Assignment of paper no 14

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Critical Evaluation of Things Fall Apart

Chinua Achebe was born in the colony of Niger in 1930, to Ibo parents who were Christian converts. He attended British-style schools in Nigeria, including University College, Ibadeen, and graduated from London University in 1953.

Achebe’s first novel, Things Fall Apart, is a classic of African literature. Among all the colonial governments in Africa, the British in Nigeria fostered first education in its territory. As a result, Nigerian writers preceded those in other areas of Africa. Things Fall Apart is noted as the first African novel. Achebe, a master of his craft, also wrote No Longer at Ease (1960), Arrow of God (1964), A Man of the People (1966), and Anthills of the Savannah (1987). Achebe also published poetry, short stories, and essays.

In Things Fall Apart and in his later novels, Achebe wanted to counter demeaning and incorrect stereotypes of his people and Eurocentric presentations of the confrontation between the Ibo of Nigeria and the British intruders. In his novels, Achebe admits, he strives for artistic excellence but also wants to give a message. Just as the oral tradition of the Ibo people served their society by sustaining its values, so the modern Ibo, writing in English, should serve Ibo society.

In Things Fall Apart, Achebe combines the Ibo oral tradition’s narrative style with the Western world’s traditional novel form. In novel form Achebe narrates an African tale in African style. The novel’s narrative voice could be Achebe’s or it could be the voice of a village elder. In either case, the voice is connected to the world of the novel. Though the voice is objective, it is also a part of the scene depicted.

·         Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart is a classic novel about the clash between two cultures. The Igbo, a proud warrior race from what is now Nigeria, see their culture and way of life slowly destroyed by European colonists. Okonkwo, once a leader of his community, kills himself because he's unable to accept the changes he sees around him.

·         Achebe intertwines the themes of religion and tradition, describing the spiritual beliefs of the Igbo and how their religion differs from Christianity. Igbo religious practices often bring clan members into conflict with Christians, who go out of their way to kill the sacred python and rescue infant twins from the Evil Forest.

·         Okonkwo considers himself the epitome of masculinity. He thinks of weak men and Christians as women, because they cannot fight and have no titles. Nevertheless, Okonkwo's favorite is Ezinma, his daughter, whom he wishes were a boy. The Igbo believe in gender roles that place women in a subservient position to men.

To achieve an African voice, Achebe uses plain, short, declarative sentences. Also, throughout the novel, characters narrate or listen to traditional stories from the society’s past and stories that illustrate and teach the culture’s values. The novel opens with the retelling of Okonkwo’s exploits in a traditional wrestling match, the ritual by which young men proved themselves worthy of a high place in their clan.

Achebe weaves Ibo proverbs into the novel’s dialogue, to clarify a point, to teach a lesson, and, usually, to provide humor. Also, many Ibo words are used in the text without translation. Some of these can be understood by the reader through context, but others remain mysterious and create a distance between the non-Ibo reader and the Ibo world of Things Fall Apart. Taken together, sentence structure, Umuofian stories, proverbs, and language create a memorable colloquial narrative voice.

The novel’s structure, on the other hand, is formal. There are twenty-five chapters: thirteen in book 1, six in book 2, and six in book 3. The pivotal chapter about Okonkwo’s accidental shooting of a young boy and his subsequent banishment is at the book’s center, in chapter 13. Achebe establishes the nature of the Umuofian society and Okonkwo’s character in book 1. In book 2 tension heightens as the outsiders appear. In book 3 the conflict comes to a head when Okonkwo kills the clerk and his people retreat before the power of the new government. The novel’s last page has the required unexpected yet inevitable ending. The novel is a very orderly work.

To return to character, Things Fall Apart presents Okonkwo as a tragic hero who struggles against internal and external forces and meets a tragic end. Obereika calls his fallen friend a “great man.” The hero is a complex man with both strengths and weaknesses. At the novel’s start Okonkwo’s deep shame about his father’s failure motivates him to become a respected man, an exemplar of all that is valued in his society. His accomplishments feed his pride and cause his rigidity. His pride, rigidity, and short temper lead to sins against the gods of his people and criticism from his chi. Finally, Okonkwo is banned from his fatherland for seven years and, when he returns home, kills in anger. Okonkwo then takes his own life, the greatest sin against the gods of his people. His is a tragic end.

The plot line of Okonkwo’s struggle and fall reveals not only his complex character but also the strong social fabric of the Umuofian people. Like Okonkwo’s character, this society is complex, having both strengths and weaknesses. Its traditions create a stable community in which each individual finds meaning. The oral storytelling and rituals for planting, harvesting, and human passage sustain an orderly society. Some of the harsher customs, such as killing the innocent Ikemefuna, exiling Okonkwo for an accidental killing, and banishing some persons to live their entire lives as outcasts, raise doubts about the ultimate wisdom of Umuofian customs. Some, like Nwoye and Obereika, question what was always done and suggest that change is necessary. Others, like Okonkwo, stand fast in defense of the tradition. When the newcomers come with a new religion and laws, the fabric of Umuofian society weakens.

The newcomers also have strengths and weaknesses. They offer a gentler religion and different laws. Their excessive zeal and righteousness, however, provoke the anger of the people the newcomers want to win over. Finally, the Umuofian people and the newcomers share a common weakness. Few attempt to learn each other’s language, customs, or beliefs. Conflict is inevitable. The situation and characters that Achebe draws in his novel are fraught with complexity. It is this complexity, as well as Achebe’s masterful writing style, that make Things Fall Apart a classic novel.

The novel was written in reaction to European assessments of African culture as found in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1902) and Joyce Cary's Mister Johnson (1939) and some critics have seen in it an effort to reverse the European view, presenting Igbo society as enlightened and the European/British colonizers as in the dark. Rather, it is an attempt to present accurately Igbo society and what its people endured in the clash of their culture with that of the British. With so much apparently determined by British occupation and rule, one major theme is that of fate vs. free will. Much of the interest in the book lies in Achebe's subtle handling of these forces as the characters both British and Igbo are in turn manipulated by or appear to steer successfully around forces beyond their control.

Okonkwo can be seen as psychologically determined by his weak father to avoid the appearance of weakness at all costs, hence his killing of Ikemefuna. Yet his own tribesmen have exonerated him from having to take a hand in the killing so that his choice is not externally determined. Misunderstanding and rigidity by chiefly male characters on both sides exacerbate already strained conditions of the colonial system. Achebe is careful to point out elsewhere that the British did not export democracy to the colonies; rather they undermined it and tried to govern the Igbo, who had a form of democracy in place, by a hierarchical, totalitarian system.

The testing of conventional wisdom on both sides by experience is also a common theme that is carried out by Achebe's use of both Christian and Igbo beliefs, proverbs and stories. Thus the fanatical Mr. Smith relies on biblical stories "of sheep and goats," "wheat and tares," and of "slaying the prophets of Baal." Ironically, it is his extremism that in part leads to the burning down of the church. On the other hand, the Igbo allot part of the Evil Forest, a demonic location where twin babies are thrown away, for the building of the church. When the church then prospers and no parishioners are harmed, the Igbo religion is dealt a severe blow. Likewise, the Church...