文/陈 梦
【Abstract】In American writer Herman Melville`s work Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street, the character of Bartleby can be read in a variety of ways. In this essay, the writer attempts to interpret this elusive figure in terms of existence and confusion of human beings in modern society.
【Key Words】Bartleby；The Scrivener； A Story of Wall Street; existence
Bartleby, The Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street is a novella by American author Herman Melville (1819-1891). The story first appeared, anonymously, in Putnam′s Magazine in two parts. It is narrated by a well-established lawyer on Wall Street who recently hires a copyist named Bartleby. According to his words, Bartleby is quite abnormal after being with him, compared with other two workers, Turkey and Nippers. With his slogan of “I would prefer not” , Bartley after several days′ high quality work begins to perform fewer tasks and even live there later. Although trying to reason with Bartleby, the narrator at last has to give up the office to get rid of this weirdo. The story ends with the lawyer′s hearing of Bartley′s death of starvation and his prior work experience of being a dead letter office.
After the first reading, readers may all could not resist to ask who is this Bartleby? And what does he represent exactly? Baffled by the character′s behavior, many critics tend to ignore his symbolic implication and in favor of looking at him in the context of Melville′s own life. However, by taking a slim consideration of current state of human life, Bartleby here can be deemed as an accusation to our modern alienated society, or even modern civilization. According to the normal standards, with no home, friends, sleep or work, even refusing to eat at last, Bartley is a total freak. But actually he is just someone with autism who asks no more than a place to stay and think. Unfortunately, in modern world, there is no place in this sense as wherever he stands, people will judge if it is right and proper. According to Jean-Paul Sartre, we are no longer master of our own situation any longer in that others are always capable of organizing the world which is different from ours. Therefore, compromising to others seems like the only way out with the payment of our own specialty and potentiality. Sartre′s famous “Others are hell” is the best portrayal of this situation which means the so-called independence is inexistent and modern men are reshaped and segmented by goods, works and others and instead of being entities, they are just parted symbols.
At the end of the story, we are told that Bartleby once worked for dead letter office. The narrator wonders if such a miserable job—burning letters that have been sent to people that have died in the meantime or who have vanished—were what caused Bartleby′s depression and self-destruction. To some extent, dead letters here reflect our pure material world. After one′s death, no matter how colorful and fascinating his material life is, it has to be burnt into ashes. This is also Melville′s caution to this alienated society as if human′s existence is only determined by goods, works, standards and others, then they will have nothing left after their death. Bartleby after the desperate job may gains an insight of this sphinxlike existential puzzle and hence become depressed and blue.
Aside from the narrator and Bartleby, Melville also gains his story an allegorical sense by taking use of minor characters, Turkey and Nippers. Both nicknames are well fit of their characters as Turkey has a turkey′s neck and Nippers is always ill-tempered and "nippy" in the morning. By refusing to give them real names, Melville emphasizes the fact that these figures′ existence can easily be defined by their function, behavior or appearance—each is just another nameless worker without any specialty and significance. In fact, this is another irony as characters like Turkey and Nipper are quite abnormal and disordered, but most of us can accept them easily. But to Bartleby, the only character with a real name in this whole story who is quiet and gentle, we believe he must be a disturbing psycho.
【References】
[1]Melville Herman. Bartley, the Scrivener: A story of Wall Street[C]//Wilfred Stone, Nancy Huddleston Packer, Robert Hoopes. The Short Story. Boston: McCraw-Hill, 1983.
[2]Raymond, Diane. Existentialism and the Philosophical Tradition. London: Evans Brothers, 1983.
（作者单位：海南大学）