මරණය භීතියට හෝ කනස්සල්ලට හේතුවක් කරගත යුතුද?
Responding to comments overheard at the funeral of the poet Ratna Sri’s wife, Ivan accepts that some of his advice on family life suits the middle class more than the poor, and describes how his own mother lived with his wife in her last years. He then argues that retirement is a long stage of life, not a waiting room for death, and considers great deaths — Madduma Bandara, the Buddha, Christ and Socrates — as well as Gandhi and Tolstoy, who learned to cycle at 67, to urge older readers to live fully until the end rather than in fear.