My Confession By Leo Tolstoy

In the short novel “The Death of Ivan Ilyich,” Leo Tolstoy seeks to warn and hopefully save the souls of his readers from living empty lives by making an example out of the main character in the story, Ivan Ilyich. Although the main theme in the novel deals with death, Tolstoy presents a number of other themes such as: the need to live a natural balanced life not dominated by propriety and decorum, the dangers of living artificial lives governed by materialism, self-interest, shallow relationships, bourgeois societal expectations, suffering, and later on redemption and altruism. Tolstoy uses these themes as a way to convince people to live and pursue what brings them real happiness not to meet the expectations of others or society.

In The Death of Ivan Ilych Leo Tolstoy conveys the psychological importance of the last, pivotal scene through the use of diction, symbolism, irony. As Ivan Ilych suffers through his last moments on earth, Tolstoy narrates this man's struggle to evolve and to ultimately realize his life was not perfect. Using symbols Tolstoy creates a vivid image pertaining to a topic few people can even start to comprehend- the reexamination of one's life while on the brink of death. In using symbols and irony Tolstoy vividly conveys the manner in which Ilych views death as darkness unto his last moments of life when he finally admits imperfection.

Furthermore, in Leo Tolstoy‘s The Death of Ivan Ilyich, and analysis will demonstrate that the character Ivan Ilyich struggles throughout his life to achieve the ideals of liberty, life and the pursuit of happiness. It is through Ivan’s death and his friend’s narration of Ivan’s life that the reader comes to the realization the the middle-class Ivan has few strength’s besides his hard work to drive him towards his ideals for wealth and property. Ivan lived his whole life with the purpose of enjoying himself. He did this through winning power at work, spending money, buying things to impress his friends, throwing parties, and playing bridge. His pursuit of happiness in material things and pleasures is so great that his deliberately avoids anything unpleasant. This means that when he settled down with a family, which was expected of him, he never grows close to them.

Tolstoy was a Russian Novelist who longed for a nontraditional lifestyle far from his noble lineage (“Leo Tolstoy”).

When one is encountered with death, life’s meaning is revealed. We infrequently agonize over whether we live a healthy lifestyle until it is too late, as demonstrated in "The Death of Ivan Ilych” and “A Good Man is Hard to Find”. Both stories allow the readers to learn the consequences of living a completely selfish, non-Christian life. Through death, characters Ivan and the grandmother are encountered with conversion experiences, in which they reevaluate their own lives. O’Conner and Tolstoy exhibited the character’s reevaluation experience through similar themes in each story.

Ivan Ilyich is a court of justice of official that thought that he was living his life the correct way. As his story progresses he becomes more reflective and emotional as he deliberates the reason for his agonizing illness and death. Ivan spends his life climbing the social ladder, focusing more on his work as his family becomes less tolerable. One his while hanging curtains he felled and hurt his side. The pain becomes so profound, he goes to the doctor that diagnose him with a terminal condition. In his final days he realized the mistakes he made and repent of living the life he did (Tolstoy, 1888). This paper will talk about how illness and disease can change our experience in life.

The Holocaust was a despicable event that had dimmed the light of societal humanity throughout from the early nineteen thirties to the mid nineteen forties. As the years passed, historians scanned through the remaining evidence from this era in order to reveal the details of this sickening massacre to the public's eye. Teachers throughout the nation have made certain to cover all aspects of this event in history class. However, students would often dutifully question this continuous effort. Why should we study the Holocaust if it had already passed long ago? After all, the past is in the past. Shouldn't we be focusing on the future ahead of us instead? In the end, the confusion among the students may never be resolved to the best

Chekhov’s use of allusion in “Misery” also stands in stark contrast to the works of other Russian literary giants such as Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, whose works often featured deep themes revolving around the aforementioned Christian thought. While a deep discussion on these themes is out of the scope of this paper, perhaps one of the most obvious and contrasting examples can be found in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, which was published around 6 years before Chekhov wrote “Misery”. Towards the end of the novel, Father Zosima, a figure who acts as a mouthpiece for Dostoevsky’s own thoughts on religion, indirectly responds to the arguments of Ivan Karamazov, who rejects God because of the existence of suffering innocents and other

