Ivan Ilyich

Leo Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilyich shares the often scary and sudden subject of death and its relation to life. Tolstoy goes about this topic by sharing the life and death of Ivan Ilyich. Ivan finds himself in physical and psychological agony as his last days wane away. Throughout his sickness, he experiences realizations that make him question his entire life and previous goals. The story of the Ivan’s death are riddled with messages about life and happiness. The three major messages are the important of time, life continuing after death, and possessions and social rank in relation to quality of life. The idea of time is a main idea throughout The Death of Ivan Ilyich. Central Pennsylvania Community College professor Michael Verno characterizes Ivan’s servant, Gerasim as a representation of a time controlled society since his “world is dominated by the preservation of an ordered day, the illusion of a structured life” (124). A former
Blake Charlton and Abraham Verghese, two Stanford professors, explains that “as a peasant, Gerasim accepts death as natural. He would not understand the middle class refusal to acknowledge death” (94). Without the blinders of money and social rank, Gerasim can grasp the entire situation about life as Ivan cannot. Gerasim’s poverty comes as an advantage “because his status enables him to spend more conflict-free time with Ivan Ilyich” (Charlton et al 94). The most symbolic representation of the anti materialistic message in Tolstoy’s piece is in the circumstances leading to Ivan’s death; while Ivan was decorating his new house with expensive furniture, he slipped and “knocked his side against the knob of the window frame” (WLB 753). Ivan’s materialistic nature is what eventually kills him. These examples are what define the message of simplicity when it comes to materialistic possession and social