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The death of ivan ilych analysis
Literary analysis of the death of ivan ilyich
Critical appreciation of the death of ivan ilyich
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Death is an unwavering reality of existence that most people neglect contemplating or give much thought to. When one is suddenly pushed into contact with this oblique reality, the only thing they seek is comfort. In The Death of Ivan Illyich, Leo Tolstoy gives us the prime paradigm of the kind of comfort and compassion that a dying person seeks. Gerasim, the young worker, provides Ivan Illyich with the form of spiritual and physical kindness that makes Ivan’s transition less painful. This is in stark contrast to his friends and family who only regard Ivan’s state of health with “indifference and deceptiveness” (Tolstoy ). Gerasim serves as an ignited candle in Ivan’s dark world and “speaks forthrightly to Ivan about his condition and offers him assistance and comfort” ( …show more content…
The reason why Ivan seeks comfort in Gerasim during his final days is because he introduces spirituality into a life that is depicted by materialism. It is as if Tolstoy is presenting readers with the two different sides of life in the same place. Gerasim is the only character throughout the book who is able to grasp the idea of life and death in a level that contrasts the superficial meanings that the others associate with life and death. In fact, it is Ivan’s friends and family that call his illness an inconvenience in their lives and make it clear to Ivan that they are waiting on his death. Ivan recognizes the amount of selfishness and lack of spirituality both in himself and those around him; “Nothing did so much to poison the last days of Ivan Illyich’s life as this falseness in himself and those around him” (Tolstoy 105). If it were not for Gerasim, Ivan would have suffered continuously during the final days of his life. He sees the value of an authentic life through Gerasim and his behavior toward someone who is on the threshold of
The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy tells the story of Ivan Ilyich, a man who deals with a mysterious illness through introspection. Until his illness, he lived the life he thought he was supposed to live. Like Candide, he was living in blind optimism. He assumed that what he was doing was the right thing because he was told as much. He had a respectable job and a family. Happiness, if it did occur to him, was fulfilling his duties as a husband and father. It was his sudden illness that allowed him to reflect on his choices, concluding that those choices did not make him happy. “Maybe I have lived not as I should have… But how so when I did everything in the proper way” (Tolstoy 1474)? Ilyich had been in a bubble for his entire life, the bubble only popping when he realizes his own mortality. This puts his marriage, his career, and his life choices into perspective. Realizing that he does not get to redo these choices, he distances himself from his old life: his wife, his children, and his career. All that is left is to reflect. This reflection is his personal enlightenment. He had been living in the dark, blind to his true feelings for his entire life. Mortality creates a space in which he can question himself as to why he made the choices he made, and how those choices created the unsatisfactory life he finds himself in
What exactly is dysfunctional? Who wrote the rules to proper family or societal behavior? How does one know exactly what the proper reaction is? Every family has its crazy members and every city it’s insane citizens, but many do a great job of covering it up. Especially when it comes to high in social standing. Many are very careful not to air their dirty laundry in public. There are times when it can get out of hand and the unthinkable may happen. Is it right for one person to automatically appoint themselves as head of the household such as, Orgon in Tartuffe? What about Ivan Ilyich? Would he have been considered the head of the house, because he allowed his wife’s attitude to predict the family’s social standing? These two stories are classic of situational irony not only from families, but in human nature. To analyze Tartuffe and The Death of Ivan Ilyich and then compare them, one must have an open mind to all sorts of behavior and believe that these situations are indeed a reality.
Tolstoy provided us with two perspectives to view Ivan’s life in “The death of Ivan Illyich”: an omniscient narrator and Ivan himself. What I plan to do is give another perspective, not necessarily to view his life, but rather to his experiences after he realized he was dying. This perspective will be an analytical and psychological; the perspective from Kubler-Ross’s Stages of death (or stages of grief, as they are better known for). These stages occur when we are faced with an event that is usually connected with death. The “normal” order in which these five stages occur, though may not go doctrinally in this order, are as such: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance.
Though illness stripped both Morrie Schwartz and Ivan Ilych of their hope for survival, their dissimilar lifestyles led each to a much different end. Morrie found himself in an overflow of compassion while surrounded by family, friends and colleagues. Ivan, on the other hand, found only the obligatory company of his wife and the painful awareness that no one really cared. Both characters ended their lives the way they lived them, as Ivan acknowledges: "In them he saw himself" (Ivn, 149). While Morrie poured himself into every moment of life and every relationship he pursued, Ivan skirted the dangers of emotion to live "easily, pleasantly, and decorously" (Ivn, 115). In the spirit of such an opposition, the two stories become somewhat like responses to each other. Morrie Schwatrz, proclaimed...
The short story “The Death of Ivan Ilych” is about a man who realizes he is dying and that no one in his life cares about him. Even more disappointing for Ivan is the realization that besides his success as a high court judge, he has done nothing else to make his life worth saving. The death of Ivan Ilyich, sadly, comes as a release of stress to all. In the end, Ivan is soothed by the release of death, his family and friends are relieved of having responsibility of Ivan taken off their shoulders, and the reader is released from the stressful journey. Tolstoy teaches the audience through the structural elements of the “black sack” metaphor and pathos about the unavoidability of death and the relief of accepting it.
