Bartleby, the Scrivener

Versions of
Bartleby, the Scrivener (1853)
by Herman Melville

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The narrator of the story is an unnamed lawyer with offices on Wall Street in New York City. He describes himself as doing "a snug business among rich men's bonds and mortgages and title-deeds." He has three employees: "First, Turkey; second, Nippers; third, Ginger Nut," each of whom is described. Turkey and Nippers are copyists or scriveners while Ginger Nut does delivery work or other assorted jobs around the office, and the lawyer decides his business needs a third scrivener. Bartleby responds to his advertisement and arrives at the office, "pallidly neat, pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn!"

144873Bartleby, the ScrivenerHerman Melville

Versions of Bartleby, the Scrivener include:

"Bartleby, the Scrivener (Part 1)", as originally published in Putnam's Monthly (November 1853)
"Bartleby, the Scrivener (Part 2)", as originally published in Putnam's Monthly (December 1853)
"Bartleby the Scrivener" in The Piazza Tales (1856)