The Problem of the Near-Death Experience: Leo Tolstoy and Andrei Platonov
N. Kasavina
May 3, 2020 DOI: 10.1080/10611967.2020.1792252 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Topics | Near-death experience |
| Key points | Argues that near-death experience in Tolstoy's The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Platonov's Soul functions as a boundary situation opening onto authentic existence. Tolstoy's protagonist confronts death to pose the question of vocation and life's meaning, disclosed only at death's verge; Platonov's Dzhan people embody a collective subject that acquires self-identity and historicity on the border of death. Both works express existential philosophy's themes of finitude, risk, and rebellion against absurdity. |
Abstract
ABSTRACT This article demonstrates the perspectives on near-death experience in two works, Leo Tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Andrei Platonov’s Soul. The author examines the significance of the boundary situation of death as a breakthrough to true existence through the experience of loneliness and abandonment; through suffering, and overcoming it through struggle; through acceptance of responsibility and existential communication. Tolstoy uses his protagonist’s situation to pose the question of man’s vocation, the true meaning of his life, which is disclosed only at the verge of death, revealing a different retrospective of his being. The situation for Platonov’s Dzhan people highlights the problem of existence of a collective subject connected to nature and tradition, acquiring its self-identity and historicity on the border of death. These situations express the cultural–historical repletion of the universal themes of existential philosophy: man’s finite nature, the riskiness of his being, his personal feat of rebellion against the absurdity of existence.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on near-death experience, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Otherworld Journeys: Accounts of Near-Death Experience in Medieval and Modern Times | 1987 | Historical analysis | |
| Neuroscience and the Near-Death Experience: Roles for the NMSA-PCP receptor, the sigma receptor and the endopsychosins | 1990 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Implications of near-death experiences for a postmaterialist psychology. | 2010 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Near-Death Experience as a Probe to Explore (Disconnected) Consciousness | 2020 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Near-death experiences between science and prejudice | 2012 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |