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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
funny
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
i would prefer not to
4/5stars
Yo I relate to bartleby on a spiritual level. As a person whose always gone above and beyond my work description or level and has gotten jack shit for it - I fucking FEEL HIM for just giving up and only doing what his job was, and then even less. We should all be like bartleby
Yo I relate to bartleby on a spiritual level. As a person whose always gone above and beyond my work description or level and has gotten jack shit for it - I fucking FEEL HIM for just giving up and only doing what his job was, and then even less. We should all be like bartleby
...happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay; but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none. (15)
I see a blurred silhouette. A person is sitting at the table. He is writing. He is not looking up. Nobody could have ever seen his face. It's been hours and he doesn't get up. A man, a chair, a table and a million papers. The spitting image of desolation. Does he have any life outside that place? Probably not.
I hope he does.
I read about this particular theme concerning jobs that drain the life out of people, before. I am talking about Benedetti's [b:Poemas de la oficina / Poemas del hoyporhoy|2577711|Poemas de la oficina / Poemas del hoyporhoy|Mario Benedetti|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1360145667l/2577711._SY75_.jpg|2591390], a collection of masterfully written poems that I highly recommend. I wrote some little notes in the form of a "review" so, I really don't have anything more to add.
This is a new side of Melville for me. I am not proud of my experience with [b:Moby Dick|2413|Moby Dick|Herman Melville|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1161044426l/2413._SY75_.jpg|2409320]. At the same time, I am not sure if I will ever come back to that book. Perhaps, I should. Because the writing I found in this short story captivated me. Maybe it is because I could also relate to the story. The kind of story at which good-natured gentlemen might smile, and sentimental souls might weep. I see people writing and reading and filing old papers, new papers, somebody else's papers. Same rhythm, same tired-looking eyes, same purpose in life: to survive. It has been said that happiness is not doing what you want but wanting what you do. I agree. Otherwise, living becomes mere existing. Mechanical breathing. Surviving.
Conceive a man by nature and misfortune prone to a pallid hopelessness, can any business seem more fitted to heighten it than that of continually handling these dead letters, and assorting them for the flames? (30)
Melville, I feel an uplifting joy. Our relationship has been rekindled thanks to this short story. A perfect combination of vivid sorrow and a tender, subtle humor.
His words resorted to the saddest yet most endearing beauty to describe one of the feelings every human being has experienced at least once: that raw feeling of loneliness. A lonely character in the middle of a crowd. A crowd of all countries and of all times. A passive, mild person who can elicit a violent reaction and a sense of sympathy at the same time.
I finished writing these rambling thoughts and I still see that man writing on his desk. The amount of papers is increasing, so is his weariness. And now, he hardly blinks. Cold and unable to move, like a snowman made by some kid after school.
The night is coming. Soon, he will be in complete darkness. He can't move but he could speak. He seems weak but he stood up for himself once, because he simply preferred not to do something.
I salute you, silent man. And I wish everyone to never have to experience the slow vanishing that dead letters can cause.
I can see that figure now—pallidly neat, pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn! (7)
I see Bartleby. A human mirror.
May 7, 14
* Also on my blog.
** Photo credit: Bartleby the Scrivener via Theatre in Chicago
Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity!
I could write a review, but I would prefer not to.
I could write a review, but I would prefer not to.
“Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay; but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none.”
Is there anything more disagreeable than someone whose internal locus of evaluation is so powerful that it sacrifices its host to prove a fucking point?
Well played, Melville.
emotional
sad
medium-paced
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
C’est un très bon classique au quel on ne pense pas souvent mais j’ai vraiment apprécié ma lecture. Je vous le conseille, j’ai passé un bon moment.
I'm not sure how best to enter this since the book I read was two short stories. If they were thematically linked... I guess it was more or less lost on me.
Of the two I found Bartleby to be the more difficult read. Difficult in the sense that it didn't grab my attention. In both stories I feel like I only barely scratched the surface in my initial readings.
I'm not really sure what to make of Bartleby and his steadfast preferring not to. The narrator and his cast of variously incapable assistants make for interesting contrast to Bartleby the (initially) industrious scrivener but soon thereafter the imperturbable and undischargable burden. I suppose it might bear some further thinking about; considering what did the narrator owe to Bartleby that he so consistently failed to put him out, and even after trying to evade by simply moving out, he found himself trying to support Bartleby by financing a better food supply once at the Tombs (not of course that this mattered at all). The narrator seems to view himself quite charitably of course.
I don't know.
And Don Benito, along with the hapless American narrator and the kind of fascinating Babo, this was a pretty interesting read. I feel like it would do me well to read it again with a more careful eye... I'm not sure how to read Benito. The narrator seemed kind of bumbling. The relationship between Babo and Benito seemed pretty interesting and I'm guessing there is a lot more for me to tease out yet in thinking about it, and what else is suggested in their backstory and by the way that Babo haunts Benito until Benito's demise not long after.
Both stories were a bit dense as I guess is normal for Melville but it definitely seems like there's a lot that I'm just not quite getting in both of these. Maybe not getting at all, I could be nowhere close, but either way much more than I've understood so far.
Of the two I found Bartleby to be the more difficult read. Difficult in the sense that it didn't grab my attention. In both stories I feel like I only barely scratched the surface in my initial readings.
I'm not really sure what to make of Bartleby and his steadfast preferring not to. The narrator and his cast of variously incapable assistants make for interesting contrast to Bartleby the (initially) industrious scrivener but soon thereafter the imperturbable and undischargable burden. I suppose it might bear some further thinking about; considering what did the narrator owe to Bartleby that he so consistently failed to put him out, and even after trying to evade by simply moving out, he found himself trying to support Bartleby by financing a better food supply once at the Tombs (not of course that this mattered at all). The narrator seems to view himself quite charitably of course.
I don't know.
And Don Benito, along with the hapless American narrator and the kind of fascinating Babo, this was a pretty interesting read. I feel like it would do me well to read it again with a more careful eye... I'm not sure how to read Benito. The narrator seemed kind of bumbling. The relationship between Babo and Benito seemed pretty interesting and I'm guessing there is a lot more for me to tease out yet in thinking about it, and what else is suggested in their backstory and by the way that Babo haunts Benito until Benito's demise not long after.
Both stories were a bit dense as I guess is normal for Melville but it definitely seems like there's a lot that I'm just not quite getting in both of these. Maybe not getting at all, I could be nowhere close, but either way much more than I've understood so far.