Things Fall Apart Notes
Intro:
TFA is the seminal African novel in English. Its most striking feature
is to create a complex and sympathetic portrait of a village culture.
He is not only trying to remind his people of the value of the past but
also to assert that it has some value. Many Africans were ready to
accept the European judgment that Africa had no culture or history
worth considering.
Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (which Achebe was taught along with
similar books) portrays a comic African who slavishly adores his white
colonialist boss to the point of being gladly shot by him. Achebe said
it was his indignation at this novel that inspired the writing of TFA.
Culture
Achebe does not portray the Ibo culture as ideal.
Many traditional cultures have considered twins magical or cursed.
Twins are in fact unusually common among the Ibo and some
subgroups value them highly.
Nwoye serves as a point of view to criticize some of the negative
aspects of the culture, particularly the less humane aspects.
l. Explain why Achebe begins with an elaborate description of the
main character Okonkwo. What do we learn about the values of
Umuofians through this?
*They value kinship, athletic prowess, individual achievement, and
integrity.
2. What role does religion play in the downfall of Umuofia? Discuss
Mr. Brown and Mr. Smith’s method of evangelization.
Mr. Brown is tolerant and does not try to force his views on anyone.
He welcomes all, including the outcasts. He tries to work with the
clan to come to an understanding. Mr. Smith, however, is rigid,
intolerant, and does not respect the Igbo ways. He does not respect
their beliefs.
3. Although Umuofia is a patriarchal society Achebe constantly points
to the importance of the feminine in Ibo culture. In what ways does
he draw attention to the fact that the feminine qualities of Ibo culture
are essential to survival?
He balances the principles of masculine and feminine. The god who
above all others who regulates life in Umuofia is Ani, the earth
goddess. And it is a reflection of Okonkwo’s failure to seek balance
between the manly virtues and the womanly virtues as understood in
Umuofia that each of the disasters that happens to him can be seen
as a crime against the earth. It could be seen as Okonkwo's tragic
flaw: he is a man who lives in culture that requires a balance
between the masculine and the feminine that he does not
acknowledge in part because he is ashamed of his father who failed
to be a “real man.”
And it is through this flaw that he is destroyed.
4. What contributes to the final tragedy of Okonkwo? Could his fall
have been avoided?
*His inability to adapt to change and his stubborn adherence to the
old ways. Only if he had changed the kind of person he was.
5. What sort of man is Unoka? Does Achebe want us to share
Okonkwo’s view of his father?
Okonkwo’s father was gentle and fun loving. He appreciated music,
laughter, stories, and socializing. Okonkwo cannot appreciate any of
the good qualities of his father.
6. Why is the story told in a roundabout way, with digressions, folk
tales and whole chapters devoted merely to description of daily life?
It closely resembles the qualities of African storytelling.
7. Why is the last section told from the point of view of the
Commissioner a man whom we have hardly met?
Because that is the way the British saw the Nigerian culture. They
failed to recognize anything of value and did not see the noble
qualities in men like Okonkwo.
8. Bride price is the converse of dowry. It involves the bridegroom’s
family paying substantial wealth in cash or goods for the privilege of
marrying a young woman. Compare this with the European custom of
dowry in which the bride’s family paid the bridegroom
9. In Part I we were introduced to an intact and functioning culture.
It may have had its faults and it accommodated deviants like
Okonkwo with some difficulty, but it still operated as an organic
whole. It is in part II that it begins to fall apart. Okonkwo’s exile is a
personal disaster and removes him from his home during a crucial
time so that he returns to a changed world, which can no longer
adapt to him.
11. All of Okonkwo’s hopes and dreams are rooted in the traditional
culture. The fact that he cannot adapt himself to the new ways helps
to explain his extreme reaction. The missionaries bring colonial
government with them. Missionaries were often viewed as agents of
imperialism. There is a saying that is common to Native Americans
and Africans alike. “Before the white man came we had the land and
they had the Bible. Now we have the Bible and they have the land.”
12. The missionaries try to refute what they consider idolatry with
the simplistic argument that the animist gods are only wooden idols;
however, the villagers are perfectly aware that the idol is not the god
in the literal sense any more than the sculpture of Christ on a
wooden cross in a Christian church is God. This sort of
oversimplification was a constant theme in that the British assumed
the natives were fools pursuing childish beliefs who only needed a
little enlightenment to be converted.
“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.” (Uchendu)
Why is Okonkwo so angry? His father did not help, and he was
ashamed and thought him a failure. Coupled with shame is fear, a
fear that dominates his whole life, the fear of failure ad the fear of
weakness. It is the fear of himself lest he resemble his father.
But the Ibo judge each man according to the individual's worth not
the father’s.
He is ruled by one passion: to hate everything his father loved,
including gentleness and idleness. Is this why he is so concerned
with not being feminine? Why he works so hard? Why he strives to
become the warrior that he has? Why he strives to earn a title? Why
he does not want his sons acting womanly?
He is fueled by the past –his father, the present (attaining respect)
and the future (avoiding failure)
Okonkwo was not a man of thought but a man of action. He thinks
no matter how prosperous a man is if he is not able to rule his
women and children he is a failure. He never openly shows emotion
except for anger. To show affection was a sign of weakness: the only
thing worth demonstrating was strength. Of course, he is much more
complex. He does show emotion. He does think.
It is obvious that Achebe sympathizes with the Ibo and also
Okonkwo. The two are the same and different. Okonkwo and his
people seem divided in how to deal with the attack on their culture
and their lives. But Achebe cannot want us to see the British as
totally responsible. There has to be a level of fate involved. What is it
that will not allow the center to hold? Or is it a combination of
extrinsic and intrinsic forces that are at work here? Obierika does say
that the white man has put a knife in the things that hold the Ibo
together and the Ibo have fallen apart.
So what is it that causes the culture to crumble? Does it take both
the force of white violence and a naiveté or faith or ignorance or fear
on the part of the Ibo to have their culture come crumbling down?