The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Confession

by Leo Tolstoy, Peter Carson (Translation), Mary Beard (Introduction)

In the last two days of his own life, Peter Carson completed these new translations of The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Confession before he succumbed to cancer in January 2013. Carson, the eminent British publisher, editor, and translator who, in the words of his author Mary Beard, “had probably more influence on the literary landscape of [England] over the past fifty years than any other single person,” must have seen the irony of translating Ilyich, Tolstoy’s profound meditation on death and loss, “but he pressed on regardless, apparently refusing to be distracted by the parallel of literature and life.” In Carson’s shimmering prose, these two transcendent works are presented in their most faithful rendering in English. Unlike so many previous translations that have tried to smooth out Tolstoy’s rough edges, Carson presents a translation that captures the verisimilitude and psychological realism of the original Russian text.

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Russia, Literature, Philosophy, Short Stories, Russian Literature

224 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1886

About the author

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Николаевич Толстой; most appropriately used Liev Tolstoy; commonly Leo Tolstoy in Anglophone countries) was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist fiction. Many consider Tolstoy to have been one of the world's greatest novelists. Tolstoy is equally known for his complicated and paradoxical persona and for his extreme moralistic and ascetic views, which he adopted after a moral crisis and spiritual awakening in the 1870s, after which he also became noted as a moral thinker and social reformer.

His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on 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 Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Reviews

[Megan Murray · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have you ever watched a film and walked away feeling like it shattered your world view. You walk away kind of wounded and groggy like it took something out of you? For me, that normally only happens with really great, dramatic films, but this piece of writing did that to me. I threw my book across the couch and just let it all sink in. It blew me away.

[Haley Annabelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ivan Ilych:Well-written and full of good lessons. If Tolstoy was a Christian he would have had a fabulous ending.

Confession: he was so close when he observed the faith of the common people. But he was way to practical about it and didn’t have any faith. I think in the end he turned to the Orthodox religion.

[victoria ˖ ࣪⊹౨ৎ⋆ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ok so I didn’t read confession but still marking as read !

[Carlos · Rating 5 out of 5]

León Tolstoi tenía 58 años cuando publicó su novela corta La muerte de Ivan Ilich, en la que realiza uno de los más penetrantes y conmovedores relatos sobre la muerte que se hayan escrito nunca.
•
Su poder para conmovernos y hacernos llorar yace en que su caracter ficcional hace más terrible su realismo: al leer esta “novella” sabemos que es perectamente posible que en nuestro lecho de muerte también nosotros pasemos por la agonía física, espiritual y psicológica de su protagonista.
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Pero Tolstoi, como el grandísimo escritor y conocedor de la naturaleza humana que era, sabía que es imposible hablar de la muerte sin hablar también de la vida. Nunca ha estado tan claro que ambas son caras de una misma moneda como en la reflexión de Ivan Ilich, en su lecho de muerte, cuando contempla su vida en retrospectiva y siente que aunque creía haberla vivido de manera “decorosa” y “ascendente”, solo ha sido un permanente descender:

“As if I were walking downhill at a regular pace, imagining I was walking uphill. That’s how it was. In the eyes of the world I was walking uphill, and to just that extent life was slipping away from under me. . . And now it’s time, to die!”
•
Pero La muerte de Ivan Ilich contiene también una elocuente y mordaz crítica de la sociedad de cualquier época y de determinados gremios como el de jueces y médicos. Y además una descripción -muy propia del naturalismo literario- del egoismo de aquellos que rodean a un enfermo terminal.
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De la narración destaco que empieza por el final, que administra eficazmente el tiempo narrativo, que emplea expresiones "formulaicas", como el uso insistente y recurrente de la palabra "decoro" aplicada a la vida, y que está hecha con la precisión de un cirujano y el aliento de un rapsoda.
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Tras valorar diferentes traducciones en español e inglés, me he decantado por la sobresaliente de Peter Carson, editor y traductor inglés de madre rusa fallecido en 2013. Se da la para mi emocionante circunstancia de que Carson realizó la traducción de esta obra encontrándose él mismo enfermo de muerte.
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Este libro probablemente sea mi mejor lectura de 2022.

[Steven R. Kraaijeveld · Rating 4 out of 5]

From The Death of Ivan Ilyich:

"How terrible and how stupid! It can't be! It can't be, but it is." (80)

From Confession:

"My situation was terrible. I knew that I would find nothing on the path of rational knowledge but the denial of life, but there, in faith, nothing but the denial of reason, which was even more impossible than the denial of life. According to rational knowledge it turned out that life is evil and people know this, that not to live is something that depends on them, but they have lived and do live, and I myself was living although I had known for long before that life is meaningless and evil. According to faith it turned out that in order to understand the meaning of life I had to renounce reason, the very thing for which meaning is needed." (166)

I had read The Death of Ivan Ilyich before, more than once, in fact, but not in the translation completed by Peter Carson—along with Confession (which I hadn't read before)—in the very last month of his life. The translation was wonderful and the experience of reading it especially poignant, given the facts—and the affinity in subject matter and approach (mainly in response to the question: Why live?) that Peter Carson perceived between the two clearly revealed itself in reading the two pieces back-to-back. In a sense, Ivan Ilyich—especially its ending—is a fictional representation of the question with which Tolstoy grapples non-fictionally in Confession: what is the meaning of (one's) life?

[Josh Laws · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Death of Ivan Ilyich is a very raw, stark and at times darkly humorous exploration of mortality through the lens of a dying judge who is honestly kind of a schmuck. The protagonist's flailing to try and get an answer to the mysterious ailment they're afflicted with resonates beyond its time period. Certainly worth the read and where the 4 star rating is coming from.

Confessions is an essay about Tolstoy's loss of faith and then later path back into the fold. It talks very explicitly about his suicidal idolizing. It's good for what it is and if you like deep philosophical dives into the meaning of life you will likely get something out of it. Just be prepared for a fair amount of arrogant pontificating.

