Bartleby The Scrivener Literary Analysis

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To easily navigate the ups and downs of life is to fully understand the nature of man, impossible. It can be even more difficult to be certain of human nature when it is constantly influenced and molded by society. In Bartleby, The Scrivener, Herman Melville proves that society can be destructive to human nature through the use of motifs, allegory, and characterization. Melville has not overlooked society’s share of accountability for the writer’s fate. There is a sense in which Bartleby’s state of consciousness may be interpreted as a reaction to the antagonistic world of Wall Street (Marx 41). The reoccurring concepts in Bartleby provide the reader with the idea that society is an “unobstructed [] brick wall” that is inevitably viewed…show more content…
Melville conveys that not only does society influence people to revel in meaningless things, but to offer disingenuous help to appear less superficial. With the action of giving Turkey a “highly-respectable coat”, the narrator establishes the sense of duty he feels to provide his employees in a way he thinks they would “appreciate the favor” (Melville 3). Similarly, the narrator provides Ginger Nut with a job “at the rate of one dollar a week” and “ a little desk to himself” so that the youngest employee can be seen “on the bench instead of a cart” (Melville 4). Though not as apparent, the narrator offers a position to this boy in need to fulfill a need of his own, disregarding the idea of doing something altruistic out of the goodness of his heart. The reoccurrence of charity within Bartleby, the Scrivener goes hand-in-hand with Melville’s explanation of how society is a hindrance on human nature through the deeper meaning of the narrator’s thoughts towards Bartleby. The narrator can easily see that “it was [Bartleby’s] soul that suffered, and his soul that [he] could not reach” (Melville 11). While it briefly seems like the Lawyer cares, the idea is that the narrator could not reach Bartleby’s soul, because he would not. What benefit did it have for him, after all? Instead, the Lawyer “[could] cheaply purchase a delicious self approval” by conveniently attempting to befriend Bartleby (Melville 7). The malevolence in the world, and irreversible misery, which good cannot touch mirrors the anguished soul of Bartleby that will go untouched by his ‘friend’, the narrator (Fogle 27). Furthermore, Melville presents these concepts with the characterization of the narrator as well because the character proposes Melville’s interpretation of society’s destructive influence on human nature. The narrator self righteously claims that he
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