Beyond the literal and the social level, we can detect in this work a theme which aligns it closely to many works of modern fiction. Its theme is the fate of modern man who must make sense of a universe whose operations he does not understand. Thus, the level of meaning which addresses the questions "How is one to survive in a prison camp?" and "How is one to survive in the Soviet Union, which is like a prison camp?" is extended to this question: "According to what principles should one live in a seemingly absurd universe, controlled by forces which one can't understand and over which one has no control?"
Ivan's fate closely resembles that of Josef K. in Franz Kafka's The Trial. Josef K. is arrested one morning without knowing why, and he attempts to find out the reasons. In his search, he encounters a cruel court bureaucracy which operates according to incomprehensible rules; lawyers and priests cannot provide him with reasonable answers for his fate, and so he finally concludes that he must be guilty. Accordingly, he willingly submits to his execution.
Ivan is also arrested and sent to prison camps for absurd reasons, and so are most of his fellow inmates. He does not understand the legalities of his case. He is, after all, only a simple worker, and he never encounters the highest authorities who might provide him with an answer. He meets only cruel, minor officials of the system, who only obey orders but do not give explanations. The intellectuals around him do not seem to have the right answers, and the religious people, like Alyosha the Baptist, are very similar to the comforters who try to explain to job the reason why he must suffer so cruelly. Their arguments are dogmatic; they are not logical or practical.
A man who finds himself in such a situation has several options. One is despair, a passive acceptance of whatever fate has in store for him. This, as Camus indicates in The Myth of Sisyphus, is unacceptable behavior for an intelligent human being. An extension of that option is suicide, an alternative that is not even mentioned in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich.
