The Death of Ivan Ilyich

The Death of Ivan Ilyich

Introduction

“Life can only be understood looking backward. It must be lived forward.”

(The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, 2008)

Borrowing the quotation from “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”, better understanding can be developed for the novel by Tolstoy, one of the greatest and most influential Russian writers, to have a review of Ivan Illych’s whole life by looking backward, and find the drives for our lives to live forward.

 In this essay, Tolstoy’s text on “The Death of Ivan Ilych” will be analyzed with the discussion about death and the meaning of life, and the discussion will be extended from the viewpoint of an individual to the vitality of a city so as to reflect the current society’s dying status.

Brief Summary of the story

“The Death of Ivan Ilych” takes place at the chronological end of the story. And then it takes the audience to a few decades earlier to have a review of Ivan Ilych’s life.  

As described by Leo Tolstoy, Ivan Illych is a diligent, obedient and so-called ordinary man. Ivan is the very model of a modern middle-class man. He attained the classic middle-class job: an official in the sprawling, faceless court bureaucracy of St. Petersburg, in his case at the Court of Justice. (Shmoop Editorial Team, 2008) He does what he is supposed to do, lived up by the expectations of others and the society, while he was not searching for any kind of truth. Therefore it was described as the most ordinary but most terrible.

There are 12 chapters for the whole book. The first one is an introduction about the whole text. Chapter 2 and 4 paints out the picture of Ivan Ilych’s childhood life, from the development of his professional career in the court and his marriage, to later his illness. He was a well-balanced boy in various aspects, after attending the law schools he climbed up his career ladder step by step as a legal official, and later he met his wife and get married without any feeling of love. It is for a period of more than 40 years.

Starting from Chapter 5, the development of the illness was presented, and the both the psychological and physical stage of dying was described. It recounted from the final declined and agonized death to the religious light.

Applying Kubler-Ross' Five Stages of Dying, Ivan Ivan Ilych first wanted to escape from the worries and further imagination from his denial and isolation stage.

In the depth of his heart he knew he was dying, but not only was he not accustomed to the thought, he simply did not and could not grasp it. (6.2-3)

Ivan Ilych entered the stage of anger, blaming the God for imposing this kind of misery and pain to him, and expecting an answer from the desperate little hope.

"Why hast Thou done all this? Why hast Thou brought me here? Why, why dost Thou torment me so terribly?" (9.10-12)

Then he entered into a dialogue with the God, discussing the meaning of his life. And Ivan Illych first realized that he may not have done anything meaningful during his whole life.

By looking back to his life, he entered into the stage of bargaining, in the way that he was trying to defend his life as meaningful and fruitful.

“And his professional duties and the whole arrangement of his life and of his family, and all his social and official interests, might all have been false. He tried to defend all those things to himself and suddenly felt the weakness of what he was defending. There was nothing to defend.”

However, he failed to defend, and he is turned into a stage of depression.

“He shuddered, shifted himself, and tried to resist, but was already aware that resistance wasimpossible, and again with eyes weary of gazing but unable to cease seeing what was before them, he stared at the back of the sofa and waited -- awaiting that dreadful fall and shock and destruction.”

Learning that he was impossible to turn back and fight against the force, he could only wait for the moment.

Finally, the stage of acceptance was reached, with his understanding of the inevitability of death and confession accompanied with a sense of relief.

When the priest came and heard his confession, Ivan Ilych was softened and seemed to feel a relief from his doubts and consequently from his sufferings, and for a moment there came a ray of hope. (11.23)

"It is finished!" said someone near him. He heard these words and repeated them in his soul.

"Death is finished," he said to himself. "It is no more!" (12.13-14)

In the midst of a sigh, and stretched out, the story ended. 

Selected Text for detailed analysis

In order to develop a more comprehensive understanding of Ivan Ilych, the text in Chapter 3 will be selected for detailed analysis, as it marked the toughest years of Ivan Ilych. And through looking at the way Ivan Ilych handled the problems of unpleasantness, his character of orderliness was further confirmed.

To begin with, unpleasantness has followed Ivan Ilych into his official refuge.

“He was expecting to be offered the post of presiding judge in a University town, but Happe somehow came to the front and obtained the appointment instead.” (3.1)

And his complaint only made matter worse. Therefore instead of confronting against the injustice till the end, Ivan Ilych decided to seek a new position. And over the period of searching and trialing, he has endured the pressure from his family, but he lived without change.

