I would prefer not to.

For the end of our alienation section, we read an epic short story written by the author of Moby Dick, Herman Melville. The title is Bartleby the Scrivener. I don't think you will look up what the story is about so here's the Wikipedia plot summary:


"The narrator, an elderly lawyer who has a very comfortable business helping wealthy men deal with mortgages, title deeds, and bonds, relates the story of the strangest man he has ever known.

The narrator already employs two scriveners, Nippers and Turkey. Nippers suffers from chronic indigestion, and Turkey is a drunk, but the office survives because in the mornings Turkey is sober even though Nippers is irritable, and in the afternoons Nippers has calmed down even though Turkey is drunk. Ginger Nut, the office boy, gets his name from the little cakes he brings the older men. Bartleby arrives in answer to an ad for another scrivener, and the narrator hires the forlorn-looking young man in hopes that his calmness will soothe the temperaments of the others.

One day, when asked by the narrator to help proofread a copied document, Bartleby answers with what soon becomes his stock response: "I would prefer not to." To the dismay of the narrator and to the irritation of the other employees, Bartleby performs fewer and fewer tasks around the office. The narrator makes several attempts to reason with him and to learn something about him, but Bartleby offers nothing but his signature "I would prefer not to." One weekend the narrator stops by the office unexpectedly and discovers that Bartleby has started living there. The loneliness of Bartleby's life impresses him: At night and on Sundays, Wall Street is as desolate as a ghost town. The narrator's feelings for Bartleby alternate between pity and revulsion.

For a while Bartleby remains willing to do his main work of scrivening, but eventually he "prefers not to" do this as well, so that finally he is doing nothing. And yet the narrator finds himself unable to make Bartleby leave; his unwillingness or inability to move against Bartleby mirrors Bartleby's own strange inaction. Tension gradually builds as the narrator's business associates wonder why the strange and idle Bartleby is ever-present in the office.

Sensing the threat of a ruined reputation, but emotionally unable to throw Bartleby out, the exasperated narrator finally decides to move out himself, relocating his entire business and leaving Bartleby behind. But soon the new tenants of the old space come to ask for his help: Bartleby still will not leave. Although they have thrown him out of the rooms, he continues to haunt the hallways. The narrator visits Bartleby and attempts to reason with him. Feeling desperate, the narrator now surprises even himself by inviting Bartleby to come and live with him at his own home. But Bartleby, alas, "prefers not to."

Deciding to stay away from work for the next few days for fear he will become embroiled in the new tenants' campaign to evict Bartleby, the narrator returns to find that Bartleby has been forcibly removed and imprisoned. The narrator visits him, finding him even glummer than usual. As ever, Bartleby rebuffs the narrator's friendliness. Nevertheless, the narrator bribes a turnkey to make sure Bartleby gets good and plentiful food. But when the narrator visits again a few days later, he discovers Bartleby newly dead. Bartleby, who had "preferred not to" eat, has starved.

Some time afterward, the narrator hears of a rumor to the effect that Bartleby had worked in a dead letter office, but had lost his job there. The narrator reflects that the dead letters would have made anyone of Bartleby's temperament sink into an even darker gloom. Dead letters are emblems of our mortality and of the failures of our best intentions. Through Bartleby, the narrator has glimpsed the world as the miserable scrivener must have seen it. The closing
words of the story are the narrator's resigned and pained sigh: "Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!"

This was a very funny story, I couldn't help but laugh out loud as I was reading. The main character, Bartleby, seemed so serious about not wanting to do anything that it seemed unrealistic that something like this can happen in real life. The content itself was nothing to be laughed about, alienation is no laughing matter, I assure you. It was the way the story was told, the way the narrator spoke that made the story comical. When asked if Bartleby would go to the post office, he replied, "I would prefer not to." When asked if he could behave reasonably, "I would prefer not to behave reasonably," said he. In fact, this was his reply to everything, including food. Little by little, Bartleby walls himself from life and thus dies. What can I take away from this story? Aside from the laughs, a more serious lesson is to be learned. However, I can't quite put it in words so I'll leave it up to your imagination.


What is our next topic? Love and its counterfeits.