"Bartleby, The Scrivener" Herman Melville

"I might give alms to his body; but his body did not pain him; it was his soul that suffered; and his soul I could not reach." -"Bartleby, The Scrivener"

"The reader never knows who Bartleby really is; his spirit and motives remain a mystery... "Bartleby, the Scrivener" is a story about the physical and mental degeneration of a man, an alienation of an individual from his own humanity." -Associated Content

In this story, there are two characters with whom we are to be concerned with. First, introductions are made to the unnamed narrator in this story, only being told that he is an "old man". The narrator introduces the reader then to the protagonist of the story as the only man that he believes a biography could not encompass, and at a loss to society that will never read it. At first Bartleby is presented as a peculiar , but reliably hard-working copy-writer. As the story goes on, Bartleby, when asked to perform tasks for his boss, he begins to decline by replying that he would prefer not to, much to the chagrin and shock to his coworkers, but most of all his boss. The Lawyer becomes frustrated at his lack of will to help out around the office. To make matters worse, Bartleby stops working altogether after his boss realizes that he indeed lives in the office and never leaves. He asks him to vacate the premises, even going as far as to offer money to his in excess of what he is owed. When he does not leave, The Lawyer decides to do a good deed and let him stay. It is only after Bartleby's presence starts to have a negative effect on business that it becomes too much altogether. The Lawyer relocates without Bartleby, but not without qualm. When Bartleby's presence becomes too much for the old building to take they send him to jail. Having been the last person wot have had a connection to the "vagrant" they call The Lawyer to the jail. Though he has become an unneeded part of of his life, The Lawyer still tries to take care of Bartleby by paying one of the keepers to feed him. Eating ends up being something that Bartleby prefers not to do, and subsequently dies of starvation on the jail grounds.

It is in Melville's "Bartleby, The Scrivener" that the reader meets on of the most peculiar and thought provoking character to come out of literature of this time period. I have a certain fondness for unexplainable actions, and the absurd, so this story hit me in all the right places. My affection for this story goes only as far as the character as Bartleby and his affect on The Lawyer, and having found the generality of the other characters, I did not understand Melville's need to provide such in depth examination of each of them. By far, the heart of this story is, not in the interactions of the two main characters, but rather of the reaction of one to the other. Seeing as Bartleby was exceptionally taciturn and steadfast in him actions, the joy of reading this famous short story is seeing from seeing inside the person who was affected most deeply by those actions that defined the protagonist.