifies precisely that Bartleby does feel this way it can be inferred from a few of the passages. The first instance that would suggest guilt is when the narrator goes to the office before church, herein he finds Bartleby at the office on a Sunday morning he is described to be “in a strangely tattered dishabille, saying quietly that he was sorry”. (Melville, 86) This quiet apology combined with the later revelation that in answering the narrator he could not look at him, (Melville, 105) does imply that Bartleby still has some guilt or shame
This can be seen in how the narrator and other lawyers never want to do anything that harms themselves or their reputation. Melville shows us this side of the lawyers when they come to the narrator to help rid themselves of Bartleby and they state, “Every body is concerned; clients are leaving the offices; some fears are entertained of a mob; something you must do, and that without delay.” Then, the narrator decides to help not out of the goodness of his heart but because he is “fearful then of being exposed to the papers.” All the lawyers have no true concerns of what happens to Bartleby as long as he is out of their way. This helps to give the reader some insight into how the law is there to attempt to keep people formed to the society intended where everyone has there place to help society run smoothly and if someone doesn’t conform to this society, they are told that they are breaking the law and must be imprisoned. Therefore, the lawyers decide to call the police on Bartleby and have him thrown in jail for nothing other than his
Melville constantly shows Bartleby's refusal of conforming to society through the profound theme. This is the theme of choice. Choice is one of the major parts of the book because it is frequently used with Bartleby, a new employee to the narrator's company. Bartleby first exhibits the use of choice when the narrator politely asks Bartleby to proofread his rough-draft. Bartleby uses this defiance at the first part of the story. He beings to show his true colors to the narrator and the readers.
Herman Melville uses a first person point of view to show the narrator’s first hand fascination with his employee Bartleby, as well as Bartleby’s strange behavior and insubordination.
He starts to disconnect himself by refusing to do work given to him by his boss, this comes from his desire to be complacent, which we find out when he says “I like to be stationary,” when talking to the lawyer (127). Bartleby continues to change throughout the story, as he goes from being an employee who won’t do his work, to never leaving the office and essentially making it his home. According to Todd Giles, “Bartleby's silence establishes distance,” meaning that he becomes so out of place that people stop expecting of him (Giles, 2007). What this causes is the need for Bartleby to be removed from the Wall Street Office. The lawyer tries in many different ways to do so, and even offers him more money than he is owed if he will quit. Bartleby refuses and continues to stay in the building, doing nothing, detached from the world around him. Eventually the lawyer changes offices due to Bartleby and leaves him there for the next buyer. Bartleby is forced out by the new owner, and in time it is told the police he is a vagrant and he is thrown into jail. Bartleby’s story ends
McCall focuses his argument within the way in which Melville has written Bartleby, The Scrivener, he goes into detail about the comical aspects within the story and uses Melville’s description of Bartleby’s saying “I prefer not to,’ he respectfully and slowly said, and mildly disappeared.” (272). McCall suggests that the adverbs Melville uses, “respectfully” , “slowly” and “mildly” , “create[s] a leisurely little excursion into the uncanny” (279). I agree that the lawyer must have had some wit and good intentions in making the claim about Bartleby up to a point, I cannot accept this fully because many people still believe that the lawyer is unreliable. Most critics within the majority, as McCall reinstates, “believe, “the lawyer is “self-satisfied”, “pompous”…”a smug fool” who is ‘terribly unkind to a very sick man’ “(2660. I disagree with the idea that the lawyer was unkind and Bartleby was sick. The lawyer was fascinated by Bartleby’s responses to the job, and Bartleby, I feel knew exactly what he was doing in stating his responses. McCall acknowledges that “these cure two central problems in the story: the nature of Bartleby’s illness and the lawyer’s capacity to understand it,”
Melville intends something less black and white with more gray shading. Melville uses dramatic irony and grim humor in “Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street. This is to show the reader how the Lawyer assumes he is a safe, successful and powerful man with extensive control in his polite society until he hires a man named Bartleby. This relationship is slowly revealed to be quite a conundrum for the Lawyer and the reader. Melville shows how the Lawyer never had any power or control over Bartleby but quite the opposite; Bartleby held all the power and control in this relationship. I will explore the important of the power struggle and the fight to maintain control between the Lawyer and Bartleby.
In Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” we are introduced to a capitalist world, a capitalist world in which an economic system controlled by private owners with the goal of making profit in the market economy exist. The story is narrated by a man mostly known as “The Lawyer”, the “elderly man” who seeks God’s acceptance by his so called “kindness” shown to his employees (Melville1483). He only sees them as property clearly shown by the following words he uses “myself, my employees, my business, my chambers and general surroundings” (Melville 1484). He tries so hard to be good but one can see through his cloak and find the real person he is, one who seeks good for oneself only. He is a fake in search of what he wants and doing it at no cost. Is his story really about helping Bartleby because he is a good person?
Although not as outwardly demanding as the chief clerk, the lawyer attempts to have Bartleby obey his orders and gets frustrated when Bartleby replies with “I would prefer not to”. The chief clerk even resorts to physical violence in a fit of rage to get Bartleby to cooperate “when this old Adam of resentment rose in me and … I grappled him and threw him”. The lawyer uses ”old Adam” to mean the “sinful character of human nature” in reference to his aggression towards Bartleby (OED). One rebuttal to my argument of the lawyer representing the bourgeoisie would be that the lawyer comes off as a kind-hearted individual who rarely shows signs of aggression or anger towards Bartleby. This is true, however, the lawyer’s appearance is from his own recollection of the story as it is narrated in first person. It is quite possible that the lawyer is an unreliable narrator, as any person narrating a story with himself in it is bound to embellish their kindness and limit their recollection of their downfalls. Gregor’s story is narrated by an omniscient third person narrator, who tells an unbiased and truthful
My conclusion, then, is that the lawyer strays from the zone of comfort to only lead him back to it. For instance, he does not try to understand Bartleby through Bartleby’s perspective, but he wants to understand who Bartleby is so that Bartleby will conform to the way he is. The lawyer’s empathy that he shows towards Bartleby is not a genuine display for Bartleby, but as a selfish way to restore the order in which he does not have to deal with this conflict.
His efforts though are fruitless because he was not able to get to Bartleby and never truly understood him, even in prison as the man eventually dies of starvation. Although after his death the lawyer does learn of Bartleby’s previous and listless job at a ‘Dead Letter Office’ which made the lawyer sympathize for him and wonder if that job is what made Bartleby so distant. Bartleby was a loner who distanced himself from everyone, even in death, he was aloof and never interacted with anyone which is not considered normal human behavior because humans are supposed to be social. This story went a little deeper and gave the idea of humanity as a whole being apathetic towards each other, because only the lawyer showed any sort of humane concern for Bartleby while the others cared less. Bartleby himself displayed apathetic behavior as he showed little to no care for how his behavior affected others or even himself. Outside in the world, many people who are stressed out and constantly working tend to only focus on themselves and have little to no care for other people most of the time. It’s another negative view on humanity, but at the same time it’s not that wrong, as society made by humans also makes others so busy and stuck in tedious schedules that they gradually become more jaded and some even become distant and
The story of Bartleby was a very interesting story open for many different interpretations. Melville does and excellent job building suspension towards different thoughts as to what caused Bartleby to become an emotionless incapable worker. Here is evidence throughout the story to reflect the kindheartedness of the narrator. After reading this work the last quote “Ah Bartleby, Ah humanity” stood out as a cry of sadness for failing to understand and further assist Bartleby. After the numerous attempts He describes himself an elder lawyer that has his own office with a total of four employees including Bartleby. The narrator takes the time to learn the qualities of each individual not just on a performance basis however, personally as well.