Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener: themes and motifs in exploration

Bartleby the Scrivener

Since the publication of Herman Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener" literary critics have written countless papers examining various themes and motifs that they determine are present in the text. There is obviously the theme of the monetary and the lower or working classes vs. The middle and upper. Also there is the question of who is in charge, employer or employee. What is most interesting is the question of responsibility. What do employees owe their employers and what do those employers owe them in return? Moreover, what do human beings owe one another when they are no longer useful to society? In this particular case, what does Bartleby the Scrivener owe to his boss and what does he then owe to Bartleby whence the young man begins to lose touch with reality?

When the reader is first introduced to Bartleby, he seems an incomparably hard worker and a real asset to his employer, whose other two employees are drunk half of the day. The only problem that the employer seems to have with Bartleby is his demeanor. "I should have been quite delighted with is application, had he been cheerfully industrious. But he wrote on silently, palely, mechanically" (Melville 2335). He works fastidiously and almost single-mindedly. It seems that he is the nearly perfect employee. This is how the system is supposed to work. A man is paid a wage and in exchange for those funds, he is required to perform duties assigned him by the man who is paying him.

However, a scrivener is expected to have certain duties besides the copying of documents. On one such occasion, Bartleby's employer asked him to look over a small sheet of paper to verify its accuracy. The employer "in [his] hate and natural expectancy of instant compliance" had no reason to think anything would happen but the task would be completed (2335). Indeed, as a man being paid to perform a task, there would be absolutely no cause to think anything other than the task would be performed, particularly such a minor one. Instead, Bartleby simple stated "I would prefer not to" (2336). This is the beginning of a series of events where Bartleby shirks the responsibilities for which he is being paid. His preference, as he refers to it, determines his actions rather than what is owed his employers.

This is but the first infraction. The second comes when the employer learns that not only is Bartleby preferring not to review his work, but that he has been sleeping in the man's offices. What more, he refused to let his employer into the office on a Sunday morning. "The apparition of Bartley appeared, in his shirt sleeves, and otherwise in a strangely tattered dishabille, saying quietly that he was sorry, but he was deeply engaged just then, and -- preferred not admitting me at present" (2340). Here the balance of power in the relationship has shifted entirely. Now Bartleby is being paid wages, part of which is designed to go to living expenses but, since he is living in his employer's building, he has few such expenses.

Rather than turning his back on his ersatz scrivener, the employer feels warmth and sympathy towards his fellow man. "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" (2342). Melville here argues for a deeper loyalty to our fellow men than employer and employee. When Bartleby no longer fulfills his duties as a worker, rather than throw him out upon his ear, the narrator does what he can to assist him. Our duty then, it could be argued is to humanity rather than to the particular humans we work for, even if those particular persons have done wrong by us.

Unfortunately, this charity does not go well by the other two men in the man's employ. It is a fair question. Why should one man have the ability to prefer not to do certain portions of his job without a valid excuse for such a refusal. Does preferring not to do something entitle a man not to do it if it is part of his job? This becomes even worse when Bartelby decides that he will do no more work. Still the employer feels a need to show charity, even though his other employees feel anger that they are doing they are now not only doing their own work, but being forced to pick up the slack left by the other scrivener. Here the question arises: what is owed to one's fellow man at the expense of your fellow men? "What shall I do? What ought I to do? What does conscience say I should do with this man, or rather ghost" (2349). Is one's duty to fellow man limited to his duty towards ourselves? The employer feels no responsibility to this man who is now doing no good by him.