Bartleby, the Scrivener

“Bartleby, the Scrivener” “Bartleby, The Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street” by Herman Melville is the tale of a young scrivener who rather than be remembered by his boss for his impeccable work and outstanding attitude is not forgotten because of his apathy towards life and the mysterious circumstances that made him act that way. In an essay, Graham Thompson, says that “the predominant themes in discussions of ‘Bartleby’remain changes in the nature of the workplace in antebellum America and transformations in capitalism” (395). Underneath the comic actions of Bartleby is a prophetic account of the service industry’s effect on a person during the rise of corporate America, as employees became numbers, and money and capitalism led to middle-class dissatisfaction which eventually led to conformism within it. Kuebrich wrote in his criticism about “Bartleby” an interesting fact about Melville: “Various aspects of Melville 's life—his family 's economic decline, his futile search for work on the Erie Canal, in Galena, Illinois, and in New York City in the late 1830s, his subsequent decision to become a commercial sailor and whaler, and the quasi-enslavement he experienced at sea—gave him an acute personal sense of the discrepancy between the nation 's economic practices and its purported democratic and Christian ideals, an understanding he would soon embody in one of his most baffling tales” (381). So it is no surprise in the irony that Melville chose the head of the office as the eyes through wish his story would be told, almost as if it was something unattainable for him in his real life. The narrator of the story is The Lawyer, a wealthy elder working in the growing financial center of the United States that was Wall Street in New York City: “Melville was aware of the material conditions and social forces that were transforming New York, and he skillfully incorporates many of these factors into ‘Bartleby.’ For instance, the story 's setting reflects the city 's

Cited: Tymieniecka. Netherlands: Springer. 2005. 119-138. Giles, Todd. “Melville’s Bartleby, The Scrivener.” Explicator. 65.2 (2007): 88-91 Hans, James S Literature. 22.2 (1995): 285-299.