[Stephanie McGuirk · Rating 4 out of 5]

They are mostly very depressing works that explore the meaning of life. But they also provide a glimmer of hope.
Confession, a memoir piece, was my favorite. Really relatable and mentally stimulating.

[Nancy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Death of Ivan Ilyich: I sought this novella out because Atul Gawande refers to it several times in Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End and because I have wanted to take another stab at Tolstoy thinking something short might help. (I've started War and Peace several times but never finished it.) While this may be a good description of the experience of dying, I found it hard to engage and care. Perhaps I got off to a bad start by the way the deaths of several of Ilyich's children are mentioned in passing. It was as if that was some sort of inconvenience that made his wife crabby.

Confession: I finally got back to this section of the book after reading [book:Tolstoy's False Disciple: The Untold Story of Leo Tolstoy and Vladimir Chertkov|20729820. That got me wondering exactly what Tolstoy's religious beliefs were. Confession seems to be a history of his struggle to identify religious truth and understand how good people of strong faith could believe such different things. I wondered about this same issue in my early teens and eventually decided there is no "truth" in religion. I've been comfortable without a belief in an afterlife for nearly 50 years now don't have the struggle with belief that Tolstoy had. This essay would probably resonate much more to someone who, like Tolstoy, feels sure there is a religious truth and wants to find it.

[Mohibullah Salarzai · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book tells the story of Ivan Ilyich, a successful judge in 19th-century Russia who, outwardly, appears to have it all—wealth, status, and a family. Yet, as Ivan confronts a debilitating illness, he begins to question the meaning of his life and his achievements, realizing too late that he has never lived authentically.

Despite having a respectable position and a family, Ivan finds himself isolated, surrounded by people who are more concerned with their own interests than with his well-being. Tolstoy captures the loneliness and despair that come with the awareness of a life wasted, presenting Ivan’s journey toward death as a painful awakening. Through Ivan’s death and the reactions of those around him, Tolstoy masterfully highlights the hollowness of a life lived for others’ approval, making this book as relevant today as when it was first written.

In conclusion, The Death of Ivan Ilyich is a profound work that captures the complexities of human life and death. It is a reminder that true fulfillment comes not from external validation or societal expectations, but from living a life true to oneself.

[Daphyne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wish I could give this a thousand stars! Tolstoy tackles all of the questions of life in this combined short story and his personal confession. In The Death of Ilyich we feel the emptiness of life, the loneliness of sickness, and the fear of death. In the Confession, Tolstoy lays before us his similar journey from banality to humanism to hopelessness to faith, and does it with solid reason & logic. Wow. I need my teens to read this.

[Lo · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Death of Ivan Ilyich: 3.5/5
Confession: 5/5
Overall: 5/5

Review to come.

[Kodanda Rama · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Death of Ivan Ilyich has become one of my favourite stories. It is harrowing, darkly funny and gives a remarkable insight into the mind of a dying person and his struggle at coming to terms with and accepting his death. His life is so ordinary and thus so very terrible. And he gets caught unaware when he knows of his impending death.

Confession has some incredibly profound thoughts. The sections until about half the essay, Tolstoy tries to reason the meaning of his life, falls prey to nihilistic thoughts and contemplates suicide is absolutely brilliant and riveting. It also serves as the basis of the ideas that were explored in the death of Ivan Ilyich so we can understand it better when they are read together.

But I didn't get as clearly his arguments for the return to faith except to remove the mental struggle of dealing with that meaninglessness in everyday life. It is just the case of me criticising my own inability to comprehend some of his ideas as they were intended.

This is my first Tolstoy read so probably I will understand it better once I know his other works, his life and once I read more philosophy in general. May be the ideas are too deep for me to be understood on the first read. The first half of Confession was soo good that I will re read it in the future and hopefully then will have a better understanding of the second part of his argument.

[Eleanor Levine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tolstoy, while you put me to sleep with "Confession," "The Death of Ivan Ilyich," transported me to the spidery aristocracy and their insufferable crankiness. What a great translation, though it is my first read of this novella. I've read Anna K and War and Peace, but never this depressing micro-tome, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I tried, truly, to read Tolstoy's "Confession," where he professes, at least in the first fifty pages, to being a tortured soul, though he owns an estate, has a big family and is a successful author from a commercial and literary standpoint. Still, I didn't find any engaging and stressful moments in "Confession," and if I really want existential angst, I'll try Friedrich N or Mr. Sartre. "The Death of Ivan Ilyich," however, is the vivisection of the presumptuous magistrate whose body/soul falls apart in the midst of his grandeur and wealth. This is the essence of all that rhetoric that is taking up room in "Confession."

[Ivan L. · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is by far my favorite book of all time. while tolstoy isn't known for his easy-reads, this book is the personification of a well thought-out metaphor laced in layman's terms. while the answer of christianity (or, capital R religion)) at the end is nothing short but expected from a man who found himself in religion towards the latter half of his life, that particular quality (which i'm not too much of a fan of) is overshadowed by his outright perfect analysis of man and their reflections on death through peter, and falling into the ease of being One of Them through ivan.

i hope i read this book until i die. and, i guess, find heaven.

[Ann Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finished the year as I started it -with Tolstoy. “Anna Karenina” in the summer made it a nice set. So interesting to read these four later books of his and learn about his faith and the change in his worldview. The memoir “Confession” mirrors what happens to Levin in “Anna”, and also explains the novel “Resurrection,” which started my year. Interesting to hear him refer to “War & Peace” and his other earlier novels as “vanity.” Brilliant, fascinating man.

