My first interpretation of this story was that it is about a really stubborn guy, but once we started to talk about it in class I developed a different interpretation of the story. My interpretation of the story is that after all the years that Bartleby worked at confiscating dead letters at the dead letter office, he himself turned into a sort of dead letter.
I come to this conclusion by observing that our lives are shaped and made by our actions, what we do, and our experiences. Without doing anything at all we are not living and therefore we are kind of living dead. This is why I see Bartleby as a dead letter, because at the end when he refuses to do anything at all he becomes a dead letter until he finally dies.
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4 comments:
Yeah, I think that's a pretty valid interpretation. A question that remains: why did Melville, the author, decide to represent Bartleby as a dead letter? Was there some bigger point he was trying to make? I think at all the walls, screens, blocked windows, and doors in the story, and I think he might be getting at something bigger...
I completely agree. Not only do our actions define our life, but so does our communication with others. A dead letter is lost before it's communicated, and Bartleby loses communication with people as well. So without communication or meaningful action, Bartleby is indeed a dead letter.
yeah i agree that if we don't do anything we aren't living but to others that just may be living for them so to me it isn't truly living
I really like your perspective on this story. I myself was not really a fan of the story and the only thing I really contributed to the interpretation pool was there were a lot of walls present throughout the story. I think the walls played an important role but I'm not sure exactly the significance. I like the way you compare him to the dead letters. He was sort of dead or lazy during the story so I can see where you could develop that. If you go through life not having any desire to try or accomplish anything you will eventually just die of sorrow basically ha. But overall well interpreted!!
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