“Master and Man” by Leo Tolstoy is a story that explores the dynamics between a peasant, Nakita and his master,Vasillii Andriech. Andriech foolishly risks both of their lives, when they venture to another town in inclement weather to secure a business deal. Unfortunately, Andreich's impatience and greed ultimately leads to his demise. At the end of the story Nikita dies and is denied the same bliss that Vasillii Andreich experiences in death; in order to solidify the dichotomy between these two men, demonstrate how Andriech cheated Nakita, and he uses Nakita's lackluster death to amplify Andriech's extraordinary passing.

Tolstoy described a most terrifying agony in "The Death of Ivan Ilyich" Ivan Ilyich also lived a false life, filled with lies and artificially multiplied needs. All his colleagues liked him, and yet, on receiving the news of his death, their first thoughts were of the changes and promotions it might occasion among themselves or their acquaintances. They gave no thought to the deceased himself, who had but recently lived among them. Even in the beginning of the work we may conjecture from Ivan Ilyich's feeling of loneliness that the sense of isolation while dying horrified Tolstoy as much as the thought of death itself. This isolation, the novelist warns, influences man's relationship with nature, which includes not only his life

Leo Tolstoy and Franz Kafka both wrote fictional tales that represented their own lives, and how trivial their lives seemed when facing death. In Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Illyich, Tolstoy brings to life his own religious beliefs, (which had changed over time), as well as defining what is truly important in life, by exposing the trivial thoughts and nature of humanity that were often hidden or unacknowledged, let alone expressed openly. Franz Kafka used more of a symbolic fiction of life in The Metamorphosis, but at the same time still successfully exposed human nature, and how trivial life can be if spent unwisely, and only to please others according to burdened expectations forced on him by his family and society.

One of the themes of Tolstoy’s story of The Death of Ivan Ilych is detachment from life, considering that all material things can substitute the true meaning of life: compassion and care for others. “Everywhere in the novel, Tolstoy speaks of Iván Ilych's desire for propriety, decorous living, and pleasantness all while making this his first and most important priority. This motivation is a poor

In this paper, I plan to explain Dostoevsky’s criticism of Western Individualism. Dostoevsky’s first criticism resides in the idea to “love life more than the meaning of it, “which is presented by the character Alyosha (Dostoevsky 3). Allowing this character to discuss this topic, along with the commentary of Ivan, demonstrates their mindset to solely focus on their own lives, opposed to caring for others. This leads to them living for the now, and not focusing on how their decisions will affect their future or others. Dostoevsky disapproves of this notion because living by this mentality encourages the guidance of logic, which is dangerous because it could tell you to kill yourself. From Dostoevsky’s Eastern Orthodox background, he believes that the only way from living from this situation is to deny it. By denying this way of living, the focus toward life will not be directed toward yourself, but toward the way you can impact the environment around you. Ivan clearly does not believe in these values, due to his intentions to commit suicide at the age of thirty. As said before, living by the idea to “love life more than the meaning of it” leads to death, and Ivan indulges in this to the fullest (Dostoevsky 3).

Throughout the perspectives of Tolstoy’s life in “A Confession and Other Religious Writings”, he describes his depression as an unanswerable question. With his pursuit only ended up becoming more and more vague and pointless, Tolstoy was at his breaking point many times in his life despite his status as a successful author with a large family. The cause of Tolstoy’s distress is his meaning of life. Tolstoy wishes to know if there is a purpose to his life, will his works and effort mean anything in the long run or if they will be forgotten in the stream of time. In his state of despair, Tolstoy used other figures such as Solomon and Buddha in a way to justify death and his own interpretation of it so that way he does not feel alone or the only