37: Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Book Cover of Things Fall Apart.
“‘There is no story that is not true. The world has no end, and what is good among one people is an abomination with others’”(141).
With masterfully crafted prose, Chinua Achebe encapsulates the life of Okonkwo, a leader of a fictional Igbo clan called Umuofia, whose lifetime demonstrates the woes of manhood, oracles of polytheistic mysticism, and white evangelical colonialism in late nineteenth century Nigeria.
In a village where, for centuries, men won influence by building huts and growing families with multiple wives--all the while sustained by the success of a quintessential yam harvest--Okonkwo sought to prove himself worthy of respect beyond his wrestling prowess.
“‘We do not ask for wealth because he that has health and children will also have wealth. We do not pray to have more money but to have more kinsmen. We are better than animals because we have kinsmen’”(165).
Growing up in a communally patriarchal system based on labor, sacrifice, and honor, Okonkwo aspired to revive his family name in the wake of his father’s failures, failures that compounded into a moral stain that haunted his limbs whenever idle.
Despite his noble efforts--lessened by often punishing outbursts toward his wives--things go horribly wrong by sheer bad luck, and he and his family are temporarily banished to another clan as white missionaries descend upon their neighbors.
Chinua Achebe.
Throughout the novel, the question of control and the power of belief hinges upon the value of merit and the uncontrollable circumstances of chance that can undermine it all.
Achebe admonishes the man who pities himself, who allows his luck and fortune too much sway over his inner world.
“‘You think you are the greatest sufferer in the world? Do you know that men are sometimes banished for life?’”(135)
Though the Igbo women are often treated like property, depending on the man who prevails over them, there is a throughline of community and mutual interest that sustains a sense of respect, sororal love, and ordered boundaries.
“‘It is not bravery when a man fights with a woman’”(93).
Achebe paints the village of Umuofia as a place of reciprocal organization and spiritual belief centered around multiple gods and an unquestionably credible oracle. It is the full faith of the people that embodies a sense of purer human connection and a wider range of feeling that is embraced instead of sullied by the moralization of control popular among Western cultures.
This is why it is all the more heart-wrenching when Okonkwo and his family return to a clan permanently changed by a church of white missionaries on their land, illustrating the colonial inquests of the British, or White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, an era infamously sordid in the erasure of entire peoples.
“‘But I fear for you young people because you do not understand how strong is the bond of kinship. You do not know what it is to speak with one voice. And what is the result? An abominable religion has settled among you. A man can now leave his father and his brothers. He can curse the gods of his fathers and his ancestors[…]”(167).
Without spoiling if or how “things fall apart”, Achebe invites the audience into an honest and tender story of a man's triumphs and losses, from his familial huts to the outskirts of his clan’s haunted forest. This novel beautifully explores cultural differences between both neighboring communities within countries as well as invading outsiders from seemingly other worlds. Achebe begs the question of if or when violent retaliation is warranted in the face of erasure, of annihilation, of blatant white supremacy and savior complexes.
You may enjoy Things Fall Apart if you liked similar works in the genre of historical fiction like Beloved by Toni Morrison, Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, or Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
Thank you for reading, feel free to leave a comment below if you have any ideas to share or recommendations for similar works!
- gab
