Please discuss and analyze any other aspects of the book, of your choice, that relates to our sense of lostness, the source of our lostness, and our attempts to either cover up or fill that emptiness through heroic life and/or the approval of others.
After I finished reading the short story I felt as if this world has little hope left. It seems as though before a world of forward culture and easier access to gaining information to fulfilling our arch types people still lived the way we do today. If in the 1800’s people led lives not for themselves but for the approval of their audiences what will it be like in 100 years from now? I think at the pace we are going now people won’t know what to do with their selves. We are such a confused species we have no idea why we are here yet we feel as though we do have a purpose. However we are destroying the earth, that doesn’t seem like a logical purpose to me?
Ivan Ilych in the earlier days of his life seemed to think that the way he lived was pretty close to perfection. After he met his wife and fell madly in love with her he still seemed “happy”, it wasn’t in till she became pregnant that they started not to see eye to eye. This made him frustrated, he wanted to appear a certain way and yet parts of the appearance were lacking. All he seemed to care about was making a high salary so that his arch type would stand up to those around him. Even his wife seemed to be concerned about the amount of money her husband was making; they both thought it was the key to happiness. Something that I found interesting was when he had begun a new job and had to move to a new home the way he decorated his home to impress. Even though most of the things in his home were antiques he wanted to be able to look just like the person next door. It didn’t matter if deep down inside this wasn’t really making him happy as long as what appeared to the eye looked happy that was all that mattered.
There was a line in the beginning of the story that caught my attention when he had passed and people were at his wake. “The expression on the face said that what was necessary had been accomplished, and accomplished rightly. Besides this there was in that expression a reproach and a warning to the living.” (Page 97) Essentially I think Ivan at the end of his life came to realize the mistake he had made. I think the accomplishment was closure to meaning. Maybe as we become closer to death we realize our waste of energy and time on things that have no significance. Maybe the look on Ivan’s face is suppose to help guide the living since we still have time to make a change.
Ivan, as almost all of us, bases his efforts in life on the map provided by his culture. The culture values "the easy, agreeable, gay and always decorous [ ...] life, approved of by society and regarded by himself as natural." What map has been provided by your family, subculture, culture? What are the main destinations and goals and plans in your life? What should the tone of your life be, according to the map you've been provided?
We forget most of our lives the importance of turning on our facet. We forget most of our lives that there are many people on this planet who have to find water, find food, and make shelter. Those are the kind of people who I believe are closer to finding inner meaning. Compared to this countries culture most people do not live the way we do. The pressure of our culture seems to corrupt any sense of true meaning because we are all just clones. We are all taught to think alike, dress alike, live alike. Unlike people who actual touch the soil of the planet and feel the earth underneath them for most of our own lives finding perfection distracts us. We waste hours envying someone or something that isn’t our own reality. We forgot how lucky we really are and feel sorry for ourselves. We should really be looking around and realizing how fortunate we are.
I think our culture has set up a map for our whole lives: birth, communication, school, good college, get degrees, get a good job, make money, get married, have babies (cycle repeats for babies), live long enough to see grandchildren, death. That’s the way most people live, doesn’t ever mention anything about being happy or making a difference in the world. As long as we keep this cycle going the more money can be accumulated for this country to remain wealthy. So that we stay on top because apparently being the best and having the most makes you a better person…unfortunately as time goes on this will just get worse and worse. Why do we fight wars, bomb other countries, what’s the purpose? I’m tired of the government making excuses it’s the fact that we are such confused and afraid human beings that we feel the need to rule because without that sense of authority we are nothing.
In all honesty I have no idea what my main destinations are and goals are at this point. I want to be able to see the whole world though because I think that when you stay trapped inside a bubble you have no idea what’s going on outside. I think people are fascinating and there are really so many different kinds of people out there. That are all equally as interesting and all have different stories. I don’t think one person is better than another because we are all just as confused as the next person. There are however people out there who are a little less confused because they have less distraction and more time to be thankful. In 7th grade I went to an island called Elthura in the Bahamas. I remember driving and looking out the window seeing tin shacks, those were people’s homes. I think seeing something like that makes you understand how fortunate you really are. Although maybe their homes were not mansions and they didn’t have expensive cars everyone on the island seemed so much happier than anyone I had ever met. They didn’t feel as though they had nothing because they were aware that they had something and I think that is meaning. This kind of meaning is not something you can buy and I think that’s what confuses us the most.
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