The Theme in the Work
The novella's lie is not that of someone who deceives to gain something. It is the decorous lie (приличная ложь, our translation), the one everyone accepts without arranging it, because it protects the forms: the sick man is only sick, he will get better, he should follow the treatment. Ivan Ilyich Golovin recognizes it because he practiced it his whole life, suffers from it when he receives it, and in the end discovers that the greatest lie was his own, the one about his own life. The book has three stages: he lies to others, others lie to him, and he stops lying to himself.
In ch. I, decorum already governs the wake: Praskovya Fyodorovna Golovina asks the practical question in the form of a request for advice:
Она сделала вид, что спрашивает у Петра Ивановича совета о пенсионе [...] но что ей хотелось узнать, нельзя ли как-нибудь вытянуть еще побольше денег, She pretended to ask Pyotr Ivanovich for advice about the pension [...] but what she wanted to know was whether there was some way to squeeze out still more money.
In ch. IV, the famous doctor does to him what he used to do to defendants, and the question that matters to him is left out:
Не было вопроса о жизни Ивана Ильича, а был спор между блуждающей почкой и слепой кишкой., There was no question of Ivan Ilyich's life, there was only a dispute between a floating kidney and the appendix.
In ch. V, his wife, who still calls the illness just an illness, kisses him on the forehead on the night he understood he is going to die:
Он ненавидел ее всеми силами души в то время, как она целовала его, и делал усилия, чтобы не оттолкнуть ее., He hated her with all the strength of his soul while she kissed him, and made an effort not to push her away.
In ch. VII, the lie is named as the main torment, and the exception is Gerasim:
Главное мучение Ивана Ильича была ложь, — та, всеми почему-то признанная ложь, что он только болен, а не умирает, Ivan Ilyich's main torment was the lie, that lie accepted by everyone for some reason, that he was merely ill and not dying.
In the same chapter, the wish to be consoled like a child shows that the lie has an accomplice inside him:
хотелось того, чтоб его, как дитя больное, пожалел бы кто-нибудь. Ему хотелось, чтоб его приласкали, поцеловали, поплакали бы над ним, как ласкают и утешают детей., He wanted someone to feel sorry for him, as for a sick child. He wanted to be caressed, kissed, and wept over, as children are caressed and comforted.
In ch. VIII, in the scene before the theater, everyone falls silent when they look at him, and the narrator says what they are afraid of:
всем становилось страшно, что вдруг нарушится как-нибудь приличная ложь, и ясно будет всем то, что есть, everyone became frightened that the decorous lie might suddenly break down somehow, and it would become clear to all what it was.
In ch. IX, the voice of the soul asks him the question, which he answers with the same yardstick as always:
«Может быть, я жил не так, как должно?» — приходило ему вдруг в голову. «Но как же не так, когда я делал все как следует?», Could it be that I have not lived as I should? it suddenly came into his head. But how could that be, when I did everything as I ought? he said to himself.
In ch. XI, before Gerasim's face, the question returns, and by morning every gesture of the family confirms that it had all been a huge mistake, one that conceals life and death:
а что, как и в самом деле вся моя жизнь, сознательная жизнь, была «не то», and what if, in fact, my whole life, my conscious life, was «not that»?
In ch. XII, the narrator says what holds him in the black sack:
Пролезть же ему мешает признанье того, что жизнь его была хорошая., What keeps him from getting through is the acknowledgment that his life was good.
The lie from outside and the lie from inside are the same, and the book makes them change places. In ch. VII Ivan Ilyich suffers from the lies of others and, before Shebek, plays the grave member of the Chamber himself; in ch. IX and ch. X he defends the correctness of his own life to keep doubt away; in ch. XII that defense is what keeps him from getting through. He leaves the lie only when he stops justifying himself, and not when others stop lying, because the others do not stop.
Who Embodies It
Praskovya Fyodorovna is the decorous lie of the house: the patience that turns into a virtue, the version offered to acquaintances, the expensive doctor, the question of whether he is not better (ch. IV, ch. V, ch. XI). The doctors are the technical lie, which argues over kidney and appendix and answers what is dangerous with what is convenient (ch. IV, ch. VIII). Gerasim is the truth without difficult words, that of the servant who does not find it necessary to hide anything (ch. VII):
Все умирать будем. Отчего же не потрудиться?, We will all die. Why not take the trouble?
Where It Appears
- Chapter I: At the wake, every gesture obeys decorum, and the widow disguises the question about the pension as a request for advice.
- Chapter II: Ivan Ilyich forgets the acts that disgusted him when he sees his superiors doing the same, and marries for agreeableness and correctness.
- Chapter IV: The famous doctor treats the case and not the person, and Praskovya Fyodorovna fixes for acquaintances the version of a husband who does not follow the treatment.
- Chapter V: Praskovya Fyodorovna offers a specialist to a man who has just understood he is going to die, and Ivan Ilyich hates her while she kisses him.
- Chapter VII: The lie that Ivan Ilyich is only ill, and not dying, is his main torment; only Gerasim does not lie.
- Chapter VIII: The ordinary doctor lies with the air of someone about to fix everything, and the family falls silent for fear that the decorous lie will break.
- Chapter IX: The voice of the soul asks whether Ivan Ilyich lived well, and he dismisses the hypothesis that he did not live as he should.
- Chapter XI: Before Gerasim, Ivan Ilyich's suspicion arises that his whole life was not that, and in the morning he sees in everyone the deception that conceals life and death.
- Chapter XII: Ivan Ilyich only gets through once he admits that everything was not that, because the acknowledgment that his life was good was holding him in the black sack.
Where the Readings Diverge
The family's lie can be read as cruelty or as fear, and ch. VIII supports both: the family goes to the theater, but the narrator says that everyone falls silent because they are afraid that what it is will become clear. On the second reading, the lie is a protection of the living as much as a torment for the dying.
What also diverges is the question of what he discovers at the end: that his life was a lie, or that it was "not that," the expression the text uses (не то, our translation). The first reading condemns the whole life; the second leaves open what "that" would be, and Ivan Ilyich himself, when he asks, falls silent without answering in ch. XII.