| Characters/Themes Explanations | The lawyer the protagonist and narrator of the story | Turkey an old scrivener who is the same general age as the lawyer, 60 | Nippers an ambitious scrivener with a fiery personality. | Ginger-nut a 12-year-old assistant who fetches cakes for Turkey and Nippers |
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What kind of person is the narrator in Bartleby the Scrivener?
The narrator of “Bartleby the Scrivener” is
the Lawyer
, who runs a law practice on Wall Street in New York.
Is the narrator of Bartleby a selfish or an unselfish man?
The narrator of Bartleby
is not a selfish man
. Instead, he was the type of man who tried to do everything for someone who was in need. He tried his best to be there for one of his workers when he knew he was not well.
How is the narrator in Bartleby unreliable?
As a narrator,
the lawyer is unreliable because the reader cannot always trust his interpretation of events
. The lawyer, as he himself admits, is a man of “assumptions,” and his prejudices often prevent him from offering an accurate view of the situation.
What POV is Bartleby the Scrivener?
Herman Melville uses
a first person point of view
to show the narrator's first hand fascination with his employee Bartleby, as well as Bartleby's strange behavior and insubordination. The lawyer hires Bartleby as his scrivener. He is awestruck because Bartleby is so quick and efficient.
What does Bartleby symbolize?
Characterized as a
symbolic fable of self-isolation and passive resistance to routine
, “Bartleby, the Scrivener” reveals the decremental extinction of a human spirit.
What type of character is Bartleby?
Bartleby. Bartleby is a young man hired by the Lawyer to serve as
a scrivener, or law- copyist
.
Who is the protagonist in Bartleby the Scrivener explain your answer?
The Lawyer
: The narrator of the story is a gray-haired Wall Street lawyer. He is the protagonist of the story because the plot is driven by his problem and goal.
Is the narrator responsible for Bartleby?
Bartleby is like
a dead part of the narrator
, and he is haunting the narrator's office, until he is finally put into the Tombs and laid to final rest.
What do the walls symbolize in Bartleby?
Walls repeatedly symbolize
Bartleby's walled-in existence
, representing his lack of anything in life to look forward to. Not only do they reflect his despairing mental state, they reinforce it. In many ways, the worst place Bartleby could have ended up, in terms of space and architecture, was the lawyer's offices.
What does the narrator represent in Bartleby?
Foremost among them is
his capacity for sympathy
; the Narrator remains rather oddly sympathetic to the enigmatic and frustrating Bartleby throughout the story. He also has a profound sense of personal responsibility, which drives him to keep checking in on Bartleby.
What is the setting of Bartleby the Scrivener?
By Herman Melville
Melville first published “Bartleby the Scrivener” in
New York
in 1853, when the young metropolis was already a booming center of commerce. The story takes place in a law office populated by a set of odd men, whose relationships with each other seem to be purely professional in nature.
What is the plot of Bartleby the Scrivener?
A successful lawyer on Wall Street hires Bartleby, a scrivener,
to relieve the load of work experienced by his law firm
. For two days, Bartleby executes his job with skill and gains the owner's confidence for his diligence.
What was wrong with Bartleby?
We are led to believe (though the lawyer stresses that he doesn't know with certainty) that Bartleby
suffers from despair
. He starts off in his job as a hard worker who impresses his new boss, the lawyer. … In the end, the lawyer finds Bartleby in the appropriately-named Tombs, a prison, where he refuses to eat and dies.
Why does Bartleby go to jail?
The Lawyer says he has nothing to do with Bartleby, so the other lawyer says he'll take care of him. … Bartleby is
arrested as a vagrant and thrown in jail
. The Lawyer visits him, but Bartleby refuses to speak to him. The Lawyer arranges for Bartleby to be fed good food in jail, but Bartleby refuses to eat.
Why did Bartleby refuse work?
He has no life outside work – he doesn't even seem to have a home outside work. However,
he must have realized how pointless the work is
; just like the time put into those dead letters had become pointless. And so, he starts to refuse to do things. Bartleby has found work to be insignificant.
