- The story is also sometimes called "Bartleby the Scrivener," and sometimes, "Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street."
- It's one of the most famous, most critically acclaimed stories in all of American literature. So, you know, no pressure.
- The narrator is a somewhat elderly lawyer.
- He says he's going to tell y'all about the weirdest, most bizarre scrivener (law copier) of all time, named Bartleby.
- Like the title of the story. By coincidence.
- Anyway, the narrator tells you that he likes to take things easy, so he works as a non-trial lawyer with mortgages and such.
- He has chambers on Wall Street, in a boring office that looks out on a wall.
- Before Bartleby showed up, the narrator had two copyists; Turkey, Nippers, and an office-boy named Ginger Nut.
- Turkey is around 60; he's a good worker in the morning, but in the afternoon his face gets ruddy and he becomes over-energetic and careless.
- The suggestion is that Turkey has too much to drink at lunch.
- He tries to get Turkey to take afternoons off, but he won't.
- The narrator's utter failure to discipline his office staff comes back to haunt him later. Foreshadowing.
- Nippers is an often irritated, ambitious man, who has debts.
- However, he works hard, and dresses well, as opposed to Turkey, who is a mess.
- Nippers' bad temper is caused by indigestion, and he's worse in the morning and usually better in the afternoon, as opposed to Turkey, who is the reverse.
- Ginger Nut is 12; his father is a carman and hopes that Ginger Nut will advance.
- Ginger Nut fetches things in the office, including snacks for Turkey and Nippers.
- So, characters all introduced…on to the plot!
- The plot is just about entirely composed of nothing happening, by the by (similar to "The Piazza"—though this is a more interesting nothing.)
- Anyway, the narrator has too much work, so he needs to hire someone.
- And he hires Bartleby—pallid, pitiable Bartleby.
- Bartleby does a ton of work at first. Go, Bartleby, go. (It won't last.)
- Even at the beginning, though, Bartleby writes so silently and morosely that the narrator is a little put out. (That's the way with bosses; they don't just want you to do work, they want you to work happily.)
- Law copyists need to double check the copies against the original on occasion. This, the narrator says, is kind of boring.
- So the narrator asks Barlteby to help with comparing the copies.
- Bartleby says "I would prefer not to."
- The narrator is thunderstruck, but is too much in a hurry to confront Bartleby about it right away, so gets Nippers to copy the paper.
- A few days later they need to examine four copies of a single document. The narrator calls in Turkey and Nippers and Bartleby.
- But again, Bartleby says he would prefer not to do the checking.
- The narrator appeals to Turkey and Nippers to see if Bartleby is acting badly. They agree he is.
- But the narrator is again hurried by business, and is generally ineffectual, so they do the checking without Bartleby again.
- The narrator over time notices that Bartleby doesn't really seem to eat anything except the occasional ginger nut.
- The narrator feels pity for Bartleby, and decides to try to indulge him, since he's useful even if he won't check copied pages.
- But later he asks Bartleby to run an errand, and he prefers not to do that either.
- The narrator is mad…but then he decides he'll just go to dinner.
- Bartleby and the narrator are both indisposed to action of any sort.
- So Bartleby stays on. Then one day the narrator goes to his offices on Sunday, and finds the door locked.
- Bartleby is living there.
- The narrator is afflicted with melancholy at the thought of Bartleby in the office all alone.
- But that doesn't stop him from rifling through Bartleby's desk, and finding a bandanna with some money, Bartleby's savings.
- The next day the narrator tries to get Bartleby to tell him where Bartleby was born, or anything about himself. He won't though.
- The narrator notices that he himself, and others in the office, are using the word "prefer" in all sorts of situations. He finds this irritating and ominous.
- And after a bit Bartleby stops copying. He just stands in the office.
- The narrator thinks that maybe Bartleby's eyes are strained, though Bartleby doesn't really explain anything.
- He has given up copying he says.
- The narrator is as ineffectual as ever. He is sorry for Bartleby, and doesn't know what to do with him, so Bartleby just stays there, doing no work, taking up space.
- Eventually the narrator pays Bartleby off, and tells him to leave.
- The narrator leaves the office, feeling that he's finally triumphed, and gotten Bartleby to go.
- But has he?
- Spoiler Alert: No.
- The narrator gets back to the office, and Bartleby is still there.
- He argues with Bartleby again. He might as well argue with a blank thing that says "I prefer not to."
- But the narrator's still not willing to throw him out, either because of compassion or general ineffectualness, it's not clear.
- So Bartleby stays around doing nothing, just hanging out.
- And he would have just left him there, but various professional acquaintances of the narratornotice that Bartleby is there, and they get cranky about it.
- So…the narrator decides to abandon the offices to Bartleby, and move himself elsewhere.
- He does so, and then the person who rents the offices from him comes to him and says, what on earth is this Bartleby person doing in my new offices?
- The narrator says, hey, he's not my problem.
- But the new guy is more energetic, and tosses Barlteby out.
- But…the narrator learns a little later that Bartleby is now haunting the landing and the stairs and upsetting the people in the building.
- The narrator is prevailed on to go and try to get Bartleby to move.
- He asks him if he'd like to work as a clerk, or go to Europe, or come with the narrator to his house.
- Shocker: it doesn't work.
- So the narrator runs away.
- He finds out a few days later that Bartleby has finally been carted off by the police.
- The narrator goes to visit Bartleby in prison; Bartleby won't speak to him, and won't eat either.
- The narrator pays the grub man in prison to feed Bartleby. It doesn't seem to do much good.
- When the narrator comes back a few days later, the grub man says Bartleby won't eat.
- Bartleby seems to be sleeping—but in fact he's dead.
- The narrator says he's found nothing more about Bartleby, except that he may have been a clerk in the Dead Letter office of the post office.
- That's where undeliverable letters go.
- The narrator says that this job may have led Bartleby to be melancholy.
- He finished by expressing sympathy for Bartleby and all humanity.
- Like most of what the narrator does, this doesn't do anyone much good.