The Death of Ivan Ilyich: Spiritual Awakening Essay -- Tolstoy Death I

The Death of Ivan Ilyich   Spiritual Awakening        He went to his study, lay down, and once once more was left alone with it. Face to face with It, unable to do anything with It. Simply look at It and grow numb with horror (Tolstoy, 97). Death takes on an pernicious persona as it eats away at Ivan Ilyich, a man horrified at the prospect of losing his life. Even more horrifying is the realization that scorn his prominence and prosperity as a Russian high court judge, Ilyich has done nothing to make his life worth saving. The Death of Ivan Ilyich begins at the end, with his associates receiving the intelligence of his passing. Here, Tolstoy emphasizes the diffident attitude the life story often have toward the dead and their unintended insensitivity to what they cant comprehend. His colleagues are more preoccupied with what kind of personnel changes his death causes and get in a game of short whist than the loss of this individual. Even hi s wife, while playing up her bereaved widow status, considers how she can profit from his passing. Aside from the pictorial portrayal of his truly devastated son, those who survive the dead man seem to consider him an inconvenient corpse. The story then flashes back to develop Ivan Ilyich as a living man. At first, the indifferent attitude of his loved ones seemed justified, since he leads a rather empty, superficial life common to the late 1800s. It appears that if someone else died, his first thoughts would turn to whist as well. Propriety, not morality, dictates his actions and he relishes power and glory. He is a consummately impervious individual, impervious to conscience, empathy, and understanding. This does not make him an evil man. More i... ...back the family has. Both of them suffer from mendacious expectation brought on by their commitment to propriety over conscience or morality. As Ilyichs condition worsens, he begins to notice the hypocrisy upon which he has groun d his life. At first, he sees those around him as perpetrators of a great lie, insisting that he will get better and making light of his condition. Later, he comes to behave that in the past he has lied to himself, and forgives his family of all his petty grudges. His realization and spiritual awakening in the moments before his death ultimately draw the greatest audience sympathy. We feel his denial and fear, his unending physical pains and emotional misery, and are able to accept, as Ilyich does, the unalterable course of our lives.Tolstoy, Leo. The Death of Ivan Ilyich. Translated by Lynn Solotaroff. petty BooksNew York, 1981.