Question

Which literary device is employed in the following sentence from Herman Melville’s short story "Bartleby, the Scrivener"?

And here Bartleby makes his home, sole spectator of a solitude which he has seen all populous—a sort of innocent and transformed Marius brooding among the ruins of Carthage!
A) allegory
B) irony
C) allusion
D) symbolism

Answer 1

which one u think it is @Barze18632

Answer 2

irony

Answer 3

It is C - Allusion. Allusion means to reference something outside of the story, such as another story, a historic event, a piece of artwork, etc. In this passage, Bartleby, The Scrivener references Marius, a Roman general and statesman - specifically, a painting of him called Marius Among the Ruins of Carthage.

Answer 4

Well its not allusion for sure, im thinking symbolism but i may not be correct,

Answer 5

I'm preeetty sure it actually is allusion. I can see why someone would say irony, but I still think allusion is much more prominent in this excerpt. It's comparing Bartleby to a famous painting called Marius Among the Ruins of Carthage. From what I gather, Bartleby is living alone in a place that used to house a huge amount of people, but now he's the only one that stays there. So, he's like Marius among the ruins of a place that had been deserted.

Answer 6

Someone told me it was symbolism so I went with that, but on the very next question it asked me to pick the correct sentence that illustrated the use of verbal irony in the same paragraph.
And here Bartleby makes his home, sole spectator of a solitude which he has seen all populous—a sort of innocent and transformed Marius brooding among the ruins of Carthage!
So it is my belief that the correct answer is irony. Thus I will be choosing that answer the next time the question rolls around. With any luck I will have passed the test and proved myself correct.