Book the Death of Ivan Ilyich

¶ … Death of Ivan Ilych

Before we interpret some of the main religious ideas behind Tolstoy's story, we will first examine some of the main characters who surround Ivan Ilych, during his life and during his long tortuous death struggles.

The reader first meets Peter Ivanovich in the very opening of the story. We soon learn that he works with Ivan Ilych in the "Law Courts" and that as youths they had studied law together. Tolstoy immediately puts a dark cloud over this assumed intimacy and affection, by clearly stating that the death of Peter Ivanovich's close friend does not engender pity or sadness, but rather, speculation on the "changes and promotions it might occasion among themselves." It is at the side of the character Peter Ivanovich that we, the readers, first enter the death room of Ivan Ilych, and first see his home, his family, and his laid out body in the coffin. We share his uncomfortableness during the scene: not quite knowing the proper way to behave, the right actions to take, and the right things to say. However our feelings for him are quickly changed when we see his real interest is in arranging his card game for the evening. Even in front of his friend's dead body, he can only think of getting away from the scene and sitting down to some gambling. We soon realize that his lifestyle is precisely the same as Ivan Ilych's was before his fateful fall. In a way he represents the life that the man in the coffin has given up, or transcended.

Gerasim is the faithful "butler's assistant" who is constantly at Ivan Ilych's side during his long slow descent into death. We know that Tolstoy idolized the Russian peasant, and Gerasim is obviously symbolic of all that the author found good in this sort of "salt-of-the-earth" character. He is portrayed as strong, healthy, simple, helpful, and sincere. He is a sort of opposite type to all the other scheming, crafty "civilized" people who populate the book. Ivan Ilych prefers to be with Gerasim above all others, and is even willing to accept his pity and sympathy, while he shows nothing but hatred towards the others if they try to show similar emotions towards the dying man. It is interesting that the only position he feels soothed is when he "has his legs resting on Gerasim's shoulders." Is Tolstoy suggesting that the upper classes in Russia have built up their cherished positions literally on the shoulders of the peasants? It is an interesting image that he presents many times towards the end of the story.

Proskovya Fedorovna is Ivan Ilych's wife. The reader's first introduction to her is not very favorable. Tolstoy immediately shows her as primarily interested in the financial aspects of her husband's death. She wonders if she can get more money from the government as a pension, and she tries to find a cheaper plot for Ivan's body. In a discussion with Peter Ivanovich about her husband's final painful days, she reveals her true selfish being when she ends saying: "Oh, what I have suffered." We learn that he had married his wife because she "came of a good family, was not bad looking, and had some little property." Ivan Ilych did not seem to much value his new companion, and was definitely not passionately in love with her. Tolstoy makes this clear when he combines (and therefore equates) his new household items with his marital affection: "conjugal caresses, the new furniture, new crockery and the new linen, were very pleasant." There may be some of Tolstoy's own poisoned marriage described in these passages here between Ivan and Prokovya. She decided at a certain point in her husband's illness, the attitude she would take to it: "that is was his own fault and was another of the annoyances he caused her." Her selfishness is made very repugnant to the reader. At one point she is depicted going out to enjoy the opera, as her husband wastes away at home. There is a falseness to the marriage, and a void or gulf between the married couple, which will not be rectified in the story: in the end Ivan merely learns to "pity her."

Vasya is Ivan's young "school-boy" son. He appears very little in the story, but plays a very important role in Ivan's struggles. During his final agonizing fits, it is his son that seems to provide a bridge between life and death, light and darkness, pain and love. His son catches his father's flaying hand, holds it and kisses it, and cries. Tolstoy writes that "at that very moment Ivan Ilych fell through (the black sack) and caught sight of the light, and it was revealed to him that though his life had not been what it should have been, this could still be rectified."

Both the stories of Bal Shem Tov and the biblical tale of Elisha in Damascus offer a perspective to interpret the spiritual journey that Ivan Ilych undertakes. We learn that in order to achieve a "good" end, we must go through a harrowing experience. The Israelites will be set on the right path only after much pain and suffering has been endured. And so it is with Ivan Ilych. To achieve his final "enlightenment" he must go through a baptism of fire. He must, just as Rabbi Zusya did, lay himself bare to feel the total power and terror of his God. And ironically it is in this "total surrender" to "His Will," that a true "freedom" is achieved. Elimelech must also learn, after he wonders how his God can remain silent in the face of atrocities, that what on the surface may appear to be evil is actually (through God's plan) a mercy.