Literature Disguised as Fun takes the story of Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street by Herman Melville and creates a witty and engaging unit of it. The small format book includes the unabridged story itself, discussion questions, a humorous story about Herman Melville’s life (sort of, but with space travel), interesting quotes by Melville to think on, additional reading suggestions, clever advertisements, and even a section where you create your own memes! I could see this taking a day to read and discuss, followed up with individual writing assignments and more discussion. 80pp, not consumable. ~Sara
This annotated edition of "Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street" includes: Introduction; Pre-flight: foundational information to better understand the story; Wrap Up: more in depth look at the story and its themes; Discussion questions; Cartoons, memes, faux posters, etc; My Trip to the Andromeda Galaxy: A brief, creative bio of the author.
"Bartleby, the Scrivener, A Story of Wall Street," is one of Herman Melville’s most famous short stories. Students will never forget the phrase “I would prefer not to,” after reading about a Wall Street attorney and his encounter with a young man who would “prefer not to.”
In addition to Melville’s short story, this volume for students in grades 7-12 includes a “Pre-Flight”, a short introduction to read before reading the story, a “Wrap-Up”, a more in depth explanation and discussion of the story, to be read after, along with “My Trip to the Andromeda Galaxy,” where Mr. Draeger travels light years away to learn about Herman Melville. The lengths this man will go for good information is truly unprecedented. If you’ve never been to an alien planet, you won’t want to miss this. Also included are open-ended, Socratic type discussion questions to help students think more in depth about the story.
These are contained (include the story), inexpensive, and non-consumable literary components you can weave into your language arts for middle and high school ages. Each one can be done by a student and parent, small group or a classroom. The content is not religious unless the author mentions it as a talking point (even then, they are not biblical in nature.) It's the questions after the story that really tripped my trigger! Why do you think so-and-so responded the way he did? Why was that good or bad? What might you have done in that situation? I'm generalizing to show the higher-order thinking structure of the questions. A short biography of the author and some background to the setting introduces the mood to come. Read the story, then comes the discussion questions. You could easily make a question into an essay topic! The voice of the guides themselves is very friendly and conversational. It makes for a relaxed vibe going into some pretty dark and heavy literature. The prices vary with the length of the reading, but they all have the same pre- and post-story content. A few scattered illustrations poke fun at the topics. At the end, I quite liked reading some quotes from the author and suggestions for further reading. These feel like something you could work into a busy week when you may not get to your heavier work. Or maybe you find yourself picking one up between larger novels to discuss. The titles are some that you may not know, so have a try at something new! I would get the whole set if it were me. ~Sara
