While Herman Melville’s lawyer in "Bartleby, the Scrivener" appears to have undergone a significant change in character by the story’s completion, the fact remains that the story is told through (the lawyer’s) first-person point-of-view. This choice of narration allows the lawyer not only to mislead the reader, but also to color himself as lawful and just. In the lawyer’s estimate, the reader is to view him as having not only made an effort to "save" Bartleby, but as a man who has himself changed for the good, ethically speaking. What the lawyer fails to acknowledge in his retelling of events is his inability to communicate with Bartleby not because of Bartleby’s shortcomings, but because of his own. The lawyer’s perception of "man" is tainted, for he does not view people as individuals, but as tools -- as possessing a usefulness and/or function. He is not attempting to reach the soul of a man; rather, he is attempting to exploit the use of a machine. 

In order to illustrate Melville’s emphasis on failed communication, he created Bartleby as a scrivener, or copier, an occupation that blatantly suggests the possession of machine-like qualities. A scrivener’s purpose, more or less, is to act as a human version of the modern-day Xerox machine. For an individual to purposely choose a profession such as this one would say a great deal about said individual. He would, more likely than not, be both mundane and dutiful. His vision would be small, and his goals, perhaps, nonexistent. The lawyer wants, and employs, men who fit this description -- men like Turkey and Nippers. He describes Turkey as "a most valuable person to me, . . . the quickest, steadiest creature too, accomplishing a great deal of work in a style not easy to be matched," yet simultaneously views him as "rather noisy" and "growing old" (2404). While he claims to so respect Turkey’s abilities, he is embarrassed by his appearance, and provides him with a coat to better the image of the firm. The lawyer describes Nippers in a similar fashion, calling him a "useful man" who "wrote a neat, swift hand; and, when he chose, was not deficient in a gentlemanly sort of deportment," though he also accuses Nippers of not knowing "what he wanted" (2405-6). He is displeased with Nippers because he sometimes illustrates free will in his outbursts and constant attempts to alter his drafting table. While the lawyer makes a point of noting his employees’ attributes, he is certain to note their character flaws, as well. For if men like Turkey and Nippers were of no "use" to him as employees, they would be of no use at all. The lawyer does not have time to waste on mere people -- possessors of choice and will -- whose worth is next to nothing. 

Bartleby, then, provides an interesting dilemma, for while he appears less than attractive to the typical reader, he is an ideal employee in the eyes of the lawyer. Upon first meeting Bartleby, the lawyer describes him as "pallidly neat, pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn" (2407). Clearly, these are less than flattering descriptions of the man, for in each case, the lawyer is unable to pay a compliment without distorting the image. On their own, personality traits such as "neat," "respectable," and "forlorn" would be regarded as kind and, to some degree, compassionate. But because each of these is preceded by a contradicting adverb, the reader is given a more thorough insight to the lawyer’s frame of mind. The lawyer is expressing some type of faux-sympathy and charity. His description does not say so much about Bartleby as it does about the lawyer himself – that he is, in many ways, tainted himself. The even greater irony, though, is that the lawyer is taken with these characteristics, for they do not suggest implications of disobedience or passion of any sort. They are characteristics of a reserved and quiet individual, one who will fall in line easily and produce on command without confrontation. They are the qualities of a machine, an asset to the lawyer and his business, for a machine has much use and can produce repeatedly with little to no direction. It is only a short while, however, before the lawyer realizes the truth of the adage "Be careful what you wish for." 

In his attempts to find a "machine" which will produce time and again without instruction, the lawyer is made victim to his own complacency. In other words, Bartleby mirrors the lawyer’s self-absorption in his repetition of the phrase "I would prefer not to." It is not only an ambiguous response, but also mechanical, for it is his answer to any and all task or question posed by the lawyer. And this does not simply go for questions in which this response is an appropriate one; rather, it suddenly becomes Bartleby’s only string of words. When asked, for instance, why he refuses to examine the copies with the other scriveners, Bartleby again replies, "I would prefer not to" (2409). Clearly this response is inappropriate, and fails to answer the question. He then looks to Turkey, Nippers, and the boy, Gingernut, for opinions of how he should handle the situation. The fact remains, however, that he has no true intention of heeding any of their suggestions. He is merely stifled, and does not know himself how to respond. Bartleby’s failure to communicate appropriately -- his provided machine-like responses rather than suitable human ones -- has ironically perplexed the man who longed for nothing more than a machine in his employ. The dehumanized lawyer who cares not at all for personality, thereby providing him with control over his machines, has been both confronted and beaten by the very thing he wished for. 

