Summer 2001 |
Notes on Things Fall Apart |
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[additional commentaries on Things
Fall Apart] Mike Rios Eng 7757 Dr. R. Nordquist Notes on Things Fall Apart What "things" fall apart in the novel? Kinship and connections (integral parts of Ibo culture) seem to fall apart; Uchendu tells Okwondo about the past "when a man had friends in distant clans. Your generation does not know that. You stay at home, afraid of your next-door neighbor. Even a man’s motherland is strange to him nowadays" (p. 137). And Okwondo is told later by an elder, "I fear for you young people because you do not understand how strong is the bond of kinship. You do not know what it is to speak with one voice" (167). But are these statements true? Do we see any evidence of fragmentation and disconnectedness (before colonization) in the Ibo people? If so, is it enough to justify the claims against the younger generation? Do we not see a culture in which people come together frequently? Do we not see the Ibo gathering for wrestling matches? Weddings? Feasts and festivals? Do we not see the Ibo gathering to listen to the elders dispense justice? Do we not see (or maybe hear) people communicating so effectively with one another that when the crier gives a message for every man in Umuofia to gather at the market place, every man shows up? What we see is a community, whole, functioning, and intact. Ironically, the very individual that is singled out by older men as having a sense of tradition and connectedness with his community is Okwondo, a man who constantly clashes with the culture he so dearly loves. How? He beats Ojiugo in the middle of the Week of Peace (29). Despite the possibility that his action may "ruin the whole clan," he continues beating his wife (30). He kills Ikemefuna, despite the respected Ogbuefi Ezeudu’s warning that Okwondo not have a hand in the boy’s execution. He commits suicide, despite his culture’s admonition against this act. But Okwondo’s clashes are not simple instances of difference of opinions, are they? His actions’ roots lie deep within his past, present, and future. Huh? Let’s consider Okwondo’s anger. But before we do, let’s ask ourselves, "Why is Okwondo so angry?" His father certainly did not help. The narrator tells us that when Okwondo’s father, Unoka, died "he had taken no title at all and he was heavily in debt" (8). Okwondo is ashamed of his father, and thinks him a failure. Coupled with this shame is fear, a fear that dominates Okwondo’s whole life, "the fear of failure and of weakness" (13). It is "the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father (13). But the Ibo judge each man according to each individual’s worth not his father’s. Yet Okwondo still lives with this fear. And so, as the narrator tells us, "Okwondo [is] ruled by one passion—to hate everything his father Unoka had loved," including gentleness and idleness (13). Is this why he is so concerned with not being feminine? Why he works so hard? Why he strives to earn a title? Why he has become the warrior he has? Why he does not want his sons acting womanly? Okwondo then is fueled by the past (the memory of father), the present (attaining respect), and the future (avoiding failure). A curious thing about Okwondo as a character: He can easily be labeled a Western hero. Consider the following statements: "Okwondo was not a man of thought but of action" (69). Okwondo thinks "no matter how prosperous a man [is], if he [is] unable to rule his women and his children (especially his women) he [is] not really a man" (53). "Okwondo never showed any emotion openly, unless it be the emotion of anger. To show affection was a sign of weakness; the only thing worth demonstrating was strength" (28). Of course, Okwondo is much more complex. He does show emotion, despite himself (when Ezinma is sick). He does think. Time after time we see him think and analyze situations. He may not come to the correct conclusions all the time, but he does consider an awful lot. So, is Achebe challenging two stereotypes at once? Is he challenging the Western notion of maleness by portraying an African as a brave, strong, warrior, leader? Is he challenging the Western notion of Africans by portraying an African as a sympathetic, realistic, thinking individual? Is Okwondo a tragic figure? Is his anger his flaw? Does he bring about his own downfall? Does he commit suicide out of fear? Out of shame? Or does he commit suicide in order to prevent the British from having the pleasure of killing him themselves? We do accept that the Commissioner would have ordered Okwondo’s execution, right? Okwondo was going to be killed, either by his hands or by white hands. Was it then, a matter of pride, although suicide was against the Ibo’s customs? Do the British not contribute to his death, anyway? Does no blame fall on the white man who not only brought a religion but also a government (155)? The white man who "put a knife on the things that held [the Ibo] together" 176)? And what about the Ibo themselves? Did they not contribute to Okwondo’s downfall, and their own, by proving as stubborn and set in their ways as him? They could have fought. They could have driven the whites out. Or could they? Would more whites not come? Would the Ibo have been eventually overtaken and colonized anyway? It is obvious that Achebe sympathizes with the Ibo, but he also sympathizes with Okwondo. The two are both the same and different, for Okwondo and his people seem divided in how to deal with the attack on their culture and their lives. And Achebe cannot want his reader to solely see the British as responsible. Can he? Let’s return to the title of the novel. Achebe named his work Things Fall Apart not Things are Separated. So there has to be a level of fate or inherent flaw involved. But in what? What is it that will not allow the center to hold? Or is it a combination of both extrinsic and intrinsic forces that are at work here? Obierika does say that the white man "has put a knife on the things that held [the Ibo] together and [the Ibo] have fallen apart" (176). So does it take both the force of white violence (from ideological to physical) and a … what? … naiveté? … faith? … ignorance? … fear? … disunion? … on the part of the Ibo to have their culture come crumbling down? Is the novel about colonialism? Partly. What about the Ibo culture? Is this the main focus of the novel? One of Achebe’s goals was to demonstrate "that African people did not hear of culture for the first time from Europeans." We do certainly get a taste of Ibo culture by reading this novel. The traditions, customs, religious beliefs, laws, stories, and even language are demonstrated effectively. All in the space of two hundred pages. Is the novel’s sparse simple style a representation of some of its themes? Is it part of Achebe’s challenge to depictions of Africans and their history as simple and not worth much study? The novel’s style may seem simple but it deals with complex issues and proves quite complex itself. The novel has a mythic quality about it. Yet it is very realistic. Is this a challenge to the myth of Africa? Is Achebe trying to replace myth with reality on the former’s terms, thereby challenging every one of its aspects? Consider Achebe’s use of metaphors and similes throughout the novel. For example: "… something seemed to give way inside him, like the snapping of a tightened bow." "A vague chill descended on him and his head seemed to swell, like a solitary walker at night who passes an evil spirit on the way." Do they contribute to the sense of culture that drives the narrative by somehow forcing the reader to look at things through the Ibo’s or even Africans’ eyes? Or do they somehow prevent the reader from identifying with the Ibo by using imagery he or she is unaccustomed to? Why is this novel
considered postcolonial? Because it deals with a culture that was colonized and
oppressed by imperialism? Because it depicts the effects of colonialism? What about the
fact that most of the novel depicts that culture before colonialism? Is the novel
countering the effects of colonialism through its demonstration of what colonialism
destroyed or tried to destroy? Is it showing the truth that has been suppressed by
colonialism? |
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