Elvis Ahn Period 5 10/1/15 Things Fall Apart Theme Paper In Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart”, the main character, Okonkwo, lives a life full of ambition to be the best in his village. This ambition is also driven by his determination to be more successful and respected than his late father, who was known as a debtor and a coward. The book revolves around Okonkwo’s life and aspirations, which includes his rise to fame and his downfall. With that being said, Okonkwo demonstrates that ambition can be beneficial to the interests of an individual, however, an excessive amount of ambition ultimately leads to one’s failure. The narrator informs readers about the negative reputation of his father, Unoka, in order to set a contrast and reasoning Despite the fact that Ogbuefi, a respected orator within the village, told Okonkwo not to partake in Ikemefuna’s murder, Okonkwo disregards it and kills Ikemefuna himself. As Ikemefuna is dying, “Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him (Ikemefuna) down. He was afraid of being thought weak” (61). Since Okonkwo’s ambitions are based on his fear of being weak or failing, killing Ikemefuna was the right thing to do. His stubborn mindset of not wanting to be viewed as weak caused him to do something that he did not plan on doing or want to do. Cutting Ikemefuna down happens to be an immediate reaction, as Okonkwo’s ambition and desire to be the strongest suddenly gets to him. He does not get the chance to fully comprehend the actual situation, causing him to impulsively kill Ikemefuna, who Okonkwo was quite fond of. His fondness of Ikemefuna is shown when “Okonkwo was inwardly pleased at his son’s development, and he knew it was due to Ikemefuna” (52). The killing causes Okonkwo to spiral into a great depression, as “Okonkwo did not taste any food for two days after the death of Ikemefuna” (63). Okonkwo falls into a period of regret and sadness; he killed someone he adored. This depression is detrimental to Okonkwo, as he loses sleep and his appetite. Due to Okonkwo’s ambitious mindset of not being perceived as weak, he makes an After Okonkwo gets banished from his original village, he goes to his motherland. There, he learns that white missionaries have arrived in his original village, and have begun converting villagers to Christianity. He becomes so blinded with being the best and being better than his father that he does not want to be weak by conforming to the missionaries’ ways. He is so resistant against the new religion that when his son, Nwoye, comes home from a Christian school, Okonkwo “… suddenly overcome with fury, sprang to his feet and gripped him (Nwoye) by the neck” (151). This only shows how much resentment Okonkwo has for the recent conformations. He is nothing less than disappointed that his son would fall under the influence of the Christian faith. If nearly killing his son because he became “weak” and started believing in a new religion is the necessary step in getting Okonkwo’s point across, then so be it. Furthermore, Okonkwo’s ambition and goal to be the best in his village blinds him from seeing the finer things in life. He is so enveloped with the thought of succeeding, that he becomes stubborn in accepting new ideas and things. He wants things done his way. It only shows the lengths that he is willing to go to show that he will not be weak and conform, which is something his father would
“They will take him outside Umofia, as is the custom, and kill him there. But I want you to have nothing to do with it. He calls you his father. (57)” This quote explains that Ogbuefi expresses concern for Okonkwo, because the Oracle explains how it would be wrongful of Okonkwo to kill Ikemefuna. “Dazed with fear, Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak. (61)” This quote portrays that Okonkwo completely disregarded what Ogbuefi and the Oracle cautioned him about, because he was too concerned about his status of what others thought of him. “At last the man was named and people sighed “E-u-u, Ezeudu is dead.” A cold shiver ran down Okonkwo’s back as he remembered the last time the old man had visited him. (121)” At this point in the story, it appears that Okonkwo is starting to realize his wrongdoings, primarily because he takes religion and his spiritual life very seriously, in regards towards the Oracle. Okonkwo begins to lose trust within his family, especially with Nwoye. (As mentioned in the previous paragraph.) In the beginning of the book, Okonkwo relied on Ikemefuna to help Nwoye become more masculine and tough. After Ogbuefi warns Okonkwo about taking part in the murder, Okonkwo thinks about what could happen to him once the gods find out. Once again, Okonkwo lets his emotions
This next quote exhibits how much Okonkwo loves and cares for his daughter, Ezinma. “I wish she were a boy,” thought Okonkwo within himself. She understood things so perfectly (Achebe, pg. 173). A woman can’t rule a household, according to Okonkwo and his clan. If Ezinma were a boy, she could run a household and be a proud son. Okonkwo would never imagine his daughter being in charge of a house. Although Okonkwo has changed and he has more compassion for his daughter. Okonkwo also respects, and treats, women better now. When Okonkwo was exiled to 7 years to his mother's land, he grew more respect for the women in his life. Okonkwo will also never love Ikemefuna as a son. But Okonkwo changed and he does love him as a son. We can say Okonkwo kills himself because he is angry at the Christian missionaries, so he commits suicide to make an example of how much they believe in their religion. One can think after Okonkwo being so violent, when he was a young man, he realized there is more to life than
Some people might say that Okonkwo was just trying to protect the tradition and cultural of his tribal village but in actuality this is far from the truth. When Okonkwo cut down the guard, he made the swift assumption that his clansmen were as passionate about fighting colonialism as him and would follow him into war. When he found otherwise, he could not understand what had happened to his village. The next place he was seen was hanging from a noose in a selfish show of hypocrisy. In the end, Okonkwo's status among his tribe counted for nothing because his own despair over the colonization of his village led him to kill himself. His whole life Okonkwo strived to not to look weak like his father, but in the end he took the cowards way out, suicide. Suicide was a great sin against the Earth. Because he took his own life, Okonkwo, a great leader of Umuofia, had to be buried by strangers. All of his work and perseverance amounted to nothing because of what he had done.
