The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Don Quixote - 1636 Words

The reader have probably wondered how different the life would be, if one day one could have followed his desires? If spontaneously, leaving his routine life behind one could have finally discovered a long awaited feeling of delight?! Life is not much different. People are living in a society: a family, a circle of friends and acquaintances - where certain customs or beliefs set the boundaries of our behaviour. People are expected to do what is thought to be right or appropriate. The actions are not necessarily supposed to be bad by nature to be thought as wrong, but it can be something different or unusual for people around. This idea goes throughout the whole story of â€Å"Don Quixote†, where a middle-aged man named Alonso Quijano,†¦show more content†¦Tolstoy, in other hand, immerses a reader into a short life story of the protagonist, starting from his family origins, to his youth and his adult life. The misleading nature of Ivan Ilyich’s existence is demo nstrated from the very beginning of novella which accurately describes the illusory reality the main character is living in. The reader might be curious why the normal and ordinary life could be horrible. It is not much possible that Tolstoy was against ordinariness itself, but rather to show the reader that the main character Ivan Ilyich never reaches anything meaningful and exciting in his life. Ivan becomes kind of a prisoner of social milieu, he does everything that is expected of him: he goes to law school just like his father did, he finds a job, gets promoted, earns enough money to enjoy his life, fulfills his duty. He becomes kind of a spiritual zombie. Tolstoy describes main character’s absence of â€Å"real† life in a subtle but authentic way, showing that Ivan is not much different from the people in his circle. As an inventor of his own illusion, or the â€Å"lie†, in which main character lives, Ivan is not showing much curiosity, moreover he is not in search of any kind of truth. He simply exists in his undisturbed, tranquil environment, until something unpredictable happens to him. During one of his ordinary actions, while hanging the new curtains in his new house, he slips, falls down, banging his side against the window frame. This