Zach Gardner
Mr. Cheng
4th Hour
Things Fall Apart
How do you want to live your life, by strength, or weakness? Will you live it by someone else’s standards, or your own? How will it compare to others around you, will you live how you want, or how others want you to live? The book Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe, is about a man and his success and failure in living an exemplary life in the Nigerian village of Umuofia
Okonkwo is the perfect man, according to his standards. Of all of the people in his Nigerian village, Umuofia, and all of the other eight villages, Okonkwo was the most exemplary figure of all. The following quote provides perspective on how ‘perfect’ he is by his standards. “Okonkwo was clearly cut out for great things. He was still young but he had won fame as the greatest wrestler in the nine villages. He was a wealthy farmer and had two barns full of yams, and had just married his third wife. To crown it all, he had taken two titles and had shown incredible prowess in two inter-tribal wars. And so although Okonkwo was still young, he was already one of the greatest men of his time” (pg. 8). The next quote describes how his achievements have affected his life, politically and socially. “His fame rested on solid personal achievements. As a young man of eighteen he had brought honor to his village by throwing Amalinze the Cat” (pg. 3). Because of all of these achievements at such a young age, Okonkwo lives a very successful life. Throughout the story, Okonkwo thinks very highly of himself and has the idea that because of his achievements, he is the most exemplary and perfect person throughout all nine villages, according to his standards.
Secondly, besides lots of great achievements, Okonkwo is very strong and determined, and this makes him a popular leader of Umuofia. The first quote describes Okonkwo’s popularity, while the second explains what he is determined to do in life. “Okonkwo was well known throughout the nine villages and even beyond” (pg. 3). “His life had been ruled by a great passion – to become one of the lords of the clan. That had been his life-spring. And he had all but achieved it” (pg. 131). The first quote illustrates his social life, while the second quote portrays how his social life will help with his life-long goal. To elaborate on this example, Okonkwo is extremely popular in all nine clans of the nine villages, and because his life-long goal is to be a lord of the clan, being well known throughout Umuofia and beyond will help him achieve his goal. This shows that Okonkwo is strong and determined because of his outstanding achievements at such a young age, and his great will power to never give up until his destination is reached.
Finally, Okonkwo feels that showing compassion, or other feminine traits, is a sign of weakness, and that it is not a good sign of manliness. Okonkwo describes how whenever he feels troubled by his father’s weakness and failure, he thinks of the manly things that he has done. “His mind went to his latest show of manliness. –‘I cannot understand why you refused to come with us to kill that boy’” (pg. 66). The preceding quote is part of a conversation between Okonkwo and Obierika. In their conversation, Okonkwo was describing how Nwoye is too much like his grandfather, which brings Okonkwo to feel disturbed by his father’s weakness and show of feminism. So when Okonkwo thinks of his most recent show of manliness, he thinks of the murder of Ikemefuna, and compares it to how Obierika did not go to kill him. In Okonkwo’s mind, this shows weakness and disobedience to the gods, by disobeying the message of the Oracle, which was to kill Ikemefuna. The reason why Okonkwo thinks of himself as so manly compared to everyone else, is because he compares his manliness to other people’s show of feminism. He compares his strength to other’s weakness. This shows that he only thinks highly of himself, and lowly of others, which in the end, is his greatest weakness.
In the story of Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo is the ideal man in his mind. He thinks he is perfect, by being strong and determined, and not showing traits of feminism. Although these traits show Okonkwo’s manliness, these traits also show how weak he really is. We see multiple examples throughout the story that elaborate on his manly achievements. Secondly, because of these achievements, he has very extreme goals for himself; he set the bar so high when he was so low. Finally, Okonkwo is always comparing his strength and manliness to other’s weakness and feminism. In the end of it all, we see that Okonkwo is a strong leader, and in the end of the story, he decides to attack the white men, and nobody follows him. Since he is still determined, he follows his plan anyway, and the story ends with Okonkwo taking his own life. This is significant, because throughout the story, we think of Okonkwo as a very strong man, but in the end, he shows the most amount of weakness.
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