Persuasive Paper: “Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!”

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The infamous ending statement in Herman Melville’s “Bartleby the Scrivener,” “Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!” (Melville 34), signifies not only the tragic demise of the character of Bartleby, but the dismal ruin of mankind as well. This enigmatic statement can be applied to both “Bartleby the Scrivener” and Melville’s other short story, “Benito Cereno.” Both stories are narrated by unreliable characters, leaving further questions on whether or not the Lawyer was genuinely trying to help Bartleby when he showed signs of depression or if the one-sided story of Captain Delano truly portrayed the slaves and their motives for taking over Cereno’s San Dominick. In each of Melville’s short stories, there is an obvious grayness about each tale, the plots of both stories start out slow and unsuspicious, but are then revealed through a dynamic change in events, and each novella has ultimate realities that are hidden through appearances. Together, “Bartleby the Scrivener” and “Benito Cereno” are stories that possess a deep meaning within them which is intended to make the reader question the definition of human nature.
The characters of the Lawyer in “Bartleby the Scrivener” and Captain Delano in “Benito Cereno” are both unreliable narrators that Melville intentionally made untrustworthy to lure the reader into believing the picture that each narrator was painting. At the beginning of the story, the Lawyer calls himself elderly and lazy, “I am a rather elderly man... I am a man who, from his youth upwards, has been filled with a profound conviction that the easiest way of life is the best” (Melville 3), proving that he is slothful in his efforts. Captain Delano is an undependable character because he is a caucasian ship captain during a tim...

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...proves that there was an obvious struggle for the whites to recognize the black slaves and give them respect, which then lead to the attempted revolt. All of this grayness in attitude or grayness in color is used as a metaphor to resemble the dull and non descriptive nature that humanity possesses.
Now, reading about humanity as a dismal ruin may seem a bit dramatic and depressing, but it is unfortunately true. Melville was using the character of Bartleby as a symbol for the inevitable fall of humankind in 1853. Today, the same message can be passed through the mysterious character of Bartleby. Times have not changed and the moral values of humans are still showing signs of utter disappointment. “Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!” (Melville 34).

Works Cited

Melville, Herman, and Herman Melville. Bartleby ; And, Benito Cereno. New York: Dover Publications, 1990. Print.

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