“Ivan Ilych had unexpectedly obtained an appointment in his former ministry which placed him two states above his former colleagues besides giving him five thousand rubles salary and three thousand five hundred rubles for expenses connected with his removal. All his ill humour towards his former enemies and the whole department vanished, and Ivan Ilych was completely happy.” (3.11)

        From the above text, the pattern of Ivan Ilych’s life is illustrated with his carefree personality. Facing the injustice, he tried to complain, but soon return back to his confort zone. After the sudden change of Ministry of Justice’s administration, he restored the previous fortunate, and restored his original life, without any change. As described in the text, it is “vanished” and he was “completely happy”.

        His growing and voluntary isolation was illustrated in the way that he increasingly ignored the drawbacks of his life and focus only on his ideal form of life.

“Everything progressed and progressed and approached the ideal he had set himself: even when things were only half completed they exceeded his expectations.” (3.12)

As described in the text above, Ivan Ilych perceived that everything is good even if there is any drawback. And in fact, Ivan’s official life resembles the pattern of his life which is conducted under clear, simple and consistent rules. He repeated the similar pattern of life day after day, from waking, going to the court and returning home for guest or alone. As described in the text, this was neither dull nor amusing.

In this chapter, Ivan’s pleasure for ambition was also well-illustrated below.

“Ivan Ilych's chief pleasure was giving little dinners to which he invited men and women of good social position, and just as his drawing-room resembled all other drawing-rooms so did his enjoyable little parties resemble all other such parties.” (3.20)

Also, the argument with his wife intensified and further confirmed his isolation from his unpleasantness.

It was a great and disagreeable quarrel. Praskovya Fedorovna called him "a fool and an imbecile," and he clutched at his head and made angry allusions to divorce. (3.21)

But the dance itself had been enjoyable. The best people were there, and Ivan Ilych had danced with Princess Trufonova, a sister of thedistinguished founder of the Society "Bear My Burden". (3.22)

From the above text, the desire of attaining respectful social status is well-described. Also, the argument with his wife intensified and further confirmed his isolation from his unpleasantness. In some sense, the “Feelinglessness” of Ivan Ilych can be seen through his indifference to various matters or problems, even having a big quarrel with his wife, he soon could be recovered with other little things. Following this analysis of his personality, more discussions will turn to the meaning of death and life with the reference by the text.

Death and meaning of life

What is the meaning of life? Do we really know what we are really looking for in our life?

“The truth is, once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.” (Mitch Albom, 1997)

Looking back Ivan Illych’s life from his death, one of the most fundamental and practical questions was sparked out in my mind, that’s about the true meaning of life, the true goals in our life.

Even in this day and age, Ivan Illych can be regarded as a so-called “role model” in our society, in the way that he fulfilled the expectations of the external sectors such as its family, the society and so on.  

Even when he was at the School of Law he was just what he remained for the rest of his life: a capable, cheerful, good-natured, and sociable man, though strict in the fulfillment of what he considered to be his duty: and he considered his duty to be what was so considered by those in authority. (2.4)

For a brief summary over the past four decades of Ivan’s life, the following chronology is organized:

1837 – Birth of Ivan Illych

1850s – Education in the School of Law

1859 – Graduation from the School of Law

1859 – 1864 – Stepping as an apprentice official for the government

1864 – Transfer and promotion to court investigator

1866 – Marriage to Praskovya Fyodorvna Mikhel

1867 – Birth of daughter, Liza; Promotion to prosecutor

1869 – Birth of son, Vasily

1880 – Change the work under the Ministry of Justice

Autumn 1881 – Consultations with doctors about the on-set of disease

January 1882 – Worsening heath

1 February 1882 – Beginning of the final agony

4 February 1882 – The death of Ivan Illich 

In fact, Ivan’s whole life is regarded as ordinary and unremarkable.

"Ivan Ilych's life had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible."(2.1)

Everything seemed so smooth for most parts of his life, say, he graduated from the Law School and found a relatively stable job, he got married and has son and daughter, he attained social status with its occupation. In spite of some small obstacles and unpleasantness, such as the failure for his marriage, he could respond it by increasing the isolation from the source of discomfort, such as moving more and more to his work. Overall speaking, everything seemed perfect and complete, nevertheless, when death approached him suddenly and quietly, Ivan Ilych first realized that his whole life is empty in just a few months.

“Without work, all life goes rotten. But when work is soulless, life stifles and dies.”

(Albert Camus)

In face of death, Ivan Ilych was forceless to change and return, but he could only wait for what would inevitably come – death. And in some sense, may be death is the only thing he has been waiting for in his whole life. Rethinking the nature of life, the story of Ivan Ilych reminded the audience that apart from fulfilling the social expectations, we should search for our own meaning in life, and strike for the chosen goals before it is too late to regret, and not to only wait for death.  

Spiritual Life and Physical Life

The death of Ivan Ilych marked the end of the physical life of the character, but it also marks the start of a spiritual life.

