mc’s Reviews > The Death of Ivan Ilych > Status Update

Tolstoy's message is clear: compassion for and empathetic connection with other human beings are the hallmarks of a proper life. The death of Ivan Ilych is not the result of his physical degeneration, but of his failure to understand the true nature and meaning of life. In actuality, however, Ivan's death does not represent a cessation of life, but rather its affirmation.

Ch.12: Moving up in social esteem has not led to joy, fulfillment, and life, but to misery, emptiness, and death. Blinded by the values of high society, he has been traveling in the wrong direction on the road of life. When Ivan realizes his error and comes to a fuller understanding of the nature of life, he is reborn spiritually and experiences extreme joy. 

Ch. 12: By adopting the values of high society, Ivan's life has lost all value. Yet when Ivan realizes the error of his past life, when he feels sorry for Vasya and Praskovya, when he opens himself up to an empathetic connection with another human being, the walls fall from around him. The self-erected barriers drop away from all sides, and Ivan experiences the true joy of unimpeded, authentic human relationships.

Quote from chapter 12: The moment he answered his wife, he realized that he was lost, that there was no return, that the end had come, the very end, and that his doubts, still unresolved, remain with him.

Ch. 11: For the first time, Ivan recognizes the hypocrisy and artificiality of his life. He calls into question the values that he has lived by, and he honestly entertains the conclusion that the way he lived has obscured both life and death. A proper view of life, Ivan now understands, entails an acknowledgment of the inevitability of death, as well as an appreciation of the true joys of life.

Ch. 10: His spiritual rebirth is stalled because, as in Chapter IX, Ivan is still unable to admit that he has not lived correctly.

Ch. 8: "And as the family leaves to attend the play, we realize that Ivan's whole life is a play and that the falseness and artificiality of conventional life has caused his death."

Ch. 7: By the end of the chapter, it is the moral pain caused by "the lie" that torments Ivan most of all. And it is clear that "the lie" carried on by his friends and family is symptomatic of a larger problem plaguing Ivan's society as a whole: the inability to acknowledge the unpleasant aspects of life.

Ch. 7: In addition to his function as spiritual midwife, Gerasim also represents truthfulness. Gerasim's willingness to admit and accept the fact that Ivan is dying is in contrast to the hypocritical attitude of Ivan's family and friends. By acknowledging that it is death and not illness, Gerasim explodes "the lie" and is able to connect with Ivan on a sympathetic and human level.

It is interesting that Gerasim's contact with Ivan is intimately physical. He not only helps Ivan with his bodily eliminations, he also comforts Ivan by "supporting" Ivan's feet on his own shoulders. This position is strikingly similar to the position of women during childbirth, and Tolstoy may be hinting at a process of spiritual rebirth helped along by Gerasim as a kind of midwife.