[Silly lil goose · Rating 5 out of 5]

TDOII: it was a bit hard to get into at first, but there was a part in the book that really clicked for me. 4 stars

Confession: omg. I. Love. I think I have to give this book a 6/5 stars. I have never felt this way about a book before… it makes me want to dive into understanding the rejection of religion by other philosophers.

[Spectre · Rating 3 out of 5]

The classic author shares his views of death as well as his personal struggle with faith amidst what seems to be a significant battle with depression.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked The Death of Ivan Ilyich better than Confession.

[Toe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Book 1: The Death of Ivan Ilyich

Objective Summary

Ivan Ilyich Golovin died on February 4, 1882. His coworkers, who were his closest “friends,” immediately thought of how his death would impact their careers. His wife immediately thought of how his death would impact the amount of money she could extract from the government. These responses give credence to Ivan’s fears late in life that he had lived his life “wrong.”

Ivan was a 45-year-old Russian judge. He left a wife and two kids, a boy and a girl. His life was “very simple and ordinary and very awful.” He always chased “decorum” and social standing. He sought to rise through the ranks of his government job with a moderate amount of success. He married his wife because it was a sensible match. They were happy for about one year in the beginning. But then she became unhappy, controlling, and nagging. They fought and grew cold and distant toward each other, though they maintained appearances during parties and social gatherings. He buried himself in his work as a source of pride and happiness. But Ivan’s greatest joy in life was the Russian card game similar to bridge called vint.

After a promotion at work, Ivan fell while hanging a curtain in his home, injuring his side. He deteriorated over the course of several (4?) months. Doctors did not agree on a diagnosis, and it is unclear what he had (a floating kidney, appendicitis, cancer, or something else). Ivan oscillated between hope of recovery and fear of death. He wanted to live and could not grasp the overwhelming finality of death. He suffered immense physical pain.

Most of all, Ivan hated how everyone around him indulged in the “lie” that he was merely ill and would recover. By pretending that his death was equivalent to a simple unpleasantness, those around him refused to acknowledge the impending doom he faced and that they would one day face. Only one person, Gerasim, a peasant and Ivan’s manservant, acknowledged that Ivan was dying. Gerasim sympathized with Ivan’s suffering and did everything he could to alleviate it.

Ivan eventually admits to himself that he lived his life “wrong” in that his worldly ambitions and interests were pointless. The immediacy of his end revealed to him that decorum and superficiality did not provide him a meaningful life. The ending is ambiguous. Ivan takes communion. Later, “some kind of force str[ikes] him in the chest and on the side.” He falls into a black hole and sees a light. He gains pity for his wife and daughter, both of whom continue to strive for the superficial. He realizes that his death will be a relief to them. His fear of death disappears. Death is no more, and he is filled with joy.


Subjective Thoughts

This is my third book in a row dealing with life and death; the other two were Siddhartha by Hesse and The Stranger by Camus. This one is probably the most unsettling. Siddhartha gives hope of peace through the eternal cycle. The Stranger gives hope of peace through absurdity and nothingness. The Death of Ivan Ilyich doesn’t give hope, at least not clearly. It seems to be a warning to find meaning in life before it’s too late. If it’s already too late for you, tough shit. We’re all going to die, and it will be very painful for at least some of us. In addition to the physical suffering, which can be extended and intense, there is a commensurate mental anguish that is as inescapable as death itself. So, in the words of Robert De Niro from Meet the Parents, “We’ll look forward to that, Greg.”

And Tolstoy doesn’t provide much hint at how to approach this fateful journey. The ending is ambiguous and shrouded in mystery. I guess it has to be that way, since none of us really know what to expect. We don’t know what force struck Ivan, or what he realized at the end. Did he actually love his wife and kids in the end? Did he realize he had lived a fine life? What was the light? Did he find God? Was his mental suffering because of the unknown and his unwillingness to accept his fate, or is it inevitable? Was acceptance his relief? Or was he just delusional from pain, and his mind succumbed to senseless synaptic firings?

And what does a good, meaningful life consist of or look like? The best we can get out of Tolstoy is to be like Gerasim: Understand everyone is suffering and dying, comfort them when you can.


Memorable Quotes

“So on hearing of Ivan Ilyich’s death the first thought of each of the gentlemen meeting in the room was the significance the death might have for the transfer or promotion of the members themselves or their friends.”

“So—he’s dead; but here I am still, each thought or felt. At this point his closer acquaintances, the so-called friends of Ivan Ilyich, involuntarily thought that they now needed to carry out the very tedious requirements of etiquette and go to the requiem service and pay a visit of condolence to the widow.”

“Three days of terrible suffering and death. That can happen to me too, now, any minute, he thought, and for a moment he became frightened. But right away, he didn’t know how, there came to his aid the ordinary thought that this had happened to Ivan Ilyich and not to him, and this ought not and could not happen to him . . . .”

“[S]he talked away and unburdened herself of what was clearly her main business with him—how on her husband’s death she could get money from the treasury.”

“Ivan Ilyich’s past life had been very simple and ordinary and very awful.”

“[H]is life which had faltered was again taking on its true and natural character of cheerful pleasantness and decorum.”

“His official pleasures were pleasures of pride; his social pleasures were pleasures of vanity; but Ivan Ilyich’s real pleasures were the pleasures of playing vint [i.e., Russian card game similar to bridge].”

“Ivan Ilyich’s chief torment was the lie—that lie, for some reason recognized by everyone, that he was only ill but not dying, and that he only needed rest and treatment and then there would be some very good outcome. But he knew that whatever they did, there would be no outcome except even more painful suffering and death.”

“The terrible, horrific act of dying, he saw, had been brought down by all those surrounding him to the level of a casual unpleasantness, some breach of decorum . . . .”

“He wept for his helplessness, for his horrible loneliness, for people’s cruelty, for God’s cruelty, for God’s absence. ‘Why have you done all this? Why have you brought me here? Why, why do you torment me so horribly?’ He didn’t expect an answer, but he also wept because there wasn’t and couldn’t be an answer.”

