Leo Tolstoy's The Death Of Ivan Ilych

“I’m not afraid to die, I just don’t want to be there when it happens” said by Woody Allen. This is an interesting quote because some way somehow we can relate to it. Death is something that we do not think about all the time and we are scared to get into that topic. Sometimes we think about death that we overdoing it. According to Socrates, he does not fear death nevertheless he thinks we shouldn’t either. Death is nothing to fear. He gives a few arguments to support his claim that death is something we should not fear.

Many people seem to fear death, but philosophers such as Socrates and Epicurus would argue that one has no reason to fear it. Socrates sees death as a blessing to be wished for if death is either nothingness or a relocation of the soul, whereas Epicurus argues that one shouldn't worry themselves about death since, once we are gone, death is annihilation which is neither good nor bad. Epicurus believes that death itself is a total lack of perception, wherein there is no pleasure or pain. I agree with Epicurus because Socrates doesn't give a sound argument for death as a blessing, whereas Epicurus' argument is cogent. I would also argue personally that death is not something to be feared because, like Epicurus, I see no sufficient evidence

Tolstoy also employs irony as he examines the plight of Ivan Ilych. This highlights the differences between Ilych's perception of his own life and reality while also allowing the reader to take part in some of the tearing anguish Ivan feels in having to submit to the wrongdoings in his life. Tolstoy compares Ivan Ilych's struggle to the plight of a man condemned to death as he "struggles in the hands of an executioner" (61). Ivan Ilych does not see death as a natural process, but as a punishment controlled by a merciless executioner, ironically much like the merciless judge he once was. Ivan Ilych's feels that death is an undeserved punishment because he never considered his own mortality. His obsession with social adroitness made mortality feel like a punishment, and his justification of this obsession made it impossible for him to let go of his life. Ivan Ilych believed he had lived his life up to social standards and because of this he would not have to endure the terrible agony of death that is beset among ordinary people. In reality he was blind to his shallow life and the transgressions he made.

Tolstoy uses characters to show varying degrees of manipulation. Today’s society also displays many instances of manipulation, primarily in entertainment.

He recognizes that in this time period, people treated death with shame. It is therefore associated with guilt on the part of the dying person and is considered unmentionable by those around this person (50). Though death is part of the human experience, Ivan Ilyich experiences this same sense of self-reproach. As he progresses closer to death, those around him, both family and friends, deny his looming fate and forced him into loneliness. They treat his death as though it were pornographic, in Gorer’s terms, and instead attempt to ignore Ivan’s state. Rather than treating death as an almost ceremonial process as in previous time periods, others see Ivan’s descent into death as a burden. He sees death negatively as both poisoning his own life and the lives of those around him (Tolstoy 24). Gorer’s theory would regard Ivan’s death not as a hilarious obscenity, but a taboo “pornographic” subject that is almost entirely disregarded by those close to him. Ivan’s wife, doctor, children, and friends all consider his death to be but a common illness rather than accept the truth of the matter of

To make a good story it should start with an essential list of components. The opening situation, conflict, complication, climax, suspense, denouement, and then conclusion. Good authors and writers sometimes mix up these "ingredients" and add some spice. This is very much the case in The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy

I related readily with Ivan Ilyich, the main character in Leo Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilyich. There was a time when I myself lived my life without regard to the spirituality of life. I, however, was very lucky in that it did not take death looming over my head to realize this. Maybe the fact that my bout of depression’s onset happened sooner in life allowed me to see it sooner. Eric Simpson put it best as “We all die, like Ilyich, and if we only live to live, to create and carve our own meaning into the universe, then life itself becomes ultimately meaningless and painfully insignificant.”

In my personal opinion, I am not afraid of death, but I am afraid of the dying process. It’s undeniable that everyone will die at some point in time, so that’s no surprise. That should be expected by all. But, how you die is the tricky part. It might be a slow death, a very painful death, or it might just happen instantly with no hurting at all. It might scare some people that you could die at any moment of any day, but that doesn’t bother me. I know that most of it is out of my control, so why worry about it? Instead enjoy life and whatever happens in the end, will happen.

