His attempts to get Bartleby to go are fruitless. But his business associates begin to wonder at Bartleby's presence at the office, since he does no work, and the threat of a ruined reputation forces the narrator to do something. The scrivener has a strange power over his employer, and the narrator feels he cannot do anything to harm this forlorn man.
And yet the narrator cannot get him to leave. He alternates between pity and revulsion for Bartleby's bizarre behavior.īartleby continues to refuse duties, until finally he is doing no work at all. The loneliness of Bartleby's life strikes the narrator: at night and on Sundays, Wall Street is as desolate as a ghost town. The narrator makes several attempts to reason with Bartleby and learn about him, but Bartleby always responds the same way when asked to do a task or give out information about himself: "I would prefer not to." One weekend, when the narrator stops in at the office, he discovers that Bartleby is living at the office. To the dismay of the narrator and the irritation of the other employees, Bartleby takes part in fewer and fewer duties around the office. One day, when Bartleby is asked to help proofread one of the documents he copied, he answers simply, "I would prefer not to." It is the first of many refusals. Bartleby comes in answer to ad, and the narrator hires the forlorn looking young man in hopes that his calmness will soothe the temperaments of the other scriveners. Ginger Nut, the office boy, gets his name from the little cakes he brings the men. Nippers suffers from indigestion, and Turkey is a drunk, but the office survives because in the mornings Turkey is sober even though Nippers is irritable, and in the afternoon Nippers has calmed down even though Turkey is drunk. The narrator already employs two scriveners, Nippers and Turkey. Bartleby is a new addition to the narrator's staff. The narrator, an elderly lawyer who does a comfortable business helping wealthy men deal with mortgages, title deeds, and bonds, relates the story of the strangest man he has ever known.
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