Bartleby, the Scrivener by Herman Melville

Melville chose to literate the reading in first person narrative by the lawyer, Bartleby’s employer. His choice of the lawyer allows the reader to feel close to Bartleby, but remain mystified by him. On the contrary, Office Space is told through Peter’s eyes. Unlike Bartleby, Peter cares to interact with others and to take part in a social life.

Marlow is one of the first characters we meet in the book. He is a sailor who is being sent of to the Congo to sail a steamboat but throughout his journey finds many obstacles. In most stories for example Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the main character is the hero. Not only

protagonists and antagonists, the plot structure and events of the story and the way he

Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street by Herman Melville was an interesting story of a scrivener, while the movie was about a public records filer. Both the story and movie had parts that overlapped like Bartleby’s “I prefer not to” attitude and the way the offices were set up. Melville introduces a scrivener that helps makes copies, proofread, and deal with scribing; at first, there was a need for a person to fill the role of a copyist and all duties associated. When first hiring Bartleby he was a diligent and with great skill, but suddenly began to show mental instabilities. This infuriated the well-known lawyer as Bartleby was becoming insubordinate. These same actions reflected in the movie as he refused to file anymore. Both the story and movie had many similarities and small differences. The story was much more detailed and better than compared to the movie.

The style of this story was not the greatest in the beginning, but got better the further into the story I got. As a reader, I found it very hard to concentrate on the first few pages because it had a very slow start to it. Once Bartleby was introduced, however, it was much easier to concentrate. The author created a great sense of mystery around Bartleby, and that is what pulled me into the story. I wanted to figure out who Bartleby was, where he came from, and why he behaved the

4. Mr. Erwin Martin, the protagonist of the story, was a small, intelligent, neat and precise man, who followed a rigid daily routine. He never drank or smoked and because of this it made him an exemplary employee at his firm. His boss even stated that “Man is fallible but Martin isn’t”. In terms of characters Martin is considered a round character. He is considered this because he is well developed and has many character traits. As the story progresses Erwin does some things out of character. One of these being, the plotting of the murder of his fellow co-worker. It does not coincide with his character traits and we can also infer that he is going through a change which might make him a dynamic character as well. Instead of murdering Mrs. Barrows with brute force, he “kills” her career by using his knowledge of his perceived personality against her. He does all these things in order to rid himself of Mrs. Barrows and continue his routine life.

There are many ways someone can interpret “Bartleby the Scrivener”. I think throughout the story the narrator (the Lawyer) is the more sympathetic character.

In the short story “Bartleby, the Scrivener,” which was written by Herman Melville, the character named Bartleby is a very odd, yet interesting individual. In the story, Bartleby is introduced when he responds to a job opening at the narrator’s office. Although there is no background information given about him, it becomes very apparent that he will be the antagonist in this story. Unlike the usual image put on the antagonist, Bartleby causes conflict with a very quiet and calm temperament. This character’s attitude, along with the fact that he is a flat and static character, makes him a very unique antagonist, and this fact is shown through the way other characters approach and deal with his conflict.

In the short story, "Bartleby the Scrivener," Herman Melville employs the use of plot, setting, point of view, characterization, and tone to reveal the theme. Different critics have widely varying ideas of what exactly the main theme of "Bartleby" is, but one theme that is agreed upon by numerous critics is the theme surrounding the lawyer, Bartleby, and humanity. The theme in "Bartleby the Scrivener" revolves around three main developments: Bartleby's existentialistic point of view, the lawyer's portrayal of egotism and materialism, and the humanity they both possess. The three developments present the lawyer's and Bartleby's alienation from the world into a "safe" world of their own design.

