Prepared by: Dhaval Diyora
Roll No: 05
Paper – 14 : The African
Literature
M.A (English): Sem- 4
Enrollment No : 2069108420190013
Batch:
2018-20
Email: d.d.diyora@gmail.com
Submitted to: Smt .S. B Gardi, Department of
English,
MK
Bhavnagar University.
Topic: Protagonist
of Things Fall Apart
Nigerian Novelist, Poet and Critic
Born: 16
November 1930 in Ogidi, Nigeria
He was raised in the large village of Ogidi, one of the
first centers of Anglican missionary work in Eastern Nigeria, and is a graduate
of University College, Ibadan. His early career in radio ended abruptly in
1966, when he left his post as Director of External Broadcasting in Nigeria
during the national upheaval that led to the Biafran War. He was appointed
Senior Research Fellow at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and began
lecturing widely abroad. From 1972 to 1975, and again from 1987 to 1988, Mr.
Achebe was Professor of English at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst,
and also for one year at the University of Connecticut, Storrs. Cited in the
London Sunday Times as one of the "1,000 Makers of the Twentieth
Century" for defining "a modern African literature that was truly
African" and thereby making "a major contribution to world
literature," Chinua Achebe has published novels, short stories, essays,
and children's books. His volume of poetry, Christmas in Biafra, written during
the Biafran War, was the joint winner of the first Commonwealth Poetry Prize.
Of his novels, Arrow of God won the New Statesman—Jock Campbell Award, and
Anthills of the Savannah was a finalist for the 1987 Booker Prize. Things Fall
Apart, Chinua Achebe's masterpiece, has been published in fifty different
languages and has sold more than two million copies in the United States since
its original publication in 1959.
Mr. Achebe has received numerous honors from around the
world, including the Honorary Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and
Letters, a Foreign Honorary Membership of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,
as well as more than thirty honorary doctorates from universities in England,
Scotland, the United States, Canada, Nigeria, and South Africa. He is also the
recipient of Nigeria's highest honor for intellectual achievement, the Nigerian
National Order of Merit, and of Germany's Friedenstreis des Beutschen Buchhandels
for 2002. In 2007 he won the International Man Booker Prize.
Mr. Achebe was the David and
Marianna Fisher University Professor and Professor of Africana Studies at Brown
University. For over fifteen years, he was the Charles P. Stevenson Professor
of Languages and Literature at Bard College. He last lived with his wife in
Providence, RI. They have four children. He died in March 2013.
About Things Fall Apart
In
1958, Achebe made a splash and flash with the publication of his first
novel: Things Fall Apart. It is the world’s most widely read African
novel. The conflict between native African culture and the influence of white
Christian missionaries and the colonial government in Nigeria.
Chinua Achebe writing Culture of Nigerian people, Gender and Tradition in Things Fall
Apart
Achebe wants to inform readers about the
value of Nigerian culture as an African. Things Fall Apart provides readers with
an insight of Igbo society and culture right before the white missionaries’
invasion on their land Umuofia. The invasion of the colonizing force threatens
to change almost every aspect of Igbo society; from religion, traditional
gender roles and relations, family structure to trade. Due to the unexpected arrival
of white missionaries in Umuofia, the villagers do not know how to react to the
sudden cultural changes that the missionaries threaten to change with their new
political structure and institutions.
It tells two overlappings, intertwining
stories, both of which center around Okonkwo, a “strong man” of an Ibo village
in Nigeria. The first of these stories traces Okonkwo’s fall from grace with
the tribal world in which he lives, and in its classical purity of line and
economical beauty, it provides us with a powerful fable about the immemorial the conflict between the individual and society. The second story, which is as
modern as the first is ancient, and which elevates the book to a tragic plane,
concerns the clash of cultures and the destruction of Okonkwo’s world through
the arrival of aggressive, proselytizing European missionaries. These twin dramas are perfectly harmonized, and they are modulated by an awareness capable
of encompassing at once the life of nature, human history, and the mysterious
compulsions of the soul.
(Hero)
Okonkwo
A man of action, powerful, fearless,
well-respected member, successful farmer and warrior and renowned as a leader of
his tribe. Okonkwo overcomes his poor background and achieves great success
through wrestling. He held
the wrestling record for 7 years.
Distance creates by
Masculine attitude.
He is
always trying to prove his masculine character which is actually the main
reason for his own fall. He thinks he has proven his masculinity by beating his
wives and son because he fears being thought of being as a weak person. He
thinks that his son Nwoye looks like his father and he cannot bear this
feeling. This is the main reason why Okonkwo never hesitates to punish or beat
Nwoye every time.
Even,
one day when Nwoye was cutting the yams, Okonkwo came and gave treatment to
Nwoye because of the size of the yams. According to Okonkwo, Nwoye was cutting
with the wrong size and said:
“if you split another yam of this
size, I
shall break your jaw”
While converting the natives to
Christianity, His desire to hide his emotions for his son actually drove a great
distance between father and son. Therefore, during Okonkwo’s exile years, Nwoye
converted to Christianity.
The generation gap is one of the most important issues
Hate towards father
He hated a lot to his father because he never took
responsibilities of his family. His father was just playing the flute so Okonkwo promises
to himself that he will be the opposite of his father whom “people laughed at because
he was a loafer and they swore never to lend him any more money because of he
never paid back”
Lack of intimacy
Lack of intimacy is one reason for the
falling apart not only for son and father but also for the tribe.
Additionally, the masculine character of Okonkwo is another reason for this
partition. In the end Okonkwo has no option and kills himself.
Exile becomes strong
reason for the failure of both
One day by mistake he killed one boy and
as per law he has to live outside from his own village and Okonkwo’s exile was
a failure for both himself and his tribe. When Okonkwo returned from exile, he
believed that if he had not gone to exile, his tribe wouldn’t be in this
situation. In other words, he felt extreme regret for what he had done. His
homeland was now a different place anymore. White men made many changes without
native support.
Okonkwo tries with the support of own people but he not able to
give a fightback to missionaries. Once he gets a chance and he broke the church but
he arrested by white people and he has paid fines for this action. He was the
leader and ruler of the Umofia but now the situation was changed so villagers
also start to accept rules and regulations of missionaries. In the last Strong Man, Okonkwo
feels alone and failure so may he not able to accept his failure and he commits
suicide.
Works Cited
Achebe, Chinua. About. 22 02
2020 <https://www.facebook.com/pg/ChinuaAchebeAuthor/about/?ref=page_internal>.
Habib, Md Arfat. " Analyzing the
character of Okonkwo in Things Fall Apart." Academia. 22 02 2020
<https://www.academia.edu/12370094/Analyzing_the_character_of_Okonkwo_in_Things_Fall_Apart>.
Hero, Course. "Things Fall Apart
Study Guide." 28 07 2016. Course Hero . 22 02 2020
<https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Things-Fall-Apart/>.
Scheub, Harold. "When A Man
Fails Alone." Jstor (2020): 61.