“But what if in actual fact all my life, my conscious life, has been ‘wrong’? It occurred to him that the notion that had previously seemed to him a complete impossibility—that he had not lived his life as he should have done—could be the truth. It occurred to him that his barely noticeable attempts at struggling against what was considered good by those in high positions above him, those barely noticeable attempts which he had immediately rejected, could be genuine, and everything else wrong. His work and the structure of his life and his family and his social and professional interests—all that could be wrong. He tried to defend all that to himself. And suddenly he felt the fragility of what he was defending. And there was nothing to defend.”

“He searched for his old habitual fear of death and didn’t find it. Where was death? What death? There was no fear, because there was no death. Instead of death there was light. ‘So that’s it!’ he suddenly said aloud. ‘Such joy!’”


Book 2: Confession

Objective Summary

Confession is the story of Tolstoy’s (1828-1910) spiritual journey. Born into an aristocratic Russian family, he was raised in the Eastern Orthodox Christian faith. He followed what his elders told him as a young boy. But he developed doubts as a teenager, during his formal schooling, and as he witnessed his brother suffer and die in agony over the course of a year. He fought in the Crimean War and then wandered as an unbeliever for decades, writing, indulging his lusts, and tending to his 16,000-acre estate.

Despite ascending the heights of material comfort, fame, and social standing, Tolstoy remained unhappy as an unbeliever. He saw no escape from suffering, aging, and dying. He viewed life as an oriental fable about a traveler who dives down a well to escape a rampaging beast above. The traveler catches onto a branch halfway through the well. The branch has some drops of honey the traveler can lick. Below the traveler at the bottom of the well is a hungry dragon waiting to devour him. The traveler can neither climb up and out because of the rampaging beast, nor drop to the bottom because of the dragon. Meanwhile, one white mouse and one black mouse (representing night and day) are slowly gnawing on the base of the branch to which he clings.

Tolstoy reasoned himself into believing that life was meaningless and the only rational response was suicide. Neither the hard sciences, such as math and physics, nor philosophy could give him satisfactory answers to his biggest questions: “Is there any meaning in my life that wouldn’t be destroyed by the death that inevitably awaits me?” The sciences told him that in infinite time and space, an infinite number of particles arranged themselves in infinite combinations. One such “ephemeral causal connection of particles” was his body and what he perceived as his life. Eventually, those particles will separate, and his life will end. Similarly, philosophy gave no respite to the apparent meaninglessness of existence insofar as the best philosophers (Buddha, Solomon, Socrates, Schopenhauer) all said that life is suffering and death is freedom. Tolstoy’s reasoning on the matter boiled down to the simple identity that o = o, meaning existence is existence, which he found true but unhelpful. He was looking for—no, required—a reason for continuing his existence.

Tolstoy found people responded to this frightening fate in four ways. First, they were ignorant of it; they just didn’t know it was a problem or didn’t think about it. They did not know they were in a well. Second, they embraced Epicureanism, meaning they enjoyed the parts of life they could. As Solomon said, “Eat, drink, and be merry.” For tomorrow we die. They lick the honey on the branch. Third, with strength and energy, they could kill themselves. They could choose to let go of the branch and fall. Fourth, they could be weak by continuing to drag out life. They could fearfully hold on to the branch, hoping their situation would change.

Out of a longing for God, and perhaps cowardice, Tolstoy avoided suicide by choosing the fourth option. He continued his contemplations, and eventually discovered faith in God as the reason for living. He consciously set aside reason as a closed avenue for providing meaning to his life. Religion, for him, provided answers to all his biggest questions. “How should I live?” “By God’s law.” “What that is real will come out of my life?” “Eternal suffering or eternal bliss.” “What meaning of life is there that is not destroyed by death?” “Union with the infinity of God, paradise.”

He attended to church and applauded the simple lives and struggles of peasants. Tolstoy found that faith, unlike science, can reconcile the finite life with the infinite universe and an infinite God. He acknowledges that he could not buy into all religious teachings, particularly the ritual and dogma, but they contained truth that he believed. He ends his confession by describing his faith in God through a dream in which he is at first struggling and falling after wriggling free of ropes. But then he looks up at the light, and he is firmly held by a pillar that he does not understand but knows is strong.


Subjective Thoughts

Tolstoy’s spiritual journey is interesting and mercifully short. He was a thoughtful and intelligent man exploring eternal concepts. But I found his explanation (argument?) for faith incomplete. Or perhaps I just need more time to turn it over in my mind. He spent more time describing the meaningless of life than providing his answer to it, which boiled down to: Go to church. It’s unclear to me how the fact of millions of Russian peasants attending church bolsters the argument that life is actually meaningful, or there actually is a God. Yes, it can give poor peasants meaning. It is effective for many people. But how does its efficacy weigh in the calculus of the truth of the matter? Are we to set aside truth for meaning or efficacy? Is it not just a variation of his option number 1, ignorance, by pretending you’re not in a well, or there is no rampaging beast up top? And, to the extent Tolstoy champions an idyllic life of manual labor, I find it unconvincing coming from an aristocrat who, as far as I can tell, never actually engaged in hard manual labor himself for any considerable period. But maybe there is something to the idea that reason is not the way to God, or to happiness.


Memorable Quotes

“I didn’t know myself what I wanted: I was afraid of life; I rushed away from it and at the same time I still hoped for something from it.”

“‘You are a lump of something stuck together by chance. The lump decays. The lump calls this decay its life. The lump will disintegrate and the decay and all its questions will come to an end.’ That is the answer given by the bright side of science, and it cannot give any other if it just strictly follows its principles.”