...s insistence on proving himself, as represented in the killing of Ikemefuna and his other discreditable actions, are results of his constant need to impress. His desires to prove himself, become a respected member of the tribe, and maintain his image as a strong warrior all combine with an inability to adapt to a changing world in the latter half of the book. “Okonkwo [is] deeply grieved” (183) by the arrival of the Europeans and the changes they bring to Ibo culture. Thinking that he can be the one to lead the effort to drive the Europeans out of the land and restore the traditions of the tribe, he commits yet another rash act; whenever he does not get the results he expects, he commits his last transgression against tribal tradition: suicide.
Because his father borrowed from others without means of returning, lived off of others, and never made a stable life for himself and his family, Okonkwo does the opposite in his life. Normally a son would inherit his father’s barn, but because his father was unmanly and “had a miserable harvest” (Achebe 16), “there was no barn to inherit” (16). Okonkwo “hate[d] everything that his father Unokoa had loved” (13) because all that his father did was weak. He makes a stable life for himself and his family by producing yams and stocking up his barn. Okonkwo’s idea of manliness is also more aggressive than the clan. When he is suggested to not take part in the killing of Ikemefuna, Okonkwo not only was there, but he “cut him down” (61) because of the fear “of being thought weak” (61). Whenever Okonkwo thought he or a member of his family was being thought of as weak, he would either beat them, physically, or himself, emotionally, up. He is more aggressive and intolerant of unmanliness because of the fear of becoming like his
Okonkwo is “a man of action, a man of war” (7) and a member of high status in the Igbo village. He holds the prominent position of village clansman due to the fact that he had “shown incredible prowess in two intertribal wars” (5). Okonkwo’s hard work had made him a “wealthy farmer” (5) and a recognized individual amongst the nine villages of Umuofia and beyond. Okonkwo’s tragic flaw isn’t that he was afraid of work, but rather his fear of weakness and failure which stems from his father’s, Unoka, unproductive life and disgraceful death. “Perhaps down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and weakness….It was not external but lay deep within himself. It was the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father.” Okonkwo’s father was a lazy, carefree man whom had a reputation of being “poor and his wife and children had just barely enough to eat... they swore never to lend him any more money because he never paid back.” (5) Unoka had never taught Okonkwo what was right and wrong, and as a result Okonkwo had to interpret how to be a “good man”. Okonkwo’s self-interpretation leads him to conclude that a “good man” was someone who was the exact opposite of his father and therefore anything that his father did was weak and unnecessary.
... a rat when it was caught by the tail and dashed against the floor”(Achebe, 63). He refused to eat for two days straight and only drank palm wine. This shows that he felt he did something horrific and knew it was wrong, but only because society and culture dictated that he had to kill Ikemefuna. Thus, Okonkwo evokes sympathy within the reader because he is not only a product of society.
Fear of failure and weakness dominates Okonkwo throughout his life. At first this fear motivates him to rise to success by working diligently and doing everything his father did not do. However, even when Okonkwo establishes an honorable reputation, fear of failure continues to overwhelm him and drives him to perform acts that lead to his suffering. One example of this is when the men of Umuofia decide that Ikemefuna must be killed and Okonkwo kills Ikemefuna even though he is told not to partake in the killing of Ikemefuna. Okonkwo panics when Ikemefuna turns to him and cries for help, and without thinking, Okonkwo slays Ikemefuna with his machete. Okonkwo does this because in the split second where Ikemefuna runs to Okonkwo for protection, Okonkwo is overpowered with fear of being seen as weak and kills Ikemefuna. This is an unwise act on behalf of Okonkwo, and as a result, he suffers emotionally in the next few days. He enters a stage of depression and cannot eat or sleep as all he can think about is what he has done to Ikemefuna. It is at this point that things start t...
