Okonkwo's Fear

In things fall apart Okonkwo had the fear of becoming his father who was lazy and unsuccessful. Okonkwo didn’t give up when he didn’t inherit seeds from his father to start his farm. Instead, he begged Nwakibie for seeds and started his own farm from the ground up. Okonkwo could have let his fear turn him into a lazy unsuccessful person but in lieu of his fear he didn’t let it impact his working life in a negative way. He decided to be proactive and to get things done on his own, further proving that he was determined to be a great farmer, unlike his father.

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

In the book Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, it carries a very common theme; fear is destructive and can provoke the most daunting actions. Okonkwo and his village went through a bunch of disasters and events because they feared a lot of stuff. Okonkwo was driven to madness by fear and most of his actions were driven by fear.

In the novel Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo’s shame for his father, Unoka, motivates him to be everything his father wasn’t. As a result, Okonkwo hides behind masculinity and conceals his emotions, in hope of escaping weakness. Stubborn and impulsive, Okonkwo makes rash decisions to uphold his reputation, which affects his tribe and his family. Okonkwo’s constant fear of resembling his father takes over his ability compromise and causes him to suffer from depression, the “loss” of his son, the loss of

Social rank and relative wealth play great roles in determining a person’s life in Umuofia society. Sometimes a man with sheer force of will cannot change his future through hard work. One of the main conflicts in Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe is the clash between Okonkwo’s determination to succeed, his free will, and fate – which seems to have less appealing things in mind. Okonkwo’s will plays a major factor in determining his future; he chooses to kill Ikemefuna with his own hands, he chooses to kill a government official, and in the end, he chooses to take his own life. However, the pre-destined conditions of his life, his father’s failures, and a series of unfortunate circumstances ultimately lead to Okonkwo’s downfall.

In the novel Things Fall Apart, strength and pride are very important aspects of the main character, Okonkwo, however, these traits may sound like excellent traits to possess but because of the way he was raised, Okonkwo harbours many of his emotions under an outer shell of violence, strength and pride. His traits can be shown by looking at where he has come from in his life, for example, Okonkwo has acquired a large amount of wealth in his life because of his hard work and dedication which he also puts towards his family, unfortunately, his family also suffers greatly because of this due to Okonkwo’s high expectations of his children and his violent ways when they do not live up to them. Secondly, Okonkwo possesses hidden emotions that

Okonkwo strives all of his life to become a stronger, more powerful, and a successful individual. He wants to do this because his father was a slack and lazy person who lived most of his life in debt and had no titles to his name. People often looked at his father as a women figure for the few achievements he redeemed. Okonkwo never wanted to be like his father and it eventually got to the point where he became fearful of becoming like him. Achebe uses the power of fear as a theme of to show how much it can devastate one’s

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.

Okonkwo’s Fears A French bishop named Jacques-Benigne Bossuet once stated, “The greatest weakness of all is the great fear of appearing weak.” Everyone has fears, but one needs courage to overcome it. In the book Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, a protagonist known as Okonkwo lived with his fear of becoming like his lazy father, Unoka. His own fear of weakness and failure became the tragic flaw that ruled his entire life.

Okonkwo’s biggest fear is he will be seen as weakling just like his father. We see evidence from the text when, “Perhaps down in his heart Okonkwo was not a cruel man. But his whole life was dominated by fear, the 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 nature, malevolent, red in tooth and claw.” This evidence supports my claim because it gives example on how Okonkwo wants to be his father’s opposite and how he wants to be more of a

In the book, Things Fall Apart, written by Chinua Achebe, the main character Okonkwo feared many things. Okonkwo was afraid of being weak; through abuse he tries to show dominance. Okonkwo also feared growing up to end up just like his lazy father. Okonkwo fears change and losing his self-worth. The fear Okonkwo had controlled his life and his fate.

Rather early in the story, Things Fall Apart, we are met with this line “his whole life was dominated by fear, the fear of failure and of weakness”. This line is referring to the life of the main character, Okonkwo, who struggles with an internal fear throughout the book.

After contrasting Okonkwo’s greatness with his father’s meekness, Achebe dives into the mind of Okonkwo in order to establish the theme of fate vs free will. This moment is very important in the narrative, as it shows Okonkwo’s determination to rise up and become prosperous ultimately comes from his fear of confronting fate. A paradox occurs as Okonkwo, a man of natural will, is compromising his well-being and true self in order to fight fate.

The acknowledgement of the innate fear inside of Okonkwo proves that the fear is present, which drives his other actions. His fear, because it is a great and internal fear consumes him and causes him to commit acts based upon that anxiety. His fear of being weak, of resembling his father, causes him to worry excessively about being viewed as strong and causes him to be aggressive and violent, both of which are very involved in his downfall. His fear does not directly cause his descent, but it is the force that drives his actions and his character, which are the direct origins of his downfall. His fear of a semblance between himself and his father proves that fear can consume a person if unchecked. Okonkwo allowed the fear of becoming his father