“So those are the direct answers human wisdom gives when it answers the question of life.
‘The life of the body is evil and a lie. And therefore the destruction of this life of the body is something good, and we must desire it,’ says Socrates.
‘Life is that which ought not to be—an evil—and the going into nothingness is the sole good of life,’ says Schopenhauer.
‘Everything in the world—folly and wisdom and riches and poverty and happiness and grief—all is vanity and nonsense. Man will die and nothing will remain. And that is foolish,’ says Solomon.
‘One must not live with the awareness of the inevitability of suffering, weakness, old age, and death—one must free oneself from life, from all possibility of life,’ says Buddha.”

“Whatever the faith and whatever the answers and to whomever it might give them, every answer from faith gives the finite existence of man a meaning of the infinite—a meaning that is not destroyed by suffering, privations and death.”

“[F]aith is the knowledge of the meaning of man’s life, as a result of which man does not destroy himself but lives. Faith is the life force. If a man lives, then he believes in something. If he didn’t believe that one must live for something, then he wouldn’t live.”

[Itachisan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tolstoy and his translator
- leo died from pneumonia
- left his wife in middle of the night bc thats what old men do in their final days to find peace and solitude
- stayed in a house in Astapovo bc got critically ill
- he's a vegetarian, pacifist, persistent critic of russian empire and russian orthodox church (he favored a primitive version of Christianity)
- became very obsessed with death especially in final days
- opposes death penalty after seeing someone get guillotined in paris
- reflects on the big questions like "if we must die what's the point in living"
- kinda unknown what illness/disease leo had

The Death of Ivan Ilyich
1
- ivan ilyich died, he will have a funeral
- people of the court (not sure what their jobs are, seems like they're lawyers i guess?) or ivan's friends i guess dont seem too saddened by his death, more concerned with how now that he's gone they're gonna get promotions and how things might be different at work now
- they have thoughts like "he died, not me" so im safe
- wth they're at ivan's house and some schwarz dude and pyotr are debating when they can play vint (russian card game)
- how's pyotr a friend when it feels like ivan's death is some sort of joke to him wth
- "this expression also held a reproach or reminder to the living. pyotr ivanovich found this reminder inappropriate - or at least not one applying to himself. this gave pyotr ivanovich an unpleasant feeling" does this dude think he's immortal?? and tbh a lot of people are like that they get uncomfy with the reminder of death. and idk it feels almost selfish especially from an islamic perspective bc rn the fact that ur feeling icky isnt the issue but a dead man transitioning to the afterlife is
- after that ivan's wife tells him ivan suffered in his last days pyotr gets spooked and thinks that can happen to him too at any minute but he pushed these "gloomy" thoughts away bc this happened to ivan and not him
- widow is crying and all but wondering how she can get treasury bc of her now dead husband (not the wife being more concerned with her money...)
- it seems ivan's son and daughter can't stand pyotr..they probs know his intentions are off
- he ended up making it on time for vint ya allah

2
- ivan's life was ordinary and awful apparently, was a member of the court of justice
- he's the 2nd brother of 3, the first had a random position like the dad while the 3rd was a failure and no one really spoke about him, worked in railways
- ivan was a middle between his brothers, never pleased anyone or went above and beyond just did what he had to do like a normal person
- he gave in to vanity lots and liked to associate with the people of higher positions, integrated himself into their lifestyle
- took his work as a lawyer seriously but was sociable and witty. had affairs (wasnt married then so i guess just had premarital sex?), drank, etc
- got a new job in another city as magistrate, and this position held much more power and affected people's lives directly as opposed to the other postion. says everyone was "in his hands"
- took on a diff approach at this new job, became more distant with government authorities and kept close to his circle of lawyers and adopted a slight a tone of slight dissatisfaction with government (this is an obvious trait of tolstoy as previously mentioned)
- met his wife, Praskovya, after 2 years of being in this new city
- he used to dance and he kinda flirted with his wife like that, by dancing with her at events
- the way he's describing his wife its like he just settled with her yikes and not fallen in love with her..he says she fell in love with me but never says the opposite
- wife got pregnant and became unpleasant lmfaoooo ITS LITERAL PREGNANCY??? SIS IS HORMONAL GET OVER IT. he would ignore her and life his life however like ???? not vibing with ivan at all anymore
- confused..kid is born and mentions real and imaginary illness of child and mother so is there something acc wrong with them??
- ivan begins investing more into his work life and securing a more independent life from the family for himself
- he took what he wanted from married life, food, bed and everyone knowing he's married (so all the good stuff basically...ok) and he found happiness in his work. this fucker just did not wanna invest some time in his marriage and just kept running away. idk whats wrong with the wife but clearly he didnt support her in anything so he can die (which he did lmao) for all i care
- more children got born and the wife became more angry but ivan was used to her moods so it wasnt anything new to him (no like i cant stand him now fr)
- moved to a new city bc he's now a prosecutor, 2 children died :(, less money bc life more expensive there. so family life became even more unpleasant for ivan
- he fought with his wife lots too and family became some public decoration only. he spent less time with them and become more and more tied to his official work (he's said this lots by now)
- another kid died left with daughter and son. to be spiteful towards his wife he didn't sent his son to law school and instead to the gymnasium (girl what....OUT OF SPITE??)

