by Leo Tolstoy
unpleasantness and to give them a semblance of harmlessness and
propriety. He attained this by spending less and less time with
his family, and when obliged to be at home he tried to safeguard
his position by the presence of outsiders. The chief thing however
was that he had his official duties. The whole interest of his
life now centered in the official world and that interest absorbed
him. The consciousness of his power, being able to ruin anybody he
wished to ruin, the importance, even the external dignity of his
entry into court, or meetings with his subordinates, his success
with superiors and inferiors, and above all his masterly handling
of cases, of which he was conscious -- all this gave him pleasure
and filled his life, together with chats with his colleagues,
dinners, and bridge. So that on the whole Ivan Ilych's life
continued to flow as he considered it should do -- pleasantly and
properly.
so things continued for another seven years. His eldest
daughter was already sixteen, another child had died, and only one
son was left, a schoolboy and a subject of dissension. Ivan Ilych
wanted to put him in the School of Law, but to spite him Praskovya
Fedorovna entered him at the High School. The daughter had been
educated at home and had turned out well: the boy did not learn
badly either.
III
So Ivan Ilych lived for seventeen years after his marriage.
He was already a Public Prosecutor of long standing, and had
declined several proposed transfers while awaiting a more desirable
post, when an unanticipated and unpleasant occurrence quite upset
the peaceful course of his life. He was expecting to be offered
the post of presiding judge in a University town, but Happe somehow
came to the front and obtained the appointment instead. Ivan Ilych
became irritable, reproached Happe, and quarrelled both him and
with his immediate superiors -- who became colder to him and again
passed him over when other appointments were made.
This was in 1880, the hardest year of Ivan Ilych's life. It
was then that it became evident on the one hand that his salary was
insufficient for them to live on, and on the other that he had been
forgotten, and not only this, but that what was for him the
greatest and most cruel injustice appeared to others a quite
ordinary occurrence. Even his father did not consider it his duty
to help him. Ivan Ilych felt himself abandoned by everyone, and
that they regarded his position with a salary of 3,500 rubles as
quite normal and even fortunate. He alone knew that with the
consciousness of the injustices done him, with his wife's incessant
nagging, and with the debts he had contracted by living beyond his
means, his position was far from normal.
In order to save money that summer he obtained leave of
absence and went with his wife to live in the country at her
brother's place.
In the country, without his work, he experienced *ennui* for
the first time in his life, and not only *ennui* but intolerable
depression, and he decided that it was impossible to go on living
like that, and that it was necessary to take energetic measures.
Having passed a sleepless night pacing up and down the
veranda, he decided to go to Petersburg and bestir himself, in
order to punish those who had failed to appreciate him and to get
transferred to another ministry.
Next day, despite many protests from his wife and her brother,
he started for Petersburg with the sole object of obtaining a post
with a salary of five thousand rubles a year. He was no longer
bent on any particular department, or tendency, or kind of
activity. All he now wanted was an appointment to another post
with a salary of five thousand rubles, either in the
administration, in the banks, with the railways in one of the
Empress Marya's Institutions, or even in the customs -- but it had
to carry with it a salary of five thousand rubles and be in a
ministry other than that in which they had failed to appreciate
him.
And this quest of Ivan Ilych's was crowned with remarkable and
unexpected success. At Kursk an acquaintance of his, F. I. Ilyin,
got into the first-class carriage, sat down beside Ivan Ilych, and
told him of a telegram just received by the governor of Kursk
announcing that a change was about to take place in the ministry:
Peter Ivanovich was to be superseded by Ivan Semonovich.
The proposed change, apart from its significance for Russia,
had a special significance for Ivan Ilych, because by bringing
forward a new man, Peter Petrovich, and consequently his friend
Zachar Ivanovich, it was highly favourable for Ivan Ilych, since
Sachar Ivanovich was a friend and colleague of his.
In Moscow this news was confirmed, and on reaching Petersburg
Ivan Ilych found Zachar Ivanovich and received a definite promise
of an appointment in his former Department of Justice.
A week later he telegraphed to his wife: "Zachar in Miller's
place. I shall receive appointment on presentation of report."
Thanks to this change of personnel, Ivan Ilych had
unexpectedly obtained an appointment in his former ministry which
placed him two states above his former colleagues besides giving
him five thousand rubles salary and three thousand five hundred
rubles for expenses connected with his removal. All his ill humour
towards his former enemies and the whole department vanished, and
Ivan Ilych was completely happy.
He returned to the country more cheerful and contented than he
had been for a long time. Praskovya Fedorovna also cheered up and
a truce was arranged between them. Ivan Ilych told of how he had
been feted by everybody in Petersburg, how all those who had been
his enemies were put to shame and now fawned on him, how envious
they were of his appointment, and how much everybody in Petersburg
had liked him.
