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Bartleby, an Innovator

In the story “Bartleby, the Scrivener,” by Herman Melville, Bartleby is the hero of Melville’s story in his refusal to participate in a workplace that represents the sad, dreary atmosphere of a bureaucratic, industrialized society. He is the only one standing up to a society that is increasingly oppressive to workers.

The other “scriveners” had their own peculiarities. “Turkey” was an older man of short stature and was very productive of a morning, but once he had dined at noon he became insolent and quick to speak out of turn. “Nippers” was a young man around twenty-five years of age and was quite the opposite of “Turkey” in that he was more productive and less challenging after his noon dining. The last was not a scrivener, but an assistant, running errands, assisting and cleaning, this was “Ginger Nut” who had a habit of collecting the shells of various different nuts. As such the narrator was well adept at dealing with the peculiarities of his employees, but Bartleby was a man of confusion to the narrator, as he was even more unusual and different than those already working for the narrator.

When Bartleby first started working as a scrivener for the narrator he was productive and good at his work, but he refused to examine the copies that he had done stating that “I would prefer not to.” (Melville) This shows a certain amount of rebellion in the character. The examining of the copies was standard procedure for a scrivener as to make sure that the copies were exact to the original, but Bartleby refused without giving an explanation as to why. The narrator confers the other scriveners and the assistant that are there also to assist in the examining of the copies, each has their own opinion on Bartleby’s stand, but all believe this to be very unusual. Instead of continuing the confrontation, the narrator chooses to examine the documents without Bartleby and think later on how to handle this unusual turn of events. As an employer, the narrator has every right to dismiss Bartleby immediately for his refusal to do part of his job, but instead he waits for the next time he needs to examine papers and ask Bartleby again to assist. Once again Bartleby refuses, to the narrator’s consternation.

At this point one must analyze what is happening. Why is Bartleby refusing to do part of his job? The view could be held that Bartleby is refusing to verify his copies as he knows them to be exact, or that his refusal is based on the character not wanting to work with others, or that he is refusing based on his opinion that this is not part of his employment. What strikes me is the refusal is based in the fact that Bartleby does not hold the opinion that examining the copies is part of his employment, that he was hired to copy and only copy. So why does he not say as much?  This could be Bartleby’s way of fighting against the expectations on workers in a society that takes the workers for granted.

Eventually Bartleby refused to even do his copying but also refused to leave the premises. The narrator later thought that the reason for Bartleby’s refusal was due to his eyes being tired and needing to “recover.” After trying to get Bartleby to copy, examine the papers or to run an errand with his continued refusal, the narrator paid Bartleby what he was owed and giving him an extra twenty dollars and saying good-bye. The narrator returned to his office the next day and found Bartleby to still be there. Bartleby would not “quit” him, the narrator, but would not copy or anything else; he just stood there staring out the window. With these new refusals of Bartleby’s we must again examine why. What was Bartleby’s purpose of staying but not doing any work? These actions could be viewed as continued fight against the expectations of workers in the society in which he lived.

Eventually the narrator decided that since Bartleby would not “quit” him, he would “quit” Bartleby and move his office, but Bartleby still did not leave the premises and the next tenant of the office eventually did end up having Bartleby removed as a vagrant and he was placed in the prison. Here the narrator visited Bartleby and tried to look after him by making sure he was well fed, but Bartleby did not eat and ended up dying in prison.

Looking at this story and the steps and stages of Bartleby the scrivener we can draw many conclusions. The view expressed throughout the breakdown of the story is that Bartleby fought against society’s expectations of workers in the only way he had control of. He refused to do certain parts of his job and eventually refused all parts, but still remained on the premises. Bartleby was a character that went against the standards set for low level employees in his time. His actions show a certain disregard for the rules he was expected to live and work by. In his refusal to do part of or his entire job he was standing for his rights as a person and we can assume that his actions could encourage others to go against the general expectations that are put on them as well.

Bartleby could be viewed as an example for the future workers to fight the society’s expectations of workers and demand rights for themselves. With this view in mind, Bartleby is an innovator in his time. He refused to do anything but what he was hired for and in turn caused his employers expectations of him to lower to a level that only entailed that of his title, “scrivener.” When these expectations by the narrator lowered, Bartleby took things a step further by refusing to do what he was hired for, but also refusing to leave. By doing this the narrator eventually accepted that he was “meant” to allow Bartleby to remain without working, until after time, other people caused the narrator pause and to view him in a different light. Though the narrator moved office, he still felt a certain responsibility toward Bartleby and tried to help him, showing that Bartleby made an impression on the narrator in his refusals.

Bartleby’s actions show that he is the only one standing up to a society that is increasingly oppressive to workers and that thought his actions may have been a little unorthodox, he did, in fact, achieve what he wanted to. He made his employer feel that his expectation of the workers was too much and that he should care about his employees and not just the work they did.