Bartleby & Co. (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780811215916)

In Bartleby & Co., an enormously enjoyable novel, Enrique Vila-Matas tackles the theme of silence in literature: the writers and non-writers who, like the scrivener Bartleby of the Herman Melville story, in answer to any question or demand, replies: "I would prefer not to." Addressing such "artists of refusal" as Robert Walser, Robert Musil, Arthur Rimbaud, Marcel Duchamp, Herman Melville, and J. D. Salinger, Bartleby & Co. could be described as a meditation: a walking tour through the annals of literature. Written as a series of footnotes (a non-work itself), Bartleby embarks on such questions as why do we write, why do we exist? The answer lies in the novel itself: told from the point of view of a hermetic hunchback who has no luck with women, and is himself unable to write, Bartleby is utterly engaging, a work of profound and philosophical beauty.

Author: Enrique Vila-Matas
ISBN-10: 0811215911
ISBN-13: 9780811215916
Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation
Language: English
Published: 12/17/2004
Pages: 178
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.76lbs
Size: 8.10h x 5.64w x 0.81d

Review Citation(s):
New York Times 06/05/2005 pg. 28
Kirkus Reviews 10/15/2004 pg. 983