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Loading... Death of Ivan Ilyich (original 1886; edition 1987)by Leo Tolstoy
Work InformationThe Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy (1886)
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Bleak Classic Brilliance I have to admit it took me a while to warm up to this, before it utterly chilled me. Beautiful, heartbreaking writing charting the life, death, and regrets of one man performed wonderfully by Simon Prebble. As someone with chronic conditions and a lot of pain, this definitely hits different. Just awfully well observed humanity in its crumbling. Over this past year, I’ve had a goal of reading more classics, and one of the ones that I put on my TBR list this past month was The Death of Ivan Illych. I was excited to read another Leo Tolstoy book—it’s probably been a good 15 years since I read anything he wrote, and what I remember of his stories is that they were pretty good. Since this is a reasonably short story, divided into chapters, I didn’t find it a difficult read. It was a bit slower than some books I’ve read, but that’s to be expected. I really enjoyed a few observations through the story—for example, one man sat down “on a low ottoman with deranged springs which yielded spasmodically under his weight.” (That description tickled my funny bone!) I also got a good chuckle out of a relatively dry observation in chapter two about how governments reward people for faithful service by giving them fictitious jobs (“and by no means fictitious thousands”). The story itself wasn’t all that striking, I found. It’s the story of a man dying from some sort of illness—likely cancer—and how he came to realize that he had, in effect, wasted his entire life. I did appreciate the inference that if we pour into others and have a relationship with God, we will have a much happier end—even if we do end up with broken health at the end of our lives. This story wasn’t nearly as memorable as some of the other Tolstoy stories I remember hearing or reading over the years, but I’m glad to be back in a space where I’m excited about reading his stories, and I’m looking forward to the next story I read from his pen!
The light ridicule with which it commences and the black horror in which it terminates... are alike suggestive of the Thackeray of Russia. Belongs to Publisher SeriesIs contained inThe Oxford Library of Short Novels {complete} by John Wain (indirect) Valitut kertomukset 2 ; suomentanut Juhani Konkka paitsi kertomuksen Kasakat, joka on Jalo Kaliman tarkistettu suomennos by Leo Tolstoi I capolavori (Anna Karenina - Guerra e pace - La morte di Ivan Il'ič- Resurrezione - La sonata a Kreutzer e altri racconti) (Italian Edition) by Lev Tolstoj (indirect) Works of Leo Tolstoy. (50 Works) Anna Karenina, War and Peace, Resurrection, Hadji Murad, A Confession, The Death of Ivan Ilych, The Kreutzer Sonata, The Forged Coupon and Other Stories & more (mobi) by Leo Tolstoy Tolstoy's Shorter Fiction Collection: The Death of Ivan Ilych, "Where Love Is, God Is", "How Much Land Does a Man Need?", "The Kruezer Sonata", among many others by Leo Tolstoy Has the adaptationInspiredHas as a student's study guideAwardsNotable Lists
Classic Literature.
Fiction.
HTML: Hailed as one of the world's masterpieces of psychological realism, The Death of Ivan Ilyich is the story of a worldly careerist, a high-court judge who has never given the inevitability of his death so much as a passing thought. But one day death announces itself to him, and to his shocked surprise he is brought face-to-face with his own mortality. How, Tolstoy asks, does an unreflective man confront his one and only moment of truth? The first part of the story portrays Ivan Ilyich's colleagues and family after he has died as they discuss the effect of his death on their careers and fortunes. In the second part, Tolstoy reveals the life of the man whose death seems so trivial. The perfect bureaucrat, Ilyich treasured his orderly domestic and office routine. Diagnosed with an incurable illness, he at first denies the truth but is influenced by the simple acceptance of his servant boy, and he comes to embrace the boy's belief that death is natural and not shameful. He comforts himself with happy memories of childhood and gradually realizes that he has ignored all his inner yearnings as he tried to do what was expected of him. Will Ilyich be able to come to terms with himself before his life ebbs away? This short novel was the artistic culmination of a profound spiritual crisis in Tolstoy's own life, a nine-year period following the publication of Anna Karenina during which he wrote not a word of fiction. A thoroughly absorbing glimpse into the abyss of death, it is also a strong testament to the possibility of finding spiritual salvation. .No library descriptions found.
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)891.733Literature Literature of other languages Literature of east Indo-European and Celtic languages Russian and East Slavic languages Russian fiction 1800–1917LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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Ivan Iliç, një gjykatës rus, duke parandier vdekjen, i rrëfehet vetvetes, paraqet gjithë etapat e jetës së tij të qendërzuara mbi fanitjet dhe sigurinë iluzore që ai shpresonte të siguronte për vetveten dhe për të tjerët në emër të drejtësisë. Po kështu edhe novela tjetër është një himn mbi jetën dhe dashurinë