“True life is the appearance of consciousness outside the boundaries of space and time. It always exists.”

(Leo Tolstoy, 1906)

From this sentence on Leo Tolstoy’s writing on “Recognizing the Spiritual Principle”, the faith that people would continue to grow spiritually up is well-illustrated. In his view, death is merely a transition from life into death, from one form to another form.

“I am dead – my spirit has stopped living in my body, but my real “I”, my spirit, will continue to live in other beings who understand me.”

(Leo Tolstoy, 1910)

Similar to The Death of Ivan Ilych, the end of Ivan’s physical form with the understanding of the true meaning of life is actually just another start for his spiritual life.

He sought his former accustomed fear of death and did not find it. "Where is it? What death?" There was no fear because there was no death. In place of death there was light. (12.13-14)

In this sense, he concludes that the soul is immortal, and the end of the physical life is just another start in another place.

Extended Discussion to the vitality of the city

“This city is dying, you know?” (When Heaven Burns, TVB 2011)

This popular quotation of a local television drama series has grasped my attention on the vitality of the city. Apart from taking death from an individual perspective, it is worth discussing the vitality of a city, especially Hong Kong, where our home lies.

To begin the discussion, historical context of Ivan Illych should be studied in order to develop a better understanding of the Russian city in Leo Tolstoy’s time. The work was published in 1886, when is followed by the assassination of Alexander II, a rather open-minded tsar who introduced the Emancipation of Serfs (1861) and a series of modernization reforms. The successor Alexander III was determined not to meet a similar fate of assassination. Therefore, the Tsar undid the reforms, under that autocratic rule, the police-force and other civil services were used to deal with those people opposed the laws and rules, even at grass-roots level.

Back to the work, with this historical understanding, the professional legal service provided by Ivan Illych was mainly in the Alexander II era. But his attitude towards life and his surroundings is actually dangerous, as the silence and the obedience is not a driving force push the society forward, but also driving the empire to the end of its rule in later stage, especially applying to Alexander III’s autocratic rule. From Ivan Illych’s individual point of view, he was making nothing out of his life. From a more macro-perspective, the gathering of the nothingness and silence of each individual life is a destructive power to the development of any place.

By analogy, space is a practiced area, in the way that the street geometrically defined by urban planning is transformed into a space by walkers. (De Certeau, Michel. 1984, 91-130) In this sense, the participation of civic members in the society is the key for creation of values, and it is which Ivan Illych lacks.

“Individual, isolated cases of foolish personal insanity are not as terrible as the widespread, organized, clever social insanity of our world” (Leo Tolstoy, 1910)

Putting Ivan Illych’s story to Hong Kong, ever-since the transfer of sovereignty from the Great Britain to the mainland China in 1997, not only the promise of universal suffrage has never achieved, but also there are obviously increasing self-censorship, political penetrations in various forms, such as the corruption of Hong Kong's electoral system by moving voters from its strongholds into constituencies to swing the election result. Besides, the increasing level of urban renewals and the annexations of property giants to the rural areas have reduced the possibilities of the land-use of the city, and narrowed the imagination of the citizens about our land. For example, the removal of Queen Pier has de-constructed the local recognition and blurred the developmental pattern of Hong Kong as a city, erasing the memory and struggle of the people. (Herman Yau, 2009) Recently, the penetrations even take place in local universities. For example, the over-use of police force during HKU Centenary Celebration Ceremony on 18 August 2011, the affiliation with the Chinese Communist Party in Student Unions and so on. All these can be seen as a sign before the age of repression, and also a sign of the contamination of the “One Country, Two Systems” promise.

Under the current circumstance, there are many roles we may choose to play. We can choose to be quiet like Ivan Illych, and we can choose to protest against the unreasonable rule with various means. Despite the critics towards the “Post-Eighties” for their so-called radical thoughts and behavior which destroys the social stability and harmony, the critics can be reviewed in another angle by the inspiration from Ivan Illych.

“The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of beauty is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, but indifference between life and death.” (Elie Wiesel, 1986)

To Ivan Illych, his indifference to his surroundings has made his life empty. To the society, if everyone is acting like Ivan Illych, the diversity of voices, the free flow of thoughts, and eventually the vitality of the city will be erased and vanished, leading to the death of a city, and it is just like the quotation of Leo Tolstoy, which is terrible.

To sum up this part of discussion, it can be seen that the destructive power of indifference is not only imposed on individual level, but also affects the vitality of the community and the city.

Conclusion

Through the narration of Ivan Illych horribly ordinary story, The Death of Ivan Illych is an insightful piece of work that not only reminded the audience about the meaning of leading a true life, but also provoked my thinking on the current society and the our role as an individual in the society.