Books : Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street (The Art of the Novella series)
|
|
In association with Amazon.com
|
by: Herman Melville
Amazon.com's Price: $10.00 Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.3
EAN: 9780974607801
ISBN: 0974607800
Label: The Art of the Novella
Manufacturer: The Art of the Novella
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 100
Publication Date: May 01, 2004
Publisher: The Art of the Novella
Sales Rank: 115845
Studio: The Art of the Novella
Related Items:
Editorial Review:
Product Description:
This beautifully packaged series of classic novellas includes the works of Anton Chekhov, Colette, Henry James, Herman Melville, and Leo Tolstoy. These collectible editions are the first single-volume publications of these classic tales, offering a closer look at this underappreciated literary form and providing a fresh take on the world's most celebrated authors.
The rat race of Wall Street is turned on its head when Bartleby the copier decides that he simply 'would prefer not to' in this absorbing early modernist tale.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - A haunting short story
"I would prefer not to."
This insolent, yet passive, statement is the start of the narrator's persistent problem.
The narrator is a lawyer on Wall Street. A safe and unambitious man, he chose to shun the limelight of public trials and specialize in bonds, mortgages and deeds. At his service are three scriveners (scriveners are copiers who replicate legal documents as well as run small errands). These three have their own idiosyncrasies: Turkey is surly in the afternoon, ... Read More
Rating:  - Square peg in a round hole
A scrivener, Bartleby, is trapped in the soul-killing monotony of his job, a job that leads a co-worker to get soused every day at lunch. After a while, Bartleby starts refusing his assigned work, but in turning away from his tasks he doesn't turn to doing anything else. His rebellion is passive - staring at the brick walls that enclose him and the others on Wall Street, he becomes a standing rebuke of superficial `busy-ness', a rebuke from which his employer eventually flees.
I appreciated ... Read More
Rating: - It's not the book, it's the shipping
The book was required reading for my daughter. When none of our local bookstores had this book and ordering would take seven days or more, I turned to Amazon knowing that I could ship the book overnight if it was in stock. That is what I did. I went to Amazon, the book was in stock and paid twice what the book was worth for OVERNIGHT SHIPPING. How long did it take me to get the book? SEVEN DAYS!!! I paid for overnight shipping and it still took SEVEN DAYS to get this book. I will think twice before getting ... Read More
Rating:  - Bartleby
In my opinion, Bartleby gets a bit boring sometimes, but maybe that's because I was sleepy when I read it. In general, the storyline is somewhat unique. Turkey and Nippers are copyists or scriveners while Ginger Nut, a boy of twelve, does odd jobs. The narrator notes these eccentricities, but excuses them. The narrator, torn between pity and exasperation, also discovers that Bartleby apparently has no home or friends, and lives in the office. Bartleby, however, only repeats his mantra, and the narrator eventually ... Read More
Rating: - I would prefer not to
The strange behaviour of the main character 'Bartleby' in this short story can be described as 'perfectly harmless passivity': 'I would prefer not to.'
The reason for this behaviour lays in the fact that Bartleby was suddenly removed out of the 'Dead Letter' office in Washington after a reorganization.
'Dead letters! does that not sound like dead men? ... Sometimes from out the folded paper the pale clerk takes a ring ... a banknote ... he whom it would relieve nor eats nor hungers anymore ... on errands ... Read More
|
|
|
