The Death of Ivan Ilyich
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- For the Austrian development critic, see Ivan Illich
The Death of Ivan Ilyich (Russian: Смерть Ивана Ильича, Smert' Ivana Ilyicha), first published in 1886, is a novella by Leo Tolstoy. It is one of Tolstoy's most celebrated pieces of late fiction. This work stems in part from Tolstoy's anguished intellectual and spiritual struggles which led to his conversion to Christianity. Central to the story is an examination on the nature of both life and death, and how man can come to terms with death's very inevitability. The novella was acclaimed by Vladimir Nabokov and Mahatma Gandhi as the greatest in the whole of Russian literature.[specify]
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[edit] Plot summary
Ivan Ilych Golovin, a high court judge in St. Petersburg with a wife and family, lives a carefree life that is "most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible." One day, he begins to suffer from a pain in his side. As Ilyich's discomfort increases, his behavior towards his family becomes more irritable. His wife finally insists that he visit a physician. The physician cannot pinpoint the source of his malady, and soon it becomes clear that his condition is terminal. He is brought face to face with his mortality, and realizes that although he knows of it, he does not truly grasp it.
During the long and painful process of death, Ivan dwells on the idea that he does not deserve his suffering because he has lived rightly. If he had not lived a good life, there could be reason for his pain; but he has, so pain and death must be arbitrary and senseless. As he begins to hate his family for avoiding the subject of his death, for pretending he is only sick and not dying, he finds his only comfort in his peasant boy servant Gerasim--the only person in Ivan’s life who does not fear death, and also the only one who shows compassion for Ivan. Ivan begins to question whether he has, in fact, lived rightly.
In the final days of Ivan’s life, he makes a clear split between artificial life, the life of himself and his family that masks the true meaning of life and makes one fear death, and authentic life, the life of Gerasim. Authentic life is marked by compassion and empathy, artificial by self-interest. Then “some force” strikes Ivan in the chest and side, and he is brought into the presence of a bright light. His hand falls onto his nearby son’s head, and he pities him. He no longer hates his son or wife, but rather feels sorry for them, because he has found at last a joy in authentic life and they will continue their artificial lives, fearing death. In the middle of a sigh, Ivan dies.
[edit] Interpretation
Christians have often embraced the apparent conversion or redemption of Ivan Ilych at the end of the story. Ivan Ilych sees the light and cries out,"What Joy!" Tolstoy's faith was one that focused on the life of Jesus as a model of love in action.[citation needed] There is, for example, no definite indication of Christian doctrine, in regards to death, only the powerful depiction of the man’s experience of dying.[citation needed]
Many people have different interpretations for the end of the novella. One such interpretation is that Ivan Ilych's whole struggle and agony ends with the great gift of a cessation of suffering. Another interpretation is that Ivan Ilych's breakthrough is the freedom that comes with truth--in his case, seeing the falsity of his life, which enables him to have a brief moment of unselfish love or at least compassion for his wife and son. It can also be interpreted that Ivan did not feel compassion towards his wife, but pity, and saw the truth of humanity in his son, that is, what it meant to be truly human.
In his lectures on Russian Literature Russian born Novelist and critic Vladimir Nabokov argues that, for Tolstoy, a sinful life is (such as Ivan's was), moral death. Therefore death, the return of the soul to God is, for Tolstoy, moral life . To quote Nabokov: "The Tolstoyan formula is: Ivan lived a bad life and since the bad life is nothing but the death of the soul, then Ivan lived a living death; and since beyond death is God's living light, then Ivan died into a new life- Life with a capital L." [1].[citation needed]
[edit] Pop Culture
- Akira Kurosawa's 1952 film Ikiru (To Live) was inspired by The Death of Ivan Ilyich, though the film is not a retelling of the Tolstoy work.
- The film Ivans XTC was also inspired by this novella.
[edit] References
- ^ Nabokov, Vladimir Vladimirovich: Lectures On Russian Literature pg.237: Harcourt Edition