The protagonist in this play is Julius Caesar. He is the Protagonist for many reasons. One is that the main plot if the play is to kill Caesar for being a bad ruler against Rome. The consipators were making plans to kill Caesar. There are many warnings in the story that Caesar is going to die, but he ingores all of them because the consipators tell him not to.If he wasn’t the Protagonist then there would be no need to have him in the play for most of them time. Even after his death Caesar still makes many appernices in the book and that makes the other charcters die. Protagonist is the main charcter in a story and that is what caesar is. It is clear that no one else is the Protagonist except for Casear. Caesear lives on in the

Bartleby’s behavior is considered a deviation from the norm because of the conforming behaviors of the other scriveners, Turkey, Nippers and Ginger Nut. As scriveners, they listen to their employer, the lawyer, and do as they were told. Their actions and reactions build the idea of “society” and how a scrivener should behave. Turkey is “a short, pursy Englishman” that is not far from sixty years old who drinks on the job which makes his work in the afternoon ineffective. Nippers is an ambitious fellow whose impatience stems from the mundane duties of being a “mere copyist” and has trouble working in the morning due to his stomach issues. The last

In short, Herman Melville’s story “Bartleby, the scrivener”, tells the tale of a successful lawyer hiring a new copyist and the challenges he faced with his new hire. Initially, the new hire, Bartleby, was extremely driven and very efficient. He had a great work ethic, and had an extraordinary output of writing for the head lawyer. On the third day Bartleby stunned his boss by preferring not to comply with his boss’s request. Bartleby’s refusal to comply was at first directed at anything outside of his copyist responsibilities, but gradually shifted toward refusing to do anything including his responsibilities as a copyist. Upon further analysis into Bartleby’s descent from a productive scrivener, to utterly useless in the office. I have found a connection between the people that isolate others because of differences, and the people that choose to stray away from “normal behavior”. This impacts the isolated person, people are negatively impacted when they live in isolation and have little personal and emotional connection with others. Without any emotional connection or contact with others, humans lose their purpose in life, or become useless like in Bartleby in the office.

“Bartleby, the Scrivener” is a remarkable short story written by author Herman Melville. The narrator of the story is a lawyer who owns his own law practice located on Wall Street and has various scriveners who work for him. The first scrivener he describes is named Turkey. He is an excellent worker in the morning, but as the day goes on his work begins to become messy and sloppy. He also has an ill temper in the afternoon. The lawyer tries to have Turkey work only in the morning, but of course Turkey argues with him so the lawyer just decides to give him less import work in the afternoon.

Have you ever seen a person so disconnected from society and from what is considered to be normal that he or she made you question their sanity? If so, you could relate with the lawyer in the story “Bartleby, the Scrivener.” In this story, the narrator, who is a lawyer, has a simple man named Bartleby respond to a job opening as a scrivener. Unbeknownst to the lawyer, Bartleby did not act in the manner the lawyer would have expected. Bartleby is so outside of what is expected that it is almost as if he had died and no longer had to live up to society’s standards. In this story, Bartleby is portrayed as a lifeless zombie and is alone with nowhere to go, no one to see, nowhere to be, and no purpose to live for.

He was able to see that the man he hired was using his office for his own living home. “For the first time in my life a feeling of overpowering stinging melancholy seized me. Before, I had never experienced aught but a not unpleasing sadness.”(Herman Melville, page 320). the narrator is feeling sad for Bartleby, he feels sad that the man who works for him is lonely and has no one to be with. However, as the story keeps going Bartleby refused to do anything. When asked to do something his simple words are, “I prefer not to.” the narrator did not like this and he got mad that he decided to move his business somewhere else. He didn't want to be in charge of Bartleby when the man would not do any work. He was proud of himself for leaving him behind without getting angry but being able to control his anger. “When again I entered my office, lo, a note from the landlord lay upon my desk. I opened it with trembling hands. It informed me that the writer had sent to the police, and had Bartleby remove to the Tombs as a vagrant.” (Herman Melville, page 329). everyone knew that the narrator knew more about Bartleby then they did. They wanted the narrator to be able and do something about Bartleby. As Bartleby was in the Tomb the narrator took time out to go and visit him. The first time he visited him Bartleby ignored him. The narrator out of his good character went to the person who cooks for them and gave him money so he can get Bartleby some good food. As stubborn as