"As good as anything Tolstoy ever wrote... Self-assured, vital, unforgettable" GuardianThe title story of this collection is about a man battling a mysterious illness. His family visit his bedside, their faces masks of concern. His colleagues pay their respects but only think of the advantages created by his death. This intensely moving story of Ivan Ilyich"s lonely end is one of the masterpieces of Tolstoy"s late fiction.