Praskovya Fedorovna listened to all this and appeared to
believe it. She did not contradict anything, but only made plans
for their life in the town to which they were going. Ivan Ilych
saw with delight that these plans were his plans, that he and his
wife agreed, and that, after a stumble, his life was regaining its
due and natural character of pleasant lightheartedness and decorum.
Ivan Ilych had come back for a short time only, for he had to
take up his new duties on the 10th of September. Moreover, he
needed time to settle into the new place, to move all his
belongings from the province, and to buy and order many additional
things: in a word, to make such arrangements as he had resolved
on, which were almost exactly what Praskovya Fedorovna too had
decided on.
Now that everything had happened so fortunately, and that he
and his wife were at one in their aims and moreover saw so little
of one another, they got on together better than they had done
&nbs
p; since the first years of marriage. Ivan Ilych had thought of
taking his family away with him at once, but the insistence of his
wife's brother and her sister-in-law, who had suddenly become
particularly amiable and friendly to him and his family, induced
him to depart alone.
So he departed, and the cheerful state of mind induced by his
success and by the harmony between his wife and himself, the one
intensifying the other, did not leave him. He found a delightful
house, just the thing both he and his wife had dreamt of.
Spacious, lofty reception rooms in the old style, a convenient and
dignified study, rooms for his wife and daughter, a study for his
son -- it might have been specially built for them. Ivan Ilych
himself superintended the arrangements, chose the wallpapers,
supplemented the furniture (preferably with antiques which he
considered particularly *comme il faut*), and supervised the
upholstering. Everything progressed and progressed and approached
the ideal he had set himself: even when things were only half
completed they exceeded his expectations. He saw what a refined
and elegant character, free from vulgarity, it would all have when
it was ready. On falling asleep he pictured to himself how the
reception room would look. Looking at the yet unfinished drawing
room he could see the fireplace, the screen, the what-not, the
little chairs dotted here and there, the dishes and plates on the
walls, and the bronzes, as they would be when everything was in
place. He was pleased by the thought of how his wife and daughter,
who shared his taste n this matter, would be impressed by it. They
were certainly not expecting as much. He had been particularly
successful in finding, and buying cheaply, antiques which gave a
particularly aristocratic character to the whole place. But in his
letters he intentionally understated everything in order to be able
to surprise them. All this so absorbed him that his new duties --
though he liked his official work -- interested him less than he
had expected. Sometimes he even had moments of absent-mindedness
during the court sessions and would consider whether he should have
straight or curved cornices for his curtains. He was so interested
in it all that he often did things himself, rearranging the
furniture, or rehanging the curtains. Once when mounting a step-
ladder to show the upholsterer, who did not understand, how he
wanted the hangings draped, he mad a false step and slipped, but
being a strong and agile man he clung on and only knocked his side
against the knob of the window frame. The bruised place was
painful but the pain soon passed, and he felt particularly bright
and well just then. He wrote: "I feel fifteen years younger."
He thought he would have everything ready by September, but it
dragged on till mid-October. But the result was charming not only
in his eyes but to everyone who saw it.
In reality it was just what is usually seen in the houses of
people of moderate means who want to appear rich, and therefore
succeed only in resembling others like themselves: there are
damasks, dark wood, plants, rugs, and dull and polished bronzes --
all the things people of a certain class have in order to resemble
other people of that class. His house was so like the others that
it would never have been noticed, but to him it all seemed to be
quite exceptional. He was very happy when he met his family at the
station and brought them to the newly furnished house all lit up,
where a footman in a white tie opened the door into the hall
decorated with plants, and when they went on into the drawing-room
and the study uttering exclamations of delight. He conducted them
everywhere, drank in their praises eagerly, and beamed with
pleasure. At tea that evening, when Praskovya Fedorovna among
others things asked him about his fall, he laughed, and showed them
how he had gone flying and had frightened the upholsterer.
"It's a good thing I'm a bit of an athlete. Another man might
have been killed, but I merely knocked myself, just here; it hurts
when it's touched, but it's passing off already -- it's only a
bruise."
So they began living in their new home -- in which, as always
happens, when they got thoroughly settled in they found they were
just one room short -- and with the increased income, which as
always was just a little (some five hundred rubles) too little, but
it was all very nice.
Things went particularly well at first, before everything was
finally arranged and while something had still to be done: this
thing bought, that thing ordered, another thing moved, and
something else adjusted. Though there were some disputes between
husband and wife, they were both so well satisfied and had so much
to do that it all passed off without any serious quarrels. When
nothing was left to arrange it became rather dull and something
seemed to be lacking, but they were then making acquaintances,
forming habits, and life was growing fuller.
Ivan Ilych spent his mornings at the law court and came home
to diner, and at first he was generally in a good humour, though he
occasionally became irritable just on account of his house. (Every
spot on the tablecloth or the upholstery, and every broken window-
blind string, irritated him. He had devoted so much trouble to
arranging it all that every disturbance of it distressed him.) But
on the whole his life ran its course as he believed life should do:
easily, pleasantly, and decorously.
He got up at nine, drank his coffee, read the paper, and then
put on his undress uniform and went to the law courts. there the
harness in which he worked had already been stretched to fit him
and he donned it without a hitch: petitioners, inquiries at the
chancery, the chancery itself, and the sittings public and
administrative. In all this the thing was to exclude everything
fresh and vital, which always disturbs the regular course of
official business, and to admit only official relations with
people, and then only on official grounds. A man would come, for
instance, wanting some information. Ivan Ilych, as one in whose
sphere the matter did not lie, would have nothing to do with him:
but if the man had some business with him in his official capacity,
something that could be expressed on officially stamped paper, he
would do everything, positively everything he could within the
limits of such relations, and in doing so would maintain the
semblance of friendly human relations, that is, would observe the
courtesies of life. As soon as the official relations ended, so
did everything else. Ivan Ilych possessed this capacity to
separate his real life from the official side of affairs and not
mix the two, in the highest degree, and by long practice and
natural aptitude had brought it to such a pitch that sometimes, in
the manner of a virtuoso, he would even allow himself to let t
he
human and official relations mingle. He let himself do this just
because he felt that he could at any time he chose resume the
strictly official attitude again and drop the human relation. and
he did it all easily, pleasantly, correctly, and even artistically.
In the intervals between the sessions he smoked, drank tea, chatted
a little about politics, a little about general topics, a little
about cards, but most of all about official appointments. Tired,
but with the feelings of a virtuoso -- one of the first violins who
has played his part in an orchestra with precision -- he would
return home to find that his wife and daughter had been out paying
calls, or had a visitor, and that his son had been to school, had
done his homework with his tutor, and was surely learning what is
taught at High Schools. Everything was as it should be. After
dinner, if they had no visitors, Ivan Ilych sometimes read a book
that was being much discussed at the time, and in the evening
settled down to work, that is, read official papers, compared the
depositions of witnesses, and noted paragraphs of the Code applying
to them. This was neither dull nor amusing. It was dull when he
might have been playing bridge, but if no bridge was available it
was at any rate better than doing nothing or sitting with his wife.
Ivan Ilych's chief pleasure was giving little dinners to which he
invited men and women of good social position, and just as his
drawing-room resembled all other drawing-rooms so did his enjoyable
little parties resemble all other such parties.
Once they even gave a dance. Ivan Ilych enjoyed it and
everything went off well, except that it led to a violent quarrel
with his wife about the cakes and sweets. Praskovya Fedorovna had
made her own plans, but Ivan Ilych insisted on getting everything
from an expensive confectioner and ordered too many cakes, and the
quarrel occurred because some of those cakes were left over and the
confectioner's bill came to forty-five rubles. It was a great and
disagreeable quarrel. Praskovya Fedorovna called him "a fool and
an imbecile," and he clutched at his head and made angry allusions
to divorce.
But the dance itself had been enjoyable. The best people were
there, and Ivan Ilych had danced with Princess Trufonova, a sister
of the distinguished founder of the Society "Bear My Burden".
The pleasures connected with his work were pleasures of
ambition; his social pleasures were those of vanity; but Ivan
Ilych's greatest pleasure was playing bridge. He acknowledged that
whatever disagreeable incident happened in his life, the pleasure
that beamed like a ray of light above everything else was to sit
down to bridge with good players, not noisy partners, and of course
to four-handed bridge (with five players it was annoying to have to
stand out, though one pretended not to mind), to play a clever and
serious game (when the cards allowed it) and then to have supper
and drink a glass of wine. after a game of bridge, especially if
he had won a little (to win a large sum was unpleasant), Ivan Ilych
went to bed in a specially good humour.
So they lived. they formed a circle of acquaintances among
the best people and were visited by people of importance and by
young folk. In their views as to their acquaintances, husband,
wife and daughter were entirely agreed, and tacitly and unanimously
kept at arm's length and shook off the various shabby friends and
relations who, with much show of affection, gushed into the
drawing-room with its Japanese plates on the walls. Soon these
shabby friends ceased to obtrude themselves and only the best
people remained in the Golovins' set.
Young men made up to Lisa, and Petrishchev, an examining
magistrate and Dmitri Ivanovich Petrishchev's son and sole heir,
began to be so attentive to her that Ivan Ilych had already spoken
to Praskovya Fedorovna about it, and considered whether they should
not arrange a party for them, or get up some private theatricals.
So they lived, and all went well, without change, and life
flowed pleasantly.
IV