Death Of Ivan Ilyich Analysis

The theme of death plays a very pivotal role in Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy. Throughout this story and especially while on his deathbed, Ivan is troubled with the concepts of materialism, the right life, and inevitability of death. With some help Ivan’s struggle can best understood through his interactions with his friends, family, and one lower class character, Gerasim. As Ivan grows sicker and sicker, he does not want to live anymore yet grows more and more terrified of death. This causes Ivan to question why this is happening to him and why his family is resenting him ultimately bringing him to tears. “He wept on account of his helplessness, his terrible loneliness, the cruelty of man, the cruelty of God, and the absence of God.”

Ivan still questions if he has lived the right life but believes that he has. It is not until right before his death that he truly understands that he did not live the right life. “Suddenly some force struck him in the chest and side, making it still harder to breathe, and he fell through the hole and there at the bottom was a light. What had happened to him was like the sensation one sometimes experiences in a railway carriage when one thinks one is going backwards while one is really going forwards and suddenly becomes aware of the real direction.” (Page 57) This metaphor of the railway carriage is of Ivan believing he has lived the right life but has only now been struck with the realization that he is

Ivan finally and ultimately accepts that, “his life had not been what it should have been,” yet, “this could still be rectified.” (Page 57) Ivan finally does not feel any anger or pain but instead sadness from what he put his family though. He tries to apologize to them and realizes that the only way to release them and free himself from these sufferings is to die. As Ivan searches for that fear of death he was so accustomed to having he realizes that it has gone and in its place he finds light, or peace. Tolstoy shows that the attractions of materialism distract us from living a more purposeful and fulfilling life. Tolstoy begins the second chapter by stating, “Ivan Ilyich’s life had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.” (Page 11) This shows that Ivan cares more about what he has in life then what he does with his life. Ivan bought, "damasks, dark wood, plants, rugs, and dull and polished bronzes — all the things people of a certain class have in order to resemble other people of that class.” (Page 22) just so he can conform to upper class standards of living the right life. Ivan’s injury sustained while hanging the curtains is the best example how his attraction to materialism was his greatest down fall. Because the upholsterer did not hang the curtains how Ivan wanted,