bartelby the scrivener & benito cereno

Bartelby the Scrivner and Benito Cereno by Herman Melville

I enjoyed both these novellas, although the oddness and ambiguity of Bartleby made a deeper impression on me.  It seemed to me to be a perfect and very poignant depiction of the debililtating effects of depression, which were chillingly and perfectly captured by Bartelby’s mantra:  “I would prefer not to.”  Exactly.  Benito Cereno was interesting for its complicated and complicating moral universe, which skews the reader’s sympathies in alarming ways.