3
- ivan wanted to be president of something but someone called Hoppe got the position, he got super angry and basically fought everyone
- that year his salary wasn't enough and no one bothered to help him, felt like everyone forgot him
- ivan traveled to petersburg to do some petition for those who didnt appreciate him so that he can transfer to another ministry
- ivan ended up getting his old position (was 2 positions higher than his collegues) and the salary he wanted. theyre moving to peterburg and settling into this new life. him n wife were on better agreements now
- became super super absorbed in decorating their new apartment. decorated like he was rich but bought things cheaply. was hanging curtains and fell (it bruised but he said he was fine)
- liked how there was always something to do with the house...until there wasnt and he became bored.
- he basically didnt have much friends tho, just professional relationships and he seemed proud bc its keeping his personal life separate from his work life
- tbh his life sounds so boring, there's no energy or life or excitement to it. he's so invested in his work, doesnt seem to have real friends bc he kinda just uses them for work too, sucky relationship with wife, not too invested in his children...like whats ur purpose here then
- he loves vint, calls it a real pleasure (so different from his official/social pleasures)
- "and everything went on like that, without any change, and everything was good." the calm before the storm i see lmfao

4
- ivan became so irritable bc of the odd taste in his mouth and the pain in his side, ruined the peace they had with his wife. wife hates him so much and wishes he dies but then she wouldnt have a salary so she's conflicted (well this explains asking for the pension thing lmfao sis is tryna get that bag)
- went to doctor and the doctor kinda stepped around answering the question if his situation was bad (aka am i gonna die??). told his wife and daughter about the situation but they didnt even seem concerned about him either so he kinda just assumed things are fine
- pain didnt get relieved with meds he was taking but he kinda convinced himself things were fine, the way he's in denial
- went to so many doctors and got pointed in diff directions but all their meds and solutions never gave him any relief.
- his situation got worseeee and ppl around him didnt understand and didnt want to understand
- his wife blamed him for the horrible mood yikes lmfao she does not care one bit about him, his daughter too
- everyone around him also didnt take it seriously and would joke about it, schwarz (the dude wanting to play vint) also took things so gleefully and cheerily
- his "friends" even took pity on him during vint and ivan would ruin the mood for them too
- "and he had to live like that on the brink of the abyss, all alone, without a single person who could understand and take pity on him."

5
- his brother in law upon seeing him went yikes which made ivan realize his appearance became so bad
- got hit with the realization that he is indeed going to die and no amount of convincing himself can deny that
- he's terrified of dying, having a crisis, no one seems to understand the state he's in

6
- he knows humans are mortals but he never imagined it happening to him. this is so true tho u see death so much and it sometimes never hits u that that can be u at any moment. we kinda separate ourselves from it. we think we're immune from death n its bad
- cant understand death, very confused rn
- immersed himself in work and did what he used to do, a time where death wasnt on his mind like now but alas, even his work as a judge got affected by his thoughts
- starts referring to death as It

7
- pooping was unpleasant but the manservant Gerasim made things bearable
- made gerasim hold up his legs bc it felt better, he starts talking to him , says that only gerasim understood him and had pity for him everyone else didnt even want to understand his situation
- he's lying about how he's dying, just told everyone at work its an illness so no one's taking things too seriously
- ivan wants to be taken care of like a sick child

8
- doesn't want to be left alone
- "he hates her with his whole soul" how are they not divorced yet omg
- the wife acts like everything is ivan's fault and that he's to blame like girl he's dying raw2e shway

9
- blaming god here as to why this is happening to him :/
-"why have u done all this? why have u brought me here? why, why do u torment me so badly?"
- trying to look back on good moments in his life and realizes there arent any outside of his childhood
- questioning if maybe he didnt live the way he should have but then rejects that idea bc he lived in the proper and "correct" way so then why is he being tormented like this..

10
- very lonely, spends his days going over memories

11
- finally realized that the impossibility of his life being all wrong is actually exactly the reality and this drove him into a deeper mental abyss bc theres nothing he can do about it now since hes dying
- looks at his wife and daughter and knows their life was just a fraud all along

12
- 3 days of screaming, full on misery, about to die
- an hour before dying, his son visits him
- realizes he doesnt wanna make things hard for his family bc the son and wife were crying
- says to them "forgive me", to free himself and them from the sufferings, notices the pain leaves
- didnt fear death anymore bc death wasnt there anymore..it got replaced by light seems like some final epiphany is happening here
- he dies with his famous quote

ok so after reaserching it seems that his famous quote at the end isnt really random and there's a connection to jesus' final words here. jesus had said "it is finished" in john 19:30 meaning that his suffering is over and that the task is completed. here tolstoy is saying that yeah his life is over like christ's but also that death has no more control of him bc he didnt fear it anymore.

tbh i expected more from this story ngl. there arent even good quotes to take away from this so like??? i mean i get it he described death from the pov of a dying man but like it wasnt as detailed as i hoped it would be? finally when things like god and questioning one's life choices were talked about the story had ended which is unfortunate bc its those thoughts i wouldve wanted more development on. i guess reading confessions will give me more insight on this story bc ik theres more religious symbolism i missed out on but like if the story isnt enough by itself then why read it u know....idk i guess i put high expectations from it and thought id come out a changed woman lmao but whatever. it was fine, not something id reread nor something id go to when im questioning life/death. and tbh i thought it would be more like st augustine's confessions but it really wasnt. ik theyre kinda different, ones a conversion story the other is a dying man but still. id give this alone a 1/5. i didnt hate it but didnt gain anything from it

