I’ve reread my notes on this story 3-4 times, and every single time the reread sends shivers down my spine, after which I fall into a mini-depression. Maybe I’m doing something wrong just like Ivan Ilyich, and I’ll only find out at the very end? I want to brush these thoughts off and say “Nah, I think I’m doing everything right,” but then I remember that Ivan Ilyich said exactly the same words, desperately trying to defend his former way of life, and that was exactly what kept him from truly living.
But how did Ivan Ilyich live? He lived using public opinion as a compass. He married because the girl, well, seemed to match his status (though there were feelings too), but it has to be admitted that the main thing turning in his head was something like “One could find a person with a better dowry, but this one is fine too.” In his career, he was a judge because the job was respectable, and along with that he was very pleased that he could decide the fate of others.
Let’s talk about his last days. What tormented him most wasn’t physical pain, but the lie that enveloped his life, which manifested through his wife, daughter, and colleagues. Looking at his surroundings, he saw himself, and since he felt disgust toward these people before his death, he understood that something was wrong with him too. Something was wrong with how he lived his life, that he ended up surrounded by these people, that in his final days there was no one beside him who would understand how he felt, sympathize, and pity him. Everyone just wanted him to stop tormenting them faster so they could go back to leading a joyful life. Ivan Ilyich had lived by exactly this principle himself, trying to escape from anything that took the joy out of his life; that’s how he escaped from home to not hear his wife’s screams, and that’s exactly how he worked as a judge. Now it turned out that in the end he himself was suffering this same fate.
Why did he end up in this situation? I see two reasons. First — living life so that others think you’re living it well; As Ivan Ilyich said: “In public opinion I was going up the hill, and exactly to that extent life was slipping out from under me.” Second — living while trying to escape responsibility, problems, leaving everything to chance, and this despite the fact that the character worked as a judge, who you’d think should bear responsibility for the fates of others, and justly decide social matters. Ivan Ilyich ran from family problems; at work, if there was a problem beyond his authority, he left it as it was. In one word, he “drifted with the current.”
For now, this is what I see as the essence of the story, but most likely with time this will be supplemented and changed.
Quotes
Colleagues' thoughts
Кроме вызванных этой смертью в каждом соображений о перемещениях и возможных изменениях по службе, самый факт смерти близкого знакомого вызвал во всех, узнавших про нее, как всегда, чувство радости о том, что умер он, я а не я.
Besides the reflections this death evoked in each man about transfers and possible changes in office, the very fact of the death of a close acquaintance aroused in all who heard of it, as always, a feeling of joy that it was he who had died, and not I.
The wife's pretense
И опять она разговорилась и высказала то, что было, очевидно, ее главным делом к нему; дело это состояло в вопросах о том, как бы по случаю смерти мужа достать денег от казны. Она сделала вид, что спрашивает о пенсионе; но он видел, что она уже знает до мельчайших подробностей и то, чего он не знал.
And again she began to talk and brought out what was evidently her main business with him; this business consisted of questions about how, on the occasion of her husband’s death, she could get money from the treasury. She pretended she was asking about the pension; but he saw that she already knew to the smallest detail even what he himself did not know.
Vanity
Теперь же судебным следователем, Иван Ильич чувствовал, что все, все без исключения, самые важные, самодовольные люди - все у него в руках. Иван Ильич никогда не злоупотреблял этой своей властью, напротив, старался смягчать выражения ее; но сознание этой власти составлял для него главный интерес
Now, as an examining magistrate, Ivan Ilyich felt that everyone, everyone without exception, even the most important and self-satisfied people — they were all in his hands. Ivan Ilyich never abused this power of his; on the contrary, he tried to soften its expressions; but the consciousness of this power constituted for him the main interest.
An unhappy marriage
Но жена один раз с такой энергией начала грубыми словами ругать его и так упорно продолжала ругать его всякий раз, когда он не исполнял ее требований, очевидно твердо решившись не переставать до тех пор, пока он не покорится, т.е. не будет сидеть дома и не будет так же, как и она, тосковать, что Иван Ильич ужаснулся.
Оставались только те редкие периоды влюбленности, которые находили на супругов, но продолжались недолго. Это были островки, на которые они приставали на время, но потом опять выпускались в море затаенной вражды, выражавшейся в отчуждении друг от друга
But once his wife began berating him with such energy and crude words, and so persistently continued to berate him every time he didn’t fulfill her demands, evidently firmly resolved not to stop until he submitted — that is, until he stayed home and pined just as she did — that Ivan Ilyich was horrified.
There remained only those rare periods of being in love that came over the spouses, but they didn’t last long. These were little islands on which they landed for a time, but then they were set adrift again into the sea of latent enmity, expressed in mutual estrangement.
The joys in his life
Радости служебные были радости самолюбия; радости общественные были радости тщеславия; но настоящие радости Ивана Ильича было радости в игры в винт.
The joys of office were the joys of self-esteem; the joys of society were the joys of vanity; but Ivan Ilyich’s real joys were the joys of playing whist.
Being misunderstood
Иван Ильич остается один с сознанием того, что его жизнь отравлена для него и отравляет жизнь других, и что эта отрава не ослабевает, а все больше и больше проникает в существо его. А на утро надо было опять вставать, одеваться, ехать в суд, говорить, писать, а если и не ехать, дома быть с теми же двадцатью четырьмя часами в сутках, из которых каждый был мучением. И жить так на краю погибели надо было одному, без одного человека, который бы понял и пожалел его.
Ivan Ilyich was left alone with the consciousness that his life was poisoned for him and was poisoning the lives of others, and that this poison did not weaken but penetrated more and more deeply into his being. And in the morning he had to get up again, dress, go to court, talk, write, and if he didn’t go, stay at home with those same twenty-four hours in a day, each of which was torment. And he had to live like this on the brink of perdition alone, without a single person who would understand and pity him.
The all-encompassing Lie
Главное мучение Ивана Ильича была ложь, - та, всеми почему-то признанная ложь, что он только болен, а не умирает. И его мучила это ложь, мучило то, что не хотели признаваться в том, что все знали и он знал, а хотели лгать над ним по случаю ужасного его положения и хотели и заставляли его самого принимать участие в этой лжи
Он чувствовал, что ложь эта, окружающая его, так путалась, что уж трудно было разобрать что-нибудь.
Ivan Ilyich’s main torment was the lie — that lie, for some reason accepted by everyone, that he was merely ill and not dying. And this lie tormented him; it tormented him that they did not want to admit what they all knew and he knew, but wanted to lie to him about his terrible condition, and wanted and forced him to take part in this lie himself.
He felt that this lie surrounding him was so tangled that it was already hard to make anything out.
A last wish
Ивана Ильичу в иные минуты, после долгих страданий, больше всего хотелось, как ему ни совестно бы было признаться в этом, - хотелось того, чтоб его, как дитя больное, пожалел бы кто нибудь. Ему хотелось, чтобы его приласкали, поцеловали, поплакали бы над ним, как ласкают и утешают детей.
At certain moments, after prolonged suffering, what Ivan Ilyich wanted most — however ashamed he was to admit it — was for someone to pity him as if he were a sick child. He wanted to be caressed, kissed, cried over, as children are caressed and comforted.
How did you live?
Как ты жил прежде, хорошо и приятно? - спросил голос. И он стал перебирать в воображении лучшие минуты своей приятной жизни. Но - странное дело - все эти лучшие минуты приятной жизни казались теперь совсем не тем, чем казались тогда. Все - кроме первых воспоминаний детства. Там, в детстве, было что-то такое действительно приятное, с чем можно бы было жить, если бы оно вернулось. Но того человека, который испытывал это приятное, уже не было. Как только начиналось то, чего результатом был теперешний он, Иван Ильич, так все казавшиеся тогда радости теперь на глазах его таяли и превращались во что-то ничтожное и часто гадкое
Женитьба … так нечаянно и разочарование, и запах изо рта жены, и чувственность, притворство! И эта мертвая служба, и эти заботы о деньгах, и так год, и два, и десять, и двадцать - и все то же!
Обратно пропорционально квадратам расстояний от смерти.
“How did you live before — well and pleasantly?” the voice asked. And he began running through in his imagination the best moments of his pleasant life. But — a strange thing — all those best moments of his pleasant life now seemed quite different from what they had seemed then. All of them — except the first memories of childhood. There, in childhood, there had been something truly pleasant, with which one could live if it returned. But the person who had experienced that pleasantness was no longer there. As soon as that began which was the cause of his present self, Ivan Ilyich, then all those joys that seemed joys at the time now melted before his eyes and turned into something trivial and often vile.
Marriage… so accidental, and the disappointment, and the smell from his wife’s mouth, and the sensuality, the pretense! And that dead service, and those money worries, and so a year, and two, and ten, and twenty — and all the same!
Inversely proportional to the squares of distances from death.
How did you live? #2
Точно равномерно я шел под гору, воображая, что иду на гору. Так и было. В общественном мнении я шел на гору, и ровно настолько из-под меня уходила жизнь… И вот готово, умирай!
И его служба, и его устройства жизни, и его семья, и эти интересы общества и службы, - все этой могло быть не то. Он попытался защитить пред собой все это. И вдруг почувствовал всю слабость того, что он защищает.
It was as if I had been going steadily downhill while imagining I was going uphill. And so it was. In public opinion I was going up the hill, and to exactly that extent life was slipping out from under me… And now it’s done, die!
And his service, and his arrangements of life, and his family, and those interests of society and service — all of it might have been not the right thing. He tried to defend all of this before himself. And suddenly he felt all the weakness of what he was defending.
So what is "the right thing"?
Да, все было не то, - сказал он себе, - но эти ничего. Можно, можно сделать “то”. Что ж “то”? спросил он себя и вдруг затих. “Да, я мучаю их, - подумал он. Им жалко, но им лучше будет, когда я умру.” Он хотел сказать это, но не в силах был выговорить. “Впрочем, зачем же говорить, надо сделать”, подумал он. Он указал жене взглядом на сына и сказал: -Уведи, жалко … и тебя - Он хотел сказать еще “прости”, но сказал “пропусти”, и, не в силах уже будучи поправиться, махнул рукою, зная, что поймет тот, кому надо.
“Yes, it was all not the right thing,” he said to himself, “but that’s nothing. It is possible, it is possible to do ‘the right thing.’ So what is ‘the right thing’?” he asked himself, and suddenly grew quiet. “Yes, I am tormenting them,” he thought. “They feel sorry, but they will be better off when I die.” He wanted to say this but couldn’t manage to utter it. “Besides, why speak — one must do,” he thought. He gestured with a look toward his son and said to his wife: — Take him away… sorry for him… and for you. — He wanted to add “forgive me” (prosti) but said “let pass” (propusti), and, no longer able to correct himself, waved his hand, knowing that the one who needed to understand would understand.