There is the life of approval, which is those who live to get others approval or attention. In which people like Ivan and majority of everyone in Ivan's society hope to obtain. Tolstoy believed the other life to be the authentic life which is represented by Gerasim, who enjoy life and sees it for what it is. The people in who live similar to Ivan are, self-centered, unable to have relationships with substance and too interested in material things. It becomes clear that the life of approval doesn't offer any reality nor probability when concerning the way things happen in life. Overall, deceives the mind and creates a different meaning of life. Those who live life similar to Gerasim is completely opposite of those similar to Ivan life. They show compassion and feeling sorrow. The feelings of others are actually considered. People are viewed as just beings approaching the end. Everyone is different and able to express their wants and dreams.

“The death of Ivan Ilych”, one of the widely celebrated piece of literature written by Leo Tolstoy, talks about a delusional man whose life seems to come to an end as he approaches the reality. It is a convincing story in which a person struggles to see the reality in the falsity he had created. The novella discusses a bitter and disturbing truth of human reality: the morale choices a person makes in his lifetime and the consequences he faces in his deathbed because of his choices.

Fear is a psychological disorder in our brains telling us there is a potential for pain. Practically every person has some sort of fear; some are common, such as fear of the dark, heights, flying and spiders. Though, one of the most universal fears in the world today is known as Thanatophobia, the fear of death. The reason for this is, as humans, we do not understand what dying really consists of, so we do not have the means to fathom what it truly is. If people understood death better, they would realize the truth about the fear: there is an irrational fear of death that should not exist.

Tolstoy's story opens with the observation that “Ivan Ilych's life had been most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible.” Tolstoy is stating the Ivan’s middle-class life was conformed and dull. It lacked true meaning. Ivan was not alone, in this story, of living this as most everyone in the story is materialistic and completely selfish. The Bible states that living your life this way is a life of sin. Ivan breaks all these rules. He chooses his wife because of her looks and status. Ivan lusts for acceptance in society. He is greedy for more money, power, and status on the social ladder. Ivan experiences the wrath of God in the form of his physical and spiritual suffering. Ivan doesn’t begin to repent until he is angrily cursing God for his suffering and he hears an inner voice that asks him what he wants. Ivan responds with “Why, to live as I used to—well and pleasantly” But with that reply, Ivan begins to realize that the life he had been living may not be too well and pleasant. Ivan is coming around to the fact that his life is empty of all but the sins that he has contentedly filled his life with. Only two hours before his death does he grasp that he could have lived better. He also realizes that he still had some time to try to fix what he can. When his wife and son come to visit him for the last time, he asks for their forgiveness. In his weakened state they cannot

After becoming ill, caused by a fall hitting his side on the window frame, he is now depressed, irritable, fearful and quarrelsome. His physical strength declines rapidly. One night while lying in the dark, he was visited by his first condition of being subject to die, in which he continuously tried to block out of his mind but it haunted him profusely. As the people around him pretends that he is only sick, Ivan now feels that he is surrounded by hypocrites,

We shall all come to it some day” (1270). Gerasim’s reply shows that unlike the other characters he does not deny that death is a normal occurrence, which may be the main reason why Ivan Ilych gravitates to him in the second half of the story. Ivan Ilych was also unaccepting of death during the first half of the story, he even continued to refer to death as “It”. Addressing death with this pronoun made it seem as if death was a person that was haunting

In Game of Thrones one of the few constants throughout the show is death. In the third scene of the show someone is killed, and people are killed right up to season seven’s finale. Almost everyone in Game of Thrones is faced with at least one near death experience, and all of the characters handle it in different ways. Being faced with death constantly leads to a couple of questions “what emotions should we face when we are about to die, and should we be afraid of death?” Death eventually comes for all of us, so why are we so afraid of it? At one point it is said “There is one god and its name is death”. Many characters acknowledge they know death is coming for them, and many acknowledge their fear, but many do not acknowledge that they