Confessions
-brought up orthodox christian but his faith was very shaky
- one should go to church and partake in those social activities but not take anything too seriously (which is how lots live their lives these days tbh, outside of visiting the mosque there is no real belief in god)
- says how all the good traits orthodoxy were supposed to have were actually found in non believers
- religion kinda becomes a habit that one does not out of devotion and belief but for the sake of keeping up habits we learned while younger. these actions are now meaningless. (explains why lots leave the religion as they grow older, they see that its pointless to do things if their heart really isnt into it or if they dont believe in it)
- stopped believing at 16, didnt do prayers nor attend church (a conscious decision)
- still believed in God and christ but couldnt really tell u beyond that
- his only real faith at the time was self-perfection (did it to please the people) and soon enough this transformed into wanting to be more powerful/famous/important than others
- when ur younger being good is mocked but doing bad is praised
- he did so many crimes (oppressed ppl really) and people still saw him as relatively moral
- began writing, mostly about the bad..he wanted to show off the good in him but couldnt
- started a new job as a writer and adopter the professional writers' way of life too which destroyed all former attempts for him to become better
- everyone he worked with didnt really know what they were doing and didnt know that they actually knew nothing. they thought themselves as poets and as teachers bc they're writer but they really arent bc they couldnt answer simple life questions. realizes that the real aim of all they did wasnt to educate but to gain praise and money. he keeps calling that place a madhouse
- stays in paris and sees a execution where someone gets beheaded and realizes that no logic of existence or progress can ever justify that act and notes that it is bad makes him a judge of whats bad not what other people say and do
- the death of his brother also had a similar affect
- came back home and decided to teach in peasant schools but the same problem came up, he's teaching without really knowing what
- "i went abroad a second time to learn there how i could manage to be able to teach others while knowing nothing myself"
- hmm the translation has some errors im ngl
- married
- lots of questions with no answers start bothering him like why? and then what? so what? these same questions plague my mind too
- omg would stop himself from hanging or shooting himself
- everything is meaningless and u die so how can u see all this and keep on living?

[Luciano Velesalami · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tbh probably worth a revisit later, maybe 5 stars

[John McDonald · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE DEATH OF IVAN ILYICH:
"Death is finished, it is no more," says Ivan Ilyich as he passes from the world. "He breathed in, stopped halfway, stretched himself,and died." Profoundly, he had not answered the question his final days posed, namely what did he live for? indeed, what do we all live for? It seems that, like Hamlet, Ilyich only understood his life in terms of his own death and that from the moment of birth, only death is certain.

Ilyich was that person who did every thing he was told, did it by the book, seized opportunities, and became predictable in his habits, his goals, his marriage and his security. As colleagues at the court died, retired, or left for other reasons, he calculated with reasonable certainty his chances of getting that colleague's better job, or promotion. At his death, his wife, for whom he had little love, sought ways to have the court for whom he was employed as a judge, pay for his funeral. His life was so predictable that it never occurred to him that a fall from a ladder which continued to cause pain could reflect the beginning of his end, which it was and which it became.

He resented that his wife and his doctors were telling him that he would recover, but he looked at them and saw in their faces that they pitied him. He saw that he was being treated differently even though they were telling him that he'd be just as he was. But he knew differently:

"It's not a case of the appendix or of the kidney, but of life and death. Yes, I had life and now it's passing, and I can't hold it back. That's it. Why deceive oneself? Isn't it obvious to everyone but myself that I am dying, and it's only a question of the number of weeks, days--maybe now."

His chief torment was "the lie" and he despised both it and those who promulgated it, including his wife who had already indicated that he wanted to leave him, before he fell and began to die. "The lie" poisoned his life, made him bitter and angry, and convinced him that he had been lied to throughout his life about how life really should be lived. In this sense, Ivan sought the same understanding that Tolstoy searched for in "Confession," asking himself, "what if, in actual fact, all my life, my conscious life, had been 'wrong'?

CONFESSION: Written as an introduction to an unpublished work and translated by Peter Carson, Confession is an invasion deep into the mind of someone very troubled by death and even more troubled by the meaninglessness of life underscored by religious faith or one punctuated by reason but wholly unsatisfying as evident in the lives lived by elites, well educated and sophisticated in matters of reason, art, literature, money, and the professions, but fundamentally unhappy chasing ephemeral goals.

His inquiries, or explorations of his own mind and manner of thinking, are torturous and bring him in a circle about the meaning of his life with the practice of religious faith or without it. His premise--what he and Solomon both concluded--is that "vanity of vanity, all is vanity. One generation passeth away; and another generation cometh but the earth abides forever. . . . As it happeneth to the fool, so it happeneth even to me; and why was I then more wise? Then, I said in my heart, this also is vanity. For, there is no remembrance of the wise more than of the fool forever, seeing that which now is in the days to come shall all be forgotten. And how dieth the wise man? As the fool. . . ." He asserts that "Happy is he who was not born; death is better than life; one needs to be rid of life. I interpreted this as a reflection of the attitude of Shakyamuni, the prince who when venturing from his castle is exposed for the first time to toothless, sick men and women who die and when they do, begin to stink and rot. It is the Buddha's version of virtue which says,
"one must not live with the inevitability of suffering, weakness, old age, and death--one must
free oneself from life, from all possibility of life."

This seems to be a proposition Tolstoy can live with, but finds that to do so, he must essentially come to accept what Ivan Ilyich accepted, that all seeking or experiencing contributes nothing if not pursued or experienced to the core purpose of "creating" good, done through virtue.

Tolstoy searches, it seems, to find a place for faith in his journey through life. He remains uncertain, except that he knows that the only rational approach to bring faith into his way of living is to live a life that seeks to do good for himself and those around him. As he says, all else is vanity and we die with nothing more than that unless we make life better for someone else, or as he put it, eschew all pleasures in life, and "submit, endure, be merciful."

Confessions and Ivan Ilych were so profound in their sentiments that I am likely to buy a copy for my own, and like many of my favorite books which leave me confounded, read and re-read it, since it really is that good.

[Lekeshua · Rating 5 out of 5]

Speechless...

[Tina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Listened to audiobook read by Simon Prebble. Powerful psychological portrait, not for the faint of heart.

[kathryn donovan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poor Ivan Ilyich couldn't survive middle age and the hedonic treadmill that he was thrown off of when he fell from ladder. He fell decorating his dumb house, thinking his cliche design decor would somehow reflect him and his personality and add merit to his life.

It's like how my online yoga instructors all arrange the backgrounds of their at-home studios. Why is there a guitar propped against the door? What happens if you need to get out? Why are your fiddle leaf plants centered just so? What is that Native American- indigenous-looking-artwork- mass-produced- in a-Chinese- factory even for? (These things are shipped to the United States. Think about that for a second. )How is it even possible to arrange your books by the color of their spines?

