James Wood

It begins after Ivan Ilyich's death.

Three judges are in their chambers and they're looking at the obituary of their colleague and in wonderful Tolstoyan mode in that sort of fantastic kind of Homeric authority that he always had as a novelist.

He just brilliantly generalizes and says, as is usual in such cases, all three of them thought, thank goodness that it's him who died and not me.

And they immediately begin to think of promotions and transfers and maybe I'll get his job and, you know, that'll be 800 extra rubles and so on.

Then one of those friends and colleagues of Ivan Ilyich goes to the funeral or the wake rather.

It's an awkward situation where he doesn't really want to be there.

He's actually thinking of how he's looking forward to playing cards a little bit later.

Life is pressing in on this colleague of Ivana Lich's, and it's tedious to have to look at the corpse and talk to the widow.

But he does it.

And then the novella stops and restarts.

And part two begins where you thought the whole book might begin, which is telling the story of Ivan Ilyich's life.

Ordinary, simple, and terrible, says Tolstoy.

And then we get this sort of 20 or 30-page recitation of the rise and rise of Ivan Ilyich.

Everything is done comme il faut.

Everything is done just as it should be.

You go to the right tailor.

You join the right clubs.

You have the right affair with the little hat maker.

When you're in the provincial town, you find out where the brothel is in the back alley, and you go to that too.

But everything is done as it should be and perfumed in the right kind of French language and so on.