A Bartleby Sort of Feeling

I don't know how many of you are acquainted with Herman Melville's "Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street" but I first read it in my junior year of high school. You can read it here.

A bit of a side-note, upon rereading it, some parts stick out. The narrator, for example, first describes himself and says, "All who know me consider me an eminently safe man. The late John Jacob Astor, a personage little given to poetic enthusiasm, had no hesitation in pronouncing my first grand point to be prudence; my next, method. I do not speak it in vanity, but simply record the fact, that I was not unemployed in my profession by the late John Jacob Astor; a name which, I admit, I love to repeat, for it hath a rounded and orbicular sound to it, and rings like unto bullion." These three sentences do not matter much to the rest of the story, except that they characterize the narrator. A safe man who lives a rather unexciting life. It could be argued Bartleby is the most exciting thing to happen to him.

The main subject of the piece, Bartleby, works as a scrivener--a clerk or scribe. All he does is copy documents for the narrator. When called upon to go over a piece of work with the narrator to confirm the copy, he says, "I would prefer not to." After Bartleby refuses to read the copies a few times the narrator says, "With any other man I should have flown outright into a dreadful passion, scorned all further words, and thrust him ignominiously from my presence. But here was something about Bartleby that not only strangely disarmed me, but in a wonderful manner touched and disconcerted me." Bartleby never says he will not do something, just that he would prefer not to: in response to the question "You will not?" he says, "I prefer not."

As the story progresses, the list of things Bartleby prefers not to do increases. Fetch the mail, fetch one of the other scriveners, help tie a package up, let the narrator into the office at one point. Eventually Bartleby prefers not to work. The narrator cannot rid himself nor the office of Bartleby and eventually moves offices entirely.

But Bartleby prefers not to leave the office, indeed "at present [he] would prefer not to make any change at all."

The landlord has Bartleby arrested and taken away as a vagrant and the narrator visits him. Bartleby turns down a dinner offer. A few days later, the narrator visits him again but this time Bartleby is dead. He preferred not to live, presumedly. The narrator concludes his tail with "Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity!"

A Bartleby sort of feeling is when you would simply prefer not to. When a choice presents itself--what to have for lunch, finding a new job, deciding what is next--your response is "I would prefer not to."  You know you should choose something or do something and you are not saying you will not do it, just that you would prefer not to. Some days are just Bartleby days.