Bartleby the Scrivener is a short story by the American writer Herman Melville, first
serialized anonymously in two parts in the November and December 1853 issues of
Putnam’s Magazine and reprinted with minor textual alterations in his The Piazza
Tales in 1856 In the story, a Wall Street lawyer hires a new clerk who, after an
initial bout of hard work, refuses to make copies or do any other task required of
him, refusing with the words “I would prefer not to.”
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