What comic elements do you find in the account of the wake that ...

[rayancarla1]

What comic elements do you find in the account of the wake that PeterIvanovich attends?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

Every spot on the tablecloth, on the hangings, the string of a windowblind broken, irritated him. He had devoted so much trouble to the arrangement of the rooms that any disturbance of their order distressed him (paragraph 104). What do you make of this passage? What is its tone? Does the narrator sympathize with Ivans attachment to his possessions?
 
  What will be an ideal response?

[elyse44]

Answer to Question 1

• Comic elements include the deacon with his imperious tone (par. 24), Peter Ivanovichs struggles with the rebellious springs of the couch (par. 33, 37), and his longing to escape to a card gamefulfilled at the end of Section I. The widow haggles over the price of a cemetery plot (par. 3335) and utters the great comic lines (in paragraph 40) congratulating herself on enduring Ivans screams.

Answer to Question 2

• Ivans excessive concern with every spot on the tablecloth seems part of his fussy overemphasis on material possessions. Tolstoy is suggesting, of course, that Ivans insistent worldliness goes together with a neglect for the welfare of his soul.