Leo Tolstoy · 1886
Questions on the text, each answered in the book’s own words, with the minute you hear it.
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Answer Iván Egórovich Shébek
“the associates and the prosecuting Attorney met in the cabinet of Iván Egórovich Shébek, and started a conversation on the famous Krasóvski case.”
Answer Peter Ivánovich
“while Peter Ivánovich, who had not entered into the discussion from the start, took no part in it, and looked through the Gazette which had been handed to him.”
Answer February 4th, 1882
“which took place on February 4th of this year, 1882. The funeral will be on Friday, at one o’clock p. m.”
Answer Two hundred roubles
“Sokolov, Iván Ilích’s butler, who came to report that the lot in the cemetery which Praskóvya Fédorovna had chosen would cost two hundred roubles.”
Answer “It is God’s will. We shall all of us be there.”
“It is God’s will. We shall all of us be there,” said Gerásim, displaying his white, solid peasant teeth”
Answer Privy councillor
“Such had been the privy councillor, the useless member of all kinds of useless establishments, Ilyá Efímovich Golovín.”
Answer Respice finem
“attached to his fob a small medal with the inscription, “Respice finem,” bade good-bye to the prince and to his tutor, dined with his companions at Donon’s”
Answer Míkhel
“Praskóvya Fédorovna Míkhel was the most attractive, clever, and brilliant girl of the circle in which he moved.”
Answer Góppe
“Iván Ilích was waiting for the place of presiding judge in a university city; but Góppe somehow got ahead of him, and received that place.”
Answer Five thousand a year
“He went there with one thing in view,—to obtain a place which would give him a salary of five thousand a year.”
Answer Showing the paper-hanger how to hang the drapery
“One day he climbed a ladder in order to show the paper-hanger how he wanted the drapery hung; he made a misstep and fell”
Answer Forty-five roubles
“the quarrel was due to the fact that the cake was left over, while the confectioner’s bill amounted to forty-five roubles.”
Answer The left side of his abdomen
“he had a peculiar taste in his mouth and an uncomfortable feeling in the left side of his abdomen.”
Answer The cæcum
“This dispute the doctor decided in the presence of Iván Ilích in a brilliant manner in favour of the cæcum”
Answer Sturgeon
“will eat some sturgeon (and he is not allowed to eat that), and will sit up playing vint until one o’clock.”
Answer Three
“he forgets what is trumps, and unnecessarily trumps his own cards, and loses the clean sweep by three points”
Answer That he is a dead man
“Exaggerate? No. You do not see it, he is a dead man,—look into his eyes. There is no light in them. What is the matter with him?”
Answer Jean
“Whither are you going, Jean?” asked his wife, with a peculiarly sad and strangely kind expression.”
Answer The foot-rest
“The foot-rest was in his way and caused him pain, so he grew angry at it and in his anger pressed harder against it and threw it down.”
Answer Kiesewetter’s
“That example of a syllogism which he had learned from Kiesewetter’s logic, “Caius is a man, men are mortal, consequently Caius is mortal,”
Answer A nick in the table
“he entered and saw that there was a nick in the table. He looked for the cause of it, and found it in the bronze adornment of the album which was bent at the edge.”
Answer Dmítri
“Lift me up. It is hard for me to do it all alone, and I have sent Dmítri away.”
Answer Chop some wood for to-morrow
“What else have I to do? I have done everything, and have only to chop some wood for to-morrow.”
Answer Shébek
“there comes his associate, member Shébek, and, instead of crying and being petted, Iván Ilích assumes a serious, stern, pensive aspect, and from inertia expresses his opinion on the decree of the court of cassation”
Answer Peter the lackey
“It was morning, because Gerásim went away, and Peter the lackey came in his place: he put out the candles, drew aside one curtain”
Answer Mikhaíl Danílovich
“she had sent for a famous doctor, who in company with Mikhaíl Danílovich (so the ordinary doctor was called) would make an examination and have a consultation.”
Answer Sarah Bernhardt
“Sarah Bernhardt was in the city, and they had a box which he had insisted that they should take.”
Answer Vásya, his son
“Besides Gerasim, it seemed to Iván Ilích, Vásya was the only one who understood and pitied him.”
Answer The opera-glass
“Líza asked her mother about the opera-glass. Mother and daughter exchanged words about who was at fault for having mislaid it.”
Answer “What do you want?”
“What do you want? What do you want?” he repeated to himself. “What? Not to suffer. To live!” he answered.”
Answer Stewed prunes
“If Iván Ilích thought of the stewed prunes which he was offered to-day to eat, he recalled the raw, wrinkled French prunes of his childhood”
Answer Petríshchev
“Petríshchev made a formal proposal. This happened in the evening.”
Answer “For Christ’s sake, let me die in peace”
“For Christ’s sake, let me die in peace,” he said.”
Answer Three days
“From this moment there began that cry which lasted for three days and was so terrible that it was not possible to hear it without horror through two doors.”
Answer “Forgigive”
“He wanted to add, “Forgive,” but said, “Forgigive,” and being unable to correct himself, he waved his hand, knowing that who needed would understand.”
“The Death of Iván Ilích” (Смерть Ивана Ильича, 1886), in the English of Leo Wiener, The Complete Works of Count Tolstoy, volume XVIII (Dana Estes & Co., Boston, 1904), from the Wikisource transcription of that volume. Three quotation marks mis-set in the transcription were corrected; otherwise every word is as printed, including Wiener’s accented spellings of the Russian names. Public domain.