Chapter 9 Summary

Ivan's wife returns from the theater and wants to sit with him, but Ivan sends her away. At her suggestion, Ivan takes some opium for his pain. Stupefied, he feels that he and his pain are being pushed into a narrow black sack. What adds to his suffering is that he is torn between cooperating and resisting. Finally, he breaks through and becomes conscious. Ivan sends Gerasim away and has a good cry.

Ivan begins to question God directly and it seems that God answers. God asks what Ivan wants and Ivan replies, "To live as I used to - well and pleasantly." The question comes back to him, "Well and pleasantly?"

Ivan looks back over his life and it begins to seem as if the only real and honest pleasures were in his childhood, where there was lightheartedness, friendship and hope. Ivan...