The Death Of Ivan Ilyich

1. The Death of Ivan Ilyich  Leo Tolstoy The Theme of Death

2. Tolstoy, 1828--1910 War and Peace Anna Karenina vivid depiction of 19th-century realist fiction. His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount A fervent Christian pacifist. Nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God is Within You , were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

3. Theme of Death For Tolstoy the theme of death was always very important Experienced a “Conversion,” The Holy Synod excommunicated Tolstoy in 1901). In The Death of Ivan Ilyich Tolstoy’s interest in and concern with the problem of death takes centre stage. The book begins and ends with death (the last word of the novel is “died").

4. Just an ordinary man Personal confessions of an ordinary commonplace man Overwhelmed by a crisis and reevaluation of life Asking the truly difficult questions Revisited on Tolstoy’s later works, “ On Life.” In the course of the story the reader sees him overwhelmed by a crisis (what was it?) This forces an evaluation. Truly difficult questions.

5. How should a man live? What is his life worth? What gives a life value? Leo Tolstoy 1828--1910 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1918—2008 Cancer Ward And the theme also forms a very important part of Solzhenitsyn’s great novel Cancer Ward , which has been called a "dissident Soviet reworking" of Tolstoy’s tale.

6. As he approaches death, Ivan Ilyich comes to see his . . . Values according to a lived life are Impossible to face death without Discovery of true Love takes away trivial fear love fear

7. Second Chapter Throughout the story one is presented with the extreme pointlessness of Ivan Ilyich’s life and its crushing emptiness. At the beginning of the second chapter, in which Ivan Ilyich’s pre-history is presented to the reader, Tolstoy writes: "Ivan Ilyich’s life had been simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible“

8. During his life Ivan has excluded his own emotions and individuality from everything, subjugating himself instead to what he considers to be "proper" or "correct", to this end he even marries without the slightest thought for love, preferring instead to look to propriety. Excluded emotions Proper and “correct” Marries without love, but for propriety

9. He is characterless and featureless in everything except in that he resembles everyone else of his type. His tragedy is to be mortal. "Why this torture?" he asks himself when he has already become gravely ill, and the answer comes back: "…for no reason, it just is so. Existential?

10. What is it to be alone?

11. Louden Wainwright III I should be optimistic and go buy some bonds and stocks They'll find a cure for Cancer soon we may get trigger-locks existence is no picnic as statistics all have shown we learn to live together and then we die alone

12. "‘How terrible,' said Eragon , ‘to die alone, separate, even from the one who is closest to you.'" The answer given to Eragon , " Everyone dies alone, Eragon , whether you are a king on a battlefield or a lowly peasant lying in bed among your family, no one can accompany you into the void…" Everyone dies alone.

13. Do we all die alone? Jackson Browne after his wife’s suicide I don't know what happens when people die Can't seem to grasp it as hard as I try It's like a song I can hear playing right in my ear That I can't sing I can't help listening Just do the steps that you've been shown By everyone you've ever known Until the dance becomes your very own No matter how close to yours Another's steps have grown In the end there is one dance you'll do alone

14. We All Die Alone This incredible story of endurance and survival relates the experiences of Jan Baalsrud after his WW II commando operation into Norway failed and he was the only resistance fighter to escape. Pursued relentlessly by the Nazis, Jan suffered injuries, frostbite, hunger, and the amputation of most of his toes. He managed, somehow, to come through it all.

15. Live Together, Die Alone 22 nd episode of “Lost.”

16. How we live Irony with the “celebrated physician” Same treatment that he had given to others in the law courts. " With great irony, we are shown how, when in effect on trial for his life in front of the "celebrated physician" that he visits, he receives from him the same treatment from him as he had been accustomed himself to give to others when they appeared in front of him in the law-courts.

17. It has been said by the famous twentieth century critic D. S. Mirsky that before Ivan Ilyich dies "he sees the inner light of Faith, renunciation and love." But at this point one is forced to ask: what faith and love for whom? And surely Ivan must by force of death’s very nature renounce death anyway?

18. Fear of death may explain his reappraisal He lifts the burden of his existence off those around him He reaches spiritual joy true, the fear of death may well explain his reappraisal of his past life, but surely Ivan Ilyich’s gladness to be able by his death to lift the burden of his existence off the shoulders of those around him is hardly enough to achieve the sort of spiritual joy he seems to reach.

19. Release of Suffering Tolstoy resists a facile "religious" conclusion. The light seen by Ivan at the bottom of the sack into which he feels himself pushed is not God’s love or the light of immortality, but instead is the release of suffering through his own personal love for others, which is not presented as connected to any particular religious system, although love for others is patently an element of many religions, and most obviously in a Tolstoyan context, with Christianity.

20. However, here life is stripped of all its poetry. All the reader is shown is futility, pain, suffering, emaciated flesh and even the difficulties of being too weak to relieve oneself unaided. We are told that once Ivan was cheerful and happy in his life, lively and agreeable: but we never witness this. The story begins with his death and then after a brief pre-history proceeds with an ever-narrowing viewpoint to describe his progress towards the death that we already know.

21. Why do we have pain?