Things Fall Apart
What does it exactly mean to "fall apart?" The protagonist, Okonkwo, and his village, Umuofia, are the concepts of things falling apart in this book. Chinua Achebe develops two stories of struggle in her novel, Things Fall Apart. The village of Umuofia and Okonkwo are in a constant struggle and they believe that the "things" that are changing are deconstructing their culture and tradition. These traditions are what hold the culture of the village together and Okonkwo's life, but if these traditions are broken or untied, things begin to "fall apart". Although life in Umuofia seemed perfect and cultured, many "things" occurred to revolutionize their social, political, and economic independence.Okonkwo, a self-made, courageous, strong man will forever hold hostility towards his father, Unoka. He promised himself to never walk in his fathers' footsteps because he was weak and a failure. Although Okonkwo always portrayed himself to be most powerful and intrepid, he constantly was "dominated by fear" (Achebe 13). However, after he achieved his many goals during his younger years, everything went downhill and eventually no success came out of it. Things started falling apart after Ikemefuna, a captive who stayed with his family
Okonkwo had very high expectations for his son and he felt like Nwoye never fulfilled them, and so he lost faith again and felt that "Nwoye was not worth fighting for" (Achebe 152). This loss resulted in Okonkwo losing faith in his strong family bond, which also parallels to his faith with his own father. he can curse the gods of his fathers and his ancestors" (Achebe 167). The British's conquest over the Africans land was a political act. Okonkwo's death proved to himself that he was a failure and therefore, he lost the greatest thing of all, faith in himself. Unexpectedly, returning to his homeland just caused more problems because he wasn't ready to adapt to new changes. Religion was the force that brought the families together. So now the Umuofians social independence was lost and the desire of a new religion dominated over their culture. This resulted in the first thing to "fall apart" and the Africans realizing "the white man's fetish had unbelievable power" (Achebe 149). Tradition was the bricks that held a house up, it's what held the village together, and if it was even touched with, everything went wrong. Okonkwo wanted Nwoye to be like him, but that was never going to happen. This caught the Africans eyes and ideas and caused tension between both cultures. An upsetting occurrence that caused more things to "fall apart" was Okonkwo's son, Nwoye, converting to Christianity.
Common topics in this essay:
Umuofia Okonkwo,
Evil Forest,
Isaac Brown's,
Okonkwo Nwoye,
Umuofia Achebe,
Commerce Conquest,
Christianity Okonkwo,
,
Mbanta Achebe,
fall apart,
falling apart,
Chinua Achebe,
lost faith,
fell apart,
village umuofia,
social economic political,
social economic,
son nwoye,
hostility towards,
economic political,
family bond,
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Acceptance Essays
