A Literary Analysis of Bartleby, the Scrivener by

Herman Melville

Society has set a standard in which a person must do something useful to be something good. So, what
would the solution be when someone separates from society? Society s answer would either be to try and
make that person do something or force that person to leave society permanently. The reason society feels
this way is because society is unwilling to see any other view aside from their own, and when that view is
challenged the only choice one has is to entirely reject society and be ready to face the consequences.

In Bartleby, the Scrivener by Herman Melville, the narrator has a most unusual incident with an employee
he hires as a law copyist. Bartleby started out being a very productive worker, but soon after he decided to
quit everything and disconnect himself from the outside world. Through the use of an office setting,
dialogue, and symbolism, the author is able to prove that detaching from society is dangerous, not only
for that person but also on society. Unvoiced communication jeopardizes interpersonal relations to the
degree of devaluing the individual and dehumanizing relationships.

The Wall Street office setting places Bartleby in a picture perfect environment where he can shut himself
out of society. In the opening scene, the narrator hires Bartleby as a scrivener and makes him a workplace
in the office. “I placed his desk close up to a small side window within three feet of the panes was a wall I
procured a high green folding screen, which might entirely isolate Bartleb”.

The narrator, like any other employer, is trying to give Bartleby some privacy, but the privacy actually
minimizes Bartleby s interactions with others too much. Bartleby s window should give a form of escape,
but in Bartleby s case the window forces him behind another wall, thus furthering his isolation. The
narrator illustrates Bartleby s isolation, “he would stand looking out, at his pale window behind the
screen, upon the dead brick wall”.

In “Bartleby the Scrivener” the narrator describes Bartleby as living in his own solitary world,
separate from society. The narrator says, “Meanwhile Bartleby sat in his hermitage, oblivious to
everything but his own particular business there”. The narrator automatically assumes that this causes
Bartleby much sadness to be so alone. The narrator assumes that Bartleby is suffering from his lack of
human interaction rather than just a man who wishes to keep to himself, saying “And here Bartleby makes
his home, sole spectator of a solitude which he has seen all populous – a sort of innocent and transformed
Marius brooding among the ruins of Carthage!”. This is also an example of how solitary characters are
often displayed as fairytale-like or as famous historical figures to explain their way of living.

Bartleby starts becoming a nuisance for the narrator when he stops doing his work. The narrator
refuses to deal with Bartleby’s insubordination because he does not know how to deal with Bartleby’s
passive-aggressive behavior and begins to pity him. Bartleby refuses to do work by calmly stating he
would prefer not to do it. The narrator comments that, “Had there been the least uneasiness, anger,
impatience or impertinence in his manner; in other words, had there been anything ordinarily human
about him, doubtless I should have violently dismissed him from the premises. But as it was I should have
as soon thought of turning my pale plaster-of-Paris bust of Cicero out of doors”. Again, we see Bartleby
being describes as something inhuman because of his lack of connection to his job and fellow workers.

The narrator gets so unnerved by Bartleby’s behavior that he, unsuccessfully, tries to tell Bartleby
to leave the office and find somewhere else to work. Again, Bartleby comes back with the reply that he
would prefer not to and stays awkwardly in the building. The narrator states, “Nothing so aggravates an
earnest person as a passive resistance… the passiveness of Bartleby sometimes irritated me. I felt
strangely goaded on to encounter him in new opposition- to elicit some angry spark from him answerable
to my own”. The narrator seems to believe Bartleby’s behavior is unnatural and disagreeable because
humans do more than retreat into silence to avoid what they do not wish to do.

Physical environments seem to hold a significant effect on Melville characters and their views and
behaviors. This is seen in “Bartleby” when the narrator finally attributes Bartleby’s demeanor to his
previous job, “Dead letters! Does it not sound like dead men? Conceive a man by nature and misfortune
prone to a pallid hopelessness, can any business seem more fitted to heighten it than that of continually
handling these dead letters, and assorting them for the flames?”. Here the narrator is attributing
Bartleby’s lack of purpose to the fact that Bartleby spent so much time disposing of purposeless and
unclaimed letters and so sought to destroy himself. The narrator himself resorts to physical escapism to
avoid Bartleby. He can only escape him by physically moving his legal practice to another building and
leaving Bartleby to stand alone in an empty room. This eventually leaves Bartleby to be sent to prison
where he continues to do nothing, including eating, and literally escapes the world by dying.

Similar themes of escapism can be seen in Melville’s short story “The Piazza.” The main character
moves to a new home in the mountain and describes his surroundings as being a fairytale-like setting. The
narrator gives the hill to the north the historical name of Charlemagne and poetically describes all manner
of foliage and weather. After building his much-desired piazza the narrator notices a cottage nestled in a
facing hill saying, “Fairies there, thought I; some haunted ring where fairies dance” (Melville, 130). The
narrator creates his own reality in his mind. He convinces himself that is couldn’t just be a simple cottage;
it has to be some sort of magical palace where fairies roam. The narrator lives alone and creates these
elaborate fantasies in order to deal with the isolation. He creates vast journeys in his mind and remains
inactive on his piazza until one day he finally sets out to discover who lives in the cottage saying, “Fairies
there, thought I, once more; the queen of fairies at her fairy-window; at any rate, some glad mountain-girl;
it will do me good, it will cure this weariness, to look on her. No more; I'll launch my yawl--ho, cheerly,
heart! and push away for fairyland, for rainbow's end, in fairyland” (Melville, 131). The narrator decides
to escape his loneliness by seeking the company of this unknown, magical fairy queen. Once he arrives at
the cottage, he meets Marianna:

Pausing at the threshold, or rather where threshold once had been, I saw, through the open door-
way, a lonely girl, sewing at a lonely window. A pale-cheeked girl, and fly-specked window, with wasps
about the mended upper panes. I spoke. She shyly started, like some Tahiti girl, secreted for a sacrifice,
first catching sight, through palms, of Captain Cook. Recovering, she bade me enter; with her apron
brushed off a stool; then silently resumed her own. With thanks I took the stool; but now, for a space, I,
too, was mute. This, then, is the fairy-mountain house, and here, the fairy queen sitting at her fairy-
window. (Melville, 135). Again we see the idea that characters are not what they seem but rather have
some fantastical identity. The narrator sees this tattered girl as both a fairy queen and a Tahiti girl.

The narrator and Marianna begin talking and he discovers that she too has been suffering from her
loneliness and has been viewing his own house as a magical place, “I looked; and after a time, to my
surprise, recognized, more by its position than its aspect, or Marianna's description, my own abode,
glimmering much like this mountain one from the piazza. The mirage haze made it appear less a farm-
house than King Charming's palace” (Melville, 136). Both the narrator and Marianna use their minds to
escape by imagining the far-off magical place within view of their own lonely homes. Marianna knows
nothing about the house or who lives there but has imagined it to be a happy place whereas her home is
not. She states, “’Rich or not, I never thought; but it looks so happy, I can't tell how; and it is so far away.
Sometimes I think I do but dream it is there. You should see it in a sunset.’” (Melville, 136). This shows
the power of the mind by stating that the manner of the owner’s lifestyle and even the existence of the
house itself could merely be a figment of her imagination because she escapes through daydreaming very
often.

The narrator physically escapes the situation and heads home where he plans to live in his own
head once more but finds that he can no longer do so when he knows the truth. “Bartleby” show how the
character’s thoughts can influence their lives and how they often drift toward the fantastical to escape the
normalcy of daily life. The settings of the story often coincide with emotions and thoughts of the
characters and lead to both a mental and a physical means of escaping in order to make any kind of
desired change to the circumstances.