“Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street” is a story of American literature classic Herman Melville, first published in 1853 in Putnam’s Magazine. The work’s plot revolves around a modest employee named Bartleby who, initially performing his work assiduously, begins resisting any changes and refuses to do any tasks in his professional and personal life. The problem of rebellious nature and interaction between the narrator, an elderly lawyer, and Bartleby takes the central place in the story. This paper aims to provide reflection on how this piece of literature can be used to convey core Christian ideas.
Under a superficial glance, it seems that the novel only narrates the tragic life of an individual who gradually starts to slide into a deep depression or acquire some mental disorder such as schizophrenia. The main character Bartleby becomes inactive, reserved, and difficult, giving a single answer to all requests: “I would prefer not to.” He totally stops performing his daily duties and caring for himself, thereby manifesting a specific protest against society. Even when the lawyer tries to encourage Bartleby to work, he resolutely refuses, without the clarification of his passivity.
However, if the readers dive deeper into the work, they reveal that Melville’s central ptoblem implicitly concerns human indifference. In particular, the narration was written in the period marked as the dawn of Capitalism that ultimately changed attitude toward people. Under this concept, persons have become perceived as instruments in the productive working system, not as the supreme creation of God, with his or her talents, soul, and uniqueness. Despite the narrator’s sympathy for Bartleby and efforts to incentivize him, he is not interested in Bartleby’s life and problems. The lawyer does not attempt to investigate the reasons for the scrivener’s depression and seclusion. The narrator only leaves him on his own and even moves to another office because the weird man thwarts his business by his presence. Eventually, although Bartleby does commit nothing criminal, he is placed in prison. In Scripture, Jesus especially condemns coldness and indifference to other people, indicating that without sacrificial love, even insignificant, individuals cannot be genuinely happy.