Terry Teach
English 102 Cline
Herman Melville (1819–1891). Bartleby, the Scrivener. 1853. Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street
February 17, 2012
“Then something severe, something unusual must be done. What! Surely you will not have him collared by a constable, and commit his innocent pallor to the common jail? And upon what ground could you procure such a thing to be done?—a vagrant, is he? What! He a vagrant, a wanderer, who refuses to budge? It is because he will not be a vagrant, then, that you seek to count him as a vagrant. That is too absurd. No visible means of support: there I have him. Wrong again: for indubitably he does support himself, and that is the only unanswerable proof that any man can show of his possessing the means so to do. No more then. Since he will not quit me, I must quit him. I will change my offices; I will move elsewhere; and give him fair notice, that if I find him on my new premises I will then proceed against him as a common trespasser” (Herman Melville (1819–1891). Bartleby, the Scrivener. 1853. Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street verse172).
Melville is very codependent on this character Bartelby. Melville is in the middle of a very powerful struggle. He has under his employment a man that is insubordinate. Melville feels sorry for him and cannot just throw him out, Bartleby won’t go. Melville will not call the police and have him removed so he comes up with an easier solution Melville will move his whole office how absurd I see this as some truly codependent behavior.”co·de·pend·ent of or pertaining to a relationship in which one person is physically or psychologically addicted, as to alcohol or gambling, and the other person is psychologically dependent on the first in an unhealthy way”(Dictionary .com).
Melville is willing to disrupt his whole life and life’s of his other workers so that he does not have confront or do anything that may upset Bartley. This paragraph shows us that even though we have no vested interest in a person we can still become co-dependent in a very short time. Here is a website that can help you determine if you maybe co-dependent click here
Works cited:
Dictionary .com
Herman Melville (1819–1891). Bartleby, the Scrivener. 1853. Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street verse172.S
Wow Terry, your post was interesting. I did not think of the lawyer as being co dependent, so that is a great perspective. It is interesting to see how many different interpretations people get from one story. I felt like the lawyer felt he had some sort of binding to keep Bartleby because Bartleby was not intentional in his rebellion. It was hard to say though for me personally, I found this reading challenging to comprehand. I also found there is some grey area in the real meaning of Melville's meaning of this story. But great post, I enjoyed it!
ReplyDelete-Kyle Audis
I agree that he became co-dependent upon Bartleby but mostly because of his reaction when he finally walked away from him. I also thought it was absurd that he would rather move his office than call the police but it just shows how deeply sorry he felt for the man.
ReplyDeleteI saw this story differently, but your point of view opened my eyes. I focused more on the depression aspect of it however the co-dependent makes a lot of sense. Alot of the times they go hand in hand. I enjoyed the passage you chose and think it went well with the idea you were putting across. I also enjoyed the link that you shared, so many people out there aren't even aware of it. Thank you for your thoughts and broadening mine. It is so great that so many different views of the story can come about.
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