Herman Melville · 1853
Questions on the text, each answered in the book’s own words, with the minute you hear it.
Challenge a friend: 123BookWarThe text
Answer Thirty years
“The nature of my avocations for the last thirty years has brought me into more than ordinary contact with what would seem an interesting and somewhat singular set of men”
Answer Prudence, then method
“had no hesitation in pronouncing my first grand point to be prudence; my next, method.”
Answer Master in Chancery
“The good old office, now extinct in the State of New York, of a Master in Chancery, had been conferred upon me.”
Answer Within ten feet
“was pushed up to within ten feet of my window panes.”
Answer A long ruler
“gesticulating with a long ruler at the other end of the room—that if his services in the morning were useful, how indispensable, then, in the afternoon?”
Answer Ambition and indigestion
“I always deemed him the victim of two evil powers—ambition and indigestion.”
Answer Red ink
“As Nippers once observed, Turkey’s money went chiefly for red ink.”
Answer One dollar a week
“cleaner and sweeper, at the rate of one dollar a week.”
Answer A ginger-cake
“was his once moistening a ginger-cake between his lips, and clapping it on to a mortgage for a seal.”
Answer A high green folding screen
“I procured a high green folding screen, which might entirely isolate Bartleby from my sight, though not remove him from my voice.”
Answer Byron
“I cannot credit that the mettlesome poet Byron would have contentedly sat down with Bartleby to examine a law document of, say five hundred pages”
Answer The third day
“It was on the third day, I think, of his being with me, and before any necessity had arisen for having his own writing examined”
Answer Cicero
“I should have as soon thought of turning my pale plaster-of-paris bust of Cicero out of doors.”
Answer He’s a little luny
“I think, sir, he’s a little luny,” replied Ginger Nut with a grin.”
Answer Beer
“gentleness is effects of beer—Nippers and I dined together to-day. You see how gentle I am, sir.”
Answer Three minutes
“just step round to the Post Office, won’t you? (it was but a three minute walk,) and see if there is any thing for me.”
Answer Four cents a folio
“he copied for me at the usual rate of four cents a folio (one hundred words)”
Answer Trinity Church
“Now, one Sunday morning I happened to go to Trinity Church, to hear a celebrated preacher”
Answer A blanket
“Rolled away under his desk, I found a blanket; under the empty grate, a blacking box and brush”
Answer Petra
“Of a Sunday, Wall-street is deserted as Petra; and every night of every day it is an emptiness.”
Answer A savings’ bank
“It was an old bandanna handkerchief, heavy and knotted. I opened it, and saw it was a savings’ bank.”
Answer Six days
“I told Bartleby that in six days’ time he must unconditionally leave the office.”
Answer Twelve dollars
“I owe you twelve dollars on account; here are thirty-two; the odd twenty are yours.—Will you take it?”
Answer An election day
“when I remembered that this was an election day.”
Answer Adams and Colt
“I remembered the tragedy of the unfortunate Adams and the still more unfortunate Colt in the solitary office of the latter”
Answer Edwards on the Will and Priestly on Necessity
“at leisure intervals I looked a little into “Edwards on the Will,” and “Priestly on Necessity.”
Answer The chambers are too far from the City Hall and the air is unwholesome
“I find these chambers too far from the City Hall; the air is unwholesome. In a word, I propose to remove my offices next week”
Answer Upon the banisters of the stairs
“sitting upon the banisters of the stairs by day, and sleeping in the entry by night.”
Answer There is too much confinement about that
“There is too much confinement about that. No, I would not like a clerkship; but I am not particular.”
Answer Stationary
“I like to be stationary. But I am not particular.”
Answer As a vagrant
“had sent to the police, and had Bartleby removed to the Tombs as a vagrant.”
Answer Mr. Cutlets
“Bartleby, this is Mr. Cutlets; you will find him very useful to you.”
Answer Of consumption at Sing-Sing
“he died of consumption at Sing-Sing. So you weren’t acquainted with Monroe?”
Answer With kings and counselors
“With kings and counselors,” murmured I.”
Answer The Dead Letter Office at Washington
“that Bartleby had been a subordinate clerk in the Dead Letter Office at Washington, from which he had been suddenly removed by a change in the administration.”
“Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-Street,” Putnam’s Monthly Magazine, November–December 1853, published anonymously; collected in The Piazza Tales (Dix & Edwards, New York, 1856). This text follows the Project Gutenberg transcription (#11231). Public domain.