Ivan pretty much avoids the idea of death because he did not think it would happen to him so soon. Death to Ivan is something that deceased people experience. Ivan and his family did not see death has a common experience for all beings. This thought is seen in Ivan as he transitions. Ivan had a routine for his life. He enjoyed working, playing bridge, and keeping his house luxurious. Tolstoy says Ivan’s life was “most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.” In the beginning of the story, the readers are presented with Ivan’s funeral. The people attending Ivan’s funeral want the whole ordeal to be over. This entire death has been an inconvenience for all of his friends and family. Death is something that Ivan battles with as he gets closer to that point in his life. The fall off of the ladder is the reason for him dying. This fall triggers unbearable pains for Ivan. Ivan is very irate towards his wife and screams due to the pain he experiences. On his death bed, Ivan struggles with dying. He is truly afraid of what is going to happen to him. “Suddenly some kind of force struck him in the chest and on the side, his breath was constricted even more, he collapsed in to the hole and there at the bottom of the hole some light was showing.” This excerpt expressed the moment in which Ivan converts. He feels a spirit that told him how to mend things with his family. In Ivan’s case, death is the only way to help his family move
Tolstoy uses The Death of Ivan Ilyich to show his readers the negative consequences of living as Ilyich did. One of the worst decisions that Ivan Ilyich made during his lifetime was based on what would monetary benefit him. In others words, he his family and his colleges relate happiness to material possessions only. They could afford to buy big house, expensive cars and fancy clothes which leaded to happiness. But it was just an illusion.
Tolstoy immediately absorbs you into the novel by beginning with Ivan’s death. The actual death scene is saved until the end of the novel, but he shows you the reaction of some of Ivan’s colleagues as they hear the news of Ivan’s death. You are almost disgusted at the nonchalant manner that Ivan’s “friends” take his death. They are surprised by his death, but immediately think of how his death will affect their own lives, but more importantly, their careers. “The first though that occurred to each of the gentlemen in the office, learning of Ivan Ilyich’s death, was what effect it would have on their own transfers and promotions.” (pg 32) As a reader, you have to wonder how Ivan must have had to live in order for people close to him to feel no sadness towards the loss or even pity for his wife. In fact, these gentlemen are exactly like Ivan. The purpose of their lives was to gain as much power as possible with n...
This is related to the theme to live without suffering because as Ivan is getting ready to die he complains about how he is in so much pain despite numerous doctor visits and medication. Tolstoy uses his complaints as indicator for the readers to know that Ivan does not want to die in pain but peace. A moment of this is when Ivan calls his family into the room and dies in front of them because he believes it will bring them joy.
Ivan Ilych was a member of the Court of Justice who was "neither as cold and formal as his elder brother nor as wild as the younger, but was a happy mean between them—an intelligent, polished, lively, and agreeable man” (Tolstoy 102). He lived an unexceptionally ordinary life and strived for averageness. As the story progresses, he begins to contemplate his life choices and the reason for his agonizing illness and inevitable death. “Maybe I did not live as I ought to have done, but how could that be, when I did everything properly?” (Tolstoy
The life of Ivan Ilyich, we are told, "had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible" (Tolstoy, Ch. 2). In analyzing this description of Ivan's life, we see that Ivan has always done what is expected of him in the eyes of others (wife, co-workers, employers, etc.). While Ivan believes his life has run easily, pleasantly, and decorously like it should, we see that in reality it is an unfulfilled life. Ivan's closest associates are more worried about who will be next in line for promotion now that he is gone, and at his funeral they are more concerned over a bridge game than grieving for the loss of a friend, "The more intimate of Ivan Ilyich's acquaintances, his so-called friends, could not help thinking also that they would now have to fulfill the very tiresome demands of propriety by attending the funeral service and paying a visit of condolence to the widow" (Tolstoy Ch. 1).
In his novella, The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Leo Tolstoy satirizes the isolation and materialism of Russian society and suggests that its desensitized existence overlooks the true meaning of life—compassion. Ivan had attained everything that society deemed important in life: a high social position, a powerful job, and money. Marriage developed out of necessity rather than love: “He only required of it those conveniences—dinner at home, housewife, and bed—which it could give him” (17). Later, he purchased a magnificent house, as society dictated, and attempted to fill it with ostentatious antiquities solely available to the wealthy. However, “In reality it was just what is usually seen in the houses of people of moderate means who want to appear rich, and therefore succeed only in resembling others like themselves” (22). Through intense characterizations by the detached and omniscient narrator, Tolstoy reveals the flaws of this deeply superficial society. Although Ivan has flourished under the standards of society, he fails to establish any sort of connection with another human being on this earth. Tragically, only his fatal illness can allow him to confront his own death and reevaluate his life. He finally understands, in his final breath, that “All you have lived for and still live for is falsehood and deception, hiding life and death from you” (69).
On the lighter side, Ivan was a believer in God, he donated to monasteries and churches, even though priests were killed on his orders. He was well educated and established the first printing house in Russia. Ivan required the clergy a movement to happen for schools to teach children how to read and write. There were times where Ivan was very devout.
Ivan rejects the Christian idea that there should be harmony in the future because he does not want people, especially children, to suffer in order to achieve that harmony. He even claims that “they have put too high a price on harmony; we can’t afford to pay so much for admission” (245). In the end, it is his compassion for others, combined with his lack of compassion for God, that spurs him to condemn God’s actions. He believes that the distant harmony that is promised with forgiveness is not worth the suffering in the
...t is . What really accentuated the story's realness was the cold-harsh fact that no one is exempt from death. This was given when Gerasim said to Ivan that everyone dies (p135). As the last book Tolstoy made before his conversion to Christianity: this book, delving deep into death, could reveal some clues about what the bible is trying to tell us about the truth of death. Is death the end, the process, or...the beginning? Who knows? One thing for certain is that every individual goes through the grief process a bit differently, and Tolstoy has proven that through his main character, Ivan Illych.