The book Things Fall Apart successfully expressed how Chinua Achebe had succeeded in writing a different story. It pointed out the conflict of oneself, the traditional beliefs, and the religious matters of the Africans. Throughout the novel, Chinua Achebe used simple but dignified words and unlike other books, he also included some flashbacks and folktales to make the novel more interesting and comprehensible. Things Fall Apart was about a man named Okonkwo, who was always struggling with his inner fear although he was known for being a strong, powerful, and fearless warior. He feared of weakness, and failure more than the fear of losing and dying and that forshadowing the consequenses he got at the end. Through this man that Chinua Achebe represented the deep and rich human characteristics and the beliefs of one religion to another.
For an abundance of authors, the driving force that aids them in creation of a novel is the theme or number of themes implemented throughout the novel. Often times the author doesn’t consciously identify the theme they’re trying to present. Usually a theme is a concept, principle or belief that is significant to an author. Not only does the theme create the backbone of the story, but it also guides the author by controlling the events that happen in a story, what emotions are dispersed, what are the actions of characters, and what emotions are presented within each environment to engage the readers in many
As you see, Okonkwo was a deprived man after hearing about the whites expanding their beliefs and customs to Umuofia. Being unable to contain it, he had no choice but to give in. Okonkwo wanted to go to war and fight the invading Europeans, but he soon realized that he was the only one hungry for war. “I shall fight alone if I choose” (Achebe 201). Being the only one seeking for revenge, he had no choice but to behead the head messenger who was trying to end a clan meeting. Letting the other messengers escape, Okonkwo’s visual was the truth. “He knew that Umuofia would not go to war” (Achebe 205). Everything that he stood for was now distant. His once powerful and running clan was now weak and resistant to fight off enemies. What was the point to live when everything else had failed him and he could do nothing to resolve it? He struggled with the changes occurring in the tribe. He was known as a very strong and honorable tribesman, but when the whites arrived promoting Christianity and other tribe members began to change as a result, even his own son, he could not bear the change. While viewing the others as weak, like his father, he tries to remain strong against change however he is the only one. Killing the messenger was the last attempt to try and save the tribe from the influence of the white man. Seeing the others not join in his action, he loses hope and in desperation ends his life
Everyone in the past, present, and future strive for success. People of all ages and generations aspire to be successful in one way or another. One of the most prominent ways to define success is having lots of money and lots of respect. The desire for money and titles can tear a life apart. In, Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe, Okonkwo’s desire for status is a negative force that is ruling his life.
The character of Okonkwo in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart was driven by fear, a fear of change and losing his self-worth. He needed the village of Umuofia, his home, to remain untouched by time and progress because its system and structure were the measures by which he assigned worth and meaning in his own life. Okonkwo required this external order because of his childhood and a strained relationship with his father, which was also the root of his fears and subsequent drive for success. When the structure of Umuofia changed, as happens in society, Okonkwo was unable to adapt his methods of self-evaluation and ways of functioning in the world; the life he was determined to live could not survive a new environment and collapsed around him.
Okonkwo’s determination to succeed in life and to not fail leads to his fatal downfall in the end of the novel. His inability to adapt to colonization and his failure to follow the morals of many of the morals of the Ibo culture also are an important key leading to his downfall. Okonkwo was willing to go to war against the missionaries, with or without the clan. He made it clear that he believed the missionaries were in the wrong for trying to change Umuofia. Since the clan wanted no part in the war with the missionaries, Okonkwo took action into his own hands and murdered the head messenger. During the killing of the messenger, Okonkwo had a moment of realization: “He knew that Umuofia would not go to war. He knew because they had let the other messengers escape. They had broken into tumult instead of action” (Achebe 205). Okonkwo finally understands that he doesn’t have support from his fellow clansmen anymore and he feels as if he loses his place in society. Instead of backing up Okonkwo and his decision to murder the messenger, the clan stood in both confusion and disorder and questioned, “ ‘Why did [Okonkwo] do it?’ ” (Achebe 205). Okonkwo’s impulsiveness causes the clansmen to question Okonkwo’s violent actions against the messenger. Throughout the entire novel, Okonkwo struggles to accept the missionaries and the changes that they
The greatest opponent in life is the one that is created inside the mind. As Okonkwo grows up, he decides to be the absolute antipodes of his father Unoka. Okonkwo perceives his father as a culmination of the weaknesses in man. In this erroneous view, Okonkwo buries his feelings deep within himself. When these emotions emerge, he views them as a sign of weakness. When Okonkwo participates in Ikemefuna's killing, he is deeply affected as he has ended the life of one who he grew to love as a son. Okonkwo is excessively depressed after the slaying, "not tasting any food for two days." (61) As he notices his confusion, he calls himself weak like a shivering old woman. In his emotionless show of strength after Ikemefuna's death, Okonkwo actually proves his frailty by hiding what he feels. Okonkwo is dominated by his private fear of appeari...