I enjoyed the story, but it left me very confused and I didn’t really understand what Melville was trying to say. As the lawyer decides how to deal with this unexpected problem, the reader wonders what is wrong with Bartleby and what has caused his unusual behaviour. Over the following days, he refuses to do more and more of the tasks that are requested of him – never giving an angry or rude response always just those same five words: “I would prefer not to”.

An increase in work leads the lawyer to look for a third scrivener and, as he has been having difficulties with the temperamental natures of the other two, he decides to hire Bartleby, a quiet man whom he hopes will be a good influence on the others.Īt first Bartleby works hard at his copying, but when the lawyer asks him to proofread a copied document, he replies with, “I would prefer not to”. The narrator is an elderly Wall Street lawyer who employs two clerks, or ‘scriveners’ – Turkey and Nippers – whose job is to make copies of legal documents, and one office boy, Ginger Nut. My favourite was the first story, Bartleby the Scrivener, which was first published in Putnam’s Magazine in 1853. I Would Prefer Not To contains four stories, although the final one takes up more than half the book and is probably better described as a novella. I’ve never read anything by Herman Melville – I know I should have read Moby Dick by now, but it has never sounded appealing to me – so when I spotted this new collection of Melville short stories from Pushkin Press it seemed a good opportunity to experience some of his work without having to commit to a 600+ page novel.

I would prefer not to melville