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Bartleby the Scrivener by Herman Melville has been understood in various ways by critics and most are based on literatures principle which tells the reader to use their own imagination. Bartleby's vivid and desperate character is one of an insignificant person, with a psychological and philosophical meaning of human condition within it. Bartleby's physical characteristics are described as he being pale and forlorn quiet, motionless, steadiness, showing a person who is unbelievably submissive, quiet and pallid having no passion for life as well as hiding from society. It seems as if he were a dead man or just a man living totally isolated from humankind. All of these characteristics indicate abandonment from the human race as well as showing that segregation from society can imperil a persons well being. Bartleby's physical distinctiveness is in many ways comparable to those of Melville himself.
The story is about Bartleby and to a definite degree the author focuses on Bartleby's actions and words only as they relate to the narrator revealing how he thinks about, and the way he acts towards him. The narrator shows an image of Bartleby as if he were a dead man; a person completely inhibited from humanity and life itself and has no ordinary human characteristics or facial appearances. Thus, the portrayal of Bartleby is astounding. He is constantly portrayed as if he were a ghost or a dead man: Bartleby like a ghost pale form long-continued motionless loneliness (B. 120) sitting behind a dead brick wall absolute alone in the universe Melville wants the reader to get familiar with an image of a man who lacks any aspirations in life; quiet, sedate, motionless, inflexible, unmoving, passive. Bartleby imagines his individuality as a frightful subjugator reflecting over the ruins of civilization. Eventually society segregates a man who had already isolated himself.
Bartleby is clearly a depressed man, who finally sees no meaning to life and starves himself. Mordecai Marcus said: Bartleby is a psychological double for the storys nameless lawyer Thus, the lawyer seeks to find the simple ways in life and Bartleby does nothing with the intention to actually live his life. Bartleby's life makes the narrator question his will, endurance and incentives. Alexander Eliot stated that: Melville himself is in part Bartleby's prototype, drawing parallels between his situation as a writer after the failure of Pierre in 1852 and Bartleby's plight Eliot gives an idea that the connection between Bartleby's depression and Melville's state of mind are inseparable. The lawyer and Bartleby combine together in ways that create a whole, thus, becoming Melville himself. Both characters abide Melville's awful persona as well as fears.
The wall Bartleby sits behind is a significant character that shows the existing features of Melville and Bartleby symbolizing deficiency, isolation, and lack of motivation in life's significance. Bartleby existed as if in a prison and behind walls which he actually created for himself, (or the author created for him). In the dead letter office and in the lawyers office Bartleby was confined behind walls and ends up within the Tombs. The disturbing peculiarities of Bartleby as a character are interpreted as certain incongruity in terms of a psychological confusion of Melville at this time in his life. The editorial appendix of The Piazza Tales states: Since both preferred solitude, both were seen as most likely being mentally unbalanced, both are inclined toward suicide and both suffered eye trouble. Bartleby's association with the dead letters symbolized dying human connections within a society in comparison with Melville's unpopular manuscripts.
An example connecting the reader to understanding that Melville is really Bartleby. Thus, the author was establishing a person as if it were his own biography. Melville himself being secluded and rejected in the world of literature developed a character from his own sensation. A person sitting behind a dead brick wall absolute alone in the universe He is a character that is a melancholic scrivener, mechanical in his actions and did not want to face the world.
A person captured within an unfamiliar and dark world of his own. Bartleby's character appears to signify humaneness, yet does not have anything good to look forward to in life, self-deluded, has totally given up in life, having an incurable disorder of the soul rather than the body", Bartleby is presented as completely isolated from life and his physical characteristics foreshadow that a person giving up on him self and giving in to others nobody really cares about him so he should look out for himself. He is described as being a pallid individual motionless and pale as well as incurably forlorn unmoving, passive, stillness. He was already hopeless as a dead man from the beginning. Bartleby lived behind walls, in a prison, which he created for himself. The dead letter office provides a concluding restrictive perspective for the lawyers final statement.
The Tombs at the end of the story signify Bartleby's isolation from his subsistence as a human. Bartleby feels most comfortable here, I know where I am finding himself abnormally calm. Consequently, the final portrait shows that others will isolate a person who decides to isolate himself and one who gives up on him self, will cause others to give up on him. Bartleby, cynical and isolated by society, died by his own hand, because he had worn himself out by preferring not to" live.
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