How Does Things Fall Apart Change

Everyone in the book Things Fall Apart must make decisions throughout the book, some of these decisions are minor, while others are major. Characters also make decisions that can be good or bad, some of the decisions affected just that person, and while others affected the people they love and know. In the book, every action has a consequence, some of these make the characters’ lives better while others turn their worlds upside down. In this essay, I’m going to talk about the decision that Okonkwo made when he was younger.

Okonkwo wrestles with his fear that any sign of weakness will cause him to lose control of his family, position in the village, and even himself. Like many heroes of classical tragedy, Okonkwo’s tragic flaw, fear, also makes him excessively proud. Okonkwo’s downfall is a result of the changes created by the coming of the British Colonisers to Igbo. The introduction of the Colonisers into the novel causes Okonkwo’s tragic flaw to be exacerbated. Okonkwo construes change as weakness, and as a result of his interpretation, Okonkwo only knows how to react to change through anger and strength. He derives great satisfaction, “hubris” or proud arrogance, from the fact that he is a traditional, self made man and thinks that to change would mean submitting to an outside force (Christianity).

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

Okonkwo lost himself after losing everything he had. He didn’t have a real enough sense of self to adapt to all the changes that hit him like a whirlwind.

In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe employs imagery, symbolism, and themes to reveal the story of Okonkwo. Throughout the novel he weaves in these things to really tell us the tale.

In the novel Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo is portrayed as a respected and determined individual whose fatal flaw eventually works against him. Throughout the novel the readers are shown that Okonkwo has many of these Characteristics because he is obsessed with the idea of becoming just like his father. This becomes his flaw in the novel that puts him into exile and makes it hard for him to adjust to the changes that were made with in his village.

Chinua Achebe unfolds a variety of interesting connections between characters in the Novel Things Fall Apart. Relationships with parents, children and inner self are faced differently, however the attitude that Okonkwo gave them determined what kind of outcome he generated from these relations. Okonkwo looks at everything through his violent and manly perspective and is afraid to show his real feelings because he thinks that he may be thought out as weak and feminine this paranoid attitude lead him to self-destruction.

In Things Fall Apart the key terms of the surrounding issue are corruption and greed. In Things Fall Apart, the author creates a view of exile that is both isolated and helpful ultimately revealing the idea that time and foreshadows corruption. To begin with, the story discuss how Okonkwo faced a terrible fate. Secondly, the novel reveals how his fate can change either negative or positive. Lastly, the book talks about how everything does not have a set course.

Okonkwo shows throughout the book Things Fall Apart that he fears weakness and failure. Often times he also shows that he is bitter and gets angry easily. This bitterness and fear leads to some consequence such as exile and death. After several encounters with failure Okonkwo realizes his weak points and gains sympathy from that. There are ways that Okonkwo shows theses things throughout the book and evidence that makes them true.

Okonkwo has become determined to climb his way back up the social ranks after have been knocked to the bottom. “He was determined that his return should be marked by his people. He would return with a flourish, and regain the seven wasted years. Although this determination took his mind off of things, he still remembered the tragedy of Nwoye. “At first it appeared as if it might prove too great for his spirit. But it was a resilient spirit, and in the end Okonkwo overcame his sorrow. He had five other sons and he would bring them up in the way of the clan (172).” Okonkwo goes as far as to say “Now he is no longer my son or you brother (172).”

This new perspective gained by Okonkwo and the reader furthers the grey-morality in which the conflict brews, and leads Okonkwo to question the morality of his own point of view. He realizes that he is one of the few tribesmen who has not given into the colonists and their beliefs, and this makes him question the very foundations of his actions: he has been fighting for what he believes is the good of his clan - the upholding of tradition and their own culture - but is he alone in this fight? Is the war he has waged against the Western culture truly for the good or his clan, or is it a selfish illusion? Okonkwo's tragic realization ultimately leads him to commit suicide, as he doubts the morality of his own resistance to cultural change, and becomes aware his adamance against the culture of the Europeans makes him no better than those he declared as

Things Fall Apart is a novel written by Chinua Achebe in 1958. The novel focuses on the main character Okonkwo, it explains his strengths and his weakness and the way he interacts can paint a picture of those strengths and weaknesses. Okonkwo has many strengths, however he also has one weakness that seems to prove predominate in his life is the personal and social obligations placed upon him. Societal and personal expectations are something that every culture seems to struggle with in some way, whether it is having expectations placed upon them, or placing them upon others. In Things Fall Apart Okonkwo seems to struggle with social and personal requirements for perfection, and this is a main theme throughout the book, as Okonkwo’s battle with expectations grows.

Every culture needs a leader that is reasonable and honorable. Hierarchy characterizes the community in Things Fall Apart, and Okonkwo’s culpability is significant in the whole book. He was deemed a fearless and impetuous leader because of the way he manages situations. However, one can assume that he was an immoral person but a profound, cognitive aspect could better explain if he was a good or bad person. Consequently, Okonkwo was a tragic hero due to his success of being a respected leader, but having a tragic flaw of being afraid of weakness and failure.

But his whole life was dominated by fear, fear of failure and of weakness. It was deeper and more intimate than the fear of evil and capricious gods and of magic, the fear of the forest, and of the forces of nature, malevolent, red in tooth and claw.” It was this deeply ingrained fear that ultimately lead Okonkwo to his downfall and it’s the same fundamental fear that led to the downfall of his people. The clan’s unwavering pursuit of strength and stability was also rooted in this fear and it was the fear that won out in the face of the European invaders. Okonkwo’s people were unable to change but equally unable to fight for the only way of life they knew. In many ways, Okonkwo was the personification of the Igbo people’s core values. The tragic irony of him being exiled by his own people reveals the fundamental fallacies of their perspectives and foreshadows the fall of both Okonkwo and his village. Nevertheless, they are not portrayed as solely a doomed people nor as unreasonable savages. Although he doesn’t let everybody see it, Okonkwo does a lot for the love of his daughter and his people put unity and family above nearly all

The description given early in the novel clearly establishes his character as being a strong and wealthy man who is well respected among the rest of the tribe due to his superior fighting abilities and his influential personality. Having achieved such elite status within the Umuofia clan, Okonkwo appears to be old-fashioned as it is seen in his approach in raising his family and tribal people. However, Okonkwo’s character changes incrementally with the emergence of a boy, Ikemefuna, from a neighboring village, who was brought to him because of his brutal attack against his wife Ojiugo during the ‘week of peace’. Amongst the Umuofia clan, the ‘week of peace’ is a tribal ritual whose conditions are not to complete any evil sins in a certain week span. After having accepted Ikemefuna into the family, Okonkwo experiences a shift in his mental state. Shortly hereafter, he questions this change, which demonstrates his lack of willingness to change which is clearly demonstrated in the book in several different ways like in chapter Eight, Okonkwo proclaims to himself, “When did you become a shivering old woman, you, who are known in all nine villages for your valour in war” (Achebe 56). This represents that his character has become a weaker, less influential individual amongst the nine tribes where he is well known. Symbolically, this depicts a fragile reputation in Okonkwo’s status within the community to which he belongs.