AP LANGUAGE AND COMPOSITION

30 Points
“Bartleby the Scrivener” Directions for Reading, Text-Marking and Vocabulary

PART 1:
As you read the story “Bartleby the Scrivener” by Herman Melville, text-mark it for the
following:
 Interesting or unusual or important/ symbolic images or descriptions
 Unusual sentences / sentence structure
 Unfamiliar words / Interesting diction
 Recurring images / ideas / themes
 Anything that you don’t understand
 Anything you find amusing or have questions about or would like to talk
about/clarify
 Character traits/development

MAKE SURE TO MAKE NOTES IN THE MARGINS ABOUT THE REASONS YOU
HAVE MARKED THE TEXT! For instance, if you underline a particular image because
you think it is symbolic, then you need to write a note in the margin saying what you
think is being symbolized.

If you underline a word because of its connotation, MAKE A NOTE IN THE MARGIN
saying what the connotation is and why you think this is important. (What is the effect?)

PART 2:
Develop a list of at least 25 words that you don’t know or are a bit uncertain of:

 Draw a box around the word on your copy of “Bartleby”

 On a separate sheet of paper, write each word down, and then look each word up
in the dictionary and then write the definition down

 Write the sentence in which it appears (underlining the word), and write down
the page number on which the sentence appears.

Here is an example:

Avocation: av·o·ca·tion (v-k sh n) n. 1. An activity taken up in addition to one's regular

work or profession, usually for enjoyment; a hobby. 2. One's regular work or profession.

The nature of my avocations, for the last thirty years, has brought me into more than
ordinary contact with what would seem an interesting and somewhat singular set of men,
of who, as yet, nothing, that I know of, has ever been written—I mean the law copyists,
or scriveners (884).