Home decor is a superficial vanity that will slowly suck the life out of all of us. Let that be the lesson we get from Ivan Illyich.

The beginning of Tolstoy's Confessions reminded me of my own suicidal ideations in college. My therapist at the time made me keep a journal. I wrote about all the people I knew and met and why I think they should also kill themselves because life was dumb for everyone. When I let her read my journal, she got upset. Then she told me I needed to eat something and gave me a Luna Bar. It was a weird experience.

Tolstoy ultimately comes to the conclusion that faith keeps us alive, but not the kind of faith that makes us believe that the eucharist wafer literally becomes the body of Christ. The other kind of faith-- the one that apparently can only be explained through a dream metaphor. Someone give Tolstoy a Luna Bar, I think he needs to eat something.

[Kaitlyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm an official Tolstoy stan.

[Dean · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's fascinating to compare "The Death of Ivan Illyich" and "Confession," and for me the fictional version of the dilemma of life and death was much the better. Tolstoy captures the isolation faced by the dying man, who craves honest human contact, no matter how difficult, and is repelled by sympathetic expressions about his health from family members - who, he realizes, find his death to be emotionally inconvenient.

The end:

And suddenly it became clear to him that what was tormenting him and would not be resolved was suddenly all resolved at once, on two sides, on ten sides, on all sides. He was sorry for them, he had to act so that it was not painful for them. To deliver them and deliver himself from these sufferings. "How good and how simple," he thought. "And the pain?" he asked himself. "What's. become of it? Where are you, pain?"

He became attentive.

"Yes, there it is. Well, then, let there be pain.

"And death? Where is it?"

He sought his old habitual fear of death and could not find it. Where was it? What death? There was no more fear because there was no more death.

Instead of death there was light.

"So that's it!" he suddenly said aloud. "What joy!"

For him all this happened in an instant and the significance of that instant never changed. For those present, his agony went on for two more hours. Something gurgled in his chest; his emaciated body kept twitching. Then the gurgling and wheezing gradually subsided.

"It's finished!" someone said over him.

He heard those words and repeated them in his soul. "Death is finished," he said to himself. "It is no more."

He drew in air, stopped at mid-breath, stretched out, and died.

[Daniel Polansky]

I should really keep a list on goodreads of things I was supposed to read in high school but did not. This was my first encounter with Tolstoy's iconic existential novelette detailing the slow death by disease of the eponymous, a bourgeois judge whose superficial, meaningless existence is figuratively, than literately, brought to an end. A soaring and profound meditation.

[Grady Ormsby · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy is a novella first published in 1886. Tolstoy examines a number of themes: the trap of bourgeois expectations, the emptiness of ambition, the inevitability of death, the consequences of living without meaning, filial love and loyalty.

The story opens in medias res as Ivan's wife Praskovya frets about how to maximize her dead husband's government pension. The reader is introduced to various characters who played a part in Ivan’s life as they visit to pay their respects. Then the action goes back thirty years into the past following Ivan through law school, marriage, family and higher paying positions in government. His rise in status corresponds to an increase in his absorption into his work and the disruption in his family life. He seems consumed not so much by ambition as an overwhelming expectation and supposition of success.

After being appointed to the position of a high court judge, Ivan departs alone to buy and furnish a house in preparation for the family's arrival in the city. While hanging curtains he makes a false step and falls, injuring his side. The injury does not seem serious at first, but its effects are chronic and pervasive. Multiple doctors are consulted to no avail. As his medical condition worsens, so do all the other aspects of his life. He grows ever more depressed and fearful. Distracted by her own preoccupation with social appearance, Praskovya offers no compassion. Ivan can hardly hide his growing hatred of her. His deterioration is told in agonizing detail and the reader begins to wonder, “Why I am still reading this incredibly depressing story?”

Ivan’s only relief and comfort are provided by the attention of his little son Vasya and the devoted ministrations of his peasant servant Gerasim, who alone from all the other characters does not fear death. Ivan begins to examine his life and to question whether he has, in fact, lived a good one.

Finally, in last three pages, both Ivan and the reader get relief from the horrible suffering. Perhaps I should give a spoiler alert as I quote some snippets. “ …he tossed about in the black sack into which he was being pushed…” “Suddenly some kind of force struck him…he collapsed into the hole and there…some light was showing.” “At that very moment Ivan Ilyich fell through and saw a light, and it was revealed to him that his life had been wrong, but that it was still possible to mend things.” “He searched for his old habitual fear of death and didn’t find it.” “Instead of death there was light. ‘So that’s it!’ he suddenly said aloud. ‘Such joy!’”

This ending is very much an exclamation point to Tolstoy’s own philosophical, spiritual and existential searches. It is an affirmation of faith, morality the necessity of a connection to life.

[Tori · Rating 5 out of 5]

This made me cry on the bus. I have never been terminally ill (lol) but as such a common experience you can very easily empathize with Ivan and feel for him, especially with a character so flawed and cynical. A bad situation with a bad man and is so good. Caveman words.

American Psycho of russian classic lit? Life and death and materialism... Change 80s new york to Russia in the Victorian age.

Ivan’s a little gay. He likes Geronimo too much and doesn’t like his wife at all.

Ivan is also a funny little cynic. “For christ’s sake let me die in peace.” haha. Made me breathe out of my nose once, made me want to die a hundred times.

The denial, self-reflection, and then pure AGONNYYY, longing for better days and the hopelessness knowing they will never be back.

The last moment when he finally feels sympathy for his wife... the “lie” of other people tip-toeing around his death, his want to be coddled, kissed and soothed like a baby, There is so much good about this. I fucking hate thinking about death but i would read this 1000 times over again. AHHHHHHHHHH. Wow. I could write an essay.