Writing "Bartleby" from the lawyer’s point-of-view, Melville allows for the lawyer’s perspective to be communicated, and no other, an intentional and intelligent decision on the part of Melville. While the lawyer seeks to stress the importance of relating Bartleby’s story to the reader, he is morso attempting to justify his own actions -- to show that not only did he attempt to reach out to Bartleby, but that he has seen the error in his ways. On the surface, that is exactly what transpired. Clearly, though, Melville does not intend for his audience to view the lawyer as a sympathetic figure, nor even a man who attempted to change his ways. After all, the reader is informed from the story’s beginning, through his own telling, that the lawyer is not the most likable of characters, nor is he righteous or good-spirited. Any sympathy felt by the reader is not out of respect, for the reader does not empathize with the lawyer; rather, the reader can only pity his obtuseness and inability to recognize that "worth" and "use" are not equivalent terms. 

There are, in fact, several scenes throughout "Bartleby" in which the lawyer is given the opportunity to perform "humanely" and "compassionately," though he manages only to further illustrate himself as desensitized. For example, after the lawyer moves his office to a new address (a choice made simply to remove himself from Bartleby, who refused to flee the premises), the new proprietor finds the lawyer and inquires of the man still in the building. Given the opportunity to perform in an appropriate, humane manner, the lawyer, once again, fails: 
 

‘I am very sorry, sir,’ said I, with assumed tranquility, but an 

inward tremor, ‘but, really, the man you allude to is nothing to 

me -- he is no relation or apprentice of mine, that you should 

hold me responsible for him.’ (2423)

Not only does the lawyer fail to admit Bartleby as an acquaintance, he outright denies him. In his many attempts to portray his actions and attempts to reach Bartleby as "just," the lawyer has managed only to incriminate himself as anything but. While the lawyer goes on to make several attempts to "reach out" to Bartleby – by seeing to his well-being while in prison, for example – his actions are for naught. The lawyer contends that his latter actions should justify himself as a right and decent individual, for he did more than sit back and watch Bartleby’s demise. What he fails to realize – what is painfully obvious to the reader – is that his actions are too little, too late. He cannot "reach" Bartleby at this point because he has already alienated himself. Redemption does not come about so easily, a point the lawyer is supposed to learn, but does not. 

It is fitting then, perhaps, to examine the conclusion of Melville’s story, for it further contains the implications of failed communication. Melville begins this section -- which is already cut off from the rest of "Bartleby" and, therefore, distinct -- by having the lawyer inform the reader that these further details are hardly necessary or important, thereby informing the reader of how important, in fact, they truly are. The lawyer points out that he discovered Bartleby was formerly employed in Washington’s Dead Letter Office, and how appropriate that a man like Bartleby who was "by nature and misfortune prone to a pallid hopelessness . . . [be] continually handling these dead letters, and assorting them for the flames" (2427). There is a recognition in the lawyer’s voice of the irony of the situation, and a comical irony, at that. For how fitting that a man as "pallidly hopeless" as Bartleby be stuck in a function that highlighted unanswered, unreceived letters -- mail that was never delivered. The lawyer recognizes the irony in the uselessness of Bartleby’s former occupation, and that is why he offers the information to the reader as nothing more than a post script, a toss-off of little importance, much like, as the lawyer sees it, the man himself. 

Bartleby’s career of missed communication again mirrors the missed communication between himself and the lawyer, a fact that the lawyer is oblivious to. In spite of his late efforts to resurrect Bartleby, so to speak – to mend the suffering and break down the self-created walls that exist between himself and the scrivener (and all of humankind, for that matter) – Bartleby’s demise is inevitable. The lawyer has already proven his inability to communicate with anything human, and when he wants a chance to rectify the situation, it is too late. Look at, then, his final words on the subject: "Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity!" (2427) Here the lawyer condemns the irony of the dehumanized society that he himself is not only a part of, but, early on in the story, admittedly searching for. After all, it was he who so cherished Bartleby’s machine-like functions, and he who now fails to realize the tragedy of the situation, despite his seemingly profound exclamation.