The Fall of the House of Bartleby the Scrivener

   In my last post I compared and reviewed two books, so I thought I'd do the same thing again with this post. Except with two short stories, that are classics, not recent YA releases, and are two different genres, instead of both being the same genre. So, perhaps I'm not really doing the same thing, but I read these two short stories recently and wanted to review them. Those short stories are The Fall of The House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe, and Bartleby the Scrivener by Herman Melville. I read these stories for school, as students usually do, (or are supposed to do at any rate) and found myself surprised by my reactions to both.

I'm almost hesitant to discuss this one, because there's this unwritten rule that you simply can't diss Poe, he's a god, rather like Beyonce, and can do no wrong in most people's eyes. However, it seems my opinion seems to stray from the norm when it comes to classic authors and pop stars, which is to say, in a roundabout way, that I didn't enjoy this one. I wanted to though! I've even read it three times! It's Poe, and I expected to like it, for I enjoyed some of his other works (The Raven, Annabel Lee) but this one just didn't do it for me. The premise is interesting, the narrator being summoned to his friend Mr. Usher's rather creepy house to keep him company while he is plagued by a mysterious illness. The biggest flaw within this story is that the language is almost impossible to get through. After reading the story I had to check good old SparkNotes to fully understand what went down. There's one paragraph that takes up over half a page, describing Mr. Usher's painting skills, and it took the last sentence of the paragraph for me to finally understand, oh, he's talking about his friend's paintings. I'm all for artsy usage of the English language, but it's still important for people to be able to understand what you've written, Poe.

Besides the issues of language, this story felt as if it was trying a little too hard to be quirky. Also, the plot, while interesting at first, didn't keep me engaged all the way through. And by the time the exciting climax came around, I didn't particularly care. I will say that reading the story made me feel rather glum and slightly creeped out, so Poe did at least manage to capture that emotion, and make you feel what the character's were feeling. My final rating is 2 out of 5 stars.

Image Credit: Rebecca Dart

As for the next short story, I was equally surprised at my reaction to it, but this was a happy surprise. I really enjoyed this one, and unlike The Fall of the House of Usher, the writing style actually made it shine. Bartleby the Scrivener is narrated by an older lawyer as he describes an unusual copyist he hires. Unfortunately for our narrator, the rest of his staff is also rather eccentric, and this leads to an unexpectedly amusing story. Bartleby, despite being an excellent typist, soon becomes more trouble than he's worth, for whenever he doesn't want to do something, he says his coined phrase, "I'd prefer not to" in such a mild tone that our good narrator doesn't know how to react. Eventually Bartleby decides he'd prefer to do nothing at all, except continue squatting in our narrator's offices, and the end is taken to county jail, where things take a tragic turn. The interactions between characters, the narrator's thoughts, and entire ridiculousness of the situation makes this an entertain read. I actually chuckled aloud a couple times. Herman Melville managed to take what is an overall small series of events into something enjoyable from start to finish, unlike Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher, which is packed to the brim with drama and epicness, but never really engages the reader. I think I'll start using Bartleby's tactic whenever my mom wants me to do the dishes. You hear me mom? "I'd prefer not to." My final rating is 5 out of 5 stars.