The Death of Ivan Ilyich

De: Leo Tolstoy

Narrado por: George Guidall

Leo Tolstoy is quite simply one of the greatest writers to ever set pen to paper. Immortalized by such epic novels as War and Peace and Anna Karenina, Tolstoy's genius was also readily apparent in his short fiction. The Death of Ivan Ilych, first published in 1886, follows the career of the unremarkable title character, who does not question his desire to live an "easy, agreeable, gay and always decorous" life, until he is lying on his death bed.

Translation © 2003 by Ann Pasternak Slater.

Public Domain (P)2007 Recorded Books

It felt so contemporary. It is a timeless story.

It took me a moment to embrace the readers accent. So I listened to it all a second time.

Timeless wisdom!

One of my favorite works by Tolstoy. This is required reading in Medical School, and for good reason!

So true to life!

Excellent internal monologue.
Tolstoy is a master. In this concise telling of a man in his times, we can see nothing has really changed!

It puts you in the body of the dying man

But I liked most was the way I could see myself acting or reacting either the same or differently. It was my first Tolstoy, chosen because I didn’t have a lot of time for listening right now. I want to listen to more. I may jump right into war in peace.

Tolstoy in a Novella!

War and Peace and Anna Karenena were too much for me. It is like reading a slower-than-life period drama. Considering the length of winters in California, I would never finish reading these books. But the Death of Ivan Ilyich gets right to the point. It details the final days of a dying man. Kind of macabre, but there is a point in most people’s lives when a reckoning is needed. This book is a prelude to your own fateful demise or that of your loved ones. Tolstoy expertly guides us through the mental anguish of confronting our own mortality. This is one